Star Wars: The Acolyte – Teach/Corrupt review S1 E6
Last week was the highlight of The Acolyte so far. If Teach/Corrupt could follow that up strongly, there was a chance of turning the show around into something eventually worth getting into despite the initial slow burn.
If anything, this episode made the case that maybe The Acolyte would have been better served as a full-length film? Again, there was just too much wasted time and a lot of nothing happening. And Teach/Corrupt was absolutely dependent on characters doing something completely against character for the sake of keeping the episode and series going.
This was the second consecutive episode with Osha wakes up in a panic. This time she’s exploring Qimir’s island and there’s a lot of uninteresting walking around.
Back on Kohfar, well actually we’re leaving Kohfar — Sol tells Jedi Mog Adana (Harry Trevaldwyn) back on Coruscant that his team is dead. Mae is disguised as Osha, which is enough to fool Jedi Master Sol. She’s sneaking up on him with one of her daggers apparently forgetting her whole redemption arc now that she knows Osha is still alive.
Let’s also not forget that Mae clearly could have killed Sol before getting on his ship. She’d stunned him and knocked Osha unconscious. If she really wanted to kill Sol she didn’t need to hitch a ride. Predictably, Sol asks her to take control of the ship while he tries to get his communication with the Jedi back on Coruscant to get through clearly. And she does not take the moment to kill him.
Is the point of Teach/Corrupt to sell Bazil stuffed animals?? He steps on Mae’s toes in a “comedic” bit while Osha’s iPhone droid spews oil at her. That’s enough to prompt her to reset the phone…droid back to factory settings. Then he hides in the vents like he’s evading xenomorphs with a flashlight because apparently trackers need to see what they’re tracking. Sigh.
Sol hugs Mae/Osha and confesses it’s time for me to tell the High Council and tell them everything. For all this buildup it sure feels like this big secret isn’t going to be worth all the teases. Mae offers solace to Sol. It seems like she said something that tipped him off of her true identity. Sol stuns her and promises to reveal everything.
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Back on Coruscant, Vernestra learns of Sol’s team’s fate and wants to go to Khofar. Vernestra, Mog and the nameless Jedi arrive at the planet’s orbit just as Sol zooms out to avoid them in a not at all suspicious manner. Vernestra’s crew find all the dead Jedi. This should be the last time we see Jecki and Yord. And for our big action sequence in Teach/Corrupt, she kills one of the big creatures that gave Qimir such fits last week.
For some reason, Mog speculates that Sol might have killed the Jedi. That’s a leap especially when these Jedi aren’t remotely formidable.
There sure is a lot of shirtless dude scenes in this series. More fodder for the “female gaze” no doubt. Osha watches Qimir strip down for a bath confident that she’s got the upper hand now that she’s got his lightsaber. Sadly, Osha didn’t consider being fully distracted when Qimir stood up out of the lake.
Osha’s posturing is hilarious. If she did what she should do — kill the guy who slaughtered her friends — a major plot ends unceremoniously. Instead, Osha has to listen to Qimir’s banter and get curious. This makes no sense and is a great example of characters behaving stupidly in order to advance the plot to a specific point.
There’s no suspense when Osha ignites the lightsaber and holds it to Qimir’s throat. He explains he wants the power of two and that his Jedi master threw him away just like Osha. None of this extended conversation makes sense. Osha watched Qimir kill her friends.
There’s no illusion here of him being a misunderstood bad boy. He is a killer who happily admits he killed the Jedi. She shouldn’t want to have anything to do with him let alone have a long dinner conversation with Qimir. Despite this shaky dialogue Manny Jacinto is pulling off his role as The Stranger. He’s by far the coolest and most interesting character in the series.
Sol tells the bound Mae that he’s had 16 years to consider this speech to Mae so she’s going to listen. Again, this raises the question why Jedi Master Torbin took his vow of silence six years after whatever happened with Osha and Mae on their home world. Back on the mystery island, Qimir’s slow burn seductive techniques are working. Osha does decide to don his helmet, which feels more of a means to sell The Stranger’s helmet than some major plot point.
Teach/Corrupt is another indicator that possibly The Acolyte could have made for a more compelling movie than a TV series. There’s too many moments where nothing happens. Moments that would be cut for pacing in a film. This one had too much idle chatter and not enough tangible developments to mean much. Next week’s penultimate episode should go a long way to finally revealing the truth and the show’s endgame.
Rating: 5 out of 10
Photo Credit: Disney
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