One more post about The Acolyte, because I’m still thinking of the show, honestly it shouldn’t have been an 8 episode show. I gave my thoughts about this after the show ended, but it should’ve been a 6 episode show. I’d keep episodes 1 and 2 the same, but then I’d push back the flashback another episode. Then I’d have episode 3 be a combined version of Day and Night with the first half cut down a bit. That way the story momentum continues a little longer and ends on most of the main cast dead and Osha and Mae switching places. Then you combine the 2 flashback episodes into one focusing more on the Jedi side of the story, with key scenes from Osha’s side of the story to show that the coven really do care for the girls. That way episode 6 becomes the new episode 5, and when we start it we know what’s going on and that allows the momentum to continue from episode 5 into the final episode.
Structurally the season is a complete mess. After a solid first 2 episodes that set the stage decently well, we go into a flashback that doesn’t really reveal what happened. That completely took the wind out of the shows sails and killed the momentum of the story so that now the story has to build up again and right where it starts getting good, the episode ends making everyone wait a week for the best episode of the show. Then after Night airs the story slows down a bit and we have to build momentum again, and right as the momentum is building we get the second flashback episode, but because the show dragged out the reveal of what happened for far too long the answer ends up feeling really unsatisfying and also kills the momentum of the story again right as it’s gearing up for the climax.
Now with the new 6 episode structure, it allows the pacing to build more naturally and the flashbacks don’t kill the momentum of the story as much. The show naturally builds from episodes 1-3 where almost everyone dies and we get a big change in the focus of the story, and then we go into the flashback episode which now doesn’t kill the momentum as much. Then episodes 5 and 6 build nicely into each other and the climax is able to build up to its conclusion better. Now this wouldn’t fix all of the problems with the show, the reveal still would’ve been disappointing to a lot of people for one thing, and there are still issues with the script and acting, but it might’ve done a bit better for viewership.
With editing the show from 8 episodes down to 6 and restructuring the entire story to keep plot momentum building it might’ve stayed on the charts longer. Episodes 1-3 all charted, really low but still they were on there, but then it dropped from the charts until the finale partially because episode 3 was very widely disliked. But now with Day/Night as episode 3 there would’ve been a much higher chance it would’ve stayed on the charts longer because now episode 3 is both a long enough episode for streaming, but also ends on a real high note, rather than that high note being episode 5 after it lost a large chunk of the audience. This way audiences likely would’ve stuck around for episode 4, and maybe they still drop it after the flashback episode, but as we saw it came back onto the charts for its final episode and that would’ve likely made it look better to Disney. A 6 episode show where the first 4 episodes chart, the 5th episode drops off, but then audiences come back for the final episode, looks way better than an 8 episode show where only the first 3 episodes chart, episodes 4-7 are off the charts, and then people come back for episode 8 before interest dies again. That being said personally I still don’t think the show would’ve done that well even with these structural changes but it’s interesting, for me at least, to think about