Acbagel

There were some more “watch minutes and engagement” streaming numbers for the Acolyte that came out this week from ReelGood, but that is a different company than the last drop of data, and one set says this is the second most watched Star Wars show behind Kenobi, and the other says it has far less viewers than Ahsoka… Third-party streaming data collection is not very reliable right now, so I’ll wait until the Nielson ratings come out before commenting further on the “performance”. Instead, I want to preface the review with a comment on Leslye Headland’s recent interview on The Mary Sue podcast.

In the interview, Leslye discusses how she wanted The Acolyte to explain why the Jedi are hesitant to train Anakin as an older child to give new context to the Prequels, “Is that why when Anakin shows up they’re like, ‘he’s too old to train,’ like, ‘we’ve learned that this doesn’t work.’ Those were the things that I was interested in.” She also briefly discusses the Ki-Adi Mundi “drama” and how she got approval from Pablo Hidalgo to change his previous Legends age to give new context to his line in The Phantom Menace. They’ve also done the same thing with Vernestra in this show, making her somehow still alive from the other High Republic books, extending her lifespan hundreds of years… All that to say, in recent years, Disney’s approach to expanding the Star Wars universe has frequently involved recontextualizing and providing new explanations for key aspects of the original Skywalker saga and other parts of their new Canon. The Ahsoka novel getting retconned for the Tales of the Jedi episode comes to mind. As does the Kenobi show rehashing the moment in Rebels with Ahsoka and Vader. Repeating plotlines and constantly trying to reference other moments has certainly become a prominent trend. While this tactic might seem like a way to add “depth” to other beloved narratives, it often results in unnecessary and shallow revisions that stifle the creative potential of these new stories. By revisiting and altering the context of pivotal moments from the original films and other works, Disney is at constant risk of diminishing their impact and alienating long-time fans who hold these moments on a near-reverent platform.

This type of “retconning” (sometimes only retconning Legends, but I’m also referring to the explaining of some new context for current canon), while intended to offer clarity, often feels forced and detracts from the originality of the current show/movie’s storytelling. From a big-picture view of Disney’s direction of Lucasfilm, this trend suggests a lack of confidence in creating fresh, compelling content that can captivate audiences without relying on the crutch of the Skywalker saga’s canon lore. As they’ve decided to bring in a ton of different directors and writers who seem to have a personal story they want to tell but need a way to cram it into the Star Wars universe, you lose the passion of wanting to purely tell a Star Wars story for Star Wars sake. It seems as though every new director wants to put their stamp on the universe by “adding” something, rather than personally taking a backseat and letting a story develop on its own.

Moreover, this trend of recontextualization can inadvertently undermine the narrative weight of what George first intended. Key moments and lines that once carried significant emotional and thematic heft that were very intentionally framed by Lucas are somewhat diluted by these added layers of explanation. How do you find a writer who is so passionate about Star Wars itself that they have a 3-6 movie/season vision for a story? Is that even possible in a post-Lucas era? This feeling of a one-off “demo” where a 6-8 episode season is released and then “We’ll wait and see if people want a Season 2” is a terrible storytelling model for the epic saga that is Star Wars, especially when there are such tight production timelines. We either need visionaries or we need adaptations of previous visionaries (Zahn’s novels, for example. Or Veitch’s Tales of the Jedi comics. Traviss’ Republic Commando series even, and as controversial as her vision of Mandalorians/Jedi may be, she had a long-term vision for her story). Is that Favreau and Filoni planning everything? A new leader? I don’t know, but it still feels like the problem with the Sequel Trilogy is occurring. Too many cooks in the kitchen each trying to interject their own take on the dish rather than a head chef bringing together a complimentary menu.

The Acolyte - Episode 6

Pacing and Structure

Not considering the intro and credits, we are up to 31 minutes and 9 seconds on the runtime this week. Still feels very short. While some parts, particularly the interactions between Qimir and Osha, are well-crafted and engaging as they slowly develop, the overall pacing often feels inconsistent. There are moments where the narrative drags, interspersed with rushed segments that fail to provide sufficient depth or context. The episode seems to oscillate between compelling character-driven scenes and seemingly superfluous content. The back-and-forth pacing of various plots detracts from the main storyline, which really needed to move forward this episode. The attempt to balance multiple plotlines, including Sol’s mysterious guilt, Qimir’s manipulative tactics, and the Jedi investigation, all left me feeling disoriented, especially about the timeline of the sequence of events that were going on. I am craving more cohesive primary storytelling rather than the quick bouncing around to slow or overly expository scenes. I will say it again, I LOVE slow, lengthy stories. But this show doesn’t have the length. It only has the slow…

Moreover, the pacing issues are exacerbated by the episode’s tendency to introduce new elements (Osha’s untapped “powers”. “The power of two” possibly hinting at a Dyad? Qimir’s scar. His reasoning for being a Sith) and characters (Vernestra’s apprentice), without adequate setup or follow-through. This all results in a sense of narrative clutter, where significant moments and character developments are lost in the noise of extraneous details. By streamlining the plot and honing in on the core storylines, the show could achieve a more engaging pace. Streamlining does not mean shortening the runtime. It can actually be done with more time on each episode because you can write larger stories, but take your time in getting from plot point to plot point.

The structure is hindered by an overreliance on mystery without delivering timely resolutions or adequate clues to keep me invested. This has been a recurring problem throughout the entirety of the series, and this issue is exemplified in Sol’s character arc. His guilt and past actions have been repeatedly hinted at for 6 episodes now, but they still aren’t addressed. We have had at least 4 conversations that I can remember where Sol tells Osha/Mae that he will tell them the full story and explain everything, but is either immediately interrupted or says he will explain when “the time is right”. Over and over and over he has promised that this story will clear everything up, but when 75% of the story has gone by and we still don’t have a clue what he is talking about, the constant teasing is not enjoyable. I suspect next week is another Flashback episode where we will actually get an answer, but the approach of saying a lot without saying anything continues to create frustrating problems with the structure of the season. It feels like the narrative is artificially prolonged to fill the episode count rather than naturally progressing toward a satisfying conclusion. Additionally, the balance of the A/B/C plots in this episode was once again a mess of transitions, often cutting away as soon as a moment started to become interesting. I think to the directing of something like Breaking Bad where you can watch a very slow scene play out for 15+ minutes straight with no cutaways at all, and it’s entirely engrossing and hypnotizing… You can do slow scenes in incredible ways, but the constant cutting around to different characters with no measure of time has not been an enjoyable experience. Again, since Week 1 it has felt like a ~3-hour movie plot that needed trimmed down to 2.5 hours but instead has been stretched to death for a subscription model. Akin to Mandalorian Season 3, we have two episodes left to wrap up a major storyline in a satisfying manner, and the task looks almost impossible.

Dialogue and Writing Quality

The dialogue in this episode was split between some big highs and lows. On the positive side, the exchanges between Qimir and Osha actually exhibited a nuanced understanding of Dark Side seduction tactics, drawing parallels to Palpatine’s manipulation of Anakin and other falls throughout Jedi history. These scenes were well-written, showcasing a methodical approach to turning someone to the Dark Side by exploiting their doubts and internal conflicts. However, these moments are contrasted by other lines where the dialogue falters. The dialogue has always felt like it’s saying something “deep” but it never communicates concrete or coherent points. The lines still feel like when you would set the spacing just a little extra on your papers in college while using as flowery of language as possible to meet a length requirement. Saying a whole lot, but it’s all actually a whole lot of nothing. It suffers from a lack of clarity, with characters acting in ways that seem driven more by “mysteries” in the plot rather than genuine motivations. It seemed like Sol didn’t realize that Mae was tricking him because that’s what the plot “needed” to happen rather than a natural outpouring of Sol into this scene. The same can be said about what he tried to say over comms. It feels like he should be screaming, “SITH! SITH! We were just attacked by a force user wielding the dark side and a red lightsaber and everyone is dead,” but for plot’s sake… he sends a moronic and unclear message and then leaves the system.

In terms of writing quality, this felt like Episode 4 where there really wasn’t a lot that happened. The episode spent a ton of time without any dialogue at all with scenic shots of the island and environments, Bazil walking around investigating, Sol trying to repair the ship a few times, and Osha sitting in quiet. The delve into philosophical discussions about the dark side and the Jedi was the highlight, and while some moments were intellectually stimulating, they often came at the expense of advancing the plot. Sol’s confession about his past sins to the Jedi Council is abruptly mentioned as we all continue to wonder how he can’t sense Mae posing as Osha, but then out of nowhere apparently Bazil tells him offscreen and he stuns her. This sequence of events lacked the necessary emotional weight and context to resonate fully as a satisfying conclusion to this mini imposter plot. Vernestra’s side story moving alongside Sol and Qimir’s was extremely confusing in terms of how it was progressing over time and felt like that entire segment could have been moved to a later point in the series rather than forcing it in so suddenly and having them just miss each other in the same system. The episode also suffers from its inconsistent tone. While the scenes between Qimir and Osha are at times tense and psychologically rich, other segments like Bazil doing “air karate” before nibbling on Mae and a droid squirting oil on her face in a gag moment feel out of place, disrupting the overall mood. This tonal dissonance makes it difficult for the episode to maintain a steady rhythm, as it swings between serious drama and seemingly unnecessary “filler” content that doesn’t lead anywhere. Did we really need to spend ~20% of the episode watching Bazil wander around the ship and plug the droid into a charger? Only to never even show a scene of him revealing his discoveries to Sol?

If the show had focused on exploring the Sith, showing how a Sith master/apprentice tries to turn and train a person who once had good intentions or corrupt a Jedi Padawan, it could have been really good. Qimir seems like a great evil protagonist. We could see how his Acolyte’s original beliefs get twisted as they fall further into the dark side, eventually plotting to kill their master and take their place, continuing the cycle of the Rule of Two. This is how the show was originally marketed before it morphed into this quasi-mystery about two “force prodigy” twins. Qimir, who was once a Jedi, seems to have been involved in the events 16 years ago, but it’s unclear if he was actually a Jedi or if he’s lying. He wants revenge on the Jedi, but the show is again vague about his true motivations. I suspect the scar on his back is from the lightwhip, hinting that Vernestra was his former master? Historically, Disney’s lack of overall vision and plan for a Star Wars narrative is evidenced in this show. I suspect it will continue the same MO of hinting at certain events or Legends connections (Plagueis, Tenebrous, Bal’demnic) and siphon small references but never actually commit to anything big because they genuinely do not have a bigger plan. Like “Project Necromancer” being hinted at and somewhat described in what, 3 or 4 different shows/movies now, but we still have absolutely no clue about the specifics, because Disney doesn’t know them.

Production Quality and Creative Direction

If the runtimes continue as they have, we are going to be looking at close to $1 million/minute in production costs. That is an astonishingly high number, and I am continually left wondering where that has gone. I think there may be some overinflated staff salaries occurring here, because I do not see anything in the show that justifies that cost. It still wavers between some sets, like the interior of Sol’s ship, looking very good, and other sets, like the interior of Qimir’s cave, looking absolutely terrible. I have to specifically mention this shot:

These rock steps look so unnatural and are easily seen as the typical styrofoam-ish/plastic that these synthetic set props are made of. This doesn’t look like a real-life cave, it looks like steps up onto a ride at a themed amusement park ride. And while I liked the design of Sol’s ship having that disconnected shuttle, the resolution and CGI on the ship in orbit were extremely low, looking more like PS2 cutscenes than a $180 million 2024 super-budget production. Bazil’s animations still look very good, and the new mini-elephant creatures had decent effects.

There really wasn’t much introduced in terms of creative art direction. The “Unknown Planet” (which I suspect is Bal’demnic due to the cortosis mine) visually resembled Ach-To to a confusing degree. It was quite empty, looked more like Earth than a galaxy far far away, and one tiny family of an alien species doesn’t feel very sci-fi. The creature looked great as a design, but to cut to that same group three different times just made the environment feel small and cheap. I wish we would see things on a larger scale. I’m not sure they properly utilized the environment and CGI as well because at one point Qimir told Osha she needed to start swimming if she wanted to make it to the ship by sundown, but the ship was CGI’d in only like… 100 yards away? It looked like she could get there in 3 minutes if she wanted. There was even a little bridge of rocks that appeared to go almost all the way to the ship. There was really nothing new or inspiring in this episode, lots of repeated sets that looked similar to the comments I had already made about them in previous episodes.

Performances and Characters

The performances in this episode are generally stronger than they have been prior, with some actors effectively portraying their characters’ complex emotions. Qimir again stands out as the highlight, showcasing a dynamic range of pain, desire, and psychological manipulation. Sol’s deliveries are on par with his excellent performance thus far, and Osha/Mae continues to lack depth. I have to say, Vernestra is the flattest, most wooden, and dullest character I’ve seen in any form of media for a very long time. Her scenes bog down the rest of the plot in this episode and her line delivery is extremely stilted and awkward. I believe she’s supposed to have played a large part in Qimir’s backstory, but it’s hard to care because she’s acted so poorly. And I can’t get over constantly seeing her human skin underneath the fading green face paint. She doesn’t really look like a Mirialan. Mog’s introduction and performance was some sort of gag-like character and I did not enjoy him whatsoever. Appeared unfit for the role and extremely foolish, intentionally.

Character motivations and development suffer due to the writing. I have massive whiplash trying to follow what characters want and why they are behaving the way they are.

Qimir - He has solidified himself as the most interesting character in the show. We need some concrete motivations and character drive soon though or else the mystery and intrigue will become tiresome rather than… titillating. They leaned into his physical appearance and visceral “draw” to the dark side, the opportunity to “live free”. Good characterization, but it needs development/conclusion or it will become as frustrating as the other constant overhanging mysteries.

Sol - Unfortunately, due to repeated foolish character decisions, my opinion of his character has greatly lessened. He was duped far too easily by Mae, he failed to reveal proper information over the comms, I have no clue what he actually wants anymore… Starting to lose me a bit with his character arc. Next week will be crucial to see how his revelation affects him.

Mae/Osha - Really nothing new to add here. Both characters are still incredibly indecisive and indistinguishable from one another. Bland performances and confusing character motivations lead me to dislike the characters thus far.

Vernestra/Mog - I would say this pairing is verging on being insufferable and a pain to watch. The stiffness and shallow performance of Vernestra (who was not at all like this in the books, from the little I’ve read) is terribly complimented by the intentional ineptitude and foolishness of her apprentice, Mog. It seems like both characters are here to do nothing more than make the Jefi appear incompetent. And they do it in the most boring ways possible.

Conclusion

This felt almost exactly like Episode 4 in terms of having a ton of time where nothing really happens in a way too short episode, except 6 lacked that “Wow!” moment that 4 had.

Rating: 3.8/10 (I’d call it “weak”, but not “very weak” or “decent”)

Pros:

Qimir’s psychological manipulation and application of the draw of the Dark Side
The discussions of cortosis and Qimir’s demeanor
Sol restraining Mae, at least he made the right decision finally

Cons:

Continued indecipherable character motivations
Tons of wasted time with Bazil and the slow development of overhanging unsatisfying mysteries
Vernestra

Best scene (I really can’t think of 3 unique scenes that I enjoyed, they’re all just Qimir and Osha in the cave):

Qimir manipulates Osha in the cave

Worst Scenes:

1. Vernestra investigates with Mog
2. Bazil wanders around but we don’t get to see the conclusion of his revelation
3. Mae fails to do anything at all in Sol’s ship

Launch of the “Outbound Flight” Visual Novel Project

Hello, I am announcing the commencement of an ambitious new visual novel project, starring the 2006 EU novel from Timothy Zahn, “Outbound Flight”. This immersive storytelling experience is a test project in the visual novel genre, blending cutting-edge AI imagery with a captivating audio narrative that explores the beloved story in a new format.

About the Project

This is a labor of love project that stems from my passion for both the EU as well as trying to innovate and push the limits of modern-day storytelling. Essentially, this is a detailed adaptation of the novel with a full cast of voiced characters, a narrator, sound effects/tracks, and accompanying AI imagery. Using DALL-E 3 and ChatGPT scripts, I have been able to create (mostly) consistent character and ship “profiles” and go line by line through the novel, generating an image for each and every sentence. I began to experiment with animating some of the images as well, so feedback on that would be appreciated. Yes, things get a little wonky at times, even the best AI image generation software is going to struggle with the complexity of the tasks I am feeding it. Because I am essentially writing a whole paragraph prompt for each sentence of the novel, sometimes the technology is limited. However, everything is consistent enough to bring you into the moment for a unique experience, and as I rewatch it, I have a much easier time picturing things as if they were being brought to life. With the sentence-by-sentence images, I have also manually added soundtracks, audio effects, and a unique cast of voiced characters for an authentic “audiobook” experience. If you are someone who struggles to focus while reading or just want to experience this novel from a new perspective, maybe give this a shot. At the end of the day, this project is certainly an experiment, and in the first chapter, you can see the various techniques that evolved as I tried to nail things down. Interested to hear if anyone thinks it’s a fun watch, but I can confidently say I had a lot of fun letting the creativity flow as I was making it. It’s a fun time to bring something you love to life in a new way!

Key Features

1. Consistent AI Imagery: Utilizing advanced rendering techniques, my aim was to deliver visuals that bring Zahn’s characters and universe to life. Every scene, from the rustic cockpit of the Bargain Hunter to the haunting beauty of distant star systems, is crafted with meticulous detail in the prompt generation. When things got really wonky, I’d take parts of various generations and combine them in Photoshop to make the scene I wanted. No, not every scene is perfect without glitches, it would take an eternity to get that right… But imagine this more like a concept art sketch as you planned the movie rather than the movie itself. Examples below:

Qennto, Maris, and Car’das evade Progga’s ambush in space

Maris glares at the distant, unfamiliar set of stars as they venture beyond known space

Progga the Hutt contacts the crew with his demands

The Bargain Hunter is caught in the Chiss “Connor Net” attack

Qennto and Maris prepare to welcome their Chiss boarders into their disabled ship

2. Rich Audio Narrative: I attempted to create a professional audiobook-style production, similar to what you’d get when Star Wars itself releases one. Yes, my voice cast is entirely custom-created AI voices as well, so through dynamic dialogues generated through Eleven Labs Speech-to-Speech synthesis, AI-generated SFX, and some Star Wars music backdrops from the EU, I tried my hardest to bring emotionally charged moments to life and ensure that listeners are having an immersive experience.

3. Faithful Adaptation: I first began creating this only using dialogue and events from the novel, and cutting out the normal “novel” descriptive sentences, but it felt very shallow and like I was doing a huge disservice to Zahn’s work. Even though it took 10x the amount of effort, I decided to move forward with a perfect one-to-one adaptation of the novel’s text so that everything is perfectly represented. Of course, I have to take personal creative liberties on the appearance of the characters, environments, and ship designs, but I did everything through the text provided in the book. Unfortunately (actually, probably very fortunately and for a great reason), DALL-E 3 has some random copyright restrictions, so sometimes it will refuse tasks that it believes are Star Wars intellectual property. “Outbound Flight” lends itself well to this however as it is such a unique story and setting, it doesn’t have a ton of copyrighted designs that are very classically Star Wars.

Goals

The goal was to push the limits of 2024 commercial AI technology to see what can be accomplished. It is also a test of my own skills in programming, storytelling, and creativity. A seamless blend of storytelling and visual artistry purely through AI is not yet possible, but this is a small glimpse at what the future could deliver. I hope I can transport a few watchers into the story of this novel in a new and enjoyable way. One day, AI will be able to take an entire novel and generate a seamless “movie-like” experience… It is a future that is both exciting and worrying. But one thing is for sure, the technology is here to stay. It’s going to revolutionize art, music, games, movies, etc. I know there are varying opinions of the application of AI when combining someone else’s arts, but to me, what I attempted here does not take anything away from Zahn/Star Wars and I hope it drives people to engage with more material. At the end of the day, ALL credit goes to Timothy Zahn and the original Lucasfilm team who made this possible.

Video Preview

CHAPTER 1 COMPLETED (18 minutes 32 seconds)
Chapter 2 In Production

Feel free to leave any and all feedback about the project itself. I would like this thread to stay on topic about the “Star Wars Fan Edits or Other Projects” aspect rather than on AI itself. That type of conversation can happen in other areas of the website or in DMs if you are interested. If there is feedback on my particular application of AI to the story or tips for improvement, etc, that is perfectly fine! DM me if you’re interested in viewing it in full.

Book 6 update:

I completed my first full pass on the Battle of Mandalore! I can’t even say Act 3 is even in the Alpha stage yet, I’d still say it’s “being filmed” per se… But I have everything organized into chunks, started making combat edits and changing some scene orders, game planning on how to resolve everything, etc. So I’ve gone all the way through the battle scene by scene to categorize everything, and I can start to see a vision for it. It’s a very tough battle to fix. The timings of events are beyond reconcilible. I will explain some of that after my next pass, but it’s genuinely the worst edited segment of the whole show. The order of events is truly impossible, there are massive missing chunks that were cut/unused for whatever reason, extremely choppy pacing, no cohesive geographic mapping to the base, and so much more… And probably the worst wipe transitions I have ever seen in Star Wars. Still a lot of technical and story work to do, but it’s coming along.

vranir said:

Very excited to see your take on Mando S3. The original version was so incredibly mediocre.

Yeah… I’d use harsher words than mediocre though. There are some very good individual scenes, but as a whole it’s a huge step down. Even with the action choreography and missing VFX… I have found multiple stormtroopers in this final battle that have the “X” red tape on them, meaning the VFX team was supposed to CGI the armor on them or put a blaster bolt there but they missed it, so there are background characters with un-CGI’d prop pieces. The whole production was just very, very rushed and sloppy, for whatever reason, this season just did not get the time and care that other parts of the show did.

Patali said:

I did just watch the scene again, and there isn’t a TON of room after his “I was.” line. So it would be a tight cut. That being said, I’m pretty sure your cut from him saying “I am Boba Fett” was already pretty tight because it cuts right away to Fennec. So, I think it will be possible but you’ll have to look and decide. But thanks for considering it.

I checked this out and agree that it works! Will be in Book 2 for the “Special Edition” release soon.

That’s interesting how you view Book 2. I will be honest, I think the big factor and reason why for me, is that I actually really liked BoBF, especially the flashback sequences. I love the Boba character in general. In fact, years ago now when “The Mandalorian” was coming out, I was literally asking “Why couldn’t this have just been Boba Fett?” Like literally Boba Fett finding the child etc lmao. Which in a way I think COULD have worked. That could have been Boba’s redemption story, since the child is an orphan just like him.
But thats just my fan fiction.

Actually, in the early scripts, the whole show was about Boba instead of Din’s role. They couldn’t work it out with timing for Temuera and also wanted a blank slate rather than having to deal with the complexity of Boba’s character. There were even plans for Boba and Luke to interact, but they cut it to tell a “smaller” story instead. I agree that if done right, I would’ve loved to see Boba instead as the main protagonist!

And yes I’m the most excited for Book 6 because it will be having not even watched Season 3, so I will be a good guinea pig for you to try that out on

I am super interested in seeing your review on everything. Definitely giving me motivation to finish quickly!

Darth Sadifous said:

Hey Acbagel, I am looking forward to the revised Book 5 and the eventual release of Book 6. Also, I would not mind a standalone book of Dr. Perishing’s arc if that is in the cards.

As for cutting Moff Gideon’s clone plot from the final, I would be down for that. However, I am cautious of this approach as this plot point could play into the announced Mandalorian movie. I believe Giancarlo Esposito even playfully eluded to this possibility in a fairly recent interview when asked if he could return. Just something to think about, but you could always alter down the road if it does indeed influence the upcoming 2026 film. I can’t wait to see what you have been cooking. Take care for now and may the force be with you!

I really don’t think they’d go back to Gideon… They have to know the kind of eye rolls they’d get for that. His appearance in S3 was already way more than enough IMO. But yes, I can always re-edit if something becomes important in the future. Excited to see how the upcoming will fit into my re-edit saga one day! From what I have access to right now though, the cloning plot is a terrible distraction that adds to the conclusion feeling extremely rushed and unsatisfying.

All the links are sent! Been getting a lot of interest in DMs and Reddit out of nowhere on these recently, not sure where it’s getting posted around… But thanks all. I am interested in diving back into these movies one day, they were my earliest projects so I know there’s a ton I could do differently now.

MagMaxx said:

Hello man, no more news about this edit? I got really interested

Hello! I began working closer with PixelJoker95 on his edit when I was starting this project, and he could do a lot more on the VFX side of things than I could so I put a pause on this. We collaborated on some ideas and I helped on the writing of some in-person scenes he was filming, so I didn’t want to rush my release when he was bringing so much to life on his end. His edit has been delayed for the past 6+ months, but it’s still going to be released this year so I’m keeping this on hold until his is out. Mine might not even be necessary after his, but I’ll see if I want to make any storytelling changes after that. Thanks for your interest, it was a fun project so I’d like to pick mine up again some day.

With the major cliffhanger at the conclusion of Episode 4, it seemed that the intended “weekly discussion” that Disney was hoping would ensue would be about the identity of the Sith and excitement for the upcoming battle. I did see some of that, but it was overshadowed by a lot of conversations about the relationship of Canon v Legends, George v Disney, Ki-Adi Mundi’s birthday, etc… If you’ve followed me or my work on this website, you know that I’m a BIG EU guy. The movies made me love Star Wars, but the EU made it a near-spiritual and inseparable part of my life. I have poured into countless Novels, Comics, and Games from the ever-vast storyline that is now dubbed “Legends” by Disney. Even amidst my great love and preference for that time and universe, I still maintain to hold a healthy mindset about the state of things, both then and now.

Under the unique headship of George Lucas, whenever he added new information to Star Wars, the EU always adapted to try to respect what he said and made. No, he didn’t consider the EU to be top-level definitive Star Wars or part of his personally written canon that he wanted to keep consistent, but he checked off on every single big-picture story and said of the EU, “I do try to keep it consistent. The way I do it now is they have a Star Wars Encyclopedia, so if I want to come up with a name or something else, I check to see if it’s already been used… They try to make their universe as consistent with mine as possible.” George and the EU had a very symbiotic relationship because he knew how much it meant to the fans, it made him a lot of money, and he did genuinely think that there were some great ideas in it that he pulled from (and also some bad ideas that he did not like). Did you know that George took from the EU: Aayla Secura from the “Republic” comic series, Double-bladed lightsabers from the Old Republic “Tales of the Jedi” comic series, the name “Coruscant” from Zahn’s Thrawn trilogy, Lightsaber blocking force lightning from “The Last Command”, etc. He skimmed through the comics from time to time as he didn’t have enough bandwidth to read novels entirely, but his creative team would come to him with general checklists such as: “Are you okay if someone writes a backstory on Yoda?” “No” “Are you okay if we make a game about Darth Vader having a secret apprentice in between 3 and 4?” “Yes” “Are you okay if Luke marries Mara Jade” “I guess, but I don’t know if I really like that” (paraphrasing quotes and answers here). All in all, some things he approved of immediately, some he outright declined, and some he needed to peruse more and never got around to a definitive answer. The mysterious mind of the Maker!

George personally created Darth Bane and the Rule of Two. He also made Darth Plagueis a Muun instead of a human. He was heavily involved with the storyline direction of Shadows of the Empire. Dark Horse wanted to kill Quinlan Vos but George told them to keep him alive. George also wrote the prologue in the “Shatterpoint” novel. So to outright say that “George didn’t consider the EU to be Star Wars at all” isn’t accurate, and neither is saying he held it to the same level as his movies. Again, they maintained a relatively symbiotic relationship. Compare that to how Disney has handled it, and I think you can see that perhaps they misjudged how much a large sect of the fanbase still treasures the EU, even to this day. 10 years ago, when Disney “decanonized” Legends, they stated, “…all aspects of Star Wars storytelling moving forward will be connected. Under Lucasfilm President Kathleen Kennedy’s direction, the company for the first time ever has formed a story group to oversee and coordinate all Star Wars creative development. ‘We have an unprecedented slate of new Star Wars entertainment on the horizon’… This is just the beginning of a creatively aligned program of Star Wars storytelling.” In retrospect, this seems to be nothing more than PR talk as almost immediately their shows and books started contradicting each other. They hired movie directors who didn’t know who Darth Plagueis was. The entire Sequel Trilogy was written one by one without a plan… No, the EU was never perfect in terms of continuity either. I would venture to say that it is impossible for any franchise so large to be perfect. But there was symbiosis at one time, whereas now I see more of a parasitic relationship. Disney wants to skim off the top of Legends without committing to faithfully telling the stories, harming both their ability to truly have free reign while also upsetting longtime fans. Changing Mundi and the nature of Cereans, extending the life of Vernestra and the nature of Mirialans, these don’t seem to be decisions that are well crafted by a cohesive story group. They are cameo scenes made without much thought toward a larger lore.

Anyway, Acolyte Episode 5 was good. Let’s get into it.

Pacing and Structure

Like last week, with the intro and credits removed we are left with 27 minutes and 4 seconds of scenes here. A whopping 12 seconds longer than last week and still placing it in the bottom of the barrel for live-action show runtimes. I’ve made this point nearly every week so I don’t see a reason to continue in depth the same critique. Sub-30-minute runtime = very bad. It is nearly impossible to tell a quality storyline in an 8 episode season with these weekly releases. Outside of the lightning flash episode length, the pacing is quite good for the middle segment. The action sequence plays out in an intriguing manner, and the whole middle 15 minutes I was glued to the screen. Unfortunately, as soon as the fighting stops we are wrenched into some excruciatingly slow scenes of Mae and Osha that drag this section down once more. Overall, the pacing was better than in previous weeks, but still flawed in major ways.

The episode opens from the perspective of Osha recovering from unconsciousness as we miss the events immediately following the force push. We’ve missed a little bit of the battle as some Jedi are already dead, but within a minute we’re back into the action. Again, this whole idea felt like a contrivance for the purpose of weekly TV rather than something that felt natural in the momentum of the show, but from there on out we’re treated to a mostly great sequence of events. From the callback to the beetles making previous scenes feel more worthwhile, to the setup for the next episodes with new plot points, this episode is structured quite well in its placement in the season. I fear another looming flashback episode is once again going to derail the momentum we just built up, and I’m hoping it won’t consume an entire week like last time and perhaps simply be integrated into ~10 minutes of another “present-day” episode. Future structure aside, this episode did a solid job of organizing the fight into chunks, though it did struggle massively with balancing A/B plots and transitions, but more on that later.

Dialogue and Writing Quality

The dialogue was a small step up from previous weeks, though not anything great, perhaps the best of the season so far. That might be a bit telling as this was the episode with the least delivered lines… However, some of the conversations between Sol and Qimir did well at creating tension and intrigue. Though I still can’t call the dialogue “good”, because it continues to come off as a tad pretentious, as if it’s pretending to say something really deep and philosophical/meaningful, but it doesn’t hold up to logical scrutiny. Or perhaps its significance once again relies on future episodes to expound upon its meaning. Qimir carried the the episode with some haunting lines referring to Jecki as an “it”, Yord’s description of Qimir’s fighting style was well-phrased, but the conversation between Mae and Osha once more proves to be the lowest quality of the episode, delivering the 4th “What have you done?!” from Osha so far…

This episode is lighter on writing in favor of a long action sequence, but even amidst the battle, we see some story and character development. The highlight of this battle to me was the unique situation of Qimir attempting to both kill the Jedi who are attacking him in order to preserve his identity, as well as trying to kill Mae who is a third party who knows too much and is simply trying to escape. This plot setup led to some great moments of storytelling inside the battle itself and is a great example of how fights don’t just have to be solely for the sake of action. The best fights are multi-layered with intrigue and situations that complicate a standard 1v1 whack 'em duel. The writing of different characters intervening and the multiple situations occurring at once was done fabulously. The decision to execute key characters here was a bold move. I want to say I love it, and I can say I wholeheartedly approve of the brutality of the Sith that created the most shocking moments in the episode, I also feel slight disappointment that we are losing some characters that were barely scratching the surface of development. While the violence and deaths were well-directed in and of themselves, I didn’t feel any loss at seeing the deaths of these characters aside from a loss of interest in their previous scenes. I was only at the very beginning stages of starting to connect with the primary side characters, and now they’re gone. I would say the fault of this is more in the pacing and short episodic structure of the show rather than the writing decision to kill them.

As I heavily suspected since episode 1, the reveal of Qimir was unsurprising to any degree. The show marketed itself as a “mystery crime drama”, but I have not been the least bit surprised by anything that has occurred so far. The mysteries have all been very obvious in your face reveals, the lead-ups to resolutions have been more blatantly confusing than interesting, and I think this show would have been much more successful if it was written as a 2-part “action thriller”. With Qimir revealed as Mask Sith, we still are left with questions about his placement in the Rule of Two. Or perhaps he even has ties to another force cult, such as the Knights of Ren (did anyone else catch the Kylo Ren theme motif playing as he encountered Osha at the end?). His line delivery to Sol left this open-ended enough that future episodes could take it in multiple directions. However, I am not left greatly anticipating the answer in excitement, but I am merely peeved that we have watched ~63% of this show and still cannot say we have even seen a Sith yet. A much more exciting premise for the Acolyte would’ve been one where Qimir is the main character and we see everything from his perspective. Mae/Osha seems quite irrelevant to my interest in anything happening in this show.

Speaking of, the writing whiplash continues in the Twindom. I have no idea where they are going with those characters. The final stand-off between Osha and Mae could have used another pass (or five) in the writer’s room. Mae’s character continues to be unintelligible, somehow going from wanting to kill Kelnacca and all the Jedi, to wanting to surrender to the Jedi, to wanting to escape the Jedi, to wanting to live happily ever after with Osha after trying to burn her alive as a child. The show clearly wants to show us what “really happened” at a later point, so while the “Twin swap” isn’t a bad idea on paper, it doesn’t feel like it has enough consistency to generate intrigue because both characters are complete wild cards. There is barely a difference between their motivations since they both 180 every single episode. What is the distinction between them at this point? I am also left baffled as to how Sol can’t sense a difference between Mae and Osha, nor can he see the giant tattoo on Mae’s forehead… I suppose Sol is battered and unbalanced right now, but still, it seems quite obvious that “Osha’s” behavior has changed and it’s strange that Sol was so easily duped (and Basil smells the difference and is going to start squawking). The other writing critique would be the beetles easily overwhelming Qimir and flying him away. It felt extremely awkward and contrived as a way to extend the plot beyond its natural conclusion at this moment, and Qimir’s sudden onset of ineptitude to remove a flashlight off his back after murdering 7 highly trained Jedi did not add up. Overall though, the writing served to create a great battle sequence but didn’t measure up to that greatness in the moments of quiet.

Production Quality and Creative Direction

While some of the aforementioned forestry props are once again notable distractions, the VFX intermixed with the battle scenes very smoothly. The lightsabers shorting out looked realistic, the force pushes through walls and plants had great use of practical effects and CGI, and the progressive dirt and grime on the actors reflected the progression of a grueling battle. The ash-like material falling from the sky contrasted with the red dirt at the feet helped make this forest feel less like Earth. While the setting itself was small in scale, it utilized itself perfectly and made the most of what the area had to offer. The beetles picking up Qimir would be the one Red “X” I’d throw on this episode’s visual quality, but aside from that, everything looked great visually.

Dare I say this was the best lightsaber fight I have seen in live-action since May 19, 2005? I’ll be upfront here, the choreography was really good. I wouldn’t say it rivaled the Nick Gillard-directed Prequel battles, but it was the closest thing I’ve seen to them from Disney so far. I would say the Sequel Trilogy lightsaber battles were atrocious, so I suppose the only comparable duel would be Ahsoka v Baylan, but this certainly beat anything in that show. The use of the environment in the battle was incredible, with people flying through doors, foliage, the Sith’s unsettling movements around the forest, and the switches between lightsabers and hand-to-hand made for thrilling changes of pace. Not only was the setting properly utilized, but the lightsaber moves themselves were fast, coordinated, acrobatic, and executed with intent. There were a few moments where I could see gaps in what a character “should” do and their actor waiting on some cue to move, but those moments were few and far between. I was highly impressed with the visceral use of violence, especially in the kill moves. I did gasp at the brutality of Qimir against Jecki, which is the first time in a LONG time that Star Wars violence has made me do that. This whole fight sequence was a massive step in the right direction for Disney, and Christopher Clark Cowan should be commended for his action directing here, as well as major props to the actors involved in the training. This battle felt like Star Wars. I wish it were the standard for action scenes rather than the exception at this point, but what a great new standard it set. Here’s to hoping we see more of this choreography crew in future projects. I also want to credit the fantastic addition of cortosis from Legends, the integration into a suit of armor was a great creative twist to a traditional battle.

I’m not exactly sure where to place this critique because I don’t know who is handling this aspect, but someone at Disney/Lucasfilm desperately needs to go to wipe transition school. These lightning-fast wipes right in the middle of battles are unbelievably jarring, so much so that they genuinely make me laugh out loud when I see how bad they are. Two times we have Sol start to run at Qimir and out of absolutely nowhere, a 0.5-second wipe transition follows his back and cuts to some other slow-moving scene. It’s bewildering as to why this is happening. I know Star Wars is infamous for wipes, but certainly, someone is looking at WHEN those wipes occurred in George’s movies, right? How are they getting dropped in these episodes in such amateurish ways? The post-production editing is sloppy to the degree of seeming like a joke. That’s harsh, but I have no other way to describe it. I work in the TV industry personally (documentaries, sports, commercials), and using fast wipes between 2 active concurrent fights back and forth is… childlike. There was another circle swipe that simply vanished a few frames early and seemed like a visual glitch. It’s like the editing team was sent a “Trasnisiton quota” a week before release and realized they had come up short and hastily went through this show and dropped some into completely random places. It’s bad. I saw this happen at the end of the Mandalorian season 3 as well, some of the worst wipe transitions I have ever seen. So it’s a recurring problem that seems outside the writers’ ability to prevent. Something is going on with their mutually shared editing team that needs to be corrected ASAP.

Performances and Characters

Manny Jacinto stole the show with his unmasked Qimir. His casual portrayal of murder and mayhem was expertly performed. He truly embodied both the mystery of the dark side user as well as the strength of one. Major props to his choreography in battle and the dedication he put into perfecting this segment. I am more excited to see him on screen again than anyone else in the show based on his performance. Another standout was an excellent effort made by Dafne Keen as Jecki. Her movements in action were incredible, especially for her age. Extremely impressive, and while I was not so impressed by her regular line deliveries, she gave a perfect final act for her character that will leave a lasting impression on my perception of this show. Sol continues to excel at delivering emotions as we see a new unbalanced side of his character. Sadly, I say this nearly every week, but the deliveries from Mae/Osha are the stand-out weak point in the show. There is barely a detectable facial performance given, and the lines do not feel like they’re coming from an in-universe character. I know it’s not aided in any way by the whiplash character “development” they’ve had, but anytime these two are the main focus of a scene it never ceases to be the worst part of the episode. Amandla doesn’t have good chemistry with… herself, and even the videography of these scenes is poorly done as the two are almost never in a frame together. The acting and directing around their relationship are not good at all.

Qimir - Even with one of the most obvious reveals I have ever seen, this character instantly became the most intriguing person in the whole show. Every interesting question now revolves around him. Is he really a Sith? Master or Apprentice? Why does he want a new acolyte? What’s his background story? How does he know so much about Sol?

Sol - After my previous concerns that he was becoming too one-dimensional, I was glad to see a new side of him in this episode. It was a great decision to show his distress and “break” him to an extent. I am truly not sure if he will recover or continue to unravel, so I am happy to see that this character has depth beyond empathy.

Mae/Osha - I am lumping them into the same category now because these two are truly indistinguishable to me. Their motivations can change on a dime, sometimes they love each other and want to sacrifice their life to save the other, sometimes they hate each other and try to kill the other, sometimes they want to faithfully serve their friends, sometimes they want to betray their friends. Now that they’re role-swapped, it’s just as believable that Osha turns dark and Mae turns light? Again, it’s not a bad idea on paper, but the characters needed to have individual consistency before now for it to be executed well. Additionally, these characters are both exceptionally weak in the force, consistently beaten by almost everyone in the show. I half expected Qimir to offer Jecki a place at his side instead of Mae or Osha. Neither has shown abilities to be greater than a standard Jedi youngling, so I’m not sure why Qimir is so interested in them.

Other characters? - With no Yord or Jecki moving forward, all we have left is… Vernestra? That’s a really weird writing decision to only have 5 named and voiced characters at this point in the show. Sol, Qimir, Mae, Osha, Vernestra. Those are the only action figures left. I am hoping for a big new Sith reveal soon. There were signs of a David Harewood casting for the show, so I’m hoping that’ll be Tenebrous. Sooner, rather than later would benefit the story.

Conclusion

Rating: 7.1/10 (I’d call it “Good”, but not “decent” or “great”)

Pros:

Best live-action lightsaber choreography in ~20 years
Qimir stole the show with new character intrigue and Jacinto’s performance
Didn’t shy away from big character deaths and Sith violence

Cons:

Lack of an intriguing primary protagonist
A couple of confusing plot contrivances (Qimir and beetles, Sol can’t recognize Mae)
Continuously terrible runtimes, episode structure, and editing

Best scenes:

1. Qimir v Jecki
2. Qimir mentally breaks Sol down
3. Qimir’s casual depictions of Sith violence

Worst Scenes:

1. Mae and Osha talking on a hilltop with more character nonsense occurring
2. Sol getting duped by fake Osha with a giant forehead tattoo
3. Qimir gets confused by a flashlight and carried away by beetles

It has been over 4 years since The Acolyte was first announced, and here we are halfway through the show after production delays, logo changes, and marketing messaging alterations from “It’s a Sith-led story” to “An investigation into a shocking crime spree pits a respected Jedi Master against a dangerous warrior from his past.”. The story thus far has been… Scattered. Unclear. It raises new questions each week, but are they good questions? After Episode 3 was lambasted in public for being “the worst Star Wars production ever”, The Acolyte had the impossible task of trying to right course if it wanted to live up to the hype when it was originally announced (2020 was a different world…)

All in all, when we refer to the original announcement of the show, “The Acolyte is a mystery-thriller that will take viewers into a galaxy of shadowy secrets and emerging dark-side powers in the final days of the High Republic era”, does it stack up to our expectations so far? I think it’s clear that Headland had an overarching vision for a Star Wars show and was able to live out her dream of bringing it to life. It’s also clear that the nature of Disney+ forced the show into an unintended format that is causing many viewers to feel disjointed in their experience of watching the story unfold. So without further ado, let’s tackle The Acolyte - Episode 4: “Day”.

Pacing and Structure

With the intro and credits removed, we are left with 26 minutes and 52 seconds of scenes here. Out of 61 Star Wars live-action TV episodes, this marks it as the second shortest episode ever made, only surpassed by The Mandalorian S03 E04 “The Foundling” (the raptor creature steals a kid episode). I’ll just say it upfront: This runtime is horrendous. Somehow this episode manages to feel both excruciatingly slow as the crew wanders aimlessly through a forest without any plot development, as well as give off a “blink and you missed the entire episode” vibe. It’s hard to even evaluate the pacing because this is clearly an incomplete episode. It was forcibly broken up into two mini-episodes at the demand of a streaming service’s subscription expectations. I don’t have anything else to say other than that this is a terrible idea for the proper development of a storyline, and the pacing in this episode is simply non-existent. They had to pad it with unnecessary scenes to meet the bare minimum runtime, but not reveal too much in these scenes because the actual plot development was intended to occur in the “next episode”. This pacing was the worst of the season.

Aside from the lack of an ending in favor of a frustrating Cliffhanger trope, the episode is structured decently. The structure of showing Mae ahead of the Jedi investigation works, as the Jedi meet and prepare for their next move, Mae moves ahead with the advantage of Qimir’s knowledge. However, the Jedi have a tracking advantage with Bazil and quickly catch up. This culminates as both squads end up in the same spot as night falls, and the Sith shows up. Overall, it’s a good idea on paper, but again, this episode is so artificially cut in half that it has to get a negative score in this category. The feeling I got watching this was one of, “To Be Continued… Right Now.” However, the screen stays black instead of coming back in 2 minutes from the commercial break. This episode concludes not on an anticipatory and quality Cliffhanger, but on a plain old annoying one that has “Big Corpo Intervention” written all over it.

Dialogue and Writing Quality

The dialogue continues to be serviceable but still comes off as stilted, somewhat boring, and overly explanatory. When you look for it, you can’t miss how every character has to always explain exactly how they’re feeling in the clearest terms possible. There is no nuance, it is always stated plainly as fact and without reflection or hesitation. I mentioned this before as this is actually akin to how George wrote dialogue and I appreciate the subtle Star Wars charm in this cadence of speech, but it is missing one very key aspect to the delivery. Rhythm. When George spoke on the critiques of his dialogue, he was quite self-aware of it sounding rather unnatural, but ultimately defended his choice by saying, “I’m not known for my dialogue. I think of it as a sound effect, a rhythm, a vocal chorus in the overall soundtrack.” The dialogue of The Acolyte is not functioning as the chorus of a beautiful song, it is functioning merely as a tool to deliver exposition that the characters, environments, music, emotions, themes, etc, are not delivering themselves. If you are trying to emulate the odd-mastery of “Wooden Dialogue” that George coined, you better have all of the pieces around it to make it function, and The Acolyte misses on other marks which makes the stiff dialogue stand out.

When I analyze the Writing Quality, I do so on two fronts: 1. As a self-contained storyline, inconsiderate of its placement in the Star Wars universe 2. As an ever-important story told in the intricately woven web of Star Wars lore and mythos. First, on the mystery crime-thriller front. The episode begins with an ominous setting that generates intrigue as Kelnacca lives in solitude, seemingly connected to Mae with symbology painted on his walls. The anticipation for a showdown with a Wookie Jedi Master is palpable. Unfortunately, we are immediately bogged down by a poorly written conversation between Osha and Jecki where the former has doubts about continuing the mission and the latter tries to persuade her to join. It’s a waste of time because I think we all inherently know that Osha isn’t going to get left behind and written out of the next couple of episodes. Her doubts last all of 50 seconds until Sol once more validates her self-confidence and she’s back on the squad. This same exact conversion has occurred in past episodes, as well as will occur again in 3 minutes when Yord again has to bolster her confidence. I believe this is all written as an attempt to show that Osha is struggling internally with her sister being alive and a “should I save her or kill her” conflict, but that can be communicated in many other ways other than 5+ 60-second conversations with surrounding Jedi rehashing the same exact premise.

On the flip side, we start to learn more about the interesting dynamic between Mae and Qimir, and these conversations carry the episode through a long slog through a forest. There really isn’t much to say about the majority of this episode as it truly is just scene after scene of the contested groups walking and occasionally giving updates on their geographical location. Unless the anticipated duel next week ends up back in the Beetle forest section, that whole scene was very pointless and added only time padding, as well as an eye roll of “Why the hell would you touch that” and the odd conversation of Osha feeling morally distraught for the flesh-craving bug dying, yet we just previously established that she is now mentally prepared to kill her sister in a few minutes…

Before addressing the events that led to the Cliffhanger, I need to move to the Star Wars front of analysis and examine the Jedi Temple scene. The Acolyte is up against a huge wall with rules established in The Phantom Menace. It is attempting to tell “a Sith-led story” from the perspective of the Jedi/former Jedi in a time when no Jedi is allowed to know about the Sith. I knew there would either have to be a cover-up, a lot of deaths, or a plot hole. I think we start to see the roots of all three of those happening in this scene. I’ll start with the worst offender here… Ki-Adi Mundi. Not only did they decide to rewrite his age by 100’s of years (In Legends, Ki-Adi wasn’t born for another ~30 years after this show’s ending, yet in this show he’s already old enough to start graying), they had to completely alter the nature of the Cerean species to take their average lifespan of ~70 years to 250+ years. I have to forcibly ask, “Why?” There are so many other Jedi who could have functioned in the role the Ki-Adi plays in this episode. Yoda, Yaddle, Oppo Rancis, Even Piel, Plo Koon, Tera Sinube, a new Jedi, etc. I think they went with Ki-Adi because he is specifically the one who comments on the Sith in TPM, but his presence in this scene is the opposite of what they should have done to handle this. Keep every single major Jedi completely away from this sequence of events so they have actual deniability instead of bringing them in but making them look like morons by overlooking this threat. I need to see more to know how it plays out, but I will be returning heavy-handed to this plot point if the Jedi are massacred by this supposed “Master and his Splinter Order” and Ki-Adi NEVER makes a connection to the Sith. Unfortunately, I sense this is the trend as the writers have begun trying to defend their storyline by simply saying Ki-Adi “doesn’t know anything about the Sith” here and making jokes about it while ignoring the fact that he should not even be born yet.

I have a major writing critique about Mae’s decision to surrender to the Jedi, but will leave that for her section in my Character review, so let’s move on to the best writing in this episode. The lead-up to the Cliffhanger. Mae’s inexplicable 180 aside, the last 4 minutes of the episode are bone-chilling and save the entire experience. The twist of Kelnacca’s premature death is the perfect kind of subverted expectation, though unfortunately I was left wishing we got to see that. Somehow, this confrontation was initially in the script but (NOTE: this writer actually deleted this Tweet during the time I was writing this review, so caution that this image may provide spoiler-y information for a future plot point)
cut out of the $180 million budget…. The best shows I have ever seen never skip the big moments. Breaking Bad, early Game of Thrones, and House of Cards, all let the viewer experience nearly every moment of drama and don’t use cut scenes as surprises to reveal new information. This disappointment aside, the directing of the arrival of the Sith is executed perfectly. I would go as far as saying it was the most emotion I have felt in any episode of this show so far, and has me more excited for the next episode than at any point of this series so far, even pre-release (granted, this isn’t saying a ton, but it’s an improvement for sure). Overall, the writing here was downhill for 90% of the episode with a few well-written scenes sparsed throughout such as the conversation with Yord and one of Mae’s talks with Qimir before a huge spike in the ending. It’s not good but was certainly saved from disaster at the end.

Production Quality and Creative Direction

The quality of the sets and creature designs continue to be all over the place, some sticking out as B-movie quality and some impressing with their believable as real-life execution. The wide panning shots of the environment look great, and I appreciate how they transformed a generic Earth forest into feeling like an alien world with the use of high-floating fog, unique sunset lighting, and the use of both mountains and trees. Every wide shot looked incredible, but it did not hold up to closer inspection. The show is having trouble with the synthetic practical effects, and it is very easy to spot plastic/styrofoam props. From the bugs on the trees before they turn into CGI, to the obvious fake plants and tree trunks scattered about, to the visible bald cap on Vernestra, to the glue on Jecki’s horns and fading face paint, this simply does not hold up to the budget it was given. Kelnacca’s costume and the Jedi robes still look stiff and fake, however, his hut and Basil both look fantastic. It’s really been hit or miss on a lot of set pieces.

The planet Khofar was well-designed on paper and the attempt to make alien fauna was welcomed and only held back through poor texturing and lighting on the prop placements. Coruscant and the Jedi Temple continue to look underwhelming, and the continued problem of overreliance on humans was especially evident in the Temple training and planning rooms. Compare to Prequel Temple sets and take any side by side to count up the aliens, background activity, and scale. I will give major props to the design team on Basil, he looked and sounded fantastic, and was a wonderful addition of the Tynnan species from Legends. His direction as an independent character was fantastic and also perfectly in line with Star Wars history. I will say that I am not at all a fan of the “Smilo Ren” mask. Unless this is an intentionally ironic/edgy costume from a tryhard Apprentice who will soon be humiliated, it just doesn’t play. Sith don’t dress like that… Especially in this time period of stalking in the shadows. However, the direction of his demeanor and costume outside of the corny smile is well done.

Performances and Characters

Though Sol carried the previous episodes, I think his deliveries were a step back this time, perhaps in part due to repetitive emotional expressions and dialogue. Mae/Osha continues to be a major weak point to me in terms of embodying their characters, Jecki remained as flat as possible, and the random Jedi lines were not inspiring either. Thankfully, Charlie Bennet actually really stepped it up as Yord and I thought his conversation with Osha was very well done and he felt like an actual in-universe Jedi. Qimir delivered a new range of emotions that were a fresh take in the show, so overall I’d say this category has stayed static at “not very good, but carried by a few solid performances from individuals.”

As we’ve reached the halfway point of this series, we should have some genuine connections to the characters and start to see the direction of the character arcs. Some are meeting this goal, while I think others are completely failing.

• Osha - The primary traits I see in her are doubt, confusion, and lack of self-confidence. This is not a particularly fun set of characteristics for the main character of a show. Her motivations continue to be all over the place from scene to scene. She’s not presented as an emotional character; she is stoic, introverted, self-reflective, and anxious. She has flip-flopped numerous times on her decision-making process and I have absolutely no idea where they are taking her character, and not in a fun and mysterious way but in a way that the character feels like she is not communicating the mind of an actual person to the audience.

• Mae -

1. Her character, like Osha, is a complete mess at this point. There are no indications whatsoever about where her motivations come from and she has already 180’d multiple times, worst of all in this episode when in a beyond bewildering decision, decides she’s had enough of murdering Jedi Masters and is ready as a young woman to spend life in a max-security Republic prison. Her “love” for her sister could not be more out of place, as we just saw in a flashback that Mae displayed serial killer behavior in torturing animals and trying to burn her sister alive in a locked room, yet 3 scenes later we are expected to believe that she is ready to be: A. tortured/killed by a Sith Lord, or B. tortured and possibly killed in a Republic prison. This decision was beyond defense, yet again the writer decides to do so by saying, “She’s not “good” in that moment she’s just super tired of this pointless (what she considers pointless) missions and errands her master is making her do.” Sorry, but this is not in any way a believable decision. Unless Mae is an imbecile with a death wish, it’s just not a sympathetic character arc. Did any of us look at this and say, “Oooh, that’s cool, I like how she developed that way”? Or did we all collectively groan, “Ohhh come on, you cannot possibly be that stupid”?

2. One side critique of Mae: I don’t think this writing team understands the Dark Side of the force. It is not merely a tool that you can tap into at will to gain enough strength to kill a Jedi Master and then go back to being a reasonable person who genuinely loves her sister. The Dark Side corrupts you spiritually. Headland touts that she is such a big fan of the EU and KOTOR, yet compare Mae’s flippant usage of the Dark Side to what the iconic Jedi Bastila Shan said of it, “The dark side is not simply giving in to anger or temptation to use the Force to destructive ends. These things only lead to the dark side. The dark side grows stronger and more insidious the closer you draw to it. It begs you to surrender to it, to release all its terrible power… and it becomes harder and harder to resist. And once you stop resisting, it is too late. It twists you up inside and turns you into a mockery of everything you once stood for.” My friends, how is it that a few sentences of reading on a screen can make me fear the Dark Side more than seeing ~2 hours of a character use it in live action? Let us hold storytelling to a high standard because high-quality Star Wars is indeed possible, it’s just not being presented in these TV shows.

• Sol - Sadly, I think Sol’s writing is proving to be overly one-dimensional. His character was not developed in any new direction, he only rehashes his care for Osha over and over and over, but I am intrigued with the possibility of seeing him in action in the next episode.

• Qimir - Perhaps I will eat these words soon and will retract this and apologize, but is it blatantly obvious that Qimir is “Masked Sith”? From the very beginning of Episode 1 when Qimir quotes the Sith Code, he was my #1 suspect for undercover Sith. I thought the same in every single scene since and was hoping this was good and intentional writing to throw us off the trail, but now I am worrying that it’s just extremely poorly disguised and bad writing. I don’t hate the idea of the twist, but it did not seem mysterious in any way other than being “This is the guy who you’re obviously supposed to believe is the Big Bad but turns out to not be”. Except… I am quite confident it is. His lines about lessons to Mae, his change of demeanor when she wants to quit, the sudden killing of Kelnacca when no one else knew his location… Not a mystery at all in my mind. I really hope this ends up not being the case because that means Qimir has his entire costume packed in his rucksack that he is clearly opening and digging around in front of Mae, he somehow breaks out of the trap, changes clothes, rushes ahead to Kelnacca at inexplicable speeds on an alternate indirect route, kills Kelnacca, then “flies” up into a nearby tree to await the others, all before either Mae or the Jedi get here. I get “a bad feeling about this” reveal in that it will be true but the details will not be explained or addressed in any way.

Conclusion

Saved solely by the final few minutes…

Rating: 5.4/10 (I’d call it “Fine”, but not “pretty good” or “pretty weak”)

Halfway point show rating: 4.2/10 (I’d call it, “pretty weak” but not “bad” or “fine”

Pros:

Great wide shots of Khofar
Bone-chilling thematic setting and entrance of the Sith
Basil was a standout alien design and plot integration

Cons:

Multiple characters have extremely confusing motivations and flip-flopping decisions
Practical effects look overly synthetic and don’t blend in
Atrocious runtime and disjointed pacing

Best scenes:

1. Sith entering the story
2. Yord talking to Osha on the hill
3. Mae and Qimir starting their venture into the forest

Worst Scenes:

1. Mae having a schizophrenic episode and a 180 of her character motivation (goes entirely against what we saw for 40 minutes in the flashback last week)
2. Journey through the forest where nothing happens (I stopped counting at double-digit wipe transitions between 30-60 second scenes of walking)
3. Jedi Temple planning scene (I am very concerned that this weak scene is going to be the only explanation of how the Sith stay in the shadows)

Patali said:
Book 2 remains my favorite movie. To me it feels the most like a single movie rather than several TV episodes put together. I say that with love, I’ve watched your first 4 films and think they are all the best way to enjoy these series. But it seems, if you’re keeping almost all of the different plots as you’ve done, that it is a feeling that is impossible to get away from entirely. Book 2 did the best IMO.

I remember you saying that from your initial reviews! That is very interesting, I love that perspective. Personally, I would say it’s my least favorite of my films, but it’s definitely the most unique/individualized out of them all so it makes sense that some would prefer it based on its structure. I agree that in order to make the other films more “movie-like” rather than still feeling somewhat episodic, I would have to cut a lot more content. I could definitely make them all feel like movies, but I think that would bring the series down to ~4 movies instead, and to me, it always feels bad when TV shows are cut down way too much into movies because the character development is so slow in TV shows, I never feel like I’ve connected as I do in movies that are designed to function around that timeframe.

Will be really interested to hear what you think of Book 6 eventually, as it’s structured similarly to Endgame where it doesn’t have a standard movie structure, but rather it’s a long-form sequence of connected building events that culminates in a final battle.

BOBA: I am Boba Fett.
FENNEC: Boba Fett is dead.
BOBA: I was.
CUT

I think that “I was.” line is great. And when you cut out the cringy “left for dead on the sands” and leave it just as “I was.” I feel it implies something greater, like Boba isn’t just referring to the Sarlacc and Jabba’s palace, but even more that he is saying “I was.” as in his whole life from when his father died, that moment in the opening. He was dead inside until he found his new family. It says a lot with two words, and through the magic of editing turns a cringy line into great writing.

Awesome! I love this idea. I will double check the delivery of the line and its tone to make sure it works in my edit, but I’m all for it on paper. Makes a lot of sense thematically. Thanks for the suggestion. As I go through all of the Special Edition edits, I’ll be referring back to your reviews of each movie too, so thanks again for writing those.

milkbundt said:

These all sound amazing! Could you please share a link with me? Thank you so much!

Sent! Would love to hear your thoughts after you watch.

Book 6 update:

I’m ~50% through my first pass of edits on the Battle of Mandalore. It’s a doozy! There is so much going on that is horrendously paced, so I don’t yet have enough to fully share the plan. I’m trying to break down everything in chunks to see what the various elements of the battle there are so I can restructure the whole thing. Currently, I have listed:

Arrival on Mandalore & entry into the base - I am planning on completely altering the whole “native Mandalorians” plotline. I thought it was incredibly distracting and added very little other than some cool-looking primitive armor sets. But overall, very forgettable characters that were tacked on at the last second and given a ton of forced dialogue. I am hoping to reframe all of this as occurring on Nevarro BEFORE they leave for Mandalore. The whole dinner and “boat” journey will act as an Intertribal council/Landsmeet where the various leaders intend to settle their differences and get on the same page before liberating Mandalore. Thankfully, the wastes of Nevarro look quite similar to the nothingness of the Volume setpiece of Mandalore… So with some crops and color grading, I think this might work, but not 100% sure yet. Might have to call an audible and replace it on Mandalore.

Ambushed by Beskar Imperials - Reframing this as our Mandalorians are overwhelmed and pushed back further into the base rather than the show presenting it where they absolutely annihilate the ambush and choose to go deeper.

Trapped by Gideon and Paz’s Last Stand - Restructuring everything here to make it actually make sense why Paz sacrifices himself.

Axe Flies to Space - This one is tough because Axe bails in the initial ambush, and he flies to orbit for SO long. It’s incredibly jarring every time we cut back to him in this plotline. Haven’t decided exactly how I’m going to handle this whole plotline of the TIEs attacking the capital ship just as Axe sends down reinforcements. I can guarantee you that I am not leaving it in the same order/context as the show though, it was extremely poorly executed there.

Bo-Katan Hides while Waiting for Reinforcements - I think it’s incredibly dumb how her squad enters the base, then exits the base and flies to a cave, then flies all the way back to the base and enters again. All the while… We have no idea what the Imperials are doing. Din is randomly wandering around and 1v1,000’ing the Imperials and Gideon while the entire attack force is hiding on a cave farm for 20 minutes. Restructuring all of Bo’s Squad’s movements here. They’re now losing the battle, flee from Gideon, escape into a heavily truncated cave section without flying away, and then will re-enter through the main hanger when the reinforcements join.

Din’s Capture and Break-out - Man, this is a bad sequence of events. Going to try to sync up some events to actually explain how Din breaks free of capture because it’s a huge eye roll why they randomly send him off “for interrogation” with only two lackey guards escorting him away. Makes no sense why Gideon considers him so important and does not oversee him whatsoever, and then freaks out when he escapes, somehow can’t track him down in his own base where there’s a perfect holographic GPS on his every move, then Din somehow wanders into the cloning center and… yeah.

Din Wanders Around - There is a huge chunk of time to solo Din walking around trying to find Gideon. It’s some decent action sets, so I don’t want to cut it, but I need to restructure and pace it differently. The whole timeline of the battle is completely thrown off by this segment. I just don’t understand what the Imperials are doing, there is no urgency whatsoever. No plan to address anything that is happening.

Gideon’s Clones - Maybe this will be a controversial call and someone can persuade me otherwise, but I am planning on cutting everything to do with Gideon’s clone army. It was my #1 worst part of Season 3 because of how shallow and glossed over it was, and Gideon’s rage reaction to their destruction is on my “Top 10 Worst Star Wars Dialogue” list. I thought his reaction was so comically over the top and out of nowhere that it completely took away from the battle with Din. I thought the show always hinted that Gideon was cloning in preparation for Project Necromancy and Snoke/Palpatine, not that he wanted to overthrow the entire Imperial Remnant by himself with his personal army of force-sensitive clones. It’s very easy to remove and I see no benefit to this random alteration at the last minute that has no resolution other than “Oh, look, I accidentally ran into some cloning tubes, let me blow them up real quick”.

Battle with Gideon - I think this is the best part of the whole battle, so I plan to simply do my classic acbagel frame-by-frame edit here.

Ending Sequence - This show ends so abruptly after the scene where Grogu saves them, and unfortunately, there’s not a ton I can do to change it. I’m still hoping to actually be able to show some of the space battle and have Boba join there as the reason the TIE’s aren’t obliterating everyone (seriously… where tf did they go? There are dozens to hundreds of ships in this base and we saw a ton fly to space and obliterate the Mando capital ship, and then they just vanish from the entire episode?) and also add Boba to the ending ceremony. I am planning to redo Armorer’s speech with some AI since I have a great model for her, but overall I just want to extend this sequence. Looking at options for how to slow it all down into more of a montage.

With all that said, I still need to cut 15-20 minutes out of the film, but I think that’s at a healthy place. Back to work!

As we’re ~12 hours away from Episode 4…

For those of you who liked the show so far, what are you hoping to see happen tonight? Which characters do you want to see in the spotlight? What are some plot developments you think would create more intrigue/excitement?

For those who haven’t liked it so far, what could they do storywise to turn ship for you? We’ve seen the production quality and that is what it is (not incredible, but not awful), so is there any way to recover your interest in the characters or plot?

I thought the flashback was a massive and unnecessary distraction and really took me out of the pacing of the first couple of episodes which I rather enjoyed, so I am hoping Ep. 4 can stay focused and deliver some genuine character connections here. Let me spend some time with our Jedi team, and give some well-written interactions between them. I didn’t like Episode 3 at all, but I thought it was the best-paced episode so far (aside from the lack of action sequences). I think the absolute worst thing they could do this episode would be to go back to the lighting fast pacing of Episode 1/2 and stay light on character development in favor of “we need to get this plot moving”. I feel like I’ve had very little time to connect with anyone yet, it’s like every scene is only the tiniest snippet of a person but I don’t actually know anyone.

Additionally, I think we really need to start seeing the Sith presence. I was hoping this show would tell the story from their perspective instead of making them the horror film monster that you barely see glimpses of… So I’m hoping the latter half of the show will bring one of them to the forefront. I think a very intriguing Sith could recover my interest, as we still have ~2.5 hours of scenes. Give me a good Sith movie and reasons to connect with the Jedi characters from here on out and I could become fond of it!

Hey, folks! I have successfully recovered and relinked everything from my SSD upgrade and drive reorganization. Nothing was lost and the project is back in action. As I began structuring the Battle of Mandalore, I made the Executive decision to cut Dr. Pershing. I put a lot of work into that episode so I still plan to release it sometime, might be a good “short film” watch to do between Books 5 & 6 in the future. But I desperately needed the runtime and it was way throwing off the pacing in general, so I feel much better about keeping Book 6 either right at or under 3 hours now. Going back into “full-scale” editing mode next week to get back to finishing this saga!

I will bounce back and forth between finalizing the Special Editions of the earlier books (this is simply enhancing SFX, double-checking colors, and adding Mando’a/consistent story elements as I alter Book 6), re-releasing Book 5 to match the events of Book 6, and completing Act 3 of Book 6 so I can prepare for the final release. Still waiting on some elements from the other artist I previously mentioned, so I want to tie at least the final Book 6 release into that and call this project COMPLETE! … at least until 2026.

In the meantime, if anyone has thoughts on how to improve Mando S3 E07 & E08 (the final two episodes), the time to share is now. Will be going frame by frame through everything over the next couple of weeks and completing this edit. So let me know if you have general or specific ideas for improvement. Once I have a solid game plan, I’ll drop my big-picture idea for it here as well.

Finally, I have gotten a few DMs about if I’m going to do an Acolyte edit. I will say, maybe. I think the show is begging for one, and I’m sure at least a dozen other people are going to jump in the mix to do it. So it depends on the timing, my interest as the season goes on, and if anyone else steps up to execute the same ideas I’ve had for it. I know I don’t want to touch it until we see more of the show’s episodic structure between the past and present because flashbacks could really change the plans in my head for it all. If you’re interested in my thoughts or reviews about the show, I have been writing detailed reviews of its lore and cinematic attributes here: Episodes 1/2, Episode 3.

Fullmetaled said:

What’s the latest on this, the project has been radio silent for a while now.

March 9th: "I’m not giving regular updates because I’m at the point where I’d like to wrap things up and prepare for the next stage. So, all I’m doing now is dialogue removal (a.k.a., making the actors not talk to match the cuts better), creating alternative shots and reactions, and removing blinking in case of reversed shots. It doesn’t seem too bombastic, but there are almost a hundred of these shots throughout the film. I’m just more focused on actually working on the film than announcing anything or engaging in discourse online.

I wish I were a millionaire with an unlimited budget and time to work on TOTM only, but the reality is far different. I’m one of the VFX artists who unfortunately lost their job due to recent strikes, so I have to take on a side project now and then just to survive and take care of my family." (a post on YouTube)

May 12th: Someone asked if the project was canceled in a YouTube comment, “No, no worries of that. I’m just quiet while working on the final VFX shots.”

June 8th: Someone asked on a YouTube comment, “Is this thing dead?” Pixel answered, “No!”

Thanks for the great review and feedback! I definitely agree with a lot of those points. This edit is ~3 years old now and I’d do some things differently now, so when I get back to re-editing my ideas I’ll be making many of the changes you suggested.

This is a difficult episode to break down. On the one hand, I barely even want to try because we clearly do not have enough information to explain the sequence of events, but on the other hand, the way these mysteries now hang in the air comes off to me as more confusing than intriguing. Overall, if asked, “Was this episode good for the show’s plot, and was it good for the larger mythos of Star Wars in general?” My answer to both of those questions would be a no.

Many fans didn’t like it, and while some can at least peer through the surface-level cultural criticisms and see the foundation of a mystery that might eventually have an interesting revelation, this show does not appeal to the masses and it will not be seen as a critical or financial success. Whether you enjoy it or not, the viewing numbers are not good for the premiere. 11.1 million viewers over 5 days is an abject failure. Ahsoka got 14 million over the same time with about half the budget of the Acolyte, and Disney wasn’t even satisfied with that performance. Yes, it’s D+'s “biggest premiere of 2024”, but have you looked at the competition? This is only their third show to launch this year, the others were “Echo” and “Renegade Nell”. That news line is an article title spun to create misleading good press for a D+ streaming platform that is hemorrhaging money and sprinting toward another quarter in the red. Iger has stated that their model failed to meet their goals, Star Wars has massively failed to bring in the money they expected it to, and we are seeing a product of that overall planning failure in the Acolyte. That does not at all mean that The Acolyte itself is “the worst thing Star Wars has ever done!!!”, I only preface this review to say that Disney tried something with many of these shows and it didn’t work financially. After Skeleton Crew and Andor S2 (maaaaybe Ahsoka S2) which are products of the old/current D+ model, we should expect to see something very different going forward for Star Wars.

Anyway, I want to focus on analyzing the episode itself now. I thought that some of the introduced ideas were fun to explore on paper, but in the episodic structure of this show, the execution of communicating such ideas was a mess and did not generate increased interest or emotion in me, and perhaps did the opposite.

Pacing and Structure

I was excited upon seeing the 44-minute runtime, as the brevity of the premiere was my primary criticism. I thought the overall pacing of Episode 3 was superior to the first two, however, even though I do generally prefer slower stories, I was actually left feeling sort of bored with this episode until the Jedi showed up. I’ll explain more in another category, but I was having trouble knowing who to empathize with or relate to in this opening 20 minutes, so the slow pacing left me feeling quite lost as to the intended direction of the plot. Overall though, I was actually pleased that this 44-minute episode felt like it had a story to tell in this designated timeframe, and it performed adequately at pacing the events throughout. I would have preferred a driving action at least 5 minutes earlier because the Witch stuff was somewhat offputting and made me feel uncomfortable, but once the Jedi walked in I could understand some of the setup.

The structure of the episode was a bit confusing. They left out scenes (intentionally, I believe) and presented situations that didn’t make any sense due to the information we were missing. Perhaps you can say this is an effort to generate intrigue for future episodes, but I would say that the sequence of events that unfolded did not make me more interested in learning what the revelations are, but rather they simply annoyed me because they seemingly painted other situations as nonsense. For example:

• Why does Mae hate the Jedi so much when it seems like they were quite willing to negotiate and Sol showed great empathy?
• Why does Torbin feel so much guilt when Mae was clearly the initiator of the violence?
• How did all of the Witches die so suddenly in the same place?
• What were all of the other Jedi doing during this very quick fire/destruction?

I fully expect answers to all of those questions and suspect our Sith figure has a significant role to play in all of this, but even brainstorming possible solutions with that in mind… I struggle to come up with answers that would justify all of these events. There would need to be some extremely high-quality writing to deliver on all of this setup and mystery. I feel worried about potential shallow and unsatisfactory revelations more than excited about the answers. I don’t think that’s an unfair caution I have, because thus far, none of the show’s revelations have given me any reason to think anything groundbreaking/mind-blowing is coming. We are ~38% through the entire show and I still have no idea what the direction is. Full flashback episodes are distracting in nature in general, and this seemed like it was intended at one point to serve as Episode 1, but then moved to Ep 3 due to anticipated backlash if it were to lead as the premiere. It felt very out of place in the episodic structure of the show as a whole.

Dialogue and Writing Quality

The dialogue quality took a complete nosedive in the episode. I would go as far as to say it is the worst dialogue I have heard in any singular episode of a Disney Star Wars show. The poem Mae and Osha repeat is extremely on the nose and awkward to listen to (we have heard it multiple times now, and it really violates the “show, don’t tell” rule), the Witch chant “The power of one! The power of two! The power of maaannnyyy!” was truly painful to listen to, and the worst offender in the episode, “You can’t stop me.” “Yes, I can.” “How?” “I’ll kill you.” was so poorly written I was completely 100% taken out of the scene. I understand a huge theme of the show is this dichotomy of light v dark represented in Osha v Mae, but the dialogue is so beyond elementary it is insulting how simply they are trying to communicate that to me. “The Jedi are good.” “The Jedi are bad.” “It’s not about good or bad…” This is middle school theater writing. I know that outside of Andor and some scenes in the OT, Star Wars has never excelled in this area to begin with, but this is a different level of low quality than even PT criticisms. As Mae and Osha stand on a collapsing bridge, the lines legitimately go, “What have you done?” “What have you done?” “What have you done?” Three times in a row back and forth… The rest of the episode was simply quite bland in this department, and certainly not enough to cover up the smorgasbord of poorly written and delivered lines.

The writing in this episode left us with way more questions than answers, which is strange for a 44-minute flashback. Usually, that is done to reveal mysteries, not create new ones. As I prefaced this review, this is the hardest section to cover because I genuinely cannot critique or praise many of the events because we have no clue why or how they happened. Things like the dead Witches, the character motivations, the Jedi guilt, Mae’s anger, how the fire spread so quickly, why the Jedi were even there in the first place, etc. are all unanswerable. I will leave these open for now and return when we have the proper context to address them as revelations unfold in future episodes. For now, let’s focus on three newly revealed storyline details.

• A sect of outcast force users (seemingly, EXTREMELY powerful/in tune with the force) band together to form a Witch “coven”. Some seem to have roots and history with the Nightsisters of Dathomir (hinted that they were exiled?), while others in the coven seem to have joined seeking refuge/safety as they delve into practices the “galaxy” doesn’t approve of. It is unclear if all of the women are force-sensitive, or if some are merely there in support of others who are. I find it hard to believe that so many force users went undetected as children and then all banded together in an extremely powerful coven without the Jedi intervening prior. We see humans, Nightsisters, Twi’leks, and some sort of rat-like lady in this coven, so for whatever reason these people have banded together without a common geographic origin. They aren’t Nightsisters themselves and with various species intermixing, I’m not even sure why they are all women. All we know is that together this group was apparently “hunted, persecuted, and forced into hiding,” however we are given no idea as to who did that. The Jedi…? Where/when/why was this randomly assembled coven shown to be such a threat to the Jedi? The Jedi never historically cared about the Nightsisters. As long as they stayed out of the way, they were free to practice whatever cultish beliefs they wanted to. Nightsisters traditionally worshipped “Spirits” rather than the force, rejected the light v dark dichotomy, and believed they communed directly with the beings of Mortis and drew their “Magick” from them rather than having a connection to an all-surrounding force presence. Obviously, they had a somewhat incorrect interpretation, but they still had great power, perhaps some even possessing power greater than the Jedi or the Sith (we saw this in TCW and the Jedi game series). Nightsisters were having their own biological children the entire time with the nightbrothers, and the Jedi weren’t preying on their entire species/people group, so I just didn’t understand where all of this “persecution” to “the brink of extinction” was coming from. Certainly not the main Nightsister clans, because they would never chase this group around the galaxy like the Mother indicates. I really don’t know what could be going on here. The Mother states that they have hidden away because “The galaxy does not welcome women like us.” Again, I was utterly baffled at this idea. The “galaxy” doesn’t give a shit about the Nightsisters or tiny sects of isolated Magick users… They never have. They have always let them live in isolation and practice their rituals in peace as long as it doesn’t disrupt the Republic. On top of this, the Mother is immediately previously shown very peacefully interacting with the local towns in peace, seemingly very welcomed by “the galaxy”. Not only was that oddly phrased, but certainly the persecution had nothing to do with them specifically being women. I am going to avoid the 2024 cultural discussion entirely, but I understand why people feel that they can read modern Earth politics into this. A simple, lore-accurate alteration to avoid this entire drama would have been, “The Jedi do not welcome into their Order Witches like us who use powers they consider to be ‘dark’.” Boom, done, none of the distractions are included, it’s true to Star Wars history, and it’s understandable why they wanted to leave the Republic where the Jedi commonly patrol. I don’t doubt Jedi would be uncomfortable around Magick users and conflict could potentially arise, but this “hunted to the brink of extinction” idea, I just don’t know where it’s coming from.

• The Mother has a unique perspective of the force, and I have no problem with primitive cultures like this coming to alternative understandings of the force, but I don’t understand what their philosophy even is. She claims that the Jedi “use” and “wield” the force, and portrays that as a negative way to commune with it. She then contrasts that with her Thread theory in a positive light, saying by “pulling it” you can “change everything”, “tie you to destiny”, and “bind you to others”. To me, that sounded exactly like “using” and “wielding” the force… Perhaps I am missing the future context of her beliefs, but I saw absolutely no difference between the two viewpoints and it came off as a different, yet equally exclusive and dogmatic belief. If anything, I would say that her views more closely align with the dark side than the light, as Jedi do not pull the force to intentionally “change everything” and “bind to destiny”, they commune with it in peace with all living things and work toward mutual good and order (ideally, speaking). Either way, Osha and Mae are trained in this alternative understanding of the force and we can see the results. Both are left unbalanced and struggling to maintain inner peace, which is not a good quality to have in Star Wars.

• Somehow, in a presently unrevealed manner, the Mother created life and implanted twins into her partner’s womb. It’s hard to comment specifically on this yet as we have no clue as to how she accomplished this, but what we can say is that this is beyond anything we have ever seen in Star Wars. It is a power always thought impossible. This is the time period in which Plageuis was experimenting with such powers and attempting to do this to create the perfect apprentice, but he failed. The force itself created Anakin to restore balance as it was, at that time, unbalanced due to the many manipulations and attempted usages of it for purposes it did not will for. So Osha and Mae being directly conceived by the Mother purely through the force is… confounding. We need more information to properly understand what happened here, so I will just say this has the potential to be problematic to lore, but not necessarily depending on where they go with it.

Overall, with these strange new practices and beliefs, I found the writing to be confusing and trying to seem complex when it truly wasn’t. It came off to me as pretentious and not building anything good upon Star Wars mythology. I love the Nightsisters and their religion of Magick, I love alternative beliefs about the force (the ancient Sith, the Rakata, the Zakuul), but this episode was just not well written in communicating a cohesive new understanding of the force in my opinion.

Production Quality and Creative Direction

The episode opens up on a beautiful and colorful setting. It invoked in me a sense of wanting to travel there and experience the galaxy full of mysteries, so I appreciated the design. I thought the sky and atmosphere looked great during the Witch ceremony, dark and purple hues definitely set a voodoo-like tone. The Witch coven building was nothing special, but it wasn’t intended to be. It gave off abandoned dam or mine vibes. The costumes here were okay, I thought it was a little strange for this persecuted and on-the-run group of Witches to have such perfectly coordinated and pressed robes… But I suppose one of them there is an excellent seamstress and they value having noble appearances and jewelry. Nothing wowed me other than the initial garden, but that old rat lady Witch was shockingly poor CGI. Looked absolutely atrocious. I would say that is unacceptably bad for a $180 million budget. I forgot to comment on it in my first review, but I am very disappointed by the soundtrack thus far. I have heard no standout tracks, and while it’s not distractingly bad or anything, I would say it’s the weakest I’ve heard from D+ Star Wars shows. I think TRoS had the worst soundtrack, and I’d put this in the same category of bottom-tier Star Wars music. I hope when the Sith shows up he will at least get things moving musically.

This episode was very focused on beliefs, culture, and identity, so I covered a lot of the creative direction in the Writing section. I would usually cover the combat and choreography here too, but there was none. Strange for the longest episode to not have a single fight scene, and even the only action at all was the 2 minutes of a fire spreading at a confusing rate. I think this episode was bogged down in trying to show the inner workings of the coven and the relationship between Mae and Osha that there wasn’t much room for anything else. I didn’t see anything here that stood out as expanding upon the High Republic era.

Performances and Characters

Again, Sol was the standout in the few scenes he was in. His actor portrayed great ranges of emotion and he continues to be the star of the show whenever he is on. The main Mother did a decent job with her voodoo-inspired performance, as well as translating her love to her children. Unfortunately, this episode was very bogged down by a distractingly poor performance from young Mae/Osha. I absolutely hate having to critique child actors, but this stood out to me as very badly acted and I have to point it out. From the lack of communicating Mae’s emotions believably, to the utterly confusing facial expressions and actions Osha was making at various events (the “I will kill you” and ensuing fire escape gave me major kid Leia in the forest vibes), I was unfortunately pulled out of believing the scenes due to some poor performances. No one else had enough screen time to even evaluate.

Finally, I want to address the characters from a perspective of who I felt like I should empathize with because I think this is one of the biggest missing components of this episode.

• Osha - She was the clearest person we can relate with here. She doesn’t like being boxed into having no personal choice, she wants to blaze her own path, and others keep pressuring her to conform. However, I was very much not understanding why she was so set on wanting to be a Jedi. Surely, for the past 8 years, she has been told that the Jedi are not her friends, so I don’t know how she got the motivation to leave her mothers and sister and family to join a group that she has been told hates her…

• Mae - From minute 1 of this episode, Mae is giving major child serial killer vibes. She is immediately shown to be torturing animals, extremely controlling and possessive of her sister, not free thinking and seeking approval of others, desiring personal power and respect, etc. She then tried to murder her dear twin in cold blood by locking her in a room and burning her to death. It’s beyond psychotic behavior. I thought this was a very strange route to take with her character, and this episode destroyed any sort of sympathy I had for her as an adult.

• Sol - Even though the Jedi aren’t portrayed in a great light here, we can empathize with Sol because he shows genuine love to the children. He is depicted as the Jedi with wisdom and care in this group whereas the others appear cold and stoic.

• Mother - I suppose we can empathize with her love for her children, but her wielding seemingly dark powers and creating life out of nothing is not something I empathize with. Everything I know about Star Wars lore points to this as a morally bad practice and one that the force itself will harshly rebel against. She leads a very black magic-inspired cult with incorrect views of the force and is just as intolerant of the Jedi as they are of her. If anything, she comes off as true neutral to me because she possesses basic decency toward others and is not entirely self-centered as we expect from Dark side users, but she isn’t someone to cheer for either. She seems to enjoy being worshipped and respected by her cult and speaks as though her word is truth, except only to her daughters.

Conclusion
Rating: 2.2/10 (I’d call it “very weak”, but not “horrible” or “unwatchable”)

Pros:

Another standout performance by Sol
Attempting to explore other views of the force
The worlds in day and night looked great

Cons:

Plot threads left open in a confusing, rather than intriguing, manner
Worst dialogue I have heard from D+ Star Wars yet, combined with bad deliveries
Newly presented ideologies are not internally coherent and do not align with the larger mythos of Star Wars

Best scenes:

1. Sol giving Osha his lightsaber
2. Sol testing Osha
3. Opening garden scene (purely for the setting)

Worst Scenes:

1. “I’ll kill you” Mae attempting to burn her sister alive (horrendous dialogue and awful characterization of Mae)
2. Witch “ascension” chant (extremely goofy looking, felt like a corny fantasy b-movie)
3. Bridge collapsing and dead Witches (these events were very confusing as they were playing out, and I was looking for any sort of explanation until the episode inexplicably ended with Mae in the garden looking for Osha. I know it’s a mystery, but mysteries have to be structured so that each clue and subsequent next question is a satisfying process, not a frustrating one)

Vladius said:

Acbagel said:

Watched the premiere last night, I think I called it pretty well to my expectations. The set design, color palettes, and feel of the worlds exceeded what I saw in marketing, I was pleasantly surprised with the environments, VFX, and characters for the most part, but there are indeed some glaring issues holding it back from being great. I think it will end up being a fine show, but unfortunately, Star Wars does not need fine. In fact, I would say fine hurts Star Wars at this point. They need big wins to restore some brand image. Is it fair to place that much pressure on The Acolyte? Probably not, but it’s reality, something has to come out to unify the fanbase if we want to see Star Wars stay at the forefront of the mainstream.

Why do we want that?

I made a number of different points here, so I’m not sure which one you’re asking about. Assuming the final sentence about Star Wars being at the forefront of culture, I think when it does that it’s proof of its outstanding and well-liked content. Star Wars has gone through many different periods of being a cultural phenomenon and it’s always produced great content in those eras. As a big fan, I want that to return because it means good shows/movies/games/stories and increases the probability of getting new and better content in the future.

The audience reviews for the Acolyte are very low so far. I disagree with a lot of what’s being said against the show, but overwhelmingly negative waves of reviews aren’t good no matter which way you frame it. That doesn’t bode well for investors pulling the trigger on future High Republic era shows or an Acolyte Season 2. Even if the criticisms aren’t fair and aren’t a direct critique of the Acolyte itself, but are instead a general protest against Disney, the money movers don’t make that distinction. They see: “Acolyte got bad reviews and had bad word of mouth online, it didn’t make enough money, scrap related future projects” compared to “Acolyte got great reviews, positive reception on social media, got us x # of new Disney+ subscribers, give us a season 2”.

I want Star Wars to be good/stay good. I think the Acolyte premiere was good, but a lot of people don’t (again, much of that is for alternative reasons, but money talks). I’d personally like Disney to focus on projects that have a higher chance of unifying the fanbase and possibly bringing Star Wars excitement into the mainstream of culture once again. I think the Acolyte is intriguing, but it’s not the project that will do that. Skeleton Crew is not going to do that. The Rey movie isn’t going to do that. Even Andor brings in only a segment of fans and won’t do that. I think a very faithful Old Republic adaptation story would (original Tales of the Jedi/KOTOR comic series), a post-RotJ Legends Luke animated show would, live-action Clone Wars movie with Hayden/Ewan/Ariana would, Darth Bane trilogy novel to film adaptation etc.

Maybe some people enjoy Star Wars becoming a bit more niche and having a split fanbase? If they do, I wouldn’t hold it against them if they are happy with how things are going and like the majority of content that’s released. But I’d like to see a return to widespread excitement. What project do you think would do that?

Watched the premiere last night, I think I called it pretty well to my expectations. The set design, color palettes, and feel of the worlds exceeded what I saw in marketing, I was pleasantly surprised with the environments, VFX, and characters for the most part, but there are indeed some glaring issues holding it back from being great. I think it will end up being a fine show, but unfortunately, Star Wars does not need fine. In fact, I would say fine hurts Star Wars at this point. They need big wins to restore some brand image. Is it fair to place that much pressure on The Acolyte? Probably not, but it’s reality, something has to come out to unify the fanbase if we want to see Star Wars stay at the forefront of the mainstream. The Acolyte does not appear that it will be that thing, but it’s certainly not a terrible show.

Pacing and Structure

The most glaring issue with The Acolyte is its pacing. The hyperspeed paced episodes seem crammed with short-form content, leaving little room for the story to flow naturally, for scenes to breathe, or for us to grow quick attachments to characters. It certainly has that “things are just happening” feel. This series’ potential is being massively held back by rapid and frequent cuts between A and B plots. Scenes often last only around 60 seconds before switching, which feels jarring and disjointed. This approach I suspect is an intentional move by Disney to maintain the action sequences and avoid the viewer drop-off experienced by previous series like Ahsoka and Andor, which received complaints of being “boring” or “slow” (not from me), but here in the Acolyte with a new timeline setting and brand new characters and an unfamiliar storyline, this rapid cut pacing ultimately disrupts the storytelling rhythm. I truly think that each episode was originally ~50 minutes and was chopped to hell in post-production to cut down to get to the action. I really do not like this kind of editing.

The structure of the premiere overall was poorly done in my opinion. Especially the endings to each episode feel extremely tacked on and do not flow whatsoever with character arcs. Very bad forced “hooks” that barely even function as hooks. This show does not want to be 30-minute episodic format, but I believe it was forced to be in Post.

Dialogue and Writing

The dialogue in “The Acolyte” is a mixed bag. While it does not fall to the level of being objectively terrible, it fails at delivering impactful and memorable lines. Fans of Lucas’ dialogue (I find myself strongly in this category, highly recommend watching this video to learn why: George Lucas: King of Wooden Dialogue) may find some nostalgic charm at times, but I absolutely understand why others might find it lacking in the depth that Andor possessed. At the very least, I am happy that this series avoids the contemporary lingo that plagued The Last Jedi and some of BoBF, but the lines here also don’t quite capture the epic feel that Star Wars dialogue is known for. It’s not a standout, but it’s not distractingly bad.

The writing of the plot is intriguing enough to keep my interest piqued, but not enough to impress me. Compared to some of the best show premieres (GoT, Lost, The Boys, House of Cards), this is nowhere close to being called “incredible 10/10!”, nor is it “absolute trash, 1/10!”. It’s a very middle-of-the-road plotline. It’s a simple murder “mystery” where we already know the murderer and some of her motivation, though I am positive there will be some twists here. The element of how the Sith play into all of this is the greatest hook the show has. We had some decent moments teasing this aspect, but it failed to build any tangible tension. I am interested in seeing where this goes, so it’s not bad writing, but I am certainly not on the edge of my seat wanting to rewatch and anticipating next week with great excitement. The prison escape on the ship, the crash, and some of the “infiltration” into the Jedi Outpost in episode 2 was quite weak in terms of writing, but there is at least intrigue with the relationships being developed, the Jedi investigation, and the looming Sith presence. However, someone watching this with no context of the timeline or what the Sith are will be feeling extremely bewildered I would imagine.

Production Quality and Creative Direction

Despite having a significant budget, The Acolyte still feels constrained creatively. There’s a palpable sense that Disney’s marketing team heavily influenced the production, resulting in a cautious approach that prioritizes accessibility over depth. The potential for a more mature and well-crafted narrative is evident but remains unfulfilled. This cautiousness likely stems from Disney’s desire to avoid another significant failure for the “Star Wars brand”, which is currently at a critical juncture for its profit margins. This leads me to feel like a lot of the creativity is stifled and stale. The VFX is good, not outstanding, but serviceable to bring you into the world. I was hoping that this era would feel more distinct, but I am at least pleased that I can say some of it felt like Star Wars. Props to the crew for being able to invoke a feeling that is extremely difficult to replicate. The costumes look a bit stiff, and I think that’s part of the point, but it doesn’t translate well for the point they want to make. You can make the Jedi give the vibe you’re going for without having every robe look like it’s oversized and pulled right off the press. Have to highlight a couple of great designs like the hyperspace droid chairs, the starship models, and the appearance of the Jedi Temple. I will say “No comment” on the pudgy Jedi…

Hope to see more of the High Republic’s uniqueness expanded upon in future episodes, but for now, I think we’re missing the worldbuilding needed to get people interested in these hundreds of years of potential storylines. The style of combat selected for creative purposes does seem to be at the forefront, and I was neither blown away nor disappointed by it. I prefer it to the absolutely atrocious fight choreography and shaky cam in BoBF, Ahsoka, and Kenobi, but it’s still nowhere close to Prequels combat scenes or even other large Hollywood productions (this show had a Dune-sized budget… it has to be judged at a high level). I dislike the constant pausing in the fights, that feels very unnatural, grabs a leg, freeze, lock eyes, start next sequence of choreographed moves. Nick Gillard was so intentional about making attacks look like they are intended to harm/kill, and the threat just doesn’t feel there at times in this show.

Performances and Characters

On a positive note, some performances, particularly by Sol, really stand out and add a ton of value to the series. He is a great actor and his emotions translated well to his character. He reminds me of an emotional Qui-Gon. Of course, Yord is not a character we are supposed to “like” per se, but I enjoyed his presence in the story and for an annoying character, he is the good type of annoying. Jecki is kind of just there, but also not annoying. Not sure if this is just me, but I thought the weakest character in the show was Osha. Found her to be quite bland and I am not at all invested in where her character goes yet. Indara dying so early felt like a bit of a waste…? I understand the deaths of these Jedi is the premise of the whole show, but it’s hard to build memorable characters when each new one is dead within 10 minutes of appearing for the first time in a 30-minute episode. We really, really need some preliminary worldbuilding before characters start dropping or beginning their main character arcs. Other characters like Vernestra, Mae’s accomplice, Torbin, not much to say… I think it’s a waste that we miss out on the depth of development for side characters. The best shows make you care about side characters and even create whole individual scenes around them. Again, this goes back to the bad pacing because you’ll never accomplish this in 30 minutes of total screentime. We need 50 minimum.

Conclusion
Rating: 6.6/10 (I’d call it “pretty good”, but not “really good” or “great”)

Pros:

Standout performance by Sol
Visually pleasing environments that feel alive
Retains elements of “Star Wars” charm

Cons:

Poor pacing and way too frequent cuts
Feels creatively constrained by forced mass appeal
Lack of depth to the main characters and a simple storyline

Best scenes:

1. Sol at the Jedi Temple (great emotion in the performance, resembled a true Jedi with his demeanor)
2. Mae’s interaction with the Monk Jedi (interesting power dynamic, creates intrigue for Mae’s revenge)
3. Confronting Mae’s accomplice (decent tension here, unsure of what would happen)

Worst Scenes:

1. “Sith” hook at the end of episode 1 (worse than 0 budget fan films I have seen)
2. Intercutting of Mae’s crash landing and Jedi coming to rescue her (A/B plots moving WAY too fast)
3. Osha’s vision of Mae (dialogue was WAY too on the nose and expository, “Brendok!” “Hello, SISTER!” the rhyme about them being twins. Show, don’t tell, people!)

rocknroll41 said:

My enthusiasm for this show keeps fluctuating, but the new cast interviews popping up have reignited my excitement, thankfully. Seems like a lot of passion was put into this.

I am experiencing this too. My excitement has jumped up and down week to week from a 3/10 up to a 7/10 or anywhere in between. Really not sure what to think. My suspicion is that the show will be better than the marketing material which hasn’t been a great depiction of the tone/setting. Usually, trailers/teasers/marketing get handled by a completely different team and the director has little to no say in what goes out, and the tone is lost in translation. I think that’s happening here. But I’m with you that I do believe we have a genuine love of the source material and story from the director and actors. That has been missing in past Disney Star Wars productions and was noticeable.

I am currently expecting this show to release decently well and have a 7.5-8/10 review, landing somewhere better than the below-average releases we have been getting recently but not peak Disney Star Wars.

Darth Sadifous said:

I know I would like to personally see a “completed” book five while you tinker with book six if you don’t mind. I think we all understand it may not be the final “product”. However, release things when you are ready and let us know if you need any suggestions in terms of structure or what not for book six. Anyways enjoy the rest of your weekend and may the force be with you!

I think I can manage to get Book 5 ready for release soon. It’s just one scene I can’t say I’m 100% certain on yet, but it might just be a couple of lines of dialogue I’ll change in the future so I’m going to move forward with prepping for release.

I needed a new local storage drive to contain all my files, and unfortunately, I messed up some of my source footage placement… I don’t believe I deleted anything permanently, I just didn’t realize where certain files were linked from and I “lost” them on the drive. As in I simply can’t find them. One of Boba’s segments I forgot I had exported separately and then reimported, so I’m trying to reconnect everything. I definitely needed more space and better organization, so this new drive was necessary, but I have been recently tied up trying to relink everything.

Other than that, not a ton of new updates on Book 6. The only major news to share is that I am now leaning toward once again cutting Dr. Pershing’s content. This movie is just getting too busy, and his story is such a distraction (though it’s individually well done) and every time I’ve reviewed an Act, it always interrupts the flow of the Mandalorians. By Book 6, I have too many characters as-is that need satisfying conclusions. Din, Boba, Bo-katan, and Grogu all get a spotlight in this movie, so to introduce Dr. Pershing AND conclude him here… It’s too much. I am heavily leaning toward cutting it, especially considering this movie is trending ~3 hours already, adding him in there is holding back the flow of the main characters. I may release the mini-film of his episodes as we’ve discussed here before.

Other than that, I have completed audio on a couple of previous scenes, but the next step is an intense dive into the Battle of Mandalore. I have to analyze this thing from top to bottom and see what I can do with it. Disappearing fleets, a base layout that shatters the space-time continuum, and plant-filled symbolic caves, oh my!

PS: What did you think of Tales of the Jedi/ Empire?

I disliked it. Episode 4 and the beginning of 5 were great, Grevious and Thrawn looked good, but other than that… Big no from me. Don’t want to bog down this thread as it’s off topic but I posted my review here: https://originaltrilogy.com/topic/Tales-of-the-Empire/id/116495/page/1#1588394

Hope The Acolyte is good! I haven’t read any of the High Republic material, so going in pretty blind. The marketing material has been hit and miss for me, but excited to give it a fair chance.

It’s a decent idea Starkiller, but I would say it doesn’t work fully because with a proper understanding of the force, we know that the future is always in motion. For Luke to have such confidence in Kylo’s future violates a very foundational aspect of what we know of the force, and I think this dialogue reads as Luke simply acting like an arrogant dolt who doesn’t understand how the force works rather than him being forced into a legitimate moral dilemma.

Him just saying that he knows Ben’s fate is sealed comes off as him being in great error about reading the force vision, which Rey immediately corrects and she seems in the right. I don’t think this fully solves the problem of Luke still being presented out of character.

TheDimitrios said:

Always good to see this is making progress!

Regarding Bad Batch I hope we get a show that follows up on those plot lines. If Barris happens to be in it as well, there could be a nice way to do a Dark Times fan edit of BB, TotE and that new show.
Fingers crossed.

Honestly, a film or two of “The Dark Times” based on some animated plot lines with TotE and TBB might be pretty cool. Would be a hell of a task to pull off, but I do think it’s possible to have a movie or two about the Republic --> Empire transition that doesn’t solely focus on TBB squad. Something to mull over perhaps. Want to keep focus on TWoM here, but feel free to post in my TBB thread if you have other thoughts on a structure for that.

Final update, I have been working with a professional artist on slightly updating the logo for this series and creating a very well-designed movie poster for it as well. Not necessary of course, but I have put so many hours into this project over the years, it felt appropriate to create that for the final release coming soon.

Darth Sadifous said:

Hey Acbagel, how are you enjoyed bad batch? Have you done anymore tinkering with the final book yet or taking a needed pause to recharge? By all mean take your time, but I’d be lying if I didn’t say I can’t wait for the final book this series (at least for now)!

Hey Darth! I did have a little bit of a break, took the family on vacation, had a huge event at work, and then have been working on two editing side projects as well (one relates to The Way of Mandalore and I’ll announce below). I also did indeed watch all of Season 2 and Season 3 of The Bad Batch + Tales of the Empire over the last three weeks, so that was a lot of spare time consumed but I like to stay relatively up to date with ongoing Star Wars stories. To be honest, I thought The Bad Batch peaked in Season 2 Episodes 7/8, the senate ones about the clone conspiracies. End of Season 2 was great as well, but I thought Season 3 went absolutely nowhere and didn’t wrap up any of the plots I was most interested in (Project Necromancer, the developments in the senate, the Clone Rebellions, Rex/Cody/Wolffe etc). So I was quite let down by the conclusion and ended up feeling like the whole series is a little bit pointless. I didn’t connect with the Batch or Omega at all, so I know they got a good story together but I thought they were by far the least interesting part of the series. Oh well, still might try to complete a movie edit one day…

So Book 6 update, I have spent a few hours going through Act 3 which is the battle on Mandalore. It’s not good, there was a lot of criticism about the nonsense structure of the base, starfighters completely disappearing, and very poor pacing, but some of the scenes are well made too (jet pack battle comes to mind). It’s been a lot to sift through looking for solutions. The first 2 hours of the movie are pretty much ready for a final polish check, but that last hour of the film is still a doozy to work out. I could release Book 5 updated right now, but I am somewhat worried I am going to have some idea in Book 6 that makes me need some scene from Book 5 or at least make me need to change a line or two so I’ve just been sitting on it… I might just drop it though as I’m still at least a month+ away from Book 6.

beachedwhale said:

I can see why it can be seen as a bit wordy, but as it is such a short scene I feel this takes the edge off of it. When imagining this taking place between two scenes I can see it not being so overbearing and giving it some substance as it is just a “travel” scene, but either way I think it’s a good job. The AI for Din is unbelievably great here! I like to keep the Skywalker inclusion as it shows with everything that’s going on Grogu is still on his mind.

I think there are a couple of instances where I can cut a word or two out, but I think we have to realize how much Din’s character is presented by season 3. He is VERY talkative compared to “peak Din” in season 1/2 that most people have in their minds. Not as many people have rewatched season 3 a lot, but he does indeed speak 2x-3x times more than in previous seasons. I look at it as part of his character growth in developing real relationships with people. As far as the mentioning of Skywalker, I have it integrated throughout the film that Grogu is still always on his mind and he’s constantly checking his pings to see if anyone from the academy has reached out because he wants to be with Grogu.

ildiem said:

Darth Sadifous said:

I like what you are doing with Boba, trying to integrate him into season three. The audio exchange isn’t completely there yet, but I definetly see what you are going for. I think less may be more. It seems a little too wordy as I know you are trying to sell the new plot through dialogue and insert in some legend’s material. Also, I would let the subtitles for the mando language stay on screen for slighly longer, they are a bit abrupt.

“Sorry, I can’t join you (just) yet. The Hutts are (already) showing interest in my territory. But I will be there when you need me.”

"Check again for a ping from Skywalker('s acedemy on Ossus).

I was thinking the same thing actually, no need for some of those words and phrases.

Acbagel, I feel like I remember seeing this somewhere, but have you already/do you plan on integrating Mando’a into your earlier movies? I can imagine it being pretty jarring otherwise, especially for someone like Boba to speak it since he hasn’t typically lived alongside Mandalorians.

Yes! So, announcement time… I have also been working on “Special Edition” releases of Books 1-5 with integrated Mando’a where appropriate, as well as tossing in more easter eggs throughout (akin to the ones I shared in Book 5/6 previews) plus adding new SFX in a number of scenes. Examples of that include recreating the SFX of the Armorer working on Din’s new armor in Book 1 (previously her hammers never made any sound, so I have reconstructed that whole scene’s audio track to make it actually sound like a sci-fi blacksmith), recreating the audio for Din’s final “flashback” of the Mandalorians saving him as a child etc.

Book 1 Special Edition is released now and in the folders I have previously sent. Will release the Special Editions of the others soon. Just been also trying to rewatch the whole series and make notes of little improvements to make. Also helps me brainstorm the right way to end the saga in Book 6 (for now). Post/DM if you want to see the films and do not have them.

The other side project has been starting my movie saga of The Boys, but I won’t go into detail about that here. I finished the first film of that, going to watch over the weekend and then make a thread and release that next week.

Thanks for checking in, hope to share more soon!

Keyan Farlander said:

The same for me, the new trailer was a solid improveemnt. I hope we get something like a 5-10 minute background video for this explaining what the whole series is about, the tone, before it airs. Something like, but for all the characters, or maybe an overview video from Headland herself?

This 2 minute YouTube video is from the official Disney+ Korea channel:

The Acolyte | Master Sol Lee Jung-jae Special Video

Honestly, this was the best trailer I’ve seen yet for the show. Wish we could get more character previews like this or what you mentioned as well. I think we are missing the background intrigue for this show, like we don’t even have a timeline placement for it yet. I guess it’s possible that could be a spoiler somehow that they’re keeping hidden, but part of the announcement for wiping away the EU was that Disney had a new plan for an organized and structured canon. We certainly didn’t experience that with the ST, no one (not even the directors) understands the chronology or placement for The Mandalorian/BoBF, and it seems like they’re just releasing projects flippantly without trying to work them into the star wars chronology.

The Acolyte has huge potential to bring interest into a structured High Republic era. I don’t like how the HR has gone with the out-of-order Phase 1, 2, 3 to begin with, but I think some background and structure would really help bring the interest in before release. I really, really want this show to succeed, I think it could launch a ton of interest into unique storytelling for this era. Just think the promo for it has been lacking a bit, but I like a lot of what I have heard from Leslye Headland in regard to Legends and her desire for character growth (though I am also concerned for just as much on the flip side for some of her comments). Either way, it’s all coming down to execution in 3-4 weeks. I am excited mostly for the concept of a new show in a new era, but very, very cautious with getting my hopes up.

daveybjones999 said:

So the new trailer for this show has dropped and it’s way better than the first one we get a much better sense of the stakes and the scale that the story is going to take place on. The action we see here looks better than the previous trailer as well. Also, it seems like the color grading is a bit better and we’re seeing scenes with more desaturated colors and a better sense of characterization. So the trailer makes me way more hopeful for the show, but there’s still something that feels missing and I’m not sure what it is.

Agree on this one, new trailer did a much better job than the first teaser. Made me a little bit more hopeful for this project. I disagree with a lot of the criticism online about this, and while I don’t think it looks great, I remain slightly optimistic about this story. Something does still feel off about it though! I don’t feel “High Republic” setting when I watch. It looks like a very sterile hollywood production, but I’m open to being wrong about that once we start seeing full episodes.

Very disappointed by the storyline decisions this time around. To the point where I was actively hating every second of watching Episode 6.

Visually, they have mastered their craft. The art style and thematic depictions are top-notch, probably the best we’ve ever seen in Star Wars animation.

Nothing wrong with Elsbeth’s episodes, other than I find them to be somewhat… pointless? I guess it provides a little bit more context for her appearance in Mando, and some of her attitude in Ahsoka. But when you have an entire universe of characters to choose from to tell 40 minutes of high-quality visual storytelling, I am not exaggerating when I say I could name 200 other characters I would have rather seen get the spotlight than Elsbeth. Her arc here just doesn’t mean anything at the end of the day. Grievous was the highlight of her episodes, followed up by Thrawn. Overall, very mediocre plot with great visuals and thematic presence. 6.2/10

Episode 4 starts incredibly strong with Barriss adjusting to a new life in the Empire. The pacing was as good as it can be in a 15-minute timeslot, and everything here was pure setup potential. Episode 5 appears to start to deliver on this with a very dark and compelling opening scene, but wow does it go off the rails. All of the setup from the previous episode gets tossed out the window, and we get example #100 of dark sider turns good. I just really can’t fathom how that decision makes sense in the second half of the episode. Then 6 just completely lost me from the very premise, to the point where I actively disliked watching it anymore. The Sister gets just as much focus as Barriss, the stupid stab through the chest doesn’t kill people trend, she ALSO turns light, Barriss looks 50 years older but the Sister hasn’t aged a day? And what a tease of Vader for absolutely nothing. That was by far the most interesting premise in the entire show, yet we don’t get anymore than the trailer. Visually still looked great, but I strongly disliked the storyline choices to the point of not even enjoying watching it and now having to try to wipe it from my mind, so a 2.3/10 for me on this arc.

I was a huge fan of Tales of the Jedi, but Tales of the Empire really, really dropped the ball for me. The title of the show barely even makes sense… The Empire was not the focus at all, and at least half the show is set in a time period where the Empire doesn’t even exist. Just very confusing directing decisions, and I left feeling like at best this is simply not worth watching because it adds nothing to the saga other than an improvement in visual effects, and at worst feeling like I disliked it so much I’m going to pretend it doesn’t exist in my headcanon. It gets a 3.1/10 overall from me and I would not recommend it to anyone unless you view it as a tech demo for what the future of Star Wars animation could be.

This final episode of Season 3 in the “Bad Batch” series certainly had its moments, but as a conclusion to the season and the entire show, it left much to be desired.

Throughout Season 3, we were treated to an improvement in storytelling compared to previous seasons, with intriguing subplots hinting at deeper narratives and a lot less random unconnected filler. However, Disney’s tendency to wrap up entire arcs in single episodes rears its head once again, leaving many of these promising storylines unresolved.

From the repetitive rescue mission involving Omega to the lack of consequence for the Bad Batch members, the show as a whole failed to deliver the stakes it initially set up, and this finale episode kind of embodied that. Despite the illusion of danger, no significant character deaths occur, and even Crosshair’s injury feels inconsequential in the grand scheme of things. We are barely even given a moment of him dealing with it, physically or emotionally.

The subplot involving the Kaminoans and their supposed contingency plan is introduced but never fully explored, leaving me wondering about its significance. Similarly, the rushed resolution of Project Necromancer feels forced, with Disney’s insistence on including it seemingly motivated solely by retroactive continuity for the sequel trilogy.

The appearance of characters like Wolffe, Cody, and Rex teased potentially compelling storylines that are ultimately left unfulfilled. Their lack of involvement in the finale feels like a missed opportunity, especially considering the setup for their inclusion earlier in the series.

Even beloved characters like Scorch are given lackluster exits, further adding to the disappointment. Tarkin’s sudden authority to shut down the Emperor’s project feels out of place, and his decision to reallocate funds to the Death Star’s construction contradicts established canon.

While this episode may have its merits on its own in terms of great tension building, incredible visuals, fun action sequences, and ultimately an emotionally happy ending, as a finale to Season 3 and the “Bad Batch” series as a whole, it falls short of expectations, leaving many loose ends and unresolved plot points in its wake. 6.7/10 finale episode, 6.3/10 for the series as a whole.

Sirius said:

Hey Smudger, I’d like to make a suggestion. Do you think it would be a good idea for you to “create” an ending for this third film that had more of an ending feel? Perhaps it is possible to produce an ending that gives at least some kind of answer to all the unresolved plots, even if they are vague answers, repurposing scenes that were discarded from its three edits. It doesn’t have to be anything extravagant, just something that gives a sense of conclusion.

For example, from what I understand, you will cut the Teth arc. But maybe it would be good to show a scene from this arc at the end, just to imply that Rex’s clone cells are still organizing themselves and will continue fighting against the empire, or something like that.

When Omega, as an adult, looks at Tech’s glasses, just before leaving Pabu, maybe it would be cool if she had a flashback at that moment to something Tech taught her, maybe even something that was motivating her to fight for the rebellion. Or maybe at this moment, make her have a touching memory with all the members of Bad Batch, as if it were her actually saying goodbye to the group. Since you left a lot of filler scenes out of the three seasons, perhaps this would be a good time to use one or more of those scenes that are inspirational, something that makes her remember fondly the moments she spent with them.

Maybe some changes like these will give the ending more impact, I don’t know.

I definitely support this idea too. Honestly, the ending was so simple and standard it makes the whole lead-up adventure barely seem worth a watch, unfortunately. It really needs something more if it’s going to pack any sort of punch. Lots of dangling plot threads, characters introduced and leave for no reason, even the whole premise of the final arc being rescuing Omega for the 27th time in this show… Kind of disappointed. It wasn’t bad by any means, but not good either. Would be in support of a radical re-edit for the ending.