TBH: The Acolyte

A Galaxy Far, Far Away with Problems Near, Near to Us

Angry Angry Hippos

Did you ever play the game Hungry Hungry Hippos? The premise of the game was that up to 4 players would slam their sweaty palms on the rumps of plastic hippos and devour as many of these little plastic marbles as possible. It was a pretty simple game concept.

So why does my heading say “Angry, Angry Hippos”?

This is what the social media landscape has turned into around coverage of Disney’s latest Star Wars show, The Acolyte. A bunch of angry people mashing buttons and trying to gobble up any attention they can get by being overly negative. So let’s talk about Star Wars - The Acolyte.

The Acolyte is set at the end of the Star Wars franchise's High Republic era, approximately 100 years before Star Wars: Episode I—The Phantom Menace (1999).

If you don’t understand the lore behind this specific show, it’s not really important to what I’m going to talk about. I also purposefully left out the rest of the synopsis from Google because it has mild spoilers, and I would prefer you watch the show—something I don’t think a lot of the show's complainers have actually done.

This show was doomed¹ from the start because it was cast as a woke Disney product in the vein of the sequel trilogy. Thus, it was review-bombed before it even got out of the gate. Every Facebook post the Star Wars page made was plastered with 😆 reactions, and any comment made in favor of the show (including my own) was littered with laugh reactions from “fans” lurking on every Acolyte post they could find.

The litany of hyperbolic issues with the show was shallow at best and bigoted at worst. They charged the show as woke. God forbid that the leads were not straight white men, I guess? If they weren’t decrying the diversity of the show, they were saying, ‘The writing is just bad.’ When pushed, most just didn’t like the story decisions. That is normally what detractors mean when they say writing is horrible: they just don’t like the decisions the creators made.

Now, there are plenty of people who have qualms with the show for legitimate reasons. But I would daresay they aren’t living online and complaining ad nauseum. They’ve addressed their concerns in a mature fashion and had healthy discourse and dialogue about the issues with the show. I’m not talking about people making genuine critiques.

What I’m addressing is a bunch of negativity being raked like muck by a cottage mill of YouTubers who grift around hating the Disney version of Star Wars.

These are just a few thumbnails from 1 search of Acolyte on YouTube

To Be Honest (TBH) about the Acolyte

The Acolyte was not a perfect season of Star Wars television, but it also wasn’t the dumpster fire that social media trolls would have you believe.

PROS

• The choreography and lightsaber combat is fantastic.

• Standout performance by Lee Jung-jae as Master Sol.

• Two surprise cameos that have me excited for a season 2.

• Manny Jacinto as The Stranger. 👀 (image below)

• The introduction of the Stranger in Episode 4, combined with Episode 5 of the show. 👌

• The concept of the twins and the interesting ties that could connect to the prequel trilogy.

THIS SHOT.

CONS

• Pacing combined with episode length creates disjointed episode feelings.

  • The shortness of early episodes could have been lengthened to give us more backstory and character development of the Jedi involved in Episodes 4 and 5.

• The ending of episode 6 should have had a piece of the finale tacked onto it.

• Stiff performance by Rebecca Henderson as Master Vernestra.²

• An episode count of 8, with 2 of the episodes being flashbacks, created issues with pacing and re-treading the plot.³

Overall: B-

I would give the show a B-. It wasn’t average or had grievous⁴ issues. It had obstacles that kept it from being great Star Wars television, but it also had a lot to offer and enjoy.

As in ALL cases, watch things for yourself, and don’t let social media commenters or YouTubers supply you with your opinions. That includes me. 😜 Happy Jedi-hunting.

1. This is the title of the final episode of the season of the show.

2. This character is apparently in the books, so the nerds can correct me if this is just accurate to that character.

3. This dynamic makes me feel like this was originally written as a film that would have revisited the original situation on Brendok with an unreliable narrator dynamic.

4. snickers.