Warning! SPOILERS for Obi-Wan Kenobi episode 3.
Obi-Wan Kenobi and Luke Skywalker hiding from the Galactic Empire on Tatooine seems like a massive blunder on the Jedi Master's part, but the canon Obi-Wan Kenobi series and a Legends-era novel prove why it makes sense. Tatooine is Anakin Skywalker’s home planet, so it seems rather foolish for Obi-Wan and Luke to hide there, but canon and Legends sources reveal that Kenobi had good reason to choose the otherwise obscure Outer Rim world. Kenobi is unaware of his corrupted former apprentice’s survival when choosing Tatooine as his hiding spot.
The 2005 novel Dark Lord: The Rise of Darth Vader explains why, in the Star Wars Legends continuity—which became an alternate timeline in 2014—Kenobi's selection of Tatooine isn’t such a poor location for him and Luke when lying low from the Empire. Obi-Wan Kenobi, understandably, assumes that Darth Vader died on Mustafar after being dismembered and immolated on the volcanic world, but he discovers the Sith Lord’s survival via a Holonet News report less than a year after Vader’s supposed death. Having already seen Darth Vader’s now-cybernetic body in the broadcast, Obi-Wan showed no surprise when confronting the Sith Lord aboard the Death Star in A New Hope.
Obi-Wan is in a similar situation in canon, as shown in the Obi-Wan Kenobi episodes “Part II” and “Part III,” where he’s told of his fallen apprentice’s survival in the former and confronts him directly in the latter. Obi-Wan learns of Darth Vader’s survival much later in canon when compared to Legends, but the effect is the same, as is the retroactive explanation for why Obi-Wan chose Vader’s home as his and Luke’s hiding spot. Moreover, both iterations show that by the time Kenobi discovers that Darth Vader is alive, it’s too late to take Luke to a different world, as he’s already become part of the Lars family.
When deciding where the children of Anakin Skywalker and Padmé Amidala would live, Obi-Wan, Yoda, and Bail Organa chose to have Leia live on Alderaan as an Organa while Luke would live with Anakin’s relatives on Tatooine. With both continuities establishing that Kenobi believed Darth Vader to be dead, choosing Tatooine as Luke’s home world seems like a harmless choice. Tatooine is an obscure world of little importance to galactic affairs writ large, and although it’s a hazardous world, Luke was well-protected by his Aunt, Uncle, and Obi-Wan Kenobi himself.
By the time Obi-Wan learns of Vader’s survival, it’s too late to take Luke from Owen and Beru, especially in the canon timeline, where he’s a young child and has grown to see them as his parents. The Legends-era novel provides an additional explanation, in which Qui-Gon Jinn’s Force ghost explains to Obi-Wan that Darth Vader won’t return to his home world due to his many traumatic memories of the planet. The Obi-Wan Kenobi series, like Legends, makes what seems like a catastrophic error in judgment an understandable choice for one of Star Wars' most iconic Jedi Masters.
New episodes of Obi-Wan Kenobi release Wednesdays on Disney+.
