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Until recently, the Wikipedia article for Peter Parker's Uncle Ben said this at the top:

For the Star Wars character that Luke Skywalker called Uncle Ben, see Obi-Wan Kenobi

As far as I can remember, Luke never refers to Obi-Wan as "Uncle Ben" in any of the films, or any of the EU works I've encountered, merely "Ben" or "Old Ben."

Has Luke Skywalker ever referred to Obi-Wan Kenobi as "Uncle Ben" in any official Star Wars work?

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  • 18
    Perhaps in a translation. Or, maybe it's about the rice.
    – Elliott Frisch
    Jun 24, 2016 at 1:03
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    Think he called him "Old Ben" at one point. Might have been thinking of that.
    – DCShannon
    Jun 24, 2016 at 1:33
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    Someone mixed that up with the Uncle Ben's commercial :)
    – Boldewyn
    Jun 24, 2016 at 7:12
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    I think, originally, undercover Yoda feeds them instant rice with the gruel, but that got pulled when the endorsement deal fell through. Yes, I am kidding.
    – PoloHoleSet
    Jun 24, 2016 at 14:20
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    @ToddWilcox - Sorted.
    – Valorum
    Jun 24, 2016 at 15:51

5 Answers 5

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The nice thing about e-Books: searches. The phrase "Uncle Ben" does not appear in the Star Wars novelization. There are 55 instances of "uncle" and all of them refer to Uncle Owen.

Thanks to Valorum, we know the phrase "Uncle Ben" doesn't appear in any of the 17 official novelisations, nor in any of the new "Journey to the Force Awakens" novels, nor anywhere in the 256 books that make up the EU. And that the word "Uncle" that appears over 50 times (in all 17 novelisations) usually to refers to Owen. It appears more than 1800 times in the EU novels (Mostly to refer to Uncle Luke, Uncle Owen or Uncle Hoole)

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    You still almost made me pull out the SW movies and pull an all-nighter with this answer..
    – phyrfox
    Jun 24, 2016 at 7:12
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    You may want to note that the phrase "Uncle Ben" doesn't appear in any of the 17 official novelisations, nor in any of the new "Journey to the Force Awakens" novels, nor anywhere in the 256 books that make up the EU.
    – Valorum
    Jun 24, 2016 at 7:37
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    Re: The word "Uncle", that word appears over 50 times (in all 17 novelisations) usually to refer to Owen. It appears more than 1800 times in the EU novels (Mostly to refer to Uncle Luke, Uncle Owen or Uncle Hoole).
    – Valorum
    Jun 24, 2016 at 7:40
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    @phyrfox- The sacrifices we make for the truth.
    – PointlessSpike
    Jun 24, 2016 at 13:37
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    Also helpful youtu.be/5GFW-eEWXlc?t=38m12s
    – User1000547
    Jun 24, 2016 at 21:32
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In the third draft of the script for Return of the Jedi, Obi-Wan Kenobi and Owen Lars were revealed to be brothers. This would have made Obi-Wan Luke's uncle (since it had already been established that his father was Vader), but it was cut from the movie. This idea found its way into the book Jedi Apprentice: The Hidden Past. More importantly, it also appears in the novelization of Return of the Jedi. Thus, it doesn't matter whether Luke said it or not - Obi-Wan was Luke's uncle... from a certain point of view.

It is possible that this fact has been misinterpreted as Luke actually calling Obi-Wan his uncle. It isn't entirely out of the question that Luke actually did call him "Uncle Ben" in some sources.

Ben continued his narrative . “When your father left, he didn’t know your mother was pregnant. Your mother and I knew he would find out eventually, but we wanted to keep you both as safe as possible, for as long as possible. So I took you to live with my brother Owen, on Tatooine... and your mother took Leia to live as the daughter of Senator Organa, on Alderaan.”
- Return of the Jedi: Star Wars: Episode VI (p. 66).

There you have it: "Ben" reveals himself to be Luke's uncle.

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    " from a certain point of view." +1. Related: scifi.stackexchange.com/questions/112540/…
    – Peter
    Jun 24, 2016 at 15:57
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    Although, even in this account, it's not a blood relation. "Uncle" Owen is actually the son of Anakin's step-father by a woman other than his mother. Uncles frequently aren't blood relatives because we don't distinguish them from uncles-in-law, although in this case it's more like step-uncle.
    – user11521
    Jun 24, 2016 at 16:04
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    @Michael - I choose to ignore the PT, so for me, if Obi-Wan was Owen's brother, he'd be Luke's uncle.
    – Wad Cheber
    Jun 24, 2016 at 16:10
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    I don't think anywhere in M-canon it is established that either of the Larses are actually related to either of Luke's parents. So this answer could benefit from the addition of where we learn that the Larses are actually Luke's biological Aunt and Uncle instead of just a kindly couple that took him in whom he calls Aunt and Uncle. Because if it's the latter, then Owen and Ben being brothers still wouldn't make Ben Luke's uncle.
    – Todd Wilcox
    Jun 24, 2016 at 17:21
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    Anakin and Owen are step brothers through Shmi and Cliegg's marriage, so Owen is Luke's true uncle (just not in blood). If Obi-Wan and Owen are (blood? step? half?) brothers by this reveil, then Anakin and Obi-Wan are also (step? in-law?) brothers, and Obi-Wan would have had to realize that during Anakin's apprenticeship (knowing Anakin's parentage) before they fought in ROTS. Messed up!
    – Remy Lebeau
    Jun 25, 2016 at 2:17
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I believe, that in the German translation, Luke refers to him as “Onkel Ben“, which is the German word for uncle. Unfortunately I don't have any sources at the moment, but i will look for some when i get home.

So if someone watched the German version and happened to edit the article, it would explain this.

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    For a second "Onkel Ben" also rung a bell to me - but when I watched Star Wars for the first time, I was young and probably simply didn't hear the difference between "Owen" (a name you usually didn't hear in German) and "Ben". Maybe the author of that claim also misheard it....
    – Zommuter
    Jun 24, 2016 at 7:40
  • if thats true, thats another reason, why in germany you you should STOP translating the voices on every damn series and movies....
    – Sir. Hedgehog
    Jun 24, 2016 at 8:44
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    Its's been some time since i've last seen the movies. So i guess i must've confused it with something else. Sorry
    – YanBear
    Jun 24, 2016 at 12:25
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    @hedgehog: What's the difference between dubbed voices erroneously saying Onkel Ben and subtitles erroneously saying Onkel Ben?
    – O. R. Mapper
    Jun 25, 2016 at 9:02
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    @hedgehog: When there are subtitles, I cannot make myself listen because reading the subtitles is just so much faster. That's why I prefer watching the original version without subtitles if I understand the original language. Still, my experience is that when people who are not fluent in a language watch a film with subtitles, the film's audio track is completely ignored (e.g. drowned in chatter), thus probably negating any learning effect. In any case, voices sound oddly "wrong" because the distinctive voices from the dubbed version are missing when you were used to the dubbed version.
    – O. R. Mapper
    Jun 27, 2016 at 10:55
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He does refer to him as "Old Ben", but never as "Uncle Ben". You can verify this by searching for "Uncle Ben" in the film's script, available at:

http://www.imsdb.com/scripts/Star-Wars-A-New-Hope.html

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  • Try to avoid link only answers. Take the relevant text and source it your answer. This helps if a link ever goes dead.
    – Skooba
    Jun 24, 2016 at 13:42
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    @Skooba what part of the movie's script would be relevant to prove that a particular sentence is never uttered? I know why link only answers are bad, but nios can hardly copy the entire script into their answer!
    – terdon
    Jun 24, 2016 at 14:09
  • @terdon it came up on the First Posts review... just trying offer advice for this and future posts. I see your point in context now, but considering how short the answer is, it still needs a bit more effort to turn it into a good answer.
    – Skooba
    Jun 24, 2016 at 14:11
  • @Skooba no argument there. I did what I could, for what it's worth.
    – terdon
    Jun 24, 2016 at 14:25
  • Citing doesn't make sense, but one worthwhile expansion of this answer would be to verify that every place in the script the word "uncle" is used, it doesn't refer to Obi-Wan. The absence of the phrase "uncle Ben" is very important, and directly relates to the question, but if it's possible that at some point Obi-Wan is referred to as "uncle", then that would be good to know or disprove. Also, it would help to look at all the scripts for at least episodes V - VII.
    – Todd Wilcox
    Jun 24, 2016 at 14:46
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NO!

There is no reference in any book, in any script, in any novelisation of Luke Skywalker ever reffering to Obi-Wan as "Uncle Ben".

You always have to remember that Wikipedia is an open free library anyone can alter the information whether its correct or not. Dont always count on the information you find there.

Propably someone with no knowledge of Star-Wars added that information there, because as others can verify as well the only "uncle" that exists in the SW Universe is "Uncle Owen".

I just fixed the referenced Wikipedia's article by the way.

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    Maybe someone was trying Citogenesis
    – Zommuter
    Jun 24, 2016 at 7:25
  • @Zommuter nahhhh more like someone mistaken the "Uncle Owen" & "Old Ben-Kenobi" names....
    – Sir. Hedgehog
    Jun 24, 2016 at 7:29
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    The question was not about if Wikipedia was correct, it asking about the SW canon.
    – Skooba
    Jun 24, 2016 at 13:23
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    This doesn't really seem to answer the question asked, other that peripherally focusing on the question of why wikipedia might be wrong.
    – Valorum
    Jun 24, 2016 at 15:15
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    @hedgehog - As I said. Your answer does answer the main question but seems to treat it as an afterthought to dealing with the wikipedia article. You've also failed to supply any evidence to back up your contention
    – Valorum
    Jun 24, 2016 at 16:18

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