Television Star Wars: The Acolyte (Disney+), update (08/19): RIP in Peace

[Kal-El814]

9 minutes ago, Greatoneshere said:

While this is an entirely fair assessment of some fans, outside of Andor and parts of The Mandalorian (which do meet the criteria of "prestige") I think expecting bigger budget, "prestige" TV more along the lines of Foundation, Game of Thrones, Wheel of Time, Rings of Power, House of the Dragon, etc. is also fair. No one is expecting Breaking Bad or The Sopranos or something with Star Wars, but hoping these shows would look better than 5-6 people on The Voice sets and sound stages whose costumes are weirdly looking more fake and more like CW costumes with each passing show is disappointing, to say the least. The aforementioned shows by comparison have more dynamic camera framing and movement, bigger and bolder sets not always on sound stages, scenes at times with more than just like 8 people standing around (though the other shows I mentioned are guilty of this too). 

 

What we have seen of Acolyte easily hangs with Wheel of Time, I think. Nobody we've seen so far is remotely as wooden as Rand, Perrin, or Nyneave on that show. Maybe nobody's on Pike's level but then again few are.

 

I also don't think the costumes in Acolyte are bad at all, they're really quite good? I know Jedi robes aren't always interesting looking but even the stitching on Carrie-Ann Moss's top made them more interesting than how Clone Wars era Jedi normally dressed up. As someone who'e watched Legends, The Flash, Superman and Lois all recently, saying Acolyte is on the level of a CW show is just... not accurate. I do think Wheel of Time probably has the best costuming since Game of Thrones, those aesthetics are probably the best part of that show. You can really tell someone cares about wardrobing and clothes on that show.

[SuperSpreader]

So many ppl hate women itt smh

[Greatoneshere]

1 hour ago, Kal-El814 said:

What we have seen of Acolyte easily hangs with Wheel of Time, I think. Nobody we've seen so far is remotely as wooden as Rand, Perrin, or Nyneave on that show. Maybe nobody's on Pike's level but then again few are.

 

I also don't think the costumes in Acolyte are bad at all, they're really quite good? I know Jedi robes aren't always interesting looking but even the stitching on Carrie-Ann Moss's top made them more interesting than how Clone Wars era Jedi normally dressed up. As someone who'e watched Legends, The Flash, Superman and Lois all recently, saying Acolyte is on the level of a CW show is just... not accurate. I do think Wheel of Time probably has the best costuming since Game of Thrones, those aesthetics are probably the best part of that show. You can really tell someone cares about wardrobing and clothes on that show.

 

To be fair, of those shows I listed Wheel of Time is the one where I've only seen an episode or two whereas I've seen all the other shows in full.  Either way my point still stands.

 

And I will say rethinking it now, maybe you're right, it's not the costumes, I think it's the shows lighting. The lighting brings out the costume aspect of the costume, making it not feel completely integrated, like its are actors on a set and we can see that to some degree. I'm not sure exactly what it is, but the show felt low budget to me and the lighting/costumes felt like a part of that. Maybe not CW bad, but definitely not prestige either. Ahsoka also felt low budget to a degree, though less so there (same as Secret Invasion did).

[Kal-El814]

6 minutes ago, Greatoneshere said:

 

To be fair, of those shows I listed Wheel of Time is the one where I've only seen an episode or two whereas I've seen all the other shows in full.  Either way my point still stands.

 

And I will say rethinking it now, maybe you're right, it's not the costumes, I think it's the shows lighting. The lighting brings out the costume aspect of the costume, making it not feel completely integrated, like its actors on a set to some degree. I'm not sure exactly what it is, but the show felt low budget to me and the lighting/costumes felt like a part of that. Maybe not CW bad, but definitely not prestige either. Ahsoka also felt low budget to a degree, though less so there (same as Secret Invasion did).

 

Somewhat ironically the lighting on Smallville was better than most other shows, prestige or not. They really played with light and color very well for most of that show.

[Greatoneshere]

Just now, Kal-El814 said:

 

Somewhat ironically the lighting on Smallville was better than most other shows, prestige or not. They really played with light and color very well for most of that show.,

 

Agreed, and I want to be clear I'm not hating on the CW, I watched many of the early seasons of Arrow, The Flash, Supergirl and Legends of Tomorrow and really liked them. Fun shows but the overly lit scenes and everyone's hair and look always being perfect regardless of situation was frequently fake looking but you got used to it.

[GeneticBlueprint]

1 hour ago, Kal-El814 said:

 

What we have seen of Acolyte easily hangs with Wheel of Time, I think. Nobody we've seen so far is remotely as wooden as Rand, Perrin, or Nyneave on that show. Maybe nobody's on Pike's level but then again few are.

 

The acting hangs with Wheel of Time for sure. In that it's atrocious. But WoT at least has some gravitas there with Rosmund Pike (as you pointed out) but also some of the supporting cast is fantastic. Acolyte doesn't have that in any sense. And for all its faults WoT at least feels big budget and lived in. Acolyte doesn't.

 

 

10 hours ago, Greatoneshere said:

 

 

I'm about where you guys are at. I've seen all of the film/TV content that Star Wars has come out with so far for the most part and at this point TV Star Wars (outside of Andor and parts of The Mandalorian) just feels cheaply shot and made and comes and goes with little fanfare after the initial hype.

...

I think for me the biggest issue is I'm just sort of bored. Like a Wookie jedi in live-action should be cause for excitement but everything just sort of feels like it comes and goes with most of these shows these days. I remember when The Mandalorian season 1 teaser trailer dropped back in the day and I was floored, couldn't have been more hyped for it. But after a number of shows that have brought down what was initially presented as pretty good quality with stuff like Obi-Wan, etc. has dampened a significant amount of my enthusiasm. The Acolyte just feels like more Star Wars in the same way a number of competent MCU TV shows have felt recently where they just sort of wash over you and in a year you barely remember what happened. I remember Star Wars media had moments that felt indelible and iconic. Now everything feels run of the mill and I think that's what some people are feeling. 

 

 

2 hours ago, Greatoneshere said:

 

While this is an entirely fair assessment of some fans, outside of Andor and parts of The Mandalorian (which do meet the criteria of "prestige") I think expecting bigger budget, "prestige" TV more along the lines of Foundation, Game of Thrones, Wheel of Time, Rings of Power, House of the Dragon, etc. is also fair. No one is expecting Breaking Bad or The Sopranos or something with Star Wars, but hoping these shows would look better than 5-6 people on The Voice sets and sound stages whose costumes are weirdly looking more fake and more like CW costumes with each passing show is disappointing, to say the least. The aforementioned shows by comparison have more dynamic camera framing and movement, bigger and bolder sets not always on sound stages, scenes at times with more than just like 8 people standing around (though the other shows I mentioned are guilty of this too). 

 

Beyond those sorts of issues, as I said, I land where everyone in this thread has mostly landed, which this was fine. It's still early too, as you said. There's nothing to already hate this show so much (as I indicated many seem to on RT and IMDb which is stupid). But, there's nothing all that compelling about it either. It's the difference between when Moff Gideon shows up with his entourage on to the planet near the end of season 1 of The Mandalorian while Mando, etc. are bunkered down in a cantina and the Ludwig Gorranson soundtrack is thumping a remix of a classic Star Wars tune while a bunch of stormtroopers get in a line to fire and many of the other shows are just not that and don't really find any other voice in its stead to similarly get us excited at least. I don't care about fan service, I just want a really good show. Other SW shows can have their own tones, not everything needs to be Andor, but at the same time that doesn't mean shows have been entirely successful at doing their own thing but remaining compelling.

 

I think these points are really the crux of the issue for me. The amount of shows we have so far isn't an issue for me with Star Wars. I feel like with this money-printing IP and the company with the resources of Disney we could have both quantity and quality. Acolyte in particular feels very Tuesday Night ABC for me. Wheel-of-Time-level should be our quality floor on a paid streaming service but so far it's the average at best with the Star Wars shows. And I guess I just set my hopes kind of high because It felt like this show was going to try and do something like Game of Thrones or Wheel of Time did: Bring in a more experienced but maybe not completely prestige actor like Sean Bean/Rosmund Pike to kind of be the glue for all the newbies and carry them quite a bit and help elevate the show above its camp and plotting weaknesses. It felt like that's what CAM was going to be and she seemed a particularly good fit for a flashy martial-arts infused action thing like Star Wars.

 

Anyways, I watched the second episode. Some of my criticisms from the first episode are much stronger now while others not so much. I'm less down on it than after just the first episode.

 

Re: clunky plotting - Main character splits from group and gets to scene of the crime all with enough time to stop and have a vision, examine the corpse, and pick up the weapon to incriminate herself faster than the guy who lives there guiding the other portion of the party to save somebody's life. Okay. Again, very weeknight network TV crime drama vibes here.

 

Re: wooden acting - Every single actor in this show both up close and off in the distance is really bad. Maybe it's the directing. Actually that Yord/Jord/Fjord guy is growing on me.

 

Re: looks - I'm not as down on the costumes as Greatoneshere (though IMO that wookiee at the end was the closest to a "walking carpet" we've had yet). And when zoomed out the locations look fantastic. The ship design was cool too.

 

I won't give up yet. I'm just disappointed in the vibe so far.

[Greatoneshere]

4 minutes ago, GeneticBlueprint said:

I think these points are really the crux of the issue for me. The amount of shows we have so far isn't an issue for me with Star Wars. I feel like with this money-printing IP and the company with the resources of Disney we could have both quantity and quality. Acolyte in particular feels very Tuesday Night ABC for me. Wheel-of-Time-level should be our quality floor on a paid streaming service but so far it's the average at best with the Star Wars shows. And I guess I just set my hopes kind of high because It felt like this show was going to try and do something like Game of Thrones or Wheel of Time did: Bring in a more experienced but maybe not completely prestige actor like Sean Bean/Rosmund Pike to kind of be the glue for all the newbies and carry them quite a bit and help elevate the show above its camp and plotting weaknesses. It felt like that's what CAM was going to be and she seemed a particularly good fit for a flashy martial-arts infused action thing like Star Wars.

 

Re: clunky plotting - Main character splits from group and gets to scene of the crime all with enough time to stop and have a vision, examine the corpse, and pick up the weapon to incriminate herself faster than the guy who lives there guiding the other portion of the party to save somebody's life. Okay. Again, very weeknight network TV crime drama vibes here.

 

Re: wooden acting - Every single actor in this show both up close and off in the distance is really bad. Maybe it's the directing. Actually that Yord/Jord/Fjord guy is growing on me.

 

The highlighted portion is the main point for me as well. Something about the show feels like network TV, like CW or ABC or something. Just looks and feels cheap. And that clunky plotting moment was particularly bad. The acting is also part of the issue, the only ones who seem good so far are Master Sol (dude from Squid Game) and Yord to some degree. 

 

But I like the time period, the general aesthetics, and that this clearly will be different than usual Star Wars to some degree though I wish we'd see more of the sheen of the High Republic rather than backwater planets that look like the planets from the OT. This is a 130 years ago!  

[GeneticBlueprint]

3 minutes ago, Greatoneshere said:

 

The highlighted portion is the main point for me as well. Something about the show feels like network TV, like CW or ABC or something. Just looks and feels cheap. And that clunky plotting moment was particularly bad. The acting is also part of the issue, the only ones who seem good so far are Master Sol (dude from Squid Game) and Yord to some degree. 

 

But I like the time period, the general aesthetics, and that this clearly will be different than usual Star Wars to some degree though I wish we'd see more of the sheen of the High Republic rather than backwater planets that look like the planets from the OT. This is a 130 years ago!  

Yeah. And to your point in another post; being network TV in and of itself isn’t bad. That certainly has a place. But I don’t pay money for network TV! 

 

With Sol in particular I’m noticing he’s having to voice over his lines a lot more than the other actors. I know he’s a good actor because yeah he was fantastic in Squid Game. I just don’t think he’s getting a lot to work with here. 

[Greatoneshere]

44 minutes ago, GeneticBlueprint said:

With Sol in particular I’m noticing he’s having to voice over his lines a lot more than the other actors. I know he’s a good actor because yeah he was fantastic in Squid Game. I just don’t think he’s getting a lot to work with here. 

 

English probably isn't his first language either, so it does make sense he'd have more ADR than others. But right now every character is more a stereotype/trope than a dynamic individual but I think that'll change with time given these four Jedi did something objectionable people don't know about.

[cusideabelincoln]

1 hour ago, Greatoneshere said:

But I like the time period, the general aesthetics, and that this clearly will be different than usual Star Wars to some degree though I wish we'd see more of the sheen of the High Republic rather than backwater planets that look like the planets from the OT. This is a 130 years ago!  

 

Isn't this only like 90 years before TPM? The show should take place further back in time for me to consider this "a different era".  Yoda is alive, Chewie is alive, and I wouldn't be surprised if see a wild Darth Plagueis appear.

 

The show still has a chance to turn it around. I disliked the nonsense of the first episodes of Loki S2, but second half was so well done (mostly because literally the first episodes didn't matter at all) I can respect it. So far in this show I don't like:

 

-Acting

-Dialogue

-How they're presenting the plot. The [temporary] "mystery" elements are forced with the characters being dumb and jumping to conclusions - the classic Harry Potter who-done-it reveals.

-Overuse of cartoonish hijinks, which the animated shows can get away with but I hold a higher standard with live action.

 

If I was 10, I'd probably love it because the fights are fine and different than what we've previously seen in SW and everything is plainly spelled out for me. It also felt rushed, because characters just explained all the backstory for us, so maybe now that enough has been laid out they can create a compelling narrative. Maybe.

[Greatoneshere]

3 minutes ago, cusideabelincoln said:

Isn't this only like 90 years before TPM? The show should take place further back in time for me to consider this "a different era".  Yoda is alive, Chewie is alive, and I wouldn't be surprised if see a wild Darth Plagueis appear.

 

The show still has a chance to turn it around. I disliked the nonsense of the first episodes of Loki S2, but second half was so well done (mostly because literally the first episodes didn't matter at all) I can respect it. So far in this show I don't like:

 

-Acting

-Dialogue

-How they're presenting the plot. The [temporary] "mystery" elements are forced with the characters being dumb and jumping to conclusions - the classic Harry Potter who-done-it reveals.

-Overuse of cartoonish hijinks, which the animated shows can get away with but I hold a higher standard with live action.

 

If I was 10, I'd probably love it because the fights are fine and different than what we've previously seen in SW and everything is plainly spelled out for me. It also felt rushed, because characters just explained all the backstory for us, so maybe now that enough has been laid out they can create a compelling narrative. Maybe.

 

I agree with most of this and agree that the show tends to just explain things for now so there is a good bit of exposition. The show takes place 100 years before TPM. For comparison's sake, in less than a hundred years we've gone through WWII, the Cold War era and the Middle East war/terrorism era. A lot happens in 100 years but it's true that it's still relatively close (comparatively) to the OT than say, something like KOTOR.

[cusideabelincoln]

4 minutes ago, Greatoneshere said:

 

I agree with most of this and agree that the show tends to just explain things for now so there is a good bit of exposition. The show takes place 100 years before TPM. For comparison's sake, in less than a hundred years we've gone through WWII, the Cold War era and the Middle East war/terrorism era. A lot happens in 100 years but it's true that it's still relatively close (comparatively) to the OT than say, something like KOTOR.

 

The opening crawl said 100 years before the rise of the Empire which happened in RotS and TPM was over a decade before that but maybe "rise of" is referring to the start of the Galactic Civil War that began in AotC which was just a few years before RotS but still about a decade after TPM.

[Greatoneshere]

6 minutes ago, cusideabelincoln said:

 

The opening crawl said 100 years before the rise of the Empire which happened in RotS and TPM was over a decade before that but maybe "rise of" is referring to the start of the Galactic Civil War that began in AotC which was just a few years before RotS but still about a decade after TPM.

 

I think they kept it vague like that intentionally but looking it up online the year in The Acolyte takes place is apparently in 132 BBY and TPM is 32 BBY so there ya go.  

[cusideabelincoln]

1 minute ago, Greatoneshere said:

 

I think they kept it vague like that intentionally but looking it up online the year in The Acolyte takes place is apparently in 132 BBY and TPM is 32 BBY so there ya go.  

 

AMBIGUITY?

 

[Kal-El814]

1 hour ago, cusideabelincoln said:

Isn't this only like 90 years before TPM? The show should take place further back in time for me to consider this "a different era".  Yoda is alive, Chewie is alive, and I wouldn't be surprised if see a wild Darth Plagueis appear.

 

The show still has a chance to turn it around. I disliked the nonsense of the first episodes of Loki S2, but second half was so well done (mostly because literally the first episodes didn't matter at all) I can respect it. So far in this show I don't like:

 

-Acting

-Dialogue

-How they're presenting the plot. The [temporary] "mystery" elements are forced with the characters being dumb and jumping to conclusions - the classic Harry Potter who-done-it reveals.

-Overuse of cartoonish hijinks, which the animated shows can get away with but I hold a higher standard with live action.

 

If I was 10, I'd probably love it because the fights are fine and different than what we've previously seen in SW and everything is plainly spelled out for me. It also felt rushed, because characters just explained all the backstory for us, so maybe now that enough has been laid out they can create a compelling narrative. Maybe.

 

This isn't intended to be critical at all, but sometimes I genuinely wonder what Star Wars y'all have been watching.

 

Cartoonish hijinks where live action is held to a higher standard?

 

 

 

Dialog?

 

 

Characters jumping to conclusions? In Empire Vader tortures Han because Luke MIGHT be getting training despite him and Sheev thinking all the Jedi are dead and that Luke MIGHT be Force sensitive enough to sense this is happening around the same time that Vader happens to be doing this and Luke MIGHT be able to figure out where Han is and MIGHT take the bait... and this all just works.

 

Harry Potter reveals? Three of the main characters in the OT are direct blood relatives, two of whom are twins? Death Star 2 happening to be operational?

 

And man I'd love to see what primetime network shows that aren't set in real life locations like hospitals or police stations or something regularly look as good as the Disney+ Star Wars shows do. I absolutely agree they don't always hang with the movies but y'all are talking like it looks like something from TNG Season 1 out here.

 

I'm not going to try to convince anyone to not have franchise fatigue generally or to like this show specifically. And there's absolutely something to be said for wanting a franchise to mature with you, to some extent, as you grow up. But I do think that some of this is coming from selective, rose colored recall.

[GeneticBlueprint]

tbf cartoonish hijinks are a lot easier to swallow from charming charismatic actors

[Greatoneshere]

2 hours ago, Kal-El814 said:

And man I'd love to see what primetime network shows that aren't set in real life locations like hospitals or police stations or something regularly look as good as the Disney+ Star Wars shows do. I absolutely agree they don't always hang with the movies but y'all are talking like it looks like something from TNG Season 1 out here.

 

I'm not going to try to convince anyone to not have franchise fatigue generally or to like this show specifically. And there's absolutely something to be said for wanting a franchise to mature with you, to some extent, as you grow up. But I do think that some of this is coming from selective, rose colored recall.

 

I think what you may be missing here is that everything you pointed out about the OT is true, but the difference is in the tone, execution, how frequently that kind of stuff comes up and how, etc. It's not a like for like comparison when you pull a scene out of context and go: "see, both are cartoonish". Sure, Star Wars has always had bad dialogue (prequels are a great example), wooden acting (prequels again) and dumb jokes, etc. But there's a difference between Leia hurling bad insults at Han Solo which indicates combative chemistry and where their relationship stands or Luke whinging about not being able to go to Tosche Station indicates that he's young, etc. An animal farting in Jar Jar Binks' direction before the podrace in TPM is not that. Integration into the overall tone of the work matters a lot. 

 

I'm not leveling those kinds of accusations at The Acolyte broadly, but yes, the stupidity, hijinks, bad dialogue, wooden acting, filmmaking quality, etc. all feed into a different reaction to these issues here than being able to wave them away in the OT. One can recognize good Star Wars from bad Star Wars in a broad sense. OT is good. PT is bad. ST is mostly bad, with some good in TFA and TLJ. The Clone Wars and Rebels cartoons were good, Resistance not so much. Rogue One was great, Solo was forgettable. The Mandalorian has high highs and some low lows (mostly in season 3) but the Book of Boba Fett was marginal and meandered. Obi-Wan was great fan service, bad everything else. Ahsoka was fine, mostly, which is where I mostly stand with The Acolyte so far.

 

I'm not sure what's so rose-tinted about understanding when Star Wars works vs. when it doesn't, even if all of Star Wars shares the same criticisms of cartoonish hijinks, bad insults and bad jokes, etc. It's a sliding scale when it comes to all of that. All of Star Wars may be on that scale, the OT included, but some find a great balance that succeeds and others are bad, or inert, or meandering, etc.

[cusideabelincoln]

22 minutes ago, Kal-El814 said:

Cartoonish hijinks where live action is held to a higher standard?

 

Characters jumping to conclusions? In Empire Vader tortures Han because Luke MIGHT be getting training despite him and Sheev thinking all the Jedi are dead and that Luke MIGHT be Force sensitive enough to sense this is happening around the same time that Vader happens to be doing this and Luke MIGHT be able to figure out where Han is and MIGHT take the bait... and this all just works.

 

Harry Potter reveals? Three of the main characters in the OT are direct blood relatives, two of whom are twins? Death Star 2 happening to be operational?

 

I'm not going to try to convince anyone to not have franchise fatigue generally or to like this show specifically. And there's absolutely something to be said for wanting a franchise to mature with you, to some extent, as you grow up. But I do think that some of this is coming from selective, rose colored recall.

 

The entire tone of the first 2 episodes has been cartoonish; you can't the same about the movies. It's fine to have some silliness, but it's overused and tries to borrow the MCU humor in The Acolyte.

 

The reveals are way more awful. Let's arrest the girl because she matches a description, then have 0 guards on the ship after implying she's extremely dangerous. Whoops she escapes so that means she's guilty. The one person of authority believes her twin is dead. Whoops just kidding now he believes she's alive.  Uh oh the good twin snuck off from the group and now someone's dead. She did it! Just kidding there's a witness saying she didn't. Etc etc.

 

The show is also going to need to have a banger scenario for me to buy that both sisters thought the other dead, both probably blaming each other for a wrongdoing.

[johnny]

1 minute ago, cusideabelincoln said:

 

The entire tone of the first 2 episodes has been cartoonish; you can't the same about the movies. It's fine to have some silliness, but it's overused and tries to borrow the MCU humor in The Acolyte.

 

The reveals are way more awful. Let's arrest the girl because she matches a description, then have 0 guards on the ship after implying she's extremely dangerous. Whoops she escapes so that means she's guilty. The one person of authority believes her twin is dead. Whoops just kidding now he believes she's alive.  Uh oh the good twin snuck off from the group and now someone's dead. She did it! Just kidding there's a witness saying she didn't. Etc etc.

 

The show is also going to need to have a banger scenario for me to buy that both sisters thought the other dead, both probably blaming each other for a wrongdoing.

please stop watching star wars. i think your life would be better without it. i’ve seen you bitch about this franchise for a decade. there are shows out there for you buddy. 

[SuperSpreader]

[cusideabelincoln]

3 minutes ago, johnny said:

please stop watching star wars. i think your life would be better without it. i’ve seen you bitch about this franchise for a decade. there are shows out there for you buddy. 

 

I don't even know who you are.

 

This you?

 

Quote

but anybody complaining after those first two episodes needs a baby bottle.

 

You're complaining about "complainers", calling them names. Shut the fuck up.

[johnny]

3 minutes ago, cusideabelincoln said:

 

I don't even know who you are.

 

This you?

 

 

You're complaining about "complainers", calling them names. Shut the fuck up.

👶🍼

[sblfilms]

16 hours ago, Kal-El814 said:

Star Wars was only “special” during the old days if you mainly paid attention to the movies.

 

My dear friend, this is literally 90%+ of people who call themselves "Star Wars fans"  The filmed content is Star Wars to most people. Everything else is just fan fiction for the most obsessed. Disney put out nearly as many Star Wars movies in a 5-year period as Lucas did in a 28-year period! Then they started putting out hours and hours of filmed TV shows too.

 

I am sure for the people who were deeply invested in the books, games, cartoons, and such, nothing fundementally changed for them.

[legend]

If the OT feels more serious, I'd wager that 90% of that vibe is because John Williams rocks. The music for the double sunset, and when Yoda is dishing out wise words makes it all feel much more important.

 

E.g.,

 

 

 

 

[legend]

Oh and I can't forget one of my favorite childhood scenes: when Luke beats Vader. Great fucking music to capture the emotion.

 

 

[cusideabelincoln]

51 minutes ago, legend said:

If the OT feels more serious, I'd wager that 90% of that vibe is because John Williams rocks. The music for the double sunset, and when Yoda is dishing out wise words makes it all feel much more important.

 

E.g.,

 

 

 

 

 

The music and sound are a huge part of Star Wars; they set the tone. The last season of the Bad Batch had some very typical cartoony moments - the team got captured many times yet always escaped the direst of circumstances - but man the score and tone (and directing) elevated it. Mando has a great score too.  Even the Prequels have good score. The Acolyte's music, though, is not impactful.

[Kal-El814]

6 hours ago, cusideabelincoln said:

The reveals are way more awful. Let's arrest the girl because she matches a description, then have 0 guards on the ship after implying she's extremely dangerous. Whoops she escapes so that means she's guilty. The one person of authority believes her twin is dead. Whoops just kidding now he believes she's alive.  Uh oh the good twin snuck off from the group and now someone's dead. She did it! Just kidding there's a witness saying she didn't. Etc etc.

 

I genuinely don't think the tone in the first 2 episodes is cartoonish nor that they attempted Whedonesque humor. I really don't see that at all.

 

At some point we're just lamenting that Star Wars does Star Wars things. Boba Fett gets OHKO'd by a blind man. Han doesn't anticipate the Empire using a tracking beacon despite being the kind of character who would absolutely use that trick himself. Sheev's hand picked Death Star 2 child generator guards get curb stomped by Ewoks.

 

2 hours ago, legend said:

If the OT feels more serious, I'd wager that 90% of that vibe is because John Williams rocks. The music for the double sunset, and when Yoda is dishing out wise words makes it all feel much more important.

 

Yes, the music in Star Wars does a ton of heavy lifting and I don't think what we've heard on Acolyte hangs with the OT or Mando.

 

6 hours ago, Greatoneshere said:

I'm not sure what's so rose-tinted about understanding when Star Wars works vs. when it doesn't, even if all of Star Wars shares the same criticisms of cartoonish hijinks, bad insults and bad jokes, etc. It's a sliding scale when it comes to all of that. All of Star Wars may be on that scale, the OT included, but some find a great balance that succeeds and others are bad, or inert, or meandering, etc.

 

I don't think it's incorrect to observe that people are generally more forgiving of media they grew up with than stuff that comes out as they get older, even in the same franchise. Star Wars specifically has gone through two generations of this now. As someone who plays a lot of Star Wars tabletop games and hang with people who are my age and grew up with the OT and people half my age who grew up with the PT, I live this phenomenon regularly. Younger people overwhelmingly enjoy the prequels more, they think the characters in the prequels are more interesting, etc. And I suspect if I'm still painting Star Wars minis in 15 years and playing against kids 30 years younger than me, they'll feel the same way about the ST.

 

So that makes it hard to just accept that the old stuff "is better" because even if I think that the OT movies are as close to being "objectively" better than the PT movies as is possible, I don't think that's really what is being driving the vibes here especially when some of the laments are as much a part of the franchise as lightsabers and starships. Is Osha being arrested and put on a droid transport ship that wasn't well guarded convenient? Sure. So was the Millennium Falcon getting tractor beamed onto something the size of a small moon and ending up a short walk from where Leia was being detained instead of several hundred miles away. So is Luke crashing his X-Wing right next to Yoda's house on a planet that's larger than earth. And so on and so on. I can't think of a great reason that we can mental gymnastics those into being okay whereas much slighter coincidences in more modern Star Wars stuff get more scrutiny.

[Massdriver]

You all are not selling this. Maybe I’ll just wait for Andor. 

[Commissar SFLUFAN]

4 minutes ago, Massdriver said:

You all are not selling this. Maybe I’ll just wait for Andor. 

 

There ain't that much there to sell so far!

[Greatoneshere]

2 hours ago, Kal-El814 said:

So that makes it hard to just accept that the old stuff "is better" because even if I think that the OT movies are as close to being "objectively" better than the PT movies as is possible, I don't think that's really what is being driving the vibes here especially when some of the laments are as much a part of the franchise as lightsabers and starships. Is Osha being arrested and put on a droid transport ship that wasn't well guarded convenient? Sure. So was the Millennium Falcon getting tractor beamed onto something the size of a small moon and ending up a short walk from where Leia was being detained instead of several hundred miles away. So is Luke crashing his X-Wing right next to Yoda's house on a planet that's larger than earth. And so on and so on. I can't think of a great reason that we can mental gymnastics those into being okay whereas much slighter coincidences in more modern Star Wars stuff get more scrutiny.

 

There's no question kids are predisposed to liking whatever they grew up with regardless of a certain level of quality but you can't look at the filmmaking of each trilogy and honestly say that only growing up with them predisposes each trilogy to be good. It's flat out clear the filmmaking in the PT, for example, is worse and less dynamic and far more stilted than the OT and ST. A kid can grow up with the PT and like it but that's rose-colored glasses (I was 13 when TPM came out so I believe I am in this group and yet have never seen the PT this way for these kinds of reasons). Liking the OT, and wanting the quality of Andor but in a different way doesn't mean we have some nostalgia bias. 

 

Again, you go into examples of both the show and the OT doing "convenient" things but again, it's the presentation that matters. Is the silly thing in line with the tone of the rest of the film? Did it sell the moment in other ways via chemistry, energy, acting, dialogue to hide rather than expose the weak plotting? Etc. The problem is the location of Leia relative to where they get tractor beamed in the Death Star is a minor matter explained away by them progressing perhaps pretty far via the editing and cutting (there's no reason to presume she's just a short walk away, I never got that sense watching those scenes given the scenes cut, one presumes they did a lot of sneaking around in between) whereas the minute Yord puts Osha on the prison transport and doesn't go with them, I went: "why isn't he escorting her back?" One I never cared about much and this immediately struck me as silly even though both are silly. For me it wasn't a deal breaker but poor plotting can be done better or worse when in tandem with the rest of the work.

[cusideabelincoln]

14 hours ago, Kal-El814 said:

I genuinely don't think the tone in the first 2 episodes is cartoonish nor that they attempted Whedonesque humor. I really don't see that at all.

 

There's just something off the presentation of all of these live action shows. The lighting, the color grading, just makes characters look out of place and probably accentuates the perceived mid acting. I found Ahsoka to have similar issues to what I'm having with The Acolyte, Obi-Wan had issues with lighting, and the biker scene in Boba Fett looked weird. Mando hides its issues the best thanks to the score and duller colors, but it has highs and lows too.

 

If these shows had been animated I'd probably overlook the flaws and scream YIPPEEEE at all the "cool" shit. But they stick out more and bother me in live action 

[Mercury33]

I’m just here to defend S2 of Wheel of Time which was outstanding. 

[TwinIon]

I don't have any strong feelings about this show other than it being silly that the twins have the exact same hair style. You're telling me that a person raised by Jedi that washed out and became a space mechanic and a left for dead kid apprenticing for a sith(?) both end up wearing their hair exactly the same after 16 years? My twin nieces, whose mother tries to style them identically don't have such perfectly matching hair.

 

Anyway, terribly minor quibble aside, I can't really muster much enthusiasm. I am genuinely glad that we're getting Star Wars without Skywalkers and I don't think the show is bad, but it hasn't really grabbed me yet. I'll keep watching unless it falls off a cliff somehow. Maybe it grows into something better. Some great shows have had worse starts than this.

[Greatoneshere]

33 minutes ago, cusideabelincoln said:

 

There's just something off the presentation of all of these live action shows. The lighting, the color grading, just makes characters look out of place and probably accentuates the perceived mid acting. I found Ahsoka to have similar issues to what I'm having with The Acolyte, Obi-Wan had issues with lighting, and the biker scene in Boba Fett looked weird. Mando hides its issues the best thanks to the score and duller colors, but it has highs and lows too.

 

If these shows had been animated I'd probably overlook the flaws and scream YIPPEEEE at all the "cool" shit. But they stick out more and bother me in live action 

 

I think there's definitely something going on, because Youtuber film reviewer Jeremy Jahns (who has more film fan takes than more complex film essayist takes with his straightforward reviews but he's still good to watch though I assume some here know who he is) who is a big Star Wars fan but pretty normal when it comes to enjoying Star Wars stuff and the first thing he says in his review that just dropped is that he texted someone saying this is "Star Wars on the CW" and he said a friend separately texted him saying the same. It can't be a coincidence we're all seeing, feeling and experiencing something shoddy about the filmmaking, the costuming, the lighting, the budget, whatever it is these (and the MCU) shows continue to look and feel cheaper for the most part. There is something very flat and CW about the show or something akin to it. I'm not saying Jeremy Jahns is some authority but that he summed up all of my issues currently with the show which he arrived at on his own such as some of the wooden acting (he points out an apt example about murder) and some of the convenient plotting. And the stupid "both twins have the same hairstyle" for some reason. I'm not as down on it all as he makes it sound but he does drive at the point that this feels throwaway in a way so far. 

 

 

 

[EternallDarkness]

watched the first episode last night...eh, didn't hate it but it didn't really grab me either. I do have to wonder what the hell was up with the campfire in space scene