Opinion The Acolyte’s 15% Audience Score Is Embarrassing, For The Audience Scorers

https://www.forbes.com/sites/paultassi/2024/06/16/the-acolytes-15-audience-score-is-embarrassing-for-the-audience-scorers/

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While Star Wars has had many controversies in the Disney era, viewers have now mobilized a fleet of TIE bombers to obliterate user scores of The Acolyte wherever possible, namely on Rotten Tomatoes and IMDB.

I previously reported that this started up right at release, as The Acolyte quickly became the lowest audience-rated Star Wars project besides the infamous Holiday Special. Now, its former 33% score has dipped below the Special’s 20% score, and is all the way down to 15%.

At a certain point, this is just absurd, and it says a lot more about the viewers than it does the quality of the show itself, which has barely even gotten started, now just three episodes in.

No, I am not going to entertain a debate that this is not review bombing. A 15% score is barely more than a third of the last most controversial Disney Star Wars project, The Last Jedi. Nothing is even close except that Holiday Special. On IMDB, it’s even easier to see. A full 54% of all reviews are 1 star, giving it a 3.6/10.



There’s also how fast this happened. For instance, Ahsoka only has 5,000 reviews in on Rotten Tomatoes after being out for months while The Acolyte has aired three episodes in two weeks and has 10,000 reviews in. The last season of The Mandalorian only has 2,500 reviews in. The beloved Andor, 5,000 reviews total, years later.

Rotten Tomatoes has previously tried to curb review bombing in the wake of what happened with Captain Marvel’s release, “verifying” people had watched the movie before reviewing. But there has been no way to enforce such a system with TV, so here we are.

Why is this happening? There are a bunch of dimensions to this, and none of them good. There is absolutely a racial and gender component to this. A clip from star Amandla Stenberg about “making white people cry” was shared tens of thousands of times online, taken out of context from an interview years earlier about her film The Hate U Give. Showrunner Leslye Headland has starred in many YouTube thumbnails lambasting the “woke” nature of the series, but also it allegedly “breaking canon.”

This is the main reason for the surge since episode 3 aired, where fans (“fans”) believe the show has broken canon or destroyed the lore of Anakin Skywalker by implying that like Anakin, the twins are a “virgin force birth.” Anakin was conceived purely through the force alone, part of his “chosen one” mythology. And now they say that’s happened again, ruining everything.

The problem is…we simply have no idea if that’s true, even if that’s what everyone is assuming after last week. Specifically, while they say the girls “have no father” it is implied that their mother did something unnatural to create them, which would not be a “spontaneous force baby” situation. Dark side meddling? Witch magic? Cloning? We simply don’t know yet, but that has not stopped fans from leaping to conclusions and saying that in three half hour episodes the series has destroyed 50 years of canon.

There is also pushback about the portrayal of the Jedi as…not great, acting as space cops rounding up force-sensitive kids to test and train, not by abducting them per se, but you know, luring them away from their families for “their own good,” which is what happened to Osha, and sparked the events that led to the death of her family and community. Of course, the concept of the Jedi as rulers has dealt with this topic many times over the years, most famously in the prequels where the arrogant, clueless Jedi council’s actions, or lack thereof, directly led to the Imperial takeover of the galaxy.

The 15% score is embarrassing. Not for the show, but for those review bombing it to a frankly laughable degree. I’m not even The Acolyte’s biggest fan, as the first two episodes I didn’t love, though I thought episode 3 was more interesting. But the worst Star Wars project by an order of magnitude in the history of the series? And it just so happens to be one mostly starring black women? This whole situation is a parody of the modern toxic fanbase of the series, and if you want to disguise it as being upset about “canon” than it shows a distinct lack of understand of both the material of the show and the wider universe. You can critique a show, sure, but overwhelmingly, that is just not what’s happening here, and it goes well beyond that. While we have seen many things like this happen with Star Wars fandom over the years, I can’t help but feel like it’s absolutely getting worse.

 

[Pentex]

But the worst Star Wars project by an order of magnitude in the history of the series? And it just so happens to be one mostly starring black women? This whole situation is a parody of the modern toxic fanbase of the series, and if you want to disguise it as being upset about “canon” than it shows a distinct lack of understand of both the material of the show and the wider universe.

"Reeeee! You can't heckin' dislike this shit writing! It has black women in it!"

*Me stepping over the Kafka-trap*

 

[Harvey Danger]

I remember back when the prequels were shit, Star Wars fans insisted I was obligated to watch them and at least try to like them "because it's Star Wars, dude!" Nope. I don't have to watch shitty movies.

I can agree with the general premise that you can't properly criticize or hate a show unless you've watched it. But nobody has the obligation to watch it, and if it's so bad you drop out during the first episode, that's still grounds for a bad review.

What this article ignores is that there are now many ways to get at the heart of corporate slop like this without watching the entire thing. You can watch an extended preview, you can listen to extensive cast and director interviews, or you can watch huge chunks of it from other reviewers.

I hate-watched the episodes through the EFAP crew's watchalong, it's like MST3K but caustic instead of funny. That means I technically didn't watch every second of the episode, because they cut out 15 second chunks just to keep things moving, and constantly talk over audio. But when something particularly dumb happens, they play a 5 second clip (copyright compliant) to highlight it. So I feel confident in leaving a bad review, even if I can't be "verified" to have watched it, even if I didn't get every second of the terrible dialog and retarded plot.

Anyone who has seen a significant part of episode 3 can recognize this as shit. I could give a meaningful critique about every aspect of the pacing, story, fight scenes, characters, lore, etc, and yes it might sound similar to what the EFAP type reviewers are saying. But that's not "review bombing", it's as much engagement as this garbage deserves, and as good a reflection of the review score as needed.

 

[Sneedenhagen Chew]

Also, did they realise what they were doing by creating a story about fatherless black kids?

I wanted to say "WRITTEN BY: A white chick and a gay Jewish man," but I'm pleased to report I did some googling and the showrunner is a white Jewish lesbian, which ticks all of the boxes in a much funnier way.

 

[Starved Artist]

Finally watched it.. Like all things these days, it's nowhere near as bad as people are complaining about; The rey movies are infinitely worse due to the irredeemable character assassination of Luke. Pretty much every "Serious nitpick" and "Honest criticism" of the Acolyte is a third party Disney issue or something that has been seen in the comics and novels, that the complainers didn't read. Now, the irony comes from the fact they said they weren't going to touch anything from the novels and comics. 10 years into the Disney buy out and suddenly , Blue Boy , Grey Jedi and Murderdroids are taking center stage.

 

[Echo_Ender]

They literally turned "A near-extinct Order of Space Wizards with laser swords tries to save the galaxy from tyranny" into

"A coven of diverse Lesbian space-witches use Wiccan Rituals to impregnate each other."

Kathleen 'The Unfireable' Kennedy has her "The Force is Female" fingerprints all over this shit.

It's so bad that it borders on parody at this point. I'm waiting for them to start having Trans force-users "Channeling the force" to transition.

 

[AnotherPleb]

Kathleen 'The Unfireable' Kennedy has her "The Force is Female" fingerprints all over this shit.

If she can't have it, nobody can.

 

[William Murderface]

Disney are fucking retards

They literally bought a franchise with a built in rabid fan base and an entire prewritten expanded universe. Literally all they had to do was make films and series, and make them as close as possible to the lore already there and the star wars nerds would be fighting each other to be the first to give them all of their money. Instead they've gone after an audience who don't care about the franchise and aren't going to start, and pissed off said rabid fans.

Not just that but the entire reason they bought Marvel and LFL was because Disney had the little girl audience already locked up with their Disney Princesses and had nothing to capture the little boy audience. So they buy comic books and Star Wars...and promptly turn them into Girl Power! properties kicking the boys to the curb which was the entire point of buying them in the first place.

Decades from now Disney will be the subject of entire courses in MBA programs of how to shoot yourself in the foot.

 

[Harvey Danger]

Kathleen 'The Unfireable' Kennedy has her "The Force is Female" fingerprints all over this shit.

It's extremely blatant. In episode 3, the lesbian space witch leader describes the Thread, the thing that ties everyone and all of existence together:

"Some call it a Force, and claim to use it. But we know the Thread is not a power you wield... Pull the Thread, change everything... what the Thread has tied together, no one can separate."​

They basically say the Jedi are too aggressive, that even the name "Force" is too aggressive. It takes lesbian space witches to understand you just nudge the ties that bind everyone together, to change destinies in a softer way. They are literally describing a female approach to the Force, in opposition to the regular way the franchise views the Force, saying that way is essentially too male.

All of this is extra retarded, because 5 seconds later the head witch shows them how to use the Thread/Force as a weapon. She even knocks over two kids as punishment. Then a scene later she nearly kills a Jedi padawan with the Thread/Force.

This is not just the usual Current Year ideological bullshit, it is inconsistent even with its own claims about itself. This is objectively bad writing, made worse by the bad content of the show and the bad intentions of the writers.

 

[Overly Serious]

Finally watched it.. Like all things these days, it's nowhere near as bad as people are complaining about; The rey movies are infinitely worse due to the irredeemable character assassination of Luke. Pretty much every "Serious nitpick" and "Honest criticism" of the Acolyte is a third party Disney issue or something that has been seen in the comics and novels, that the complainers didn't read. Now, the irony comes from the fact they said they weren't going to touch anything from the novels and comics. 10 years into the Disney buy out and suddenly , Blue Boy , Grey Jedi and Murderdroids are taking center stage.

I've not watched it (and therefore not reviewed it as that would be unethical), but perhaps you can answer the one question I have about it as I've been unable to get an answer out of anybody for this.

There's a floaty jedi dude who one of the twins wants to assassinate but she can't because his Force powers prevent her touching him, hitting him with weapons etc. My question is actually this following bit: she buys some poison which he then drinks. Why does he drink it? How does she get him to? The clip I saw he's just holding it and drinking it and nobody has explained to me how she gets him to.

 

[Jet Fuel Johnny]

>Show shows fire in space as a campfire
>Fans complain
"YOU JUST DON'T GET IT! REEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!"
>Shows stone and metal temple burn down from fire
>Fans complain
"YOU JUST DON'T GET IT! REEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!"

When your series can't even get FIRE right, hang it up.

The funny thing is, you know that the Prequels made ol' Kat Kennedy think she was the driving force behind Star Wars and could have done it even better if it wasn't for all those pesky men. If only they'd listened to HER and let HER make the movies, they'd be even better.

Of course the Sequel Trilogy failed. Disney forced her to rely on MEN.

Now her stuff is failing and that can't be right.

It must be THE MEN!

It's fucking hilarious.

 

[Otterly]

A female protag, especially if queer and colored, cannot be flawed at all. And you are not supposed to subject her to true hardship or dire predicaments in order to let her "learn her lesson".

This is something that I hate because it makes female protagonists DULL. A decent heroes journey should be possible for both sexes. Even Jane Austen wrote female heroines who get slapped for their flaws and then rebuild as a better women before they get the man. Lizzy Bennett’s pride means she almost torpedoes not only her own happiness but her sisters as well, and it’s only when she realises this and engages in some pretty scathing self recrimination that she can make amends.

You know, in a franchise that was historically aimed at boys.

I’m sure it was, but I grew up around the time the first movies were released and things weren’t so aimed at just one sex then. We all enjoyed Star Wars, I don’t remember things being so princess vs trucks in those days.

They basically say the Jedi are too aggressive, that even the name "Force" is too aggressive.

Funny fact: the police in the uk have had the same thing happen to them. Calling them the police force is too aggressive so now they’re the police service

just nudge the ties that bind everyone together, to change destinies in a softer way.

Just like our favourite government nudge unit, the behavioural insights team.
Are the redditors right about Star Wars metaphor??

 

[The Ugly One]

Decades from now Disney will be the subject of entire courses in MBA programs of how to shoot yourself in the foot.

Why would the black transwomen who will make up 100% of the Ivy League faculty in 2044 teach that?

This is not just the usual Current Year ideological bullshit, it is inconsistent even with its own claims about itself.

Well, yeah. Women wrote it.

 

[Los Pollos Hermanos]

There's a floaty jedi dude who one of the twins wants to assassinate but she can't because his Force powers prevent her touching him, hitting him with weapons etc. My question is actually this following bit: she buys some poison which he then drinks. Why does he drink it? How does she get him to? The clip I saw he's just holding it and drinking it and nobody has explained to me how she gets him to.

https://youtu.be/xVEEtDz21C8

It’s really lame. But it mostly adds to the theory that the Jedi actually killed all the witches and not the fire. Because that guy specifically did nothing during the confrontation except get possessed, so what else could he be apologizing for?

 

[Sister Miriam Godwinson]

https://youtu.be/xVEEtDz21C8

Did she just... shame him into suicide?

Yikes. Very problematic. Where is the trigger warning.

 

[Morethanabitfoolish]

This is not just the usual Current Year ideological bullshit, it is inconsistent even with its own claims about itself. This is objectively bad writing, made worse by the bad content of the show and the bad intentions of the writers.

Oh the bright side we now know some people did watch the Wheel of Time show. And they are writing for Star Wars.

 

[Drag-on Knight 91873]

It's so bad that it borders on parody at this point. I'm waiting for them to start having Trans force-users "Channeling the force" to transition.

That horny Zabrak woman is probably their version of a tranny, as the Darth Maul horns are a male trait that female Zabrak like Asajj Ventress didn't have.

I've not watched it (and therefore not reviewed it as that would be unethical), but perhaps you can answer the one question I have about it as I've been unable to get an answer out of anybody for this.

There's a floaty jedi dude who one of the twins wants to assassinate but she can't because his Force powers prevent her touching him, hitting him with weapons etc. My question is actually this following bit: she buys some poison which he then drinks. Why does he drink it? How does she get him to? The clip I saw he's just holding it and drinking it and nobody has explained to me how she gets him to.

He feels guilty for... something. Which is a scene that has very derpy execution because the idea of the scene is that she is supposed to weaken his resolve so that he lowers his guard. Basically, the Darth Sion fight, but written by an idiot because the way to get that scene to work is to have very good literary dialogue in it. It's supposed to be a battle of will, but Mae is a derpy idiot and doesn't have the mental stats to pull off the kind of dialogue in any part of KOTOR 2.

 

[MirrorNoir]

You can tell they really wanted this shit specifically to be a massive hit for whatever reason. Ahsoka stars a black woman, has a predominantly female cast and also sucks hard but didn't raise this level of vitriol on one side and defensiveness on the other. Haters were at worst indifferent towards Andor, which was also more or less lockstep with all the trappings of modern Star Wars besides the now customary totally atrocious writing. They even basically say this in the article, perplexed that this show, which was shilled far and above all the others, is getting shit on harder. It couldn't be that it's just that bad.

If there's nothing about this show that sets it far apart from any other slop they've put out, wouldn't it make the most sense that it's just that much shittier? Also, it's been pushed more, so more people are probably tuning in or at least looking up shit about it. Barely needs to be said but this writer is either straight up check-in-the-mail shilling or is profoundly retarded.

Part of the issue, IIRC, is that Kennedy has been slowly trying to hijack the SW TV show production from Filoni after he repeatedly upstaged her (to the point that she tried to executive fiat, via press conference, declare Baby Yoda a girl just to spite Filoni, who wanted Baby Yoda to be male and have Disney take Filoni's side on the issue of Baby Yoda's gender) and even with her demanding that he had to push females over males in his shows/fire any actor who dared have an opinion that wasn't lunatic left. And Acolytes is the first 100% Kennedy SW TV show where she was in the driver's seat and everyone involved being Team Kennedy and not Team Filoni, after only having partial control over Andor.

And it's telling that Kennedy managed to get Disney to open up the checkbook so she could buy off people to shill Acolytes and blood libel critics on social media after they stopped doing that after Captain Marvel came out. It probably pisses Kennedy the fuck off that Disney didn't let her splurge on paying people off to make Episode 9 look like a huge hit and protect her Mary Sue Rey. And part of me seriously wonders if the shill campaign we are seeing, is 100% due to the fact that Kennedy was told that Iger will finally fucking fire her cunt ass if Acolyte doesn't perform well as far as Iger being forced, to save his own hide in the recent proxy fight, to agree to stop protecting Kennedy every time she devalues/harms the Star Wars property to save his own ass.

 

[Drag-on Knight 91873]

is that Kennedy has been slowly trying to hijack the SW TV show production from Filoni after he repeatedly upstaged her

This implies a power struggle that I don't think exist. It's not like Filoni won't play ball with the feminist messaging since he made Bo Katan become the leader of the Mandalorians in season 3... and led to the loss of their precious Darksaber and he made Ahsoka which has women be in every major authority figure... and revealed just how corrupt and incompetent the New Republic is in the process. Nor is Filoni that successful or beloved by everyone to make him unfireable.

 

[TittlyWinks ;)]

Funny fact: the police in the uk have had the same thing happen to them. Calling them the police force is too aggressive so now they’re the police service

In the US they've made moves to change terminology like "policeman" or "fireman" to... "police/fireperson", I guess? I don't think I've heard anyone actually use the new term in real life, they just avoid the word altogether. Clown world.

 

[Grub]

I would argue the opposite. I'd say it's actually very hard to produce a good Star Wars story, primarily because the formula is so simple. You'd just be doing the first film again - which some argue they basically did with The Force Awakens (although I haven't actually seen it

I've only seen the first half hour or so before I fell asleep from boredom but the parts I seen were pretty much the original star wars movie except with a nigger and a woman instead of Luke.