So a girl comes in to a bar…unless you’ve heard this already. She navigates her way through tables full of various and sundry extra-terrestrial patrons till she is facing off against someone in Jedi robes. However, these fights would not be familiar to any Star Wars fans. It’s like an episode from a Hong Kong action movie that also has some Star Wars elements – people throwing punches and parries but they’re increased by the powers of Jedi which involve blocking and throwing each other with invisible force. And the show starts with it all—precision-choreographed Force-fu that proceeds almost without any one of them reaching for lightsabers. You can’t deny how strong this opener is—it grabs you by the throat like Darth Vader’s Force choke, making it clear who is behind all this mayhem — Leslye Headland. We are talking about The Acolyte Movie.
In fact, Russian Doll creator once pitched The Acolyte as Frozen meets Kill Bill, so we can see Quentin Tarantino’s influence right away – he must have known that House Of Blue Leaves would come back to haunt him one day. In this case though, masked assassin Mae (Amandla Stenberg) embarks on her own roaring rampage of revenge making sure that some select group among Jedi have joined the family of Ghosts before their time was due to end. Its intentions are foggy at best which makes it quite different from others and even though several other Star Wars shows might have dipped a toe in their morally ambiguous waters, it feels weird having a lead character who openly kills people because she feels like doing so. On another note though, none of these Jedi are much more than your typical Star Wars types really except theirs hold themselves up much higher than others do; cynicism versus those traditionally noble lightsaber knights.
This is the first screen property set entirely apart from the Skywalker saga, The Acolyte unravels its storyline just one century before The Phantom Menace, unfolding in the twilight of the High Republic era when the Jedi are at their strongest. From flinty-eyed masters Indara (Carrie-Anne Moss) and Sol (Squid Game’s Lee Jung-jae), through Force Wookie Kelnacca (Joonas Suotamo), Jedi jobsworth Yord (Russian Doll’s Charlie Barnett) and eye-rolling Padawan Jecki (Dafne Keen), there is something else to these golden-robed ascetics – a slight sense of darkness that distinguishes them from what we have come to think of as protectors of peace and justice. It’s not merely refreshing textural change; it paints an authoritarian air around these Jedi, who are portrayed as an arrogant, heavy-handed organization in desperate need of a reality check.
This all greatly contributes to making the show’s central premise work. Mae is sort of cast as a villainess at first, but pretty soon we see that she knows exactly what she wants and when more details about her past filter in — this is why episode two was so powerful—maybe her grudge isn’t entirely unfounded after all? Out of everything unique to the High Republic compared with other Star Wars periods, however, one thing stands out – most Jedi were/are dicks.
For those who have already immersed themselves in the High Republic series through various related novels and comics, the familiarity will not really be new; it may also include familiar faces like Vernestra Rwoh (Rebecca Henderson), a Jedi of Mirialan origin with greenish skin. However, while one might not get used to the shininess of this hardly ever shown galaxy (which is something between dirtiness during the Original Trilogy era and perfect cleanliness of the Prequels’ time), its livery remains typically Star Wars: there are Trade Federation remnants left Neimoidians (no more offensive speech for them!), new Pip the pocket droid merchandise line comprises cross between tricorder and lunchbox, and we are taken into a coven of Force Witches not dissimilar to, but different from Ahsoka’s last seen Nightsisters from Dathomir. The implications for an environment that has changed but feels similar are many. This is unfortunately true to some extent.
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