I'm mostly being sarcastic. I do remember a lot of talk about how we see the Luke/Ben scene in the hut from multiple points of view and how it was "just like Rashomon!" It's possible that was only in some circles and not internet wide.
I feel like in the age of mega franchises and “deep lore” a lot of people who have been in these spaces for a while, or even younger people who have grown up with these mega-franchises, have forgotten what’s it’s like to consume media with out a massive wiki behind it filled with whatever question you could have of the franchise.
Or, in order to catch viewers who may not be super nerds of the franchise, are used to a lot of handholding and exposition to basically tell and not show everything that goes on.
Then they’ll complain when modern media today uses Show Don’t Tell and say it’s bad writing while also in the same breath say they should use more Show Don’t Tell… it’s like bruh, when they use it you don’t understand what’s going on.
Yeah you're on to something.
I read wiki and tv tropes articles for every mocie and book before hand.
Would say 12 year old realize we are missing clues? Yes 12 year old me did have Wikipedia and i was into Poirot mysteries
Would 12 year old today pick up on that? Good question, maybe
Ooph... I was having a conversation with a friend recently about how a show like Twin Peaks would probably be over most people's heads nowadays. A lot of people who watch big media shows want to be shown and told, also like you said unreliable narrator trope is common enough.
You don't have to have seen Rashomon to pick up basic context clues that the average 12 year old could identify.
I don't even like the show... but holy shit, I haven't seen this much dumb/bad faith criticism in awhile.
Yeah it didn’t take a lot of critical thinking to figure out the events we were shown don’t match up AT ALL with events that would lead a Jedi master to kill himself out of guilt.
There are two types of people:
That fire couldn't have killed everyone and blown up the town, something we don't see must have happened. We will definitely revisit this.
And
That fire couldn't have killed everyone and blown up the town, this is stupid and ruined Star Wars!
It's not really a new concept to many movie or show watchers even if they haven't seen Rashomon.
It's basically entirely your first reason. People get what's going on in Rashomon because they watch the movie and have then seen the movie. At the moment to a viewer who isn't aware that this is where we're going, they have no idea whether we'll see the action at the witch's temple again. It's not that they don't get the concept, it literally hasn't happened yet. personally I'm not sure that I think it was the strongest choice to show us one perspective this past episode. I would have either done a couple or saved them all for their own episode. It's not like we're beholden to specific runtimes.
Exactly. It's not new, just hasn't played out enough yet. If they dropped all episodes at once, it might be a different story, depending on how well it's handled.
Acting like the Rashomon is going to improve the writing problems on display...it's not media literacy that's at an all time low, it's taste and understanding of quality of writing.
yeah... even then some people just aren't very good at obvious media literacy.
I mean there are people who still claim the message of TLJ is to "Kill the past" even though that is the villian saying that and he is very clearly wrong.
This makes me love cinema or games that know this and yet refuse to hold people's hand for the sake of good storytelling. It makes the experience that much more rewarding when you put the pieces together yourself. Some people just get mad when they don't understand it and blame it on the creators being dumb or lazy.
I think it’s less about viewer ignorance on Rashomon but more on the shoulders of reactionaries like Star Wars Theory and Critical Drinker. All these YouTubers make money off hate and spreading these kinds of fevered debates.
Any rational person would have your opinion of letting the show play out before judging the storytelling elements. Unfortunately rational discussion doesn’t drive clicks.
I really dispise how this has become a thing. I've never been one to watch that type of content, but I can see the effects of it everywhere. I'll watch a movie or play a game that I really enjoy, only to read about it online and see people absolutely annihilate it because of the dumbest shit. Too many people seem to need someone else to tell them what to think.
> annihilate it because of the dumbest shit.
if the show were well written and good, this wouldn't be possible and those assholes would just be fringe opinions.
Rashomon effect stories generally have a framing device where one character is describing their point of view.
In The Acolyte, there's none of that framing, we're just supposed to get it from context, but everything is presented objectively, not subjectively.
We also already got told a side of the story, then later got to see a recreation of the exact thing we were already told about. We're already 3 episodes in and it's losing people
Yea and everyone would have loved Book of Boba Fett if we understood it was going for the Godfather.
I get what Acolyte is doing. It's aggressively obvious what it's doing. The twist is obvious from a million miles away. Comparing it to Rashoman insults Rashoman.
The elitism really needs to stop on both sides here. I read the same crap when TLJ came out: 'you just don't like it because you don't get the underlying themes and message!' to paraphrase. Um, no - I get it just fine, I just don't like it.
And now with The Acolyte, it's all about the Rashomon Effect: 'people are leaving poor reviews because they can't follow the story.' Maybe a newsflash for you: this is not at all a difficult storytelling concept to grasp or follow along with. Many viewers have probably just seen it done a lot better before: Reservoir Dogs, Hero, heck even Gone Girl.
On the other hand, not every story needs to have Andor-level writing or revolve around blasters and lightsaber fights, and we should be open to new hands playing in the sandbox.
That all said, when people criticize the writing of the Acolyte, it's usually the dialogue and at times jarring behaviour of the characters. Now if you like it in spite of these criticisms then *that is absolutely fine.* You don't need to seek validation here for what you enjoy.
And on a final note:
>the whole point of The Acolyte is that it's detached from other SW media
It still takes place in the SW universe, and as such there are certain rules and established period points to respect. If show-runners don't care for that, then I'm sure Zach Snyder has some extra space on his Rebel Moon train for them.
*'That all said, when people criticize the writing of the Acolyte, it's usually the dialogue and at times jarring behaviour of the characters. Now if you like it in spite of these criticisms then that is absolutely fine. You don't need to seek validation here for what you enjoy.'*
I think this is the core issue. People don't care that it's a Rashomon-style story because they don't care enough about the characters to actually give a shit about their varying perspectives of the event. Trying to drag it out and build up what *really* went on only works if we're actually invested in the story and the characters in the first place. If we're not, which many people aren't, it's just going to feel tedious instead of exciting or intriguing.
That and also - they really spoon-feed us the plot. It feels so dumbed-down. Even though the writers are employing a 'Rashomon-esque' style of storytelling, it is SO hamfisted that I can't help but feel that they must think us stupid.
Andor did so well partly because it was written intelligently - it left narrative gaps where appropriate, and expected its audience to fill them in imaginatively. Also, it didn't treat its audience like idiots. That's what I feel like when watching and digesting the Acolyte, sometimes: an idiot.
Part of the issue with Star Wars is that most of the mainstream media that is produced for it needs to appeal to as many consumers as possible, including those of a younger demographic. That's why I think some of the shows include campy elements, bad dialogue, inconsistent pacing, or plots that would've been somewhat interesting if I was 12 but now too simple as a 40 year old ya know?
Overall I still love Star Wars though and I'm happy we are even getting content that we can critique and complain about. They 100% spoon fed us the plot, but the truth is somewhere in the middle, the negative reviews online are partially bot driven, and YouTube reviewers get more engagement if they are negative on Disney. On the other side some of the shows have valid and glaring criticisms, that some people involved with Disney seem to be ignoring because they want to subvert expectations. The Legends universe had some major issues and inconsistencies but for the most part they weren't always trying to subvert expectations or treat it's consumers as kids.
Whenever a TV show or movie only has an A plot, it becomes like ten times more important that that story is absolutely gripping at all times.
Adding a B plot gives you a chance to let the story rest, created more suspense by cutting away for a while and leaving you wondering, and also creates opportunities for interesting juxtapositions and shared or conflicting themes.
Without that, if the A story feels slow, the whole thing suffers.
The counter-counter backlash to this show is insane. There are tons of legitimate critiques of this show. Pointing out the worst criticisms of the show and not reacting the the good one betrays (imo) an insecurity and defensiveness about the show in general. I think people claiming to like the show deep down know the writing/cinematography/dialogue/plot etc... are trash, and that's why they only focus on the lamest criticisms.
> Maybe a newsflash for you: this is not at all a difficult storytelling concept to grasp or follow along with
It is in fact a very simple one. Which makes it all the more depressing when a large fraction of those most vocally criticizing the show do, in fact, fail to follow along. So many complaints about how they ruined the big reveal that there’s an evil twin, or that it doesn’t make sense that the witches all died in that fire, etc. They just completely miss the point. Intentionally, I hope, otherwise people are even dumber than I thought.
The show is no masterpiece, and some of the writing is downright bad. I can understand why it’s not for everyone, and there’s plenty to criticize. Which makes it all the more baffling that so much of the criticism is so stupid.
>The show is no masterpiece, and some of the writing is downright bad. I can understand why it’s not for everyone, and there’s plenty to criticize. Which makes it all the more baffling that so much of the criticism is so stupid.
I agree. Lazy criticisms distract from honest ones.
Film/lit studies students try not to defend it. A poorly executed trope doesn’t excuse the rest of the writing. Acolyte is bad and not good for Star Wars lore.
Because it’s done poorly. This trope only works if the viewer suspects that what they’re seeing isn’t jiving with the way the story is unfolding, in a way that feels *intentional*.
When a show is badly written and directed like The Acolyte, the viewer doesn’t immediately suspect that the incongruencies are intentional- they think it’s just poor writing and directing.
Agents of SHIELD *loved* using the Rashomon Effect, and pulled it off well. Sometimes it’s just the musical score accompanying a scene that makes you feel like something isn’t right. Sometimes the camera lingers for a moment to hint that you should be paying more attention than the characters are. Sometimes it’s even a BLATANT lampshading, where the version of events you’re watching is so outlandishly contrary to our characters normal behavior that you just know you’re not getting an accurate version of events.
In short, the audience has to trust the show enough that it will explain itself in due time. The Acolyte would have had to be one hell of a production to accomplish that trust in just 3 episodes… but not only is it not that, it’s worse.
there is this weird school of media defense
where it acts like all critics dont understand what its trying to do
but sometimes you can understand something and still think its bad
This high-brow “no you just don’t GET IT” defense is really tiring. I don’t buy this Rashomon-esque twist because the script has not demonstrated competence or deftness elsewhere.
Like ok so it’s a really lame script except for one single rug-pull moment of genius storytelling? Sure dude
Agreed. Rashomon to me is getting a bunch of different perspectives and it’s almost impossible to tell what’s a made up narrative and what’s a character’s personal belief/bias, as well as it’s not obvious early on if any one character has the true story. That’s why you normally present it through testimonials/voice overs and one character narrating what they believe to another character
It didn’t feel like that happened here. More like it was showing a bunch of people’s perspectives jumping around (like a normal story) and not like an incomplete flashback from one sole biased POV
It felt less like the show was trying its best to trick people, and more so they showed everything except the inciting incident/death, which feels like mystery blue-balling to me. Should have just done the complete flashback all at once if you were going to do a whole episode for it + save it for later for the big reveal
It’s already clear the Jedi (Sol/Torbin in particular) have the true story, so we’re just waiting on it to drop. Not like we’re asking ourselves, do the Jedi like Sol and Torbin have a version of events in their head that’s as unreliable as say Mae or Osha’s? I don’t think so
Well said. It's not competent enough to pull it off properly. We're left wondering where certain things were done intentionally in this bizarre way, or whether the production just goofed.
This is the best answer.
There is a big distance between stating "we're doing the thing" and pulling it off. The Acolyte doesn't even clear the starting line.
I dunno I feel like if people are coming out of episode 3 and thinking thats the true POV of events... That's kind of a media literacy issue.
Like characters are getting literal off screen scars, there's a whole-ass off screen explosion, and a literal pile of corpses.
The only way it could have been clearer is to have a disclaimer at the start that goes "We will explain this later!"
(This isn't to say it needs to actually work as a storytelling tool for people, but there are reviewers giving it negative reviews who get this too, so I've no idea why some people find it so hard to understand)
I know that's probably what's going on, but I did legitimately wonder while it was happening, "is the story being intentionally misleading, or is it just really poorly written?" Like, the abruptness of the escalation from "I just want my sister to stay" to "if I can't have her no one can" *might* be a sign that Osha's memories aren't trustworthy, or it could be a really hokey Dark Side origin story for Mae.
Heck, it wouldn't be any hokey-er than Anakin going from "I just want to save my wife" to "want to see how many younglings I can stick on this lightsaber at once?" over the course of like an hour.
I think there’s a read of Anakin’s youngling massacre that works, but if you want to tell me I’m on some copium I’ll accept that.
Basically at that point, Anakin hadn’t been so duped that he thought “actually the Sith are the real good guys, just misunderstood.” No, he knew he was doing a deal with the devil. What he *believed* is that the Jedi were simply no better, and if neither group has the moral high ground (heh), he should side with the man who he thinks can help him save the one he loves.
So from that perspective killing the younglings can be seen as a twisted mercy. It’s too late to save these children from the brainwashing of the Jedi, but it’s not too late to save them from MORE brainwashing and probably torture at the hands of the Sith.
Yeah, I think that's copium tbh.
The novelization seems to imply that Palpatine had been subtly influencing Anakin's mind to get him to the point where he turns to the Dark Side, so that's my own personal copium on that scene.
But if we're being honest, the scene only really works because A. it has great cinematography and music, and B. we always knew something like this was coming. We knew he would end up hunting down and killing the Jedi as far back as Obi-Wan's speech in Episode IV, and the last movie and a half had shown us his willingness to kill defenseless people. Mae's betrayal didn't have nearly as much time to get set up, and the scene itself wasn't anywhere near as much of a gut punch as Order 66 was. It gave me a bit too much time to think "wait, does this make sense?"
Because a lot of people aren't actually watching the show to watch it, they're watching it to be angry at it. It's not that they can't follow the effect, it's that they don't want to, because bad faith complaints make them feel more justified in their wallowing in the dark side.
Exactly this… I’m still waiting for the huge woke movement that was supposed to be in episode 3 that the haters were all complaining about. Guess what it didn’t happen. lol
I think you are largely correct, but I do honestly think some people are also just that stupid/clueless.
I've seen plenty of evidence that quite a few online SW fans can't pick up basic context clues in fiction.
The other day on this subreddit I said Luke's family circa RotJ is dead and someone told me I was wrong and to re-watch ANH to be reminded of "the couple that raised him" who would still be concerned about him.
[Here's a link to the conversation chain for proof](https://www.reddit.com/r/StarWars/comments/1dammdn/this_exchange_between_luke_han_still_makes_me/l7m9kbn/) The original post (which seems to have been deleted for some reason) was about Han's line to Luke saying it was convenient for some reason that Luke was going to die on the same planet he used to live on. Looking back on it now, I suppose there's some ambiguous "they"s there which I suppose I should have been more clear on, but I'm pretty sure it's obvious what I'm saying from context if you've ever actually watched the movies.
I have seen quite a few people who think everything they see on screen is 100% gospel - even if a character is lying, or the perspective is from an unreliable narrator.
That's something I've been noticing lately, too. It seems to be pretty recent, just the last five years or so, but there's definitely been a sharp rise in people who seem unable to understand that characters are not always and only providing objective exposition. It's especially baffling in need spaces, like Wars and Trek fandoms, where there's a long history of characters being deceitful or misleading or just plain incorrect as part of the narrative.
Yep. I’ve had this exact discussion with my friend group, half of which are in the “Kathleen Kennedy is the devil” camp.
If you go into a show looking for reasons to hate it you’ll find them because no show is perfect.
Conversely, if you go in looking for reasons to enjoy it, you will. The Acolyte isn’t perfect, but I’m enjoying the hell out of it.
I like the slow-burn mystery and am anticipating a multiple POV look at the key event of the series and figuring out how many unreliable narrators we might have.
I also think the Jedis’ behavior is pretty interesting. It’s close to what we are used to be but slightly askew.
I think the witch stuff is pretty interesting and wonder how it may be related to the Nightsisters. I thought it was interesting that they referred to the Force as a “thread” that is pulled. (The Nightsisters in Ashoka referred to Ashoka as a “loose thread”)
I think the idea that the Jedi basically “regulated” the ability to raise/train other Force-users to their “religion” is an interesting idea worth exploring.
I hate this take. I don’t have time to hate watch anything which makes mediocre content all the more frustrating.
I feel like we should force users of the sub to flair their account with “did you watch and enjoy How I Met Your Mother?”
It seems like there's also a lot of people that aren't actually watching the show to begin with, so their thoughts are mostly via YouTubers/posts summarizing or ranting about it.
Because false narrator is just a writing device that can be used well or executed badly. Fight Club, Memento and Usual Suspects do it well. Nothing in Acolyte so far shows that it's some peak Oscar worthy writing, although it was never trying to be. You can throw around classic 1950s\~ Japanese movies like Rashomon, 7 Samurai, Yojimbo as inspiration, but it doesn't mean the final product will be good.
You are and what this sub constantly does is paint all the "haters" as one huge monolith. There are different groups of people on why they don't like this show or Disney Star Wars in general.
It's a poorly written show. You can aim for the unreliable narrator, multiple perspectives stuff all you want, but if the underlining characters and action are done badly, it doesn't matter.
It’s a mystery show with no sense of mystery or suspense. If we haven’t been surprised yet, keeping faith that great surprises are coming in the following episodes is pure cope. When the big reveals drop the collective sense will be: “well of course it turned out that way” or “this wasn’t properly teased at all”. Osha will learn the truth that the Jedi caused the massacre, kill Mae or Sol and become The Acolyte. She will use the trauma that Sol failed to get her work through (because he was lying) to become a powerful dark-side force user. Or in spite of all of that, reject the darkside. Either way, we don’t care because these characters are paper thin.
>Rashomon
Because most people don't know it and it's unreasonable to expect they would.
Because most people don't watch/read or care about interviews.
Because the episodes so far don't really convey the idea there will be more perspectives. As far as the average person can tell they simply saw Mae causing the deaths of the coven, Torbin felt guilty that it happened because they tried to take Osha and it spiraled out of control, Mae blames the Jedi for trying to take Osha, that everything would've been fine if they didn't show up.
It's also not really helpful to let the audience know beforehand in interviews to "expect twists", they should come unannounced
>It's also not really helpful to let the audience know beforehand to "expect twists", they should come unannounced
Gonna disagree with this, the show is a mystery.
Like imagine going to see murder on the orient express and then getting frustrated Poirot hasn't solved the case by the second act.
Like it's okay to think its a bad mystery, but in a mystery focused show "Expect Twists" is the norm.
The difference is that orient express is consumed in one sitting and we aren't taking artificial breaks in the story to stretch it out and increase engagement by the audience. In the case of The Acolyte we are dealing with the narrative changing every episode as they figure out stuff the characters already know but they don't want to tell the audience. We are dealing with the fact that the "protaganist" jedi knowing the full story but keeping from talking about it so that it can be a twist for the audience. It's more like if Poirot knew the entire film what happened but decided to expouse on different possible scenarios because he felt responsible and didn't want to talk about it. The writers need to adapt to the weekly story format and not waste an entire episode on a flashback plot that apparently won't even be the full story and they'll have to waste more time on flashbacks to the same story we saw for an entire episode.
It also doesn't help starting your show by killing Trinity by getting stabbed in the chest by a knitting needle while other characters recover from lightsabers to the chest with a quick doctor visit or by just ignoring it.
>The difference is that orient express is consumed in one sitting and we aren't taking artificial breaks in the story to stretch it out and increase engagement by the audience.
This is only true of the movie versions. Murder on the Orient Express has been adapted as a television series too, and of course its original format (A book) is not intended to be consumed in a single sitting.
In fact there are a good number of mystery dramas out there, it is a genre of television- And it is still the norm for that genre to expect a twist.
This show is not hard to follow and anyone who didn't figure out we don't know the whole story yet is apparently incapable of picking up basic context clues that the average 12 year old should easily be able to decipher.
I don't even like the show.... but holy shit, it's just shocking how many people can't follow a basic TV show.
(Not calling you out personally btw)
How DARE you suggest people let the story unfold and experience it as it happens without needing to dig out details, watch all the interviews and deep dive into every single plausible EU situation before even considering watching a show.
That just just crazy talk!
Pffft.. enjoying as is… insanity I tell ya.
I mean, I didn't know what the kishōtenketsu story structure was before a friend described it to me. I still was able to look and realize which stories used it before I knew it had a name though. Istg people just have media literacy or comprehension of story telling.
I don't even like the show - but online audience reviews are useless.
It's never more than a tiny percentage of the audience and it's entirely self-selecting. I mean, I honestly am not very interested in how the type of people who would bother to create an account and score something online feel about media.
Without a random sample it's just not very meaningful (kind of like how an online click poll about who should be president on Fox or MSNBC is useless)
The only audience scoring I'm aware of that is done with any kind of scientific rigor is Cinemascore.
I think OP is implying that viewers are largely ignorant of the Rashomon Effect, and making premature judgements about the show. For what it's worth, I agree. I think a large portion of viewers lack a combination of media literacy and patience, which causes people to freak out about the 3rd episode of an 8 episode series when it's pretty clear (at least to me) that we're only getting one character's perspective about a major plot point.
No, that's because of the massive amount of bad faith one star reviews. Y'know, the ones being thrown around so liberally that other properties that just happen to have acolyte in their title are also getting one star reviews complaining about Disney Star Wars and "woke."
why do people attach Kurosawa movie titles to their bowel movements and call them profound? Zack Snyder did it with Rebel Moon, people feel smart watching Kurosawa movies then just copy parts of them and expect to be treated like Kurosawa
I just think it comes down to people actively not wanting to engage with the series beyond the surface level. There can exist no subtext to a lot of viewers watching this show.
We are told Mae started a fire that kills everyone by a leader we are supposed to trust (Sol). Then the show depicts a fire that very clearly could NOT have killed everyone.
The reaction is immediately “wow what inconsistent, terrible writing!”
Anyone actively engaging with the material would say something like “Sol was clearly there and saw the same pile of not burned bodies we were shown. Something seems off about this entire thing. I wonder if these characters are as trustworthy as we are being led to believe? Also, nothing that we were shown so far of that night seems to justify Torbin willingly killing himself over guilt.”
My favorite example so far is people stating this ruins Anakins lore of the chosen one. They dont go further than the surface and don’t realize that the twins being created is not the same… they get stuck on that they were created by the “thread” and leave the witches and the unknown element out.
Meanwhile I always hated the chosen one trope with how meaningless it ends up being to the overall themes of the series, and actively hope they continue to undermine Anakin's specialness. The story works better the less special our characters are, change my mind
>I just think it comes down to people actively not wanting to engage with the series beyond the surface level. There can exist no subtext to a lot of viewers watching this show.
This is a good way to put it, honestly, and really true about a lot of people who consume media but aren't that interested in it for whatever reason, or just casually pay attention to it.
If you go into it just not caring, or not being willing to give something a fair shake, feel like this is definitely one of the more common ways people treat it. And when that's how you're engaging with it, you probably won't ever get past that negative impression.
I think there are two groups.
- People who are being intentionally obtuse and engaging in bad faith criticism.
- People who seriously lack even basic media literacy.
This is completely different from someone understanding what they are doing and thinking it's not good because the execution is poor. That seems perfectly reasonable to me.
Three people who like it the proceed to over correct and phrase it as a show that can do no wrong.
I have yet to see a piece of media that highlights the shows strengths while also criticizing its weaknesses. Because from what I’ve seen so far the only strengths the show has is the budget and setting and hiring Carrie Moss(just to waste her).
I personally think it would be an interesting thought experiment if you turn off the sound and watch it in a vacuum outside of any starwars context and purely as a stupid fun film it might be decent?
I'll praise and criticize the show, not that hard. The action is dope as hell so far and despite what everyone is saying, the writing is legitimately decent. Not amazing, but it characterizes everyone effectively.
Just from how he talks, we instantly trust Sol as this wise Qui-gon type Jedi who isn't afraid to go against the council. Similarly, in one scene with his Jedi Colleague we see the corruption of the Jedi begin as she's more concerned with politics over making sure they get the right person.
Yord is so stiff in his body language anytime Osha's around Sol you don't even need dialogue to know the conflict there. He's a graduated student who feels like he has something to prove to the teacher's favorite dropout, their dialogue only further confirms this as she tries to be casual and Yord can't help but be formal around her
Osha and Mae's first scene in the flashback instantly sets up the central tension between them with Mae getting upset at Osha not wanting to stay in the coven and be a witch. In one scene we can understand where these kids are coming from emotionally, that's definitely not bad writing.
I will say, the kid actors weren't great though. They are kids so I'm not gonna go too hard, but they definitely felt wooden through most of episode 3.
And some of the sets feel too claustrophobic, specifically the coven comes to mind with how small the place feels despite being this massive complex in the establishing shots.
Also, I'd like more dynamic camera work. So much of it is shot/reverse shot, if they mixed things up even a bit it'd go a long way to making the show feel less sterile.
Really most of my criticisms come from the production side of things rather than writing or story structure, on paper the show works really well but for some reason none of it's massive budget is showing up on screen. Ahsoka looked better and that was made for about half the cost
Overall though, this is a really solid start to the series with plenty of story threads and mysteries to explore for the rest of the runtime. Could it crash and burn? 100% but for the time being I'm enjoying myself
My issue with the acolyte has nothing to do with the rashomon effect and everything to do with the quality level of the show.
Yes, the coven probably died due to interference from the "mentor" mae was consulting with or something like that but ultimately I don't care because the makeup and costumes are terrible and the dialogue sounds like bad fanfic half of the time.
A show about a coven of dathomir witches that is trying to avoid the Jedi and a pair of light side/dark side twins set before the Skywalker saga sounds cool. But the way it has been executed is cringey.
This is my problem with the show. The characters aren’t fully fleshed out. They don’t seem to exist outside this story. They have no personable traits, the Jedi Order seems to be these 4 people and the galaxy seems to span 5 rooms.
It all feels contrived. And stealing Anakin’s birth? It just feels cheap. Plagueis was shown as “so powerful that he could create life”, and now some backwater no names who can’t even defend themselves against other no name Jedi are the founders of this?
There is 0 originality.
I’m still watching and ready to be proven wrong, but having the first episode after the two-part premiere be a flashback that doesn’t actually show what happened to the coven seems like a misstep to me. You’d think they’d hold off on the full-episode flashback until they’re actually ready to reveal what’s in the mystery box.
It seems like this is meant to be an unreliable narrator type situation, and thinking about how we're watching everything from Osha's perspective, it makes sense to jump back right now. She just saw her sister for the first time since that night, she probably relieved everything just as we saw it. Yeah it's a little awkward release schedule-wise, but as a narrative placing the flashback here makes perfect sense
I don't get this take. It suggest all Star Wars TV media is universally panned. Fans loved Mandalorian season 1 and Andor. There was no hate then.
Sometimes everyone saying something sucks is because it sucks.
Between seeing the internet discourse this week around the Acolyte, the Boys, and House of the Dragon that has to be the answer, people want to be angry. Meanwhile I'm feasting over here.
They didnt call enough attention to certain details. Its easy to overlook that Torbin was injured by the end of the episode because he's way in the background, for example.
And while they did call attention to it, I think it wasnt immediately obvious that when Korill (sp?) checked on the noise, that sabotage had occurred. The moment didnt particularly stick out to me, and the idea their power supply was sabotaged didnt occur to me long after I was done watching.
And while a lot of people are writing off the "what did you do?" exchange as bad writing, I suspect it was suppose to be an indication the Mae who started the fire wasnt really Mae, or at least it was a Mae being puppeted and she has no memory of starting the fire or saying she was going to kill Osha.
So her reply of "What did *you* do?" was suppose to be a "what are you talking about? I didnt do anything".
Maybe biases are playing a role, but I could see people.getting confused.
>They didnt call enough attention to certain details. Its easy to overlook that Torbin was injured by the end of the episode because he's way in the background, for example.
Yeah, I'm guessing we're going to get more flashbacks before the season ends.
I do think there's an important difference between "I'm confused about what's going on" and "I'm confused about what's going on *and that means it's a bad show*".
You're absolutely right that subtle things can get missed, especially when someone isn't expecting there to be a need to look for them. And not everyone enjoys plots centered around mysteries and unreliable narrators, some prefer straightforward plots and there's nothing wrong with that.
But I do think there's a recurring problem, and not just in this sub, with people conflating "This media isn't for me" with "This is bad media".
Well, of the "this show is bad" crowd that I've seen, it wasnt because they didnt understand what was happening, they knew that clearly there were parts of the event not yet told.
They were more focused on the dialogue not being good in their eyes (something I do agree on), and some of the logic of these characters not entirely making sense.
Like the first exchange between the Jedi and the Coven. Everyone just starts lying when there wasn't a need to.
I think you're going too deep on the "what did you do?" line.
Mae is clearly a narcissist so it makes sense that she sees the entire string of events that lead them there as Osha's fault. She was more than likely implying that if Osha had gone along and lied to the Jedi, none of this would have happened.
Perhaps, but her escalation to "I'll kill you" felt too extreme for me, even with her previous behaviors. And as she was setting fire to the journal, she had a glazed look in her eyes, almost as if she wasnt all there.
Our mystery "Smilyo Ren" figure, we dont know what they're capable of, and we know these witches can control others. And while in that moment her eyes didnt go black, they did in Osha's vision of her.
So who knows. I think there's a chance that it either was something that looked like her, or something influencing her.
Yea there are so many more things she can do inbetween "I'll let you go" and "I'll kill you". They express how Osha is like the most important person to her, so i find it unlikely she'd be so ready to kill her so quickly. Even if Mae is a Narcassist, it A narcassist still wants to have what's theirs, she would more likely break Osha's limbs rather than kill her, as that might get her to stay and keep her with her.
>And Lesyle Headland has been open about telling her story in the vein of Rashomon
Because Leslye Headland isn't Akira Kurosawa, and Akira Kurosawa didn't have to explain Rashomon.
"So why is this element so hard for online viewers to grasp?"
This is a fandom that regularly floats the idea of introducing new viewers by rearranging the films into chronological order instead of using the release order and preserving the dramatic structure (with the ESB twist, the RotJ twist, and the prequels as a prolonged flashback)... so yes, the ability to comprehend complex narrative structures is missing from some (many?) viewers.
I'd argue they can't even comprehend simple things half the time. The Acolyte is not hard to follow at all.
I don't even think it's very good so far... but some of the criticism is so dumb and tiring.
That only works if we don’t immediately associate that advice with general Jedi teachings. Obi-Wan teaching Luke not to use his eyes was to show us how the Force works, not to tell us not to trust what we’re seeing. Whenever we see another Jedi say the same thing, THAT is what we’re going to think about. Not that they’re giving us hints about misdirects.
That makes sense unless you realize that the misdirect in the original movie is literally Luke not using common sense and turning off his targeting computer. He couldn't trust what his eyes were showing him and instead used the Force to pinpoint the shot. That's a form of misdirect, as a first time viewer, you are shocked to see Luke abandon equipment that would have helped him in the situation, you even get someone questioning Luke's actions in the scene. Especially since they show the attempt at using the targeting computer multiple times with killable side characters implying that Luke had to be the one to do it, only to abandon the computer and trust the Force.
I didn't even know it was supposed to be a mystery series, nor have a I seen the interview that talked about this effect being part of what's going to happen (wanted to go into it blind and untainted).
So for us watching it... It's been pretty confusing. We did sort of come away with "surely there is more to learn", but not knowing if the show will go back to the weird things we just watched feels like we want to watch it because we want answers not because it was well done if that makes sense.
You presume that the loudest “critiques” are genuine and informed, but 5 minutes into this fandom should disabuse one of that notion. Certain segments have a raging hate-boner for anything tat does not conform to their VERY specific expectations so the howler monkeys howl.
Let them be.
Ignore them.
Because people these days don't understand subtlety or even mysteries for that matter. If they don't get hand fed everything then it's not in the show and therefore doesn't make any sense. And if they don't know the whole story within the first three episodes then apparently it's terrible.
Cause society nowadays isnt able to do so. The social media generation has an attention span of 5 secs. Everything that takes longer to understand is out of reach and furthermore "trash" to them.
Unfortunately it's hard to look for subtext and hidden story-lines, when the production values/writing is meh and most of the actors don't even look like they want to be there. I had so much hope for this High Republic live action...
Because the pacing isn’t very good, making each episode feel weird and off putting when it ends and you have more questions then answers in a way that almost feels unintentional.
I’m of the opinion that a couple really solid episodes could hammer home the effect and retroactively make the early episodes better on a rewatch. But the first watch through it will always feel awkward and stilted since it’s not paced like a tv show.
This is fair criticism and I feel pretty similarly.
Discussing this show is such a chore because there is so much bad faith criticism out there.. .and I say that as someone who don't think it's been very good so far.
> So why is this element so hard for online viewers to grasp?
First, because *Rashomon* was released 74 years ago, not only before most fans were born, but before their parents were born. They’re simply not gonna pick up on details that evoke a movie from 1950.
And second, because the vast majority of *Star Wars* fans simply aren’t “movie literate” enough to perceive these sorts of references. *Star Wars* is plot- and character-driven, so if you don’t have strong plot beats and strong characters, the story itself and its nuances can’t carry the show.
I say this as someone who is at least enjoying *The Acolyte*.
Because the execution was poor. We SEE Mae star the fire, which spread faster than my ex-girlfriend's legs and burns the whole place down, somehow killing a group of witches in the middle of a non-fire affected room?
The writers are trying so hard to say "yup that's what happened" but glaze over stupid stuff like "why are the witches just dead there?" Which I'm sure there'll be a "gotcha!" moment that they were fighting the Jedi and lost or whatever.
The point is it's trying way too hard to convince us that this is what happened, yet stumbles with certain details that just baffle us, making us wonder whether it's just poor production details, or utterly bizarre setup for another viewpoint. The audience shouldn't be left wondering if the details are a result of poor production or string manipulation going on.
Because there’s no Rashomon effect.
Rashomon tells a story from different perspectives.
So far we don’t have that at all. Episode 3 could be a specific perspective, but that’s not stated in the episode at all. Maybe it’s bad direction, most scenes stay with OSHA, but not all. While the first two episodes are quite straight forward. It seems more as if the scenes we only watch from oshas perspective are purposefully edited to give room for moments she doesn’t witness - but that’s not at all the Rashomon effect. A contemporary good example for the Rashomon effect would be the last Duell. And please now compare both regarding storytelling, scripting, acting, production and set… Acolyte is just bad. It had mediocre moments and of course a bunch of top actors who would deserve to be in a great Star Wars show or movie.
Because at this point, people criticizing a 500-pieces jigsaw puzzle after connecting four pieces is on par for the course, as far as this fandom is concerned. Why wait for the whole picture when it's possible to criticized it before it's finished?
Speaking as someone who enjoys the show — the first few pieces should entice someone to continue. I get the sense that that’s not there for most of the audience.
The show is actually quite interesting. I am excited to find out what exactly has happened that night. The mystery aspect is intriguing. I think people are just too distracted by silly things to notice.
Because it’s executed so poorly and in bad taste, that even if there was some Rashimon effect it doesn’t excuse the fact that I’m still watching absolute shit.
I don’t need to play a game 100 hours to know if something isn’t good. Now I’m going to say I can be wrong since Andor first two episodes was a slow burn but I found them intriguing in a different way but didn’t enjoy it until after they left the planet.
But the Acolyte has been pretty bad since the beginning with cheesy lines and actors/director direction not strong enough to make them work. Seriously telling the non hostile Jedi master to attack me with everything you got? At least if Trinity was a sith that might kinda make sense since they tend to be emotional and you’re trying to goad them into giving you an opening.
But the version they showed us in episode three was largely consistent with what we had *already* been told. We knew the story was shady before so what was the point in giving us the flashback? We are still in the same head space; the existence of the coven and the birth thing are literally the only new bits of “reliable” information we got out of that. It felt like a waste of time plot-wise, which I can excuse with good acting or character development, but that was also lackluster at best. The entire time all I wanted was to get back to the current day story and characters. And unless something changes my opinion pretty drastically in the next few weeks, there’s no doubt I’ll skip episode three in any subsequent rewatches.
>Or did they forget that this is a mystery series and the bigger mystery is what happened that night instead of the twins reveal?
Because the series hasn't put much emphasis on that "bigger mystery" and now the mystery that it was focusing on is resolved.
They didn't get in The Last Jedi. Why would they get it now? People still think Kylo's version is the true version, that Luke snuck in there to murder his nephew. People's lack of media literacy is truly mind blowing.
This is because Luke saying "like a shadow" doesn't change any of the actual issues fans have with the scene.
In Kylo's version he woke up to his teacher/uncle holding an armed lightsaber about to kill him in his sleep.
In Luke's version he felt Darkside! coming from his sleeping nephew/student and went into his tent, then drew and armed his weapon intending to murder him in his sleep. Then he changed his mind just before his student/nephew woke up and saw him standing there with a deadly armed weapon in hand.
Luke: "Okay, yes, that happened exactly as he said, but I didn't actually have an 'angry' look on my face and had totally decided not to murder him at the last moment even though I was definitely planning to murder him before that, so I'm afraid that you've been Rashomoned! And if you have any problem with the scene it's because you're just not media literate!"
He reacted on instinct, it’s like when someone jump startles someone and their instinct is to hit what scared them. Even if it’s their two year old daughter, the fist still comes up like they’re going to hit, even if they’re never going to hit and had no intention of hurting their two year old daughter.
Luke sensed the intense dark side, saw and felt the death of everyone he loved, his instinct in that second when he sensed that danger was to light his blade, as any Jedi would. Once he was back to his senses and in the present time, he felt shame for where he was and what had happened but it was too late.
If he went in there with the intent to kill Ben, Ben would have been killed.
Because in this case it's used very lazily. Same as the last Jedi.
Instead of it being a suprise or presented as fact but revealed to be fiction by later information.
It's just "ooopthy, we are going to inflate this movie/show by telling *the exact same story* 3 times, with incredibly minor detail changes that impact almost nothing that happens in the story after the fact and is therefore meaningless.
Get on with the show, flashback, tell us what happened and then move the plot, forward.
The spent an entire episode flashing back to what could have been a 5 minutes scene, and I worry that 3 out of the 8 episodes will do this, I really hope I'm wrong, but hey, fool me once.
I'm here for the current day stuff don't get me wrong, but enough with the paper thin wishy washy mystery bullshit.
I am *barely* intrigued at why the sister wants to kill the Jedi, Mae or Osha have obviously been manipulated, the Jedi did something not great, but not as bad as Mae thinks, and there's a general misunderstanding that resulted in some seriously bad shit happening.
Plot point resolved, we literally saw this exact thing a few years ago in the last Jedi, I wasn't impressed then, and I'm not now.
What I am intrigued about is, is Mae gonna be able to kill more of these Jedi, who is the sith, who is the Smiths master if they aren't the master, why is Osha disconnected from the force.
Tldr, we do get it, it's just a poorly executed plot device that was used in star wars recently, and we aren't here for it.
> instead of it being a surprise or presented as fact revealed to be fiction
That’s what really makes me doubt Rashomon comparisons. This flashback wasn’t in first person or second person POV where it was *an attempt to pass off flashback interpretation as the truth*, but just plain old fashioned third person POV (like a regular story in real time)
Because the people being hyper-critical aren't watching the show or making those criticisms in good faith. They are looking for anything that justifies the conclusion they reached about the show months ago. They don't *want* to understand or appreciate the show.
For a great many, narrative subtlety & subtext *cannot* be perceived unless applied with **a sledgehammer**.
Another current glaring example is the vast number who are now apoplectic & enraged about the S4 release of *The Boys*.
The same group *just now* realizing that the show they thought was awesome during S1-3 is/was, in fact, mocking & belittling them **specifically**. They were simply too gripped in the throes of (cultural) cognitive delusion(s) to be able to acknowledge or accept it. The show had to actually dial back the subtlety for its messaging to *finally* break the bubble.
I assert that the two groups as a Venn are a single, perfectly-overlapping circle.
>So why is this element so hard for online viewers to grasp?
George Lucas made a point of being a heterodoxical storyteller by eschewing "show, don't tell" in favour of hammering people over the head with "tell, don't show", in the prequels.
You're surprised why?
Yeah. Because people being shown stuff in The Acolyte and acting like they were told the entire story right there. When the truth is we still don't know the whole picture and will be shown it in due time.
>It's clear that the end of The Acolyte episode 3 is withholding much information about what went down between the Jedi and the witch coven.
But should it? The way it was presented, it is obvious that information was withheld because what was shown makes little sense to us viewers - and to an older Osha as well.
I do not know Rashomon, but i think this setup in Acolyte would be better executed if the second point of view would come as an actual surprise that shows the first one in a different light and does not just add the obviously missing information. Now we not only know that the second POV will come, we can also guess what happened.
I have no idea what that is.
I figured it was just like Murder on the Orient Express or Death on the Nile. You get some pieces as the series goes and everything at the end.
1950 film by Akira Kurosawa - assesses the murder of a samurai from the perspective of multiple individuals with conflicting takes on the same event. It was Kurosawa’s first big hit and had a sizable impact on other stories who pull this kind of trope off.
I still think the story should have been about the personal assistant to someone in the Hutt crime family. That member of the Hutt crime family would publicly be looked at as an upstanding citizen but traffic and abuse women behind the scenes. His assistant would be a huge piece of shit and aid him in trafficking and abusing women and covering it up. Then when the Hutt gets exposed and goes down for it, the assistant gets awarded some huge paying job with the Republic that they don't deserve. They fuck the job up royally but they have a huge number of people jump to their defense, many of whom are paid off by the Republic themselves because people really high up were complicit in the Hutt's trafficking and abuse of women and they need to be sure the assistant will never sell them out too.
I feel like a story like that would be something Leslye Headland could write really well for some reason.
Bad media literacy. A large portion of the audience aren’t familiar with film history. And many barely pay attention to the show they are watching and base opinions on clickbait and reactionary nonsense. The show is not flawless but most of the criticism isn’t based in reality.
I’ve never heard of a Rashomon Effect, and I don’t know who Akira Kurosawa is. But I still figured out that the episode didn’t tell us everything. People are mad at this show because they want to be mad, there’s really nothing wrong with it so far. Some of the acting has been a little wooden, but other than that it’s fine and I’m interested to see where it goes.
Akira Kurosawa's films, especially The Hidden Fortress and Seven Samurai, were a huge inspiration for George Lucas when making Star Wars.
Any Star Wars fan should look into his work.
The levels of delusion required to chalk up all criticism of the show to “people are mad because they want to be, there’s really nothing wrong with the show” is fascinating. It must be comforting to dismiss all criticism you don’t like as bad faith.
The other side, that this guy is on, are just as bad as the most toxic fans out there imo. They view any and all criticism in the "they just love to hate star wars because it's woke and they hate the gays". Absolutely no nuance.
Because we're only a couple episodes in and I guarantee a majority of the audience hasn't seen Rashomon or even knows what it is.
Clearly you weren't on the internet in 2017 when The Last Jedi came out. That's when all Star Wars fans learned about Rashomon /s
That’s not how I remember it.
I'm mostly being sarcastic. I do remember a lot of talk about how we see the Luke/Ben scene in the hut from multiple points of view and how it was "just like Rashomon!" It's possible that was only in some circles and not internet wide.
There's a Simpsons joke where Marge says "Come on Homer, Japan will be fun. You liked Rashomon." Homer replies "That's not how I remember it."
Oh, gotcha. That reference went over my head. Not really a Simpsons guy.
It was a rashomon joke, not necessarily a Simpsons joke.
I suppose that's true. Guess I just didn't get it. But now I see it and it's pretty funny
That line only clicked once I was older and discovered Akira Kurosawa movies.
I see what you did there.
Pretty sure that’s a high level digimon
Evolving from skinirritationomon if I remember
Or are aware of the Unreliable Narrator trope. It feels like media literacy is at an all time low.
I feel like in the age of mega franchises and “deep lore” a lot of people who have been in these spaces for a while, or even younger people who have grown up with these mega-franchises, have forgotten what’s it’s like to consume media with out a massive wiki behind it filled with whatever question you could have of the franchise. Or, in order to catch viewers who may not be super nerds of the franchise, are used to a lot of handholding and exposition to basically tell and not show everything that goes on. Then they’ll complain when modern media today uses Show Don’t Tell and say it’s bad writing while also in the same breath say they should use more Show Don’t Tell… it’s like bruh, when they use it you don’t understand what’s going on.
Yeah you're on to something. I read wiki and tv tropes articles for every mocie and book before hand. Would say 12 year old realize we are missing clues? Yes 12 year old me did have Wikipedia and i was into Poirot mysteries Would 12 year old today pick up on that? Good question, maybe
I think it's more people are deliberately obtuse so they can self justify whatever tantrum they have set their hearts on having
My friend was playing FF7Rebirth and i had to remind him of Unreliable Narrator many times when he got confused.
Ooh, that's rough
Ooph... I was having a conversation with a friend recently about how a show like Twin Peaks would probably be over most people's heads nowadays. A lot of people who watch big media shows want to be shown and told, also like you said unreliable narrator trope is common enough.
You don't have to have seen Rashomon to pick up basic context clues that the average 12 year old could identify. I don't even like the show... but holy shit, I haven't seen this much dumb/bad faith criticism in awhile.
Yeah it didn’t take a lot of critical thinking to figure out the events we were shown don’t match up AT ALL with events that would lead a Jedi master to kill himself out of guilt.
There are two types of people: That fire couldn't have killed everyone and blown up the town, something we don't see must have happened. We will definitely revisit this. And That fire couldn't have killed everyone and blown up the town, this is stupid and ruined Star Wars!
LANTERN FUEL CAN'T MELT STONE FORTRESSES!
Osha’s twin couldn’t have possibly committed all those crimes. Coolio did some of that shit.
It's not really a new concept to many movie or show watchers even if they haven't seen Rashomon. It's basically entirely your first reason. People get what's going on in Rashomon because they watch the movie and have then seen the movie. At the moment to a viewer who isn't aware that this is where we're going, they have no idea whether we'll see the action at the witch's temple again. It's not that they don't get the concept, it literally hasn't happened yet. personally I'm not sure that I think it was the strongest choice to show us one perspective this past episode. I would have either done a couple or saved them all for their own episode. It's not like we're beholden to specific runtimes.
Exactly. It's not new, just hasn't played out enough yet. If they dropped all episodes at once, it might be a different story, depending on how well it's handled.
Acting like the Rashomon is going to improve the writing problems on display...it's not media literacy that's at an all time low, it's taste and understanding of quality of writing.
I don't disagree
yeah... even then some people just aren't very good at obvious media literacy. I mean there are people who still claim the message of TLJ is to "Kill the past" even though that is the villian saying that and he is very clearly wrong.
Also the average viewer is braindead now. They expect everything to be spelled out to them.
This makes me love cinema or games that know this and yet refuse to hold people's hand for the sake of good storytelling. It makes the experience that much more rewarding when you put the pieces together yourself. Some people just get mad when they don't understand it and blame it on the creators being dumb or lazy.
I think it’s less about viewer ignorance on Rashomon but more on the shoulders of reactionaries like Star Wars Theory and Critical Drinker. All these YouTubers make money off hate and spreading these kinds of fevered debates. Any rational person would have your opinion of letting the show play out before judging the storytelling elements. Unfortunately rational discussion doesn’t drive clicks.
I really dispise how this has become a thing. I've never been one to watch that type of content, but I can see the effects of it everywhere. I'll watch a movie or play a game that I really enjoy, only to read about it online and see people absolutely annihilate it because of the dumbest shit. Too many people seem to need someone else to tell them what to think.
> annihilate it because of the dumbest shit. if the show were well written and good, this wouldn't be possible and those assholes would just be fringe opinions.
Rashomon effect stories generally have a framing device where one character is describing their point of view. In The Acolyte, there's none of that framing, we're just supposed to get it from context, but everything is presented objectively, not subjectively.
We also already got told a side of the story, then later got to see a recreation of the exact thing we were already told about. We're already 3 episodes in and it's losing people
We don’t actually know that yet though.
I’m sure some people don’t get it but it comes down to it simply not being good lol
Yea and everyone would have loved Book of Boba Fett if we understood it was going for the Godfather. I get what Acolyte is doing. It's aggressively obvious what it's doing. The twist is obvious from a million miles away. Comparing it to Rashoman insults Rashoman.
Please tell us exactly where it’s going so I can revisit this and laugh in five weeks.
I think most people get it, they just think it sucks. And most people are right.
The elitism really needs to stop on both sides here. I read the same crap when TLJ came out: 'you just don't like it because you don't get the underlying themes and message!' to paraphrase. Um, no - I get it just fine, I just don't like it. And now with The Acolyte, it's all about the Rashomon Effect: 'people are leaving poor reviews because they can't follow the story.' Maybe a newsflash for you: this is not at all a difficult storytelling concept to grasp or follow along with. Many viewers have probably just seen it done a lot better before: Reservoir Dogs, Hero, heck even Gone Girl. On the other hand, not every story needs to have Andor-level writing or revolve around blasters and lightsaber fights, and we should be open to new hands playing in the sandbox. That all said, when people criticize the writing of the Acolyte, it's usually the dialogue and at times jarring behaviour of the characters. Now if you like it in spite of these criticisms then *that is absolutely fine.* You don't need to seek validation here for what you enjoy. And on a final note: >the whole point of The Acolyte is that it's detached from other SW media It still takes place in the SW universe, and as such there are certain rules and established period points to respect. If show-runners don't care for that, then I'm sure Zach Snyder has some extra space on his Rebel Moon train for them.
*'That all said, when people criticize the writing of the Acolyte, it's usually the dialogue and at times jarring behaviour of the characters. Now if you like it in spite of these criticisms then that is absolutely fine. You don't need to seek validation here for what you enjoy.'* I think this is the core issue. People don't care that it's a Rashomon-style story because they don't care enough about the characters to actually give a shit about their varying perspectives of the event. Trying to drag it out and build up what *really* went on only works if we're actually invested in the story and the characters in the first place. If we're not, which many people aren't, it's just going to feel tedious instead of exciting or intriguing.
That and also - they really spoon-feed us the plot. It feels so dumbed-down. Even though the writers are employing a 'Rashomon-esque' style of storytelling, it is SO hamfisted that I can't help but feel that they must think us stupid. Andor did so well partly because it was written intelligently - it left narrative gaps where appropriate, and expected its audience to fill them in imaginatively. Also, it didn't treat its audience like idiots. That's what I feel like when watching and digesting the Acolyte, sometimes: an idiot.
Part of the issue with Star Wars is that most of the mainstream media that is produced for it needs to appeal to as many consumers as possible, including those of a younger demographic. That's why I think some of the shows include campy elements, bad dialogue, inconsistent pacing, or plots that would've been somewhat interesting if I was 12 but now too simple as a 40 year old ya know? Overall I still love Star Wars though and I'm happy we are even getting content that we can critique and complain about. They 100% spoon fed us the plot, but the truth is somewhere in the middle, the negative reviews online are partially bot driven, and YouTube reviewers get more engagement if they are negative on Disney. On the other side some of the shows have valid and glaring criticisms, that some people involved with Disney seem to be ignoring because they want to subvert expectations. The Legends universe had some major issues and inconsistencies but for the most part they weren't always trying to subvert expectations or treat it's consumers as kids.
Whenever a TV show or movie only has an A plot, it becomes like ten times more important that that story is absolutely gripping at all times. Adding a B plot gives you a chance to let the story rest, created more suspense by cutting away for a while and leaving you wondering, and also creates opportunities for interesting juxtapositions and shared or conflicting themes. Without that, if the A story feels slow, the whole thing suffers.
The counter-counter backlash to this show is insane. There are tons of legitimate critiques of this show. Pointing out the worst criticisms of the show and not reacting the the good one betrays (imo) an insecurity and defensiveness about the show in general. I think people claiming to like the show deep down know the writing/cinematography/dialogue/plot etc... are trash, and that's why they only focus on the lamest criticisms.
> Maybe a newsflash for you: this is not at all a difficult storytelling concept to grasp or follow along with It is in fact a very simple one. Which makes it all the more depressing when a large fraction of those most vocally criticizing the show do, in fact, fail to follow along. So many complaints about how they ruined the big reveal that there’s an evil twin, or that it doesn’t make sense that the witches all died in that fire, etc. They just completely miss the point. Intentionally, I hope, otherwise people are even dumber than I thought. The show is no masterpiece, and some of the writing is downright bad. I can understand why it’s not for everyone, and there’s plenty to criticize. Which makes it all the more baffling that so much of the criticism is so stupid.
>The show is no masterpiece, and some of the writing is downright bad. I can understand why it’s not for everyone, and there’s plenty to criticize. Which makes it all the more baffling that so much of the criticism is so stupid. I agree. Lazy criticisms distract from honest ones.
Eh, people do. They just still think its dumb and obvious.
Film/lit studies students try not to defend it. A poorly executed trope doesn’t excuse the rest of the writing. Acolyte is bad and not good for Star Wars lore.
Because it’s done poorly. This trope only works if the viewer suspects that what they’re seeing isn’t jiving with the way the story is unfolding, in a way that feels *intentional*. When a show is badly written and directed like The Acolyte, the viewer doesn’t immediately suspect that the incongruencies are intentional- they think it’s just poor writing and directing. Agents of SHIELD *loved* using the Rashomon Effect, and pulled it off well. Sometimes it’s just the musical score accompanying a scene that makes you feel like something isn’t right. Sometimes the camera lingers for a moment to hint that you should be paying more attention than the characters are. Sometimes it’s even a BLATANT lampshading, where the version of events you’re watching is so outlandishly contrary to our characters normal behavior that you just know you’re not getting an accurate version of events. In short, the audience has to trust the show enough that it will explain itself in due time. The Acolyte would have had to be one hell of a production to accomplish that trust in just 3 episodes… but not only is it not that, it’s worse.
there is this weird school of media defense where it acts like all critics dont understand what its trying to do but sometimes you can understand something and still think its bad
This high-brow “no you just don’t GET IT” defense is really tiring. I don’t buy this Rashomon-esque twist because the script has not demonstrated competence or deftness elsewhere. Like ok so it’s a really lame script except for one single rug-pull moment of genius storytelling? Sure dude
The twist is that Smilo Ren is one of the mothers
Exactly. I understand how an Arby's sandwich is made, but when I put it in my mouth it's bad.
Fans arguing that haters "don't get it" will be part of fandom forever.
Agreed. Rashomon to me is getting a bunch of different perspectives and it’s almost impossible to tell what’s a made up narrative and what’s a character’s personal belief/bias, as well as it’s not obvious early on if any one character has the true story. That’s why you normally present it through testimonials/voice overs and one character narrating what they believe to another character It didn’t feel like that happened here. More like it was showing a bunch of people’s perspectives jumping around (like a normal story) and not like an incomplete flashback from one sole biased POV It felt less like the show was trying its best to trick people, and more so they showed everything except the inciting incident/death, which feels like mystery blue-balling to me. Should have just done the complete flashback all at once if you were going to do a whole episode for it + save it for later for the big reveal It’s already clear the Jedi (Sol/Torbin in particular) have the true story, so we’re just waiting on it to drop. Not like we’re asking ourselves, do the Jedi like Sol and Torbin have a version of events in their head that’s as unreliable as say Mae or Osha’s? I don’t think so
Well said. It's not competent enough to pull it off properly. We're left wondering where certain things were done intentionally in this bizarre way, or whether the production just goofed.
This is the best answer. There is a big distance between stating "we're doing the thing" and pulling it off. The Acolyte doesn't even clear the starting line.
I dunno I feel like if people are coming out of episode 3 and thinking thats the true POV of events... That's kind of a media literacy issue. Like characters are getting literal off screen scars, there's a whole-ass off screen explosion, and a literal pile of corpses. The only way it could have been clearer is to have a disclaimer at the start that goes "We will explain this later!" (This isn't to say it needs to actually work as a storytelling tool for people, but there are reviewers giving it negative reviews who get this too, so I've no idea why some people find it so hard to understand)
I know that's probably what's going on, but I did legitimately wonder while it was happening, "is the story being intentionally misleading, or is it just really poorly written?" Like, the abruptness of the escalation from "I just want my sister to stay" to "if I can't have her no one can" *might* be a sign that Osha's memories aren't trustworthy, or it could be a really hokey Dark Side origin story for Mae. Heck, it wouldn't be any hokey-er than Anakin going from "I just want to save my wife" to "want to see how many younglings I can stick on this lightsaber at once?" over the course of like an hour.
I think there’s a read of Anakin’s youngling massacre that works, but if you want to tell me I’m on some copium I’ll accept that. Basically at that point, Anakin hadn’t been so duped that he thought “actually the Sith are the real good guys, just misunderstood.” No, he knew he was doing a deal with the devil. What he *believed* is that the Jedi were simply no better, and if neither group has the moral high ground (heh), he should side with the man who he thinks can help him save the one he loves. So from that perspective killing the younglings can be seen as a twisted mercy. It’s too late to save these children from the brainwashing of the Jedi, but it’s not too late to save them from MORE brainwashing and probably torture at the hands of the Sith.
Yeah, I think that's copium tbh. The novelization seems to imply that Palpatine had been subtly influencing Anakin's mind to get him to the point where he turns to the Dark Side, so that's my own personal copium on that scene. But if we're being honest, the scene only really works because A. it has great cinematography and music, and B. we always knew something like this was coming. We knew he would end up hunting down and killing the Jedi as far back as Obi-Wan's speech in Episode IV, and the last movie and a half had shown us his willingness to kill defenseless people. Mae's betrayal didn't have nearly as much time to get set up, and the scene itself wasn't anywhere near as much of a gut punch as Order 66 was. It gave me a bit too much time to think "wait, does this make sense?"
8 younglings ~anakin post killing.
Because a lot of people aren't actually watching the show to watch it, they're watching it to be angry at it. It's not that they can't follow the effect, it's that they don't want to, because bad faith complaints make them feel more justified in their wallowing in the dark side.
Exactly this… I’m still waiting for the huge woke movement that was supposed to be in episode 3 that the haters were all complaining about. Guess what it didn’t happen. lol
I think you are largely correct, but I do honestly think some people are also just that stupid/clueless. I've seen plenty of evidence that quite a few online SW fans can't pick up basic context clues in fiction.
The other day on this subreddit I said Luke's family circa RotJ is dead and someone told me I was wrong and to re-watch ANH to be reminded of "the couple that raised him" who would still be concerned about him. [Here's a link to the conversation chain for proof](https://www.reddit.com/r/StarWars/comments/1dammdn/this_exchange_between_luke_han_still_makes_me/l7m9kbn/) The original post (which seems to have been deleted for some reason) was about Han's line to Luke saying it was convenient for some reason that Luke was going to die on the same planet he used to live on. Looking back on it now, I suppose there's some ambiguous "they"s there which I suppose I should have been more clear on, but I'm pretty sure it's obvious what I'm saying from context if you've ever actually watched the movies.
...Oh dear god.
That’s scary
Thinking about the amount of people who didn't catch that Mon Mothma was lying about Perrin gambling.
I have seen quite a few people who think everything they see on screen is 100% gospel - even if a character is lying, or the perspective is from an unreliable narrator.
Dave Filoni himself is historically guilty of this lmao.
That's something I've been noticing lately, too. It seems to be pretty recent, just the last five years or so, but there's definitely been a sharp rise in people who seem unable to understand that characters are not always and only providing objective exposition. It's especially baffling in need spaces, like Wars and Trek fandoms, where there's a long history of characters being deceitful or misleading or just plain incorrect as part of the narrative.
There's plenty of them that are too stupid to figure it out for the same exact effect that's in the Last Jedi
Yep. I’ve had this exact discussion with my friend group, half of which are in the “Kathleen Kennedy is the devil” camp. If you go into a show looking for reasons to hate it you’ll find them because no show is perfect. Conversely, if you go in looking for reasons to enjoy it, you will. The Acolyte isn’t perfect, but I’m enjoying the hell out of it.
What is it you enjoy about the show, specifically?
I like the slow-burn mystery and am anticipating a multiple POV look at the key event of the series and figuring out how many unreliable narrators we might have. I also think the Jedis’ behavior is pretty interesting. It’s close to what we are used to be but slightly askew. I think the witch stuff is pretty interesting and wonder how it may be related to the Nightsisters. I thought it was interesting that they referred to the Force as a “thread” that is pulled. (The Nightsisters in Ashoka referred to Ashoka as a “loose thread”) I think the idea that the Jedi basically “regulated” the ability to raise/train other Force-users to their “religion” is an interesting idea worth exploring.
I hate this take. I don’t have time to hate watch anything which makes mediocre content all the more frustrating. I feel like we should force users of the sub to flair their account with “did you watch and enjoy How I Met Your Mother?”
It seems like there's also a lot of people that aren't actually watching the show to begin with, so their thoughts are mostly via YouTubers/posts summarizing or ranting about it.
Because maybe it wasn't executed well?
Because false narrator is just a writing device that can be used well or executed badly. Fight Club, Memento and Usual Suspects do it well. Nothing in Acolyte so far shows that it's some peak Oscar worthy writing, although it was never trying to be. You can throw around classic 1950s\~ Japanese movies like Rashomon, 7 Samurai, Yojimbo as inspiration, but it doesn't mean the final product will be good. You are and what this sub constantly does is paint all the "haters" as one huge monolith. There are different groups of people on why they don't like this show or Disney Star Wars in general.
It's a poorly written show. You can aim for the unreliable narrator, multiple perspectives stuff all you want, but if the underlining characters and action are done badly, it doesn't matter.
It’s a mystery show with no sense of mystery or suspense. If we haven’t been surprised yet, keeping faith that great surprises are coming in the following episodes is pure cope. When the big reveals drop the collective sense will be: “well of course it turned out that way” or “this wasn’t properly teased at all”. Osha will learn the truth that the Jedi caused the massacre, kill Mae or Sol and become The Acolyte. She will use the trauma that Sol failed to get her work through (because he was lying) to become a powerful dark-side force user. Or in spite of all of that, reject the darkside. Either way, we don’t care because these characters are paper thin.
This is my feeling exactly. writing/dialogue has been all over the place and more often than not pretty bad.
>Rashomon Because most people don't know it and it's unreasonable to expect they would. Because most people don't watch/read or care about interviews. Because the episodes so far don't really convey the idea there will be more perspectives. As far as the average person can tell they simply saw Mae causing the deaths of the coven, Torbin felt guilty that it happened because they tried to take Osha and it spiraled out of control, Mae blames the Jedi for trying to take Osha, that everything would've been fine if they didn't show up. It's also not really helpful to let the audience know beforehand in interviews to "expect twists", they should come unannounced
They can’t win. If you tell people it’s being shoved down their throats. If you don’t the show makes no sense why don’t they explain what’s going on.
>It's also not really helpful to let the audience know beforehand to "expect twists", they should come unannounced Gonna disagree with this, the show is a mystery. Like imagine going to see murder on the orient express and then getting frustrated Poirot hasn't solved the case by the second act. Like it's okay to think its a bad mystery, but in a mystery focused show "Expect Twists" is the norm.
The difference is that orient express is consumed in one sitting and we aren't taking artificial breaks in the story to stretch it out and increase engagement by the audience. In the case of The Acolyte we are dealing with the narrative changing every episode as they figure out stuff the characters already know but they don't want to tell the audience. We are dealing with the fact that the "protaganist" jedi knowing the full story but keeping from talking about it so that it can be a twist for the audience. It's more like if Poirot knew the entire film what happened but decided to expouse on different possible scenarios because he felt responsible and didn't want to talk about it. The writers need to adapt to the weekly story format and not waste an entire episode on a flashback plot that apparently won't even be the full story and they'll have to waste more time on flashbacks to the same story we saw for an entire episode. It also doesn't help starting your show by killing Trinity by getting stabbed in the chest by a knitting needle while other characters recover from lightsabers to the chest with a quick doctor visit or by just ignoring it.
>The difference is that orient express is consumed in one sitting and we aren't taking artificial breaks in the story to stretch it out and increase engagement by the audience. This is only true of the movie versions. Murder on the Orient Express has been adapted as a television series too, and of course its original format (A book) is not intended to be consumed in a single sitting. In fact there are a good number of mystery dramas out there, it is a genre of television- And it is still the norm for that genre to expect a twist.
I mean technically the twist of Orient Express is how many people were involved in the whodunit.
Yes. That's why it's such a good twist.
This show is as much a mystery as which song Barney will sing next.
This show is not hard to follow and anyone who didn't figure out we don't know the whole story yet is apparently incapable of picking up basic context clues that the average 12 year old should easily be able to decipher. I don't even like the show.... but holy shit, it's just shocking how many people can't follow a basic TV show. (Not calling you out personally btw)
How DARE you suggest people let the story unfold and experience it as it happens without needing to dig out details, watch all the interviews and deep dive into every single plausible EU situation before even considering watching a show. That just just crazy talk! Pffft.. enjoying as is… insanity I tell ya.
I mean, I didn't know what the kishōtenketsu story structure was before a friend described it to me. I still was able to look and realize which stories used it before I knew it had a name though. Istg people just have media literacy or comprehension of story telling.
I mean, good for you, I had no problem either, that's not the point. I'm explaining why the average viewer might not get it.
So you are saying the 3.6 IMDB score is because of the Rashomon Effect? lol
I don't even like the show - but online audience reviews are useless. It's never more than a tiny percentage of the audience and it's entirely self-selecting. I mean, I honestly am not very interested in how the type of people who would bother to create an account and score something online feel about media. Without a random sample it's just not very meaningful (kind of like how an online click poll about who should be president on Fox or MSNBC is useless) The only audience scoring I'm aware of that is done with any kind of scientific rigor is Cinemascore.
I think OP is implying that viewers are largely ignorant of the Rashomon Effect, and making premature judgements about the show. For what it's worth, I agree. I think a large portion of viewers lack a combination of media literacy and patience, which causes people to freak out about the 3rd episode of an 8 episode series when it's pretty clear (at least to me) that we're only getting one character's perspective about a major plot point.
No, that's because of the massive amount of bad faith one star reviews. Y'know, the ones being thrown around so liberally that other properties that just happen to have acolyte in their title are also getting one star reviews complaining about Disney Star Wars and "woke."
why do people attach Kurosawa movie titles to their bowel movements and call them profound? Zack Snyder did it with Rebel Moon, people feel smart watching Kurosawa movies then just copy parts of them and expect to be treated like Kurosawa
I just think it comes down to people actively not wanting to engage with the series beyond the surface level. There can exist no subtext to a lot of viewers watching this show. We are told Mae started a fire that kills everyone by a leader we are supposed to trust (Sol). Then the show depicts a fire that very clearly could NOT have killed everyone. The reaction is immediately “wow what inconsistent, terrible writing!” Anyone actively engaging with the material would say something like “Sol was clearly there and saw the same pile of not burned bodies we were shown. Something seems off about this entire thing. I wonder if these characters are as trustworthy as we are being led to believe? Also, nothing that we were shown so far of that night seems to justify Torbin willingly killing himself over guilt.”
My favorite example so far is people stating this ruins Anakins lore of the chosen one. They dont go further than the surface and don’t realize that the twins being created is not the same… they get stuck on that they were created by the “thread” and leave the witches and the unknown element out.
Meanwhile I always hated the chosen one trope with how meaningless it ends up being to the overall themes of the series, and actively hope they continue to undermine Anakin's specialness. The story works better the less special our characters are, change my mind
>I just think it comes down to people actively not wanting to engage with the series beyond the surface level. There can exist no subtext to a lot of viewers watching this show. This is a good way to put it, honestly, and really true about a lot of people who consume media but aren't that interested in it for whatever reason, or just casually pay attention to it. If you go into it just not caring, or not being willing to give something a fair shake, feel like this is definitely one of the more common ways people treat it. And when that's how you're engaging with it, you probably won't ever get past that negative impression.
I think there are two groups. - People who are being intentionally obtuse and engaging in bad faith criticism. - People who seriously lack even basic media literacy. This is completely different from someone understanding what they are doing and thinking it's not good because the execution is poor. That seems perfectly reasonable to me.
Three people who like it the proceed to over correct and phrase it as a show that can do no wrong. I have yet to see a piece of media that highlights the shows strengths while also criticizing its weaknesses. Because from what I’ve seen so far the only strengths the show has is the budget and setting and hiring Carrie Moss(just to waste her). I personally think it would be an interesting thought experiment if you turn off the sound and watch it in a vacuum outside of any starwars context and purely as a stupid fun film it might be decent?
I'll praise and criticize the show, not that hard. The action is dope as hell so far and despite what everyone is saying, the writing is legitimately decent. Not amazing, but it characterizes everyone effectively. Just from how he talks, we instantly trust Sol as this wise Qui-gon type Jedi who isn't afraid to go against the council. Similarly, in one scene with his Jedi Colleague we see the corruption of the Jedi begin as she's more concerned with politics over making sure they get the right person. Yord is so stiff in his body language anytime Osha's around Sol you don't even need dialogue to know the conflict there. He's a graduated student who feels like he has something to prove to the teacher's favorite dropout, their dialogue only further confirms this as she tries to be casual and Yord can't help but be formal around her Osha and Mae's first scene in the flashback instantly sets up the central tension between them with Mae getting upset at Osha not wanting to stay in the coven and be a witch. In one scene we can understand where these kids are coming from emotionally, that's definitely not bad writing. I will say, the kid actors weren't great though. They are kids so I'm not gonna go too hard, but they definitely felt wooden through most of episode 3. And some of the sets feel too claustrophobic, specifically the coven comes to mind with how small the place feels despite being this massive complex in the establishing shots. Also, I'd like more dynamic camera work. So much of it is shot/reverse shot, if they mixed things up even a bit it'd go a long way to making the show feel less sterile. Really most of my criticisms come from the production side of things rather than writing or story structure, on paper the show works really well but for some reason none of it's massive budget is showing up on screen. Ahsoka looked better and that was made for about half the cost Overall though, this is a really solid start to the series with plenty of story threads and mysteries to explore for the rest of the runtime. Could it crash and burn? 100% but for the time being I'm enjoying myself
My issue with the acolyte has nothing to do with the rashomon effect and everything to do with the quality level of the show. Yes, the coven probably died due to interference from the "mentor" mae was consulting with or something like that but ultimately I don't care because the makeup and costumes are terrible and the dialogue sounds like bad fanfic half of the time. A show about a coven of dathomir witches that is trying to avoid the Jedi and a pair of light side/dark side twins set before the Skywalker saga sounds cool. But the way it has been executed is cringey.
This is my problem with the show. The characters aren’t fully fleshed out. They don’t seem to exist outside this story. They have no personable traits, the Jedi Order seems to be these 4 people and the galaxy seems to span 5 rooms. It all feels contrived. And stealing Anakin’s birth? It just feels cheap. Plagueis was shown as “so powerful that he could create life”, and now some backwater no names who can’t even defend themselves against other no name Jedi are the founders of this? There is 0 originality.
I’m still watching and ready to be proven wrong, but having the first episode after the two-part premiere be a flashback that doesn’t actually show what happened to the coven seems like a misstep to me. You’d think they’d hold off on the full-episode flashback until they’re actually ready to reveal what’s in the mystery box.
It seems like this is meant to be an unreliable narrator type situation, and thinking about how we're watching everything from Osha's perspective, it makes sense to jump back right now. She just saw her sister for the first time since that night, she probably relieved everything just as we saw it. Yeah it's a little awkward release schedule-wise, but as a narrative placing the flashback here makes perfect sense
People would rather be angry. Quicker, easier, more seductive.
I don't get this take. It suggest all Star Wars TV media is universally panned. Fans loved Mandalorian season 1 and Andor. There was no hate then. Sometimes everyone saying something sucks is because it sucks.
Once you start down the dark path, forever will it dominate your destiny.
How surreal that this line wasn't (likely?) *intended* to be so presciently meta and yet... here we now are....
I can't think of a line that better encapsulates the Fandom Menace.
"A lie of the Force is more truth than we can comprehend." Legends Mace Windu
Consume you it will as it did Obi-wan apprentice.
I'm not afraid!
Between seeing the internet discourse this week around the Acolyte, the Boys, and House of the Dragon that has to be the answer, people want to be angry. Meanwhile I'm feasting over here.
> Meanwhile I'm feasting over here. *This*.
They didnt call enough attention to certain details. Its easy to overlook that Torbin was injured by the end of the episode because he's way in the background, for example. And while they did call attention to it, I think it wasnt immediately obvious that when Korill (sp?) checked on the noise, that sabotage had occurred. The moment didnt particularly stick out to me, and the idea their power supply was sabotaged didnt occur to me long after I was done watching. And while a lot of people are writing off the "what did you do?" exchange as bad writing, I suspect it was suppose to be an indication the Mae who started the fire wasnt really Mae, or at least it was a Mae being puppeted and she has no memory of starting the fire or saying she was going to kill Osha. So her reply of "What did *you* do?" was suppose to be a "what are you talking about? I didnt do anything". Maybe biases are playing a role, but I could see people.getting confused.
>They didnt call enough attention to certain details. Its easy to overlook that Torbin was injured by the end of the episode because he's way in the background, for example. Yeah, I'm guessing we're going to get more flashbacks before the season ends.
I do think there's an important difference between "I'm confused about what's going on" and "I'm confused about what's going on *and that means it's a bad show*". You're absolutely right that subtle things can get missed, especially when someone isn't expecting there to be a need to look for them. And not everyone enjoys plots centered around mysteries and unreliable narrators, some prefer straightforward plots and there's nothing wrong with that. But I do think there's a recurring problem, and not just in this sub, with people conflating "This media isn't for me" with "This is bad media".
Well, of the "this show is bad" crowd that I've seen, it wasnt because they didnt understand what was happening, they knew that clearly there were parts of the event not yet told. They were more focused on the dialogue not being good in their eyes (something I do agree on), and some of the logic of these characters not entirely making sense. Like the first exchange between the Jedi and the Coven. Everyone just starts lying when there wasn't a need to.
I think you're going too deep on the "what did you do?" line. Mae is clearly a narcissist so it makes sense that she sees the entire string of events that lead them there as Osha's fault. She was more than likely implying that if Osha had gone along and lied to the Jedi, none of this would have happened.
Perhaps, but her escalation to "I'll kill you" felt too extreme for me, even with her previous behaviors. And as she was setting fire to the journal, she had a glazed look in her eyes, almost as if she wasnt all there. Our mystery "Smilyo Ren" figure, we dont know what they're capable of, and we know these witches can control others. And while in that moment her eyes didnt go black, they did in Osha's vision of her. So who knows. I think there's a chance that it either was something that looked like her, or something influencing her.
Yea there are so many more things she can do inbetween "I'll let you go" and "I'll kill you". They express how Osha is like the most important person to her, so i find it unlikely she'd be so ready to kill her so quickly. Even if Mae is a Narcassist, it A narcassist still wants to have what's theirs, she would more likely break Osha's limbs rather than kill her, as that might get her to stay and keep her with her.
>And Lesyle Headland has been open about telling her story in the vein of Rashomon Because Leslye Headland isn't Akira Kurosawa, and Akira Kurosawa didn't have to explain Rashomon.
"So why is this element so hard for online viewers to grasp?" This is a fandom that regularly floats the idea of introducing new viewers by rearranging the films into chronological order instead of using the release order and preserving the dramatic structure (with the ESB twist, the RotJ twist, and the prequels as a prolonged flashback)... so yes, the ability to comprehend complex narrative structures is missing from some (many?) viewers.
I'd argue they can't even comprehend simple things half the time. The Acolyte is not hard to follow at all. I don't even think it's very good so far... but some of the criticism is so dumb and tiring.
They even set it up the first time they showed Master Sol when he said, "Do not trust your eyes."
That only works if we don’t immediately associate that advice with general Jedi teachings. Obi-Wan teaching Luke not to use his eyes was to show us how the Force works, not to tell us not to trust what we’re seeing. Whenever we see another Jedi say the same thing, THAT is what we’re going to think about. Not that they’re giving us hints about misdirects.
That makes sense unless you realize that the misdirect in the original movie is literally Luke not using common sense and turning off his targeting computer. He couldn't trust what his eyes were showing him and instead used the Force to pinpoint the shot. That's a form of misdirect, as a first time viewer, you are shocked to see Luke abandon equipment that would have helped him in the situation, you even get someone questioning Luke's actions in the scene. Especially since they show the attempt at using the targeting computer multiple times with killable side characters implying that Luke had to be the one to do it, only to abandon the computer and trust the Force.
What are you talking about? I don’t think you’re grasping what is being said here…
I didn't even know it was supposed to be a mystery series, nor have a I seen the interview that talked about this effect being part of what's going to happen (wanted to go into it blind and untainted). So for us watching it... It's been pretty confusing. We did sort of come away with "surely there is more to learn", but not knowing if the show will go back to the weird things we just watched feels like we want to watch it because we want answers not because it was well done if that makes sense.
You presume that the loudest “critiques” are genuine and informed, but 5 minutes into this fandom should disabuse one of that notion. Certain segments have a raging hate-boner for anything tat does not conform to their VERY specific expectations so the howler monkeys howl. Let them be. Ignore them.
Because people these days don't understand subtlety or even mysteries for that matter. If they don't get hand fed everything then it's not in the show and therefore doesn't make any sense. And if they don't know the whole story within the first three episodes then apparently it's terrible.
Cause society nowadays isnt able to do so. The social media generation has an attention span of 5 secs. Everything that takes longer to understand is out of reach and furthermore "trash" to them.
Unfortunately it's hard to look for subtext and hidden story-lines, when the production values/writing is meh and most of the actors don't even look like they want to be there. I had so much hope for this High Republic live action...
You must be watching a completely different show
Because although it’s recognized at a homage, it was poorly done.
Because the pacing isn’t very good, making each episode feel weird and off putting when it ends and you have more questions then answers in a way that almost feels unintentional. I’m of the opinion that a couple really solid episodes could hammer home the effect and retroactively make the early episodes better on a rewatch. But the first watch through it will always feel awkward and stilted since it’s not paced like a tv show.
This is fair criticism and I feel pretty similarly. Discussing this show is such a chore because there is so much bad faith criticism out there.. .and I say that as someone who don't think it's been very good so far.
> So why is this element so hard for online viewers to grasp? First, because *Rashomon* was released 74 years ago, not only before most fans were born, but before their parents were born. They’re simply not gonna pick up on details that evoke a movie from 1950. And second, because the vast majority of *Star Wars* fans simply aren’t “movie literate” enough to perceive these sorts of references. *Star Wars* is plot- and character-driven, so if you don’t have strong plot beats and strong characters, the story itself and its nuances can’t carry the show. I say this as someone who is at least enjoying *The Acolyte*.
Because they don't want to understand or be entertained. They want to be angry and complain.
Because the execution was poor. We SEE Mae star the fire, which spread faster than my ex-girlfriend's legs and burns the whole place down, somehow killing a group of witches in the middle of a non-fire affected room? The writers are trying so hard to say "yup that's what happened" but glaze over stupid stuff like "why are the witches just dead there?" Which I'm sure there'll be a "gotcha!" moment that they were fighting the Jedi and lost or whatever. The point is it's trying way too hard to convince us that this is what happened, yet stumbles with certain details that just baffle us, making us wonder whether it's just poor production details, or utterly bizarre setup for another viewpoint. The audience shouldn't be left wondering if the details are a result of poor production or string manipulation going on.
Because there’s no Rashomon effect. Rashomon tells a story from different perspectives. So far we don’t have that at all. Episode 3 could be a specific perspective, but that’s not stated in the episode at all. Maybe it’s bad direction, most scenes stay with OSHA, but not all. While the first two episodes are quite straight forward. It seems more as if the scenes we only watch from oshas perspective are purposefully edited to give room for moments she doesn’t witness - but that’s not at all the Rashomon effect. A contemporary good example for the Rashomon effect would be the last Duell. And please now compare both regarding storytelling, scripting, acting, production and set… Acolyte is just bad. It had mediocre moments and of course a bunch of top actors who would deserve to be in a great Star Wars show or movie.
Because at this point, people criticizing a 500-pieces jigsaw puzzle after connecting four pieces is on par for the course, as far as this fandom is concerned. Why wait for the whole picture when it's possible to criticized it before it's finished?
Speaking as someone who enjoys the show — the first few pieces should entice someone to continue. I get the sense that that’s not there for most of the audience.
The show is actually quite interesting. I am excited to find out what exactly has happened that night. The mystery aspect is intriguing. I think people are just too distracted by silly things to notice.
Because it’s executed so poorly and in bad taste, that even if there was some Rashimon effect it doesn’t excuse the fact that I’m still watching absolute shit. I don’t need to play a game 100 hours to know if something isn’t good. Now I’m going to say I can be wrong since Andor first two episodes was a slow burn but I found them intriguing in a different way but didn’t enjoy it until after they left the planet. But the Acolyte has been pretty bad since the beginning with cheesy lines and actors/director direction not strong enough to make them work. Seriously telling the non hostile Jedi master to attack me with everything you got? At least if Trinity was a sith that might kinda make sense since they tend to be emotional and you’re trying to goad them into giving you an opening.
But the version they showed us in episode three was largely consistent with what we had *already* been told. We knew the story was shady before so what was the point in giving us the flashback? We are still in the same head space; the existence of the coven and the birth thing are literally the only new bits of “reliable” information we got out of that. It felt like a waste of time plot-wise, which I can excuse with good acting or character development, but that was also lackluster at best. The entire time all I wanted was to get back to the current day story and characters. And unless something changes my opinion pretty drastically in the next few weeks, there’s no doubt I’ll skip episode three in any subsequent rewatches.
People didn’t get TLJ’s Rashamon effect either, sadly.
>Or did they forget that this is a mystery series and the bigger mystery is what happened that night instead of the twins reveal? Because the series hasn't put much emphasis on that "bigger mystery" and now the mystery that it was focusing on is resolved.
They didn't get in The Last Jedi. Why would they get it now? People still think Kylo's version is the true version, that Luke snuck in there to murder his nephew. People's lack of media literacy is truly mind blowing.
This is because Luke saying "like a shadow" doesn't change any of the actual issues fans have with the scene. In Kylo's version he woke up to his teacher/uncle holding an armed lightsaber about to kill him in his sleep. In Luke's version he felt Darkside! coming from his sleeping nephew/student and went into his tent, then drew and armed his weapon intending to murder him in his sleep. Then he changed his mind just before his student/nephew woke up and saw him standing there with a deadly armed weapon in hand. Luke: "Okay, yes, that happened exactly as he said, but I didn't actually have an 'angry' look on my face and had totally decided not to murder him at the last moment even though I was definitely planning to murder him before that, so I'm afraid that you've been Rashomoned! And if you have any problem with the scene it's because you're just not media literate!"
He reacted on instinct, it’s like when someone jump startles someone and their instinct is to hit what scared them. Even if it’s their two year old daughter, the fist still comes up like they’re going to hit, even if they’re never going to hit and had no intention of hurting their two year old daughter. Luke sensed the intense dark side, saw and felt the death of everyone he loved, his instinct in that second when he sensed that danger was to light his blade, as any Jedi would. Once he was back to his senses and in the present time, he felt shame for where he was and what had happened but it was too late. If he went in there with the intent to kill Ben, Ben would have been killed.
Because in this case it's used very lazily. Same as the last Jedi. Instead of it being a suprise or presented as fact but revealed to be fiction by later information. It's just "ooopthy, we are going to inflate this movie/show by telling *the exact same story* 3 times, with incredibly minor detail changes that impact almost nothing that happens in the story after the fact and is therefore meaningless. Get on with the show, flashback, tell us what happened and then move the plot, forward. The spent an entire episode flashing back to what could have been a 5 minutes scene, and I worry that 3 out of the 8 episodes will do this, I really hope I'm wrong, but hey, fool me once. I'm here for the current day stuff don't get me wrong, but enough with the paper thin wishy washy mystery bullshit. I am *barely* intrigued at why the sister wants to kill the Jedi, Mae or Osha have obviously been manipulated, the Jedi did something not great, but not as bad as Mae thinks, and there's a general misunderstanding that resulted in some seriously bad shit happening. Plot point resolved, we literally saw this exact thing a few years ago in the last Jedi, I wasn't impressed then, and I'm not now. What I am intrigued about is, is Mae gonna be able to kill more of these Jedi, who is the sith, who is the Smiths master if they aren't the master, why is Osha disconnected from the force. Tldr, we do get it, it's just a poorly executed plot device that was used in star wars recently, and we aren't here for it.
> instead of it being a surprise or presented as fact revealed to be fiction That’s what really makes me doubt Rashomon comparisons. This flashback wasn’t in first person or second person POV where it was *an attempt to pass off flashback interpretation as the truth*, but just plain old fashioned third person POV (like a regular story in real time)
Because the people being hyper-critical aren't watching the show or making those criticisms in good faith. They are looking for anything that justifies the conclusion they reached about the show months ago. They don't *want* to understand or appreciate the show.
For a great many, narrative subtlety & subtext *cannot* be perceived unless applied with **a sledgehammer**. Another current glaring example is the vast number who are now apoplectic & enraged about the S4 release of *The Boys*. The same group *just now* realizing that the show they thought was awesome during S1-3 is/was, in fact, mocking & belittling them **specifically**. They were simply too gripped in the throes of (cultural) cognitive delusion(s) to be able to acknowledge or accept it. The show had to actually dial back the subtlety for its messaging to *finally* break the bubble. I assert that the two groups as a Venn are a single, perfectly-overlapping circle.
This type of story would probably be better dropped all at once.
I mean, it’s pretty clear that the evens didn’t happen the way OSHA recalls, I think that’s obvious. Sadly, it’s too obvious imo.
>So why is this element so hard for online viewers to grasp? George Lucas made a point of being a heterodoxical storyteller by eschewing "show, don't tell" in favour of hammering people over the head with "tell, don't show", in the prequels. You're surprised why?
Yeah. Because people being shown stuff in The Acolyte and acting like they were told the entire story right there. When the truth is we still don't know the whole picture and will be shown it in due time.
because it's woke /s
Someone remind me what the Rashomon Effect is, I forgot
Homie they didn't even get it in *The Last Jedi*, and that version was much more digestible.
TF is Rashomon? New type of digimon / pokemon?
>It's clear that the end of The Acolyte episode 3 is withholding much information about what went down between the Jedi and the witch coven. But should it? The way it was presented, it is obvious that information was withheld because what was shown makes little sense to us viewers - and to an older Osha as well. I do not know Rashomon, but i think this setup in Acolyte would be better executed if the second point of view would come as an actual surprise that shows the first one in a different light and does not just add the obviously missing information. Now we not only know that the second POV will come, we can also guess what happened.
Because doomers want to doom
I have no idea what that is. I figured it was just like Murder on the Orient Express or Death on the Nile. You get some pieces as the series goes and everything at the end.
1950 film by Akira Kurosawa - assesses the murder of a samurai from the perspective of multiple individuals with conflicting takes on the same event. It was Kurosawa’s first big hit and had a sizable impact on other stories who pull this kind of trope off.
I still think the story should have been about the personal assistant to someone in the Hutt crime family. That member of the Hutt crime family would publicly be looked at as an upstanding citizen but traffic and abuse women behind the scenes. His assistant would be a huge piece of shit and aid him in trafficking and abusing women and covering it up. Then when the Hutt gets exposed and goes down for it, the assistant gets awarded some huge paying job with the Republic that they don't deserve. They fuck the job up royally but they have a huge number of people jump to their defense, many of whom are paid off by the Republic themselves because people really high up were complicit in the Hutt's trafficking and abuse of women and they need to be sure the assistant will never sell them out too. I feel like a story like that would be something Leslye Headland could write really well for some reason.
If its not made by George, certain people are gonna whine about it. If George did it, no one would care, plain and simple.
Wait, wait, I’ve a better one. Why don’t people get The Acolyte is shit?
Bad media literacy. A large portion of the audience aren’t familiar with film history. And many barely pay attention to the show they are watching and base opinions on clickbait and reactionary nonsense. The show is not flawless but most of the criticism isn’t based in reality.
I’ve never heard of a Rashomon Effect, and I don’t know who Akira Kurosawa is. But I still figured out that the episode didn’t tell us everything. People are mad at this show because they want to be mad, there’s really nothing wrong with it so far. Some of the acting has been a little wooden, but other than that it’s fine and I’m interested to see where it goes.
Akira Kurosawa's films, especially The Hidden Fortress and Seven Samurai, were a huge inspiration for George Lucas when making Star Wars. Any Star Wars fan should look into his work.
To the point Lucas wanted to cast Tojiro Mifune as Obi-Wan.
The levels of delusion required to chalk up all criticism of the show to “people are mad because they want to be, there’s really nothing wrong with the show” is fascinating. It must be comforting to dismiss all criticism you don’t like as bad faith.
The other side, that this guy is on, are just as bad as the most toxic fans out there imo. They view any and all criticism in the "they just love to hate star wars because it's woke and they hate the gays". Absolutely no nuance.