Star Wars: The Acolyte … Not Your Skywalker’s Star Wars This Is (and That’s A Good Thing)

The Acolyte begins with a stranger approaching a Jedi Master Indara (Carrie Ann Moss) in a local cantina and challenging her to a fight which is choreographed nicely, setting the tone for the show. After Master Indara is killed, the scene shifts to the Jedi Temple on Coruscant where the news of Master Indara is relayed to Master Sol, who is informed that the suspected assassin is Osha, who he rescued after her family and planet were destroyed and became of his Padawan who left the Order years before and is now a mechanic on a Trade Federation cargo ship.

Next, Jedi Knight Yord Fandar and Master Sol’s Padawan Jecki Lon arrive on the Trade Federation ship and arrest Osha, accusing her of murdering Master Indara. Osha, willing to prove her innocence, willingly surrenders and is placed on a prison ship for transport back to Coruscant but a mutiny by some of the prisoners leaves Osha stranded on a planet, as Master Sol is permitted to go search for Osha and bring her back along with Yord and Jecki. After finding Osha alive, they receive word that another attempt on a Jedi Master has occurred and that the assassin once again fits Osha’s description. This leaves both Osha, who has already had a vision that her twin sister is alive and Master Sol to believe that somehow Mae, Osha’s twin also survived, and has turned down the path of the Dark Side. The four are too late to prevent the death of Jedi Master Torbin, who poses more of a challenge for Mae to kill, which she doesn’t really, only providing the means and the motivation to end his suffering.

With this death, it is hinted that there is some connection between Masters Indara, Torbin, Sol, and the Wookiee Jedi related to the death of Osha & Mae’s family and planet, for which Mae has become an Acolyte of the Dark Side for revenge.

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The first two episodes, while not much happens, does set up the series in a good way while leaving questions to be asked and be answered as the plot builds over the eight episodes. The characters are likable, although the franchise trope of “twins” seems a bit played out, but hopefully, as the series continues it will not become too much of a distraction.

Master Sol, played by Squid Games star Lee Jung-Jae, is excellent as the brooding Jedi Master looking for answers and redemption for his past failures.

Amandla Stenberg does a good job of playing Osha and Mae and shows the difference between the two sisters when Osha tries to impersonate Mae to get information from Mae’s operative.

Charlie Barnett, as Jedi Knight Yord Fandar, is one of the standouts of the show as the Jedi Knight ready to prove himself to his Master. Fandar seems to be over-eager at times and willing to take the hard line against Osha, whom he knows from their time together as Padawans. Fander also gets the honor of delivering the classic Star Wars line, “I’ve got a bad feeling about this,” which is always great to see worked into the script.

Padawan Jecki Lon is the mechanism for which the few moments of humor are interjected into the story, and it helps break the tension, refocus the group, and set the tension to build back up, moving the story forward.

Hopefully there will be flashback scenes as the connections between the four Jedi Masters in revealed, so Carrie Anne Moss’s Master Indara, Dean-Charles Chapman’s Master Torbin, and Wookiee Jedi Master Kelnacca can be further explored with screen time. It will also be interesting to see the role Master Vernestra Rwoh will play going forward as she is the only character that has appeared in the previous High Republic series and has a connection to the events of the destruction of the Starlight Beacon by the Nihil.

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The first two episodes do a great job of establishing what the High Republic has become, but also that there is some Dark Force threatening to bring it down.

One minor disappointment was that the pilot didn’t open with the Star Wars scroll… It would have been nice to see mention of The Battle of Jedha, The Nihil, the destruction of the Starlight Beacon, or something that gave more definition to what the High Republic Era is, but at least it did have the classic camera pan down from space to the planet surface.

The many nitpicks that have been pointed out (what no Yoda? He’s is hanging out with the kids over in The Young Jedi Adventures, I believe) some are justified such as some weak writing in spots (such as how the prisoners who mutinied were caught but they didn’t bother to check the planet for survivors), but as a whole the series looks to be a slow burn that will have a big payoff worth the wait.