‘The Acolyte’ Episode Eight Recap: “The Acolyte”

*Warning: the following article contains major spoilers for episode eight of The Acolyte*

Well, we have finally reached the tail end of The Acolyte, with an episode aptly titled “The Acolyte,” and the results are…mixed? It wasn’t as terrible as the third and seventh episodes, but it’s also nothing to write home about. Surprisingly, though, the finale has the best-looking cinematography and sharpest match-cut of the entire series, where Osha (Amandla Stenberg) and Mae’s (Amandla Stenberg) cross-kick are intercut with Qimir (Manny Jacinto) and Sol’s (Lee Jung-jae) lightsabers in an X-formation.

When this happened, I cheered. This type of juice is what Star Wars desperately needs, alongside an incredibly kinetic duel between Osha/Mae and Qimir/Sol. On that front, director Hanelle M. Culpepper more than rose up to the task to at least end the show on a high rather than do it on a whimper. However, and as much as showrunner Leslye Headland promised nothing would happen, The Acolyte can’t escape two meaningless cameos of Darth Plagueis and Yoda, both in wordless appearances, adding zero texture to what previously occurred in the show other than having the audience do the Rick Dalton pointing meme.

The rest of the story isn’t too enthralling either, though it comes in splashes of interest, especially when Osha starts pulling into the Dark Side when Sol reveals that he did kill their mother (Jodie Turner-Smith). Instead of letting him talk and explain what happened, as he did with Mae, Osha force-chokes Sol to death, without even using her fingers until the bitter end. This moment is incredibly potent, especially regarding how Headland smartly reverses the protagonists’ main traits: Mae was seduced by the Dark Side but ultimately saw the light, while the very light corrupted Osha she thought protected her.

I think it’s an interesting conceit that honestly deserved further development because all this does is set up the main conflict for a second season instead of satisfactorily wrapping up the arcs that were introduced this season while teasing what’s to come. There is an incredible shot of Osha’s blue lightsaber slowly turning red as the Dark Side fully corrupts her soul, but it isn’t enough to entice us to want to watch a second season.

Then there’s the whole side arc involving Vernestra Rwoh (Rebecca Henderson) arriving at Brendok to apprehend Qimir, but The Stranger has left with Osha. Mae is the only one who has remained and goes to Coruscant with the master, who reveals that Qimir was her apprentice before he turned to the Dark Side. That’s a neat twist, but we rarely spend time with her during the series, so it doesn’t register as important to the episode as it should be. Even when she visits Yoda to tell her about all of this, it has zero emotional impact on the story at hand because we never spend enough time with the protagonists.

After this scene occurred and the show cut to the credits, I wondered if I truly liked The Acolyte. Of course, there were some great episodes, such as the fifth one. But did it amount to something tangible and have characters we could latch onto from beginning to end? Unfortunately, most side characters die before they can do something or anything or are used to subvert expectations immediately. I didn’t care about any of them, minus Sol since he had the most development. But even well-portrayed characters like Osha and Mae (Stenberg is a fantastic actor) couldn’t work with a script that is undercooked in virtually every aspect.

The fight scenes are certainly cool and give a unique flair to Star Wars that we’ve never seen before, but that shouldn’t be the main draw. The Acolyte should primarily be about its story and characters, but Headland immediately wants to subvert expectations before its story has a chance to take off. It doesn’t work like that, and this insistence on doing so ultimately falters the show, even if it has a few good episodes. It’s a shame because I was very much looking forward to seeing this new vision of Star Wars on screen, but it, unfortunately, is yet another hollow cog in the Disney machine, having no idea what to do with one of the biggest intellectual properties in the world. The force is not strong with this one.

All episodes of The Acolyte are now available to stream on Disney+.