Star Wars: The Acolyte – Destiny review S1 E3

Destiny was another very talky episode of The Acolyte. Unlike Revenge/Justice, Destiny was a full flashback explaining Mae and Osha’s tragic backstory.

Well, supposedly tragic backstory. This was a case where it didn’t feel like the episode provided this big revelatory deep dive into the characters. At least not enough to warrant devoting an entire episode of an eight-episode season.

While the effort to cast twins for the roles of Mae and Osha is commendable some of the illusion is shattered as Lauren and Leah Brady are fraternal twins. There are distinct differences between the two.  It seems hard to believe — even in a galaxy where Wookies exist — that fraternal twins become identical twins as they grow up.

Mae and Osha are part of presumably a lesbian witches coven where they had a Wonder Woman type birth. Although it does seem weird that in the Star Wars mythos that showrunner Leslye Headland would take the “There was no father” approach from the prequels.

Osha is less excited about the prospect of a secluded life as part of the coven with no one her age besides Mae. At least little Ani had a whole crew of pals including Kitster back on Tatooine.  Mae doesn’t want anything more out of life besides hanging with the coven and Osha.

We do know that the coven’s leader, Mother Aniseya (Jodi Turner-Smith, Murder Mystery 2), manipulated the witches’ interpretation of the Force to create life while another witch, Koril (Margarita Levieva), carried the twins.

Writers Jasmyne Flournoy and Eileen Shim don’t offer enough back story on the witches beyond their desire to be away from the rest of the world. They have a catchy chant when it’s time for younger witches to ascend to full status. Since Mae and Osha have already stated their entire family got wiped out, there’s not much time to flesh out their heritage long term so every moment was vital.

And here’s the Jedi. Maybe it’s not that shocking but the four Jedi are Indara, Sol, Kelnacca and Indara’s padawan Torbin (Dean Charles-Chapman). Now having seen Torbin’s great crime against Mae there should literally be no reason he’d feel guilty enough to kill himself. That seemed off for a Jedi in general, but it comes off incredibly silly after Destiny.

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The Jedi are clearly bored and have somehow found out there’s children here that should be tested for training. Aniseya and Koril aren’t thrilled at the prospect of giving the girls up, but Osha’s curiosity about a chance to explore the stars wins out. Granted, Osha was very reluctant to a life as a full-time witch, but it sure felt like this shouldn’t have been her decision alone while still a child.

To avoid a full-on battle they couldn’t win against the Jedi, the witches come up with a workaround for the Jedi testing — have the twins fail it. That’s a pretty elegant solution actually. Only, Osha doesn’t want to fail. Sol and Indara see through her weak efforts to sabotage her test and encourage her to be true to herself and train to be a Jedi. This was the norm for the Jedi according to the lore, but it does come off weird that families let these complete strangers take their children and never see them again.

There was a tease that Mae might have had some justification for her rip-roaring, murderous rampage, but that’s not the case. Mae just went off the deep end of the prospect of never seeing her sister again. She starts a fire that somehow triggers an explosion that kills all the witches with the exception of Mae and Osha. They get separated and each thinks the other is dead.

This really wasn’t the wild twist as the original reveal of the twins and was a weak way to kill off the coven. Turner-Smith in particular gave Aniseya such style and presence that it was a waste to cast her for a doomed role. Maybe there will be more flashbacks, but this was disappointing.

Mae’s quest for vengeance seems ridiculously misguided since she was the arsonist. Sure, if the Jedi hadn’t come around all of that wouldn’t have happened blah blah. But it was Mae who sparked the flame. not Indara, Sol, etc.

Destiny shed some light on Mae’s agenda but in the process drastically weakened the initial main villain’s motives.

Rating: 5 out of 10

Photo Credit: Disney