The Acolyte (2024) TV
6 min read
The latest show from the House Of Mouse is fine (at best) but lots of people simply dont like it…
Theres a wide divide There are many reasons for it. We’ll get there momentarily. But first have a look at the rotten tommato score for this and its not good.
A Long Time Ago In A Galaxy Far, Far Away . . .
So whats the premise for this latest whack at the intellectual property that is Star Wars that Disney simply cant help themselves from putting out there… 100 years before the rise of the Empire. The Acolyte takes place in the High Republic’s final days, just before the long era of peace and prosperity came crashing down into turmoil and strife—at least partly thanks to the arrogance of the Jedi Order itself. Partly, too, thanks to a mysterious new villain who (we can only hope) turns out to be Darth Plagueis.
Its not too bad a premise if you think about it, they have slogged to death the Skywalker era of the world, this time rather than that they are looking at the history of the Jedi order from the view of its members, more in line with the Games and Books rather than the films. The story is still in canon as they say being in the years of the Jedi and not anything new but it is simply another slow burn.
Unfortunately, The Acolyte retains many of the franchise’s worst habits and does next to nothing with the new setting that makes it actually feel new. This could be set two years before the prequel trilogy and nobody would be the wiser.
Disney and the show’s creators have billed this series as a “darker” delve into Star Wars. Critics have echoed this sentiment, calling it a show that makes “bold choices.” and some say that The Acolyte is “An experimental, galvanizing standalone story that establishes a new caliber of what Star Wars TV can do.” Galvanizing! New caliber!
Well sorry but we have to be watching something different to them because this thing simply sucks!.
Elsewhere we get such quotes as:
- “’The Acolyte’ presents in its first few episodes, a dashing adventure of mystery, action, impressive fight sequences and a cat and mouse game that keeps you intrigued from one episode to the next.”
- “Showrunner Leslye Headland, best known as the co-creator of the Netflix series Russian Doll, breathes new life into the Star Wars universe with The Acolyte.”
- “[Leslye] Headland has created one of the best Star Wars series to date making it a character driven revenge story over one relying on copious action scenes, light sabers battles or legacy characters to drive the series.”
But sorry, these people simply don’t have a clue what good entertainment is, are they watching a different cut or story line we are not privy to? Some reviewers say that the fight scenes are “impressive fight sequences” and other say the story is “never seen before”. Sorry but to get to this level of acting and fighting, go to a con, most cos-players would do a better job than these wooden actors are doing.
Nothing here, beyond the era, is actually all that new. And very little about it is particularly compelling or well-written. It is, however, very, very diverse and I suspect that this focus on diversity drives a great deal of both the positive reception and the bad review. When you commit so utterly to making a social cause the thing that defines your show, you effectively guarantee that it becomes just another shouting match in the never-ending culture wars.
Many positive critic reviews are . . . less crazy, however. They’re marked Fresh on Rotten Tomatoes, but they include phrases such as:
- “[The Acolyte] doesn’t really offer anything new to the universe in the way that Andor did, and ultimately feels a bit forced”
- Its not amazing but its not terrible
- “This is not the worst we’ve seen from Star Wars TV no is it the best”
Acolyte’s bad reception from viewers
Audience scores reflect another extreme. At 39% (as of this writing) the show is decidedly rotten. Is that an accurate representation of actual audience opinions? Are people just mad because The Acolyte is so diverse? Maybe not 39% but far, far from 93%.
Whatever you might think on this front, most of the complaints seen focus on the stilted dialogue, predictable plotting and so forth. Mostly, longtime Star Wars fans just continue to feel generally deflated by the overall crapness and lack of anything from Disney that could be called new or inventive . A sampling:
- “The show was watchable, which was an improvement over Obi-Wan and the listless Ahsoka but there is no sign of genuine creative ambition in this show and it suffers from the same sense of weightlessness and lack of dramatic sense as Ahsoka. The characters don’t grab my interest and I haven’t spent two seconds thinking about the plot during or after watching.”
- “Ugh. This is as bad as you’ve heard. Visually, it looks…OK, I guess? The fights are fine but being massively overrated by Disney-friendly media. The rest is a garbage fire. Terrible acting, weird pacing, bargain basement writing, and pointless changes to Star Wars mythology. It just “feels” wrong throughout, even compared to other Disney Star Wars”
- “Having thus far watched the first 2 episodes the show is just very….eh. Like a lot of folks are saying the score is fantastic & it’s probably the highlight. But good sound can’t carry a show. Thus far the characters are all a bit bland – I’m hopeful of further character development in the next episode.”
The main problems with this show so far though can be summed up in just a few sentences –
Its slow, each episode seems to be drawn out, in the real world you could do these in 20 minutes, why they though we want all these long shots, the back story, the bad acting and the Jedi we wont ever know.
The Fight sequences, would you believe the Jedi can be beaten so easily, Skywalker era would have you think that if not winners that the Jedi could hold their own indefinitely due to the force, this old set though… nope their done quick.
The actors, not many known names, to us anyway, the acting here looks like something that they are doing as part of a theater company lesson at best, at worst you want to slap them to shut up. They would be better off on a day soap opera than with Disney, how did they get cast.
The waste of a big name, carrie-anne is gone in the first 5 minutes, did she only have time between gigs to come do the start or was she just paid allot to be there. And her scene simply is so poor she would be better off having left this one alone, though, as with others, she can now do more than matrix cons and never technically need to work again now.
So in summary, this is another attempt to milk the franchise that simply doesn’t work, its slow, its boring its badly acted and the script is more like it was written in haste in the strike. If your a fan then you will watch if your not then you will miss.
3/5
The idea could have been done so much better if time and a bit more talent was put to this.
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