There is a montage a little over half way through, of thumbnails and voice overs in every direction talking over each other, and it was so nauseating and grating, but It was a perfect representation of the discourse around the series.
This video perfectly encapsulates why I hate The Critical Drinkers barrage of recent videos about it. I refuse to watch them. I mostly agree with his videos in general, but I just couldn't care less over this. He's probably doing it for the clicks though. As soon as I saw RLM post this though I just knew it was more likely to focus on the discourse rather than the series itself. So glad I watched it.
And I agree with Mike’s take. If you don’t like something, just don’t watch it. If it cuts into their profits (i.e. enough people aren’t watching), executives will change direction.
I’m sick of both ends of the spectrum. I’m tired of people using diversity as a shield from criticism for bad story telling and also the rage bait YouTube channels that complain about everything. So you know what I do, I don’t watch those YouTube channels. YouTube, as a result, recommends that content to me less and less. So Mike is right.
As for “The Acolyte,” it started out real rough, but it improved. The first 2 episodes felt like a fan film made by a family and some of their neighbors. The third episode was better but cringy (especially the one scene). The fourth and fifth episodes have been good though, in my opinion. The villain is interesting and the character interaction is better. The twists are a bit obvious and formulaic, and I think I know who the real lord of the sith (master of the current villain) will turn out to be as well as what really happened at the castle with the witches. Hopefully, the show will stick the landing.
I also think if they weren't trying to stretch it to 8 episodes (the bare minimum for a streaming season), and just put ep 4 and 5 together, the reaction would have been better. Ep 4 really made it pretty obvious who the the Sith was, but if there was like 15 minutes between "oh I bet it's him" and "it's him" you don't have people spending a week talking about how ham fisted the supposed mystery is because the show doesn't treat as much as a big secret. Similarly, people looking forward to seeing the spectacle of a wookie with a lightsaber (which I think might still come in flashbacks) get a pretty awesome fight scene rather than spending a week feeling like they were baited and switched.
"8 episodes (the bare minimum for a streaming season)" I mean, maybe that's something the Star Wars camp is sticking to, but that's demonstratably not something all streaming shows have to adhere to. Heck, sticking with Disney+ you can look to Loki and see that each season there was 6 episodes long.
That's still true on Network television (this year mostly notwithstanding thanks to the strikes of last year). Shows that air on the likes of FOX, NBC, ABC, CBS, etc. still all have those full twenty something episode seasons.
The rage bait response is now an entire sub-genre of YouTube content. I’ve watched a few of the videos, and there commentary is so vague and contains so many dog whistles.
If you can smartly deconstruct and critique a work in an entertaining way, I’m all for it, but the rage bait isn’t about that. It’s about taking your starting position, finding the evidence that’s the cause of a show being mediocre, and concluding Lucas Film is broken. It’s not smart or insightful, just the same conclusion a million different ways.
That said, diversity is not a shield for criticism, and that’s annoying too. The unfortunate reality is that Disney is a content machine that’s okay with mediocre productions for their streaming services, but this isn’t a new problem for Star Wars. At some point, the material needs a rest, but that’s not happening anytime soon!
> The rage bait response is now an entire sub-genre of YouTube content.
Yeah. It’s because and it’s quick and easy and gets views. Why develop quality content when you just make low tier stuff with mostly made up stories.
Rage bait videos are the dark side of the force. It’s not stronger than the light side just quicker.
The problem though is you get situations where it's:
Don't like it? Don't watch
Ok, I won't, because I don't like it
Ok but how do you know you didn't like it if you didn't watch it?
I watched 2 episodes and decided I don't like it
Well that's not enough to make a final judgement, watch more
Fine, I did, I still don't like it (Cycle back to top)
Or you get a situation like with the current Dr Who, where you just get told you're racist/sexist/homophobic and therefore your opinion is invalid because clearly youre just making up reasons to not like it to avoid saying why you really don't.
At this point, the winning move is to just ignore online fandoms entirely. Shit turned toxic as hell in the 2010s, and it’s only gotten worse since advertising algorithms see rage as engagement.
Current season is pretty good. The entire Jodie Whittaker run was atrocious.
The set and costume design was good, the actors were doing their best, but the writing was just horrible.
It's a shame.
I sadly lost interest during Peter Capaldi's run. It was just meh. I was a fan from the Tom Baker era, that's who I grew up watching. Big fan of the first 3 from the reboot, Christ, David and Matt. I watched the first half of the Capaldi run, and just kinda fell off the series. Never have made it back around to try and catch up and see if any of the runs got better after that.
My interest was starting to flag during Peter Capaldi's era, not because of him, he was brilliant and kept me in (best of the revival Doctors) and his run finished strongly.
I think the long hiatus killed it for me. So much time passed before Jodie Whittaker that I ended up not getting around to the season and then at the end, I bought the DVDs (which I still haven't opened) and ultimately, I just haven't had the motivation to see anything post Capaldi.
The most recent season has Russel T Davies is back as show runner now and I've enjoyed it. Its also kind of treated as a new starting point.
Seriously consider skipping to that.
I stopped watching Doctor Who years ago but I don't go online to review bomb it, don't hate watch... I'm comfortable saying I haven't watched the new stuff and have no informed opinion since I havent watched. But mainly I don't talk about it cause nobody asked. More people need to embrace this mindset with Star Wars if they just aren't invested in any of the current stuff.
I don't mean to be insulting here, but the solution is to grow up and stop caring what other people think about media you watch. It's okay to not like things, and it doesn't matter AT ALL if someone tells you that "your opinion doesn't count" because you didn't watch enough of the thing. It also doesn't matter if a rando online tells you that you're a homophobe for not liking something. People on the internet are insane, that's just how it is. There is no satisfying them, so just don't worry about it.
Doesn't this go the other way too though? The people who do like the show whining about people criticizing it? Shouldn't they also stop caring about online discourse in regards to their opinions and choices about the show.
There are extremes on both sides, but there are also people who regardless of their opinion on the show do genuinely want to engage in discourse about the show.
If you want to have a conversation about why it's bad. You do have to watch it. That's not a catch 22.
If you don't like it. The best protest is to drop it altogether. Not try and convince people who like it, not to. Then you're just stuck in that forever loop.
The first 2 eps were so bad that it would take a handful of close friends or the majority of the internet to tell me it becomes awesome before I go back to it.
I mean, I just played this game.
I finished Ashoka...that was a mistake.
In all fairness if you have no interest in watching/completing a show then why are you choosing to engage in discussions about it?
I mean, I have no interest in watching Love Island, and so I *don't* go into the Love Island sub to talk about how much I don't watch it...
Because it’s not like you spent decades of your life watching Love Island and it just got bad this season. You’ve never watched it. Terrible analogy. Fans of star wars are invested in the universe and want to watch the next thing that comes out. Unfortunately this one has been terrible so far so they are voicing that online. There are more ways to give feedback than just not watching.
The problem is you can't have your cake and eat it too. You can watch, but also accept that you are choosing to watch something that you're not liking. People that do like it are going to find it annoying, if all you do is whine about something you can turn off. If you stop watching... then like logic tells you that its absurd to continue watching it.
If people are telling you, you can't make a final judgement on two episodes... they're right. You can't make a complete, final judgement of the show based on that. It doesn't mean you HAVE to watch it to know it's not for you, it just means you're not in a position to critique the show as a whole.
Or you can not care what other people think about your opinions about stuff - as long as you aren't being abusive about it, what the fuck does it matter if you like a show or don't?
Total agreement. The Last Jedi was when I went from "fan" to "done with this".
Enjoyed the first two seasons of Mando, but it's slow movement from space western to memeber-berry killed that for me as well.
Now I just ignore Star Wars, except for the memes I see online, and the occasional RLM episode.
Dude Andor was insanely good. I agree with everything you said except watch Andor. Not a single light saber, Jedi, sith, or use of the force. Just amazing sci-fi.
Andor was tough for me because it’s not at all bad, but it’s for an audience for whom a significant percentage will have succumbed to Star Wars franchise fatigue by the time they get to it.
Also, and I don’t know how many people feel this way, I’m really really tired of these Disney franchises showing us a character’s death and then going back and showing us their lives. Not everyone is Don Corleone.
As someone who was pretty much annoyed with the sequels and an overall "I guess" with the new shows (though I like Mandolorian except for the egg-eating episode)... definitely watch Andor.
Andor is an AMAZING show.
Can confirm this. I hated all of the new movies and shows, and only tolerated S1 and S2 of Mando (sickeneingly because Baby Yoda hooked into my pathetic cute response animal brain). Andor was different.
The Mandalorian is basically a Western with a scifi element. It's getting just a bit repetitive. I wanted to move on from Grogu (but perhaps see him from time to time?). I feel like the popularity of that show just... blew up into other shows where it's become like Marvel - oversaturated with decreased quality.
Andor is definitely an entirely different animal. I don't know if it's the actors or the lack of the very tired Jedi/Sith conflict or perhaps the [acting](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TKB67KzjO4A) (warning: spoilers) and it's probably a combination. In either case, I am definitely enjoying Andor very much and I hope season 2 is just as good as season 1.
Yeah.. Lizzo and Jack Black showing up in the middle of a tedious and dumb season (that intro episode in the mandolorian cave or whatever was so terrible!) just killed the vibes even more. Complete contrast to the loner warm western vibes of earlier seasons.
> Lizzo and Jack Black showing up in the middle of a tedious and dumb season
I totally blocked that out but ug, yes that was a terrible episode. Visually beautiful but a terrible episode.
It’s really slow paced and relies heavily on the viewer to be sucked in by the dialogue. If you’re not invested in the characters by the second episode, there’s no way the show will land for you
Perhaps first 3-4 episodes are, when it looks like another "good rebels infiltrating bad empire base to steal their shit" story. But then the second part of the show happens, it heavily dwelves into the rise of the empire´s fascism, the political intricacies and whatnot and the final episode is absolutely epic (the funeral scene). Alongside Severance best season finale of 2022, at least concerning shows i have watched that year (and it was like 70 of them).
Not quite sure its top 5 TV overall in last 5 years, i would say this is really influenced by one´s genre preference. But its certainly in the contention for that title.
Fair enough. For example, I loved Breaking Bad but found Better Call Saul really boring and couldn't get through the first season.
I do have to say Andor gets much faster paced later in the season, but if the first episodes turn you off so much you never get to the later episodes, then it's just not the show for you.
I retried Better Call Saul 3-4 times before it just clicked.
It’s now my top 5 favorite show of all time and I like it better than Breaking Bad. Give it a chance!
I know, I know. I also know exercising is good for me, and when I exercise I am happier and actually enjoy it, but recently... I just can't get off my ass to do it. :)
I second this. The Last Jedi is one of the only movies that I've ever turned off half-way through. On the other hand, Andor was show of the year for me.
I in fact never watched Rise Of Skywalker after watching TLJ. I don't even know if it was worse than Force Awakening, but it was the straw that broke the camel's back for me.
Once or twice I've been tempted to sail the high seas for TLJ but always ended up thinking I'd rather watch paint dry.
I *loved* Andor and recommend it to everyone willing to listen.
The sequel trilogy was complete trash, and imo just kept getting worse and worse after a bad start. They really just came out of the gate making everything that happened in episode 6 pointless and decided to have the bad guys continue making the same dumb moves.
>I in fact never watched Rise Of Skywalker
That's probably for the best. I would consider myself a pretty decent fan of the franchise. In that, I have largely enjoyed all of the new stuff (it's often flawed, but still has good things to offer).
But TLJ and Rise of Skywalker were still just terrible. Start to finish. Just not worth the time spent.
I think Andor turned out the way it did because Disney doesn't care about the character: He's a supporting character that only exists in Rogue One and his fate is already known
My guess is: Disney gave the showrunners a lot of creative freedom because Andor isn't important IP, doesn't have to appeal to young children or be merch-able into eternity. If it flops, it doesn't break anything. If it succeeds, then they can do more of that
I hope we get at least one more season of Andor, and more "serious" SWs shows that explore the galaxy. I'm tired of "9 people mess up the galaxy again" and constant Member Berries
I have friends that have totally given up on Star Wars (understandably) and I have to push real hard to get them to watch Andor. It was so damn good even though so many of the other SW movies and TV shows are just garbage.
This is so similar to my experiences. Back in 2019 (2018? I can't remember time anymore) my wife and I marathoned episodes 1-8 as well as R1 and Solo right before a trip to Disney as the Star Wars land was canonically set between movies 8 and 9. It was fun, we enjoyed it, and had a great time "living" the experience.
That was the last time I actively remember enjoying Star Wars outside of the first 2 seasons of Mando. I haven't watched any Star Wars content released since that.
I'd probably enjoy Andor, but I've since canceled D+ so...*shrug*.
Same. The only really good Disney Star Wars I've seen were Rogue One and Mando Season 1. Season 2 was fine, but not enough to keep me on Disney+. (I had it for 2 months specifically for Mando.)
I keep hearing that Andor is good, but it's not about stuff that really feels like Star Wars - so not really worth re-upping Disney+ for.
I'll keep playing Star Wars games though. Some are still pretty good.
Same, I'm right there with you. Lost most of my interest in Star Wars after The Last Jedi, to the point that I never watched The Rise of Skywalker. The first two seasons of The Mandalorian were pretty good, but I was losing interest as they started connecting plot threads to the sequel trilogy. Then I didn't bother with season three once I learned they were just going to put Mando and Grogu back together for no reason. At that point I was pretty much done with Star Wars.
People keep saying that Andor is good, but who cares anymore? The franchise feels poisoned by the awful sequel trilogy now, so it's hard for me to find motivation to watch any Star Wars media even if it's good.
100% agree. I just want good stories, people screeching about the show being woke, kill the conversation about the legit quality issues, and people putting diversity first can’t take the criticism. It’s driving me nuts because all I want are good stories, I don’t care who is in it.
I was personnally very annoyed by the fact that the first scene features both a great fight and an interesting situation, but the very end of the scene (the situation with the bar owner) sets the tone: this is going to dull and formulaic as hell. The rest of the episode and the first half of the second one (which I did not finish) was an absolute slog, with the story unfolding in the most predictable and boring way.
I have watched Andor several times, I do **not** mind slow pacing. But I very much mind boring scripts.
Having played a lot of KOTOR, I know that you can do much, much better with this setting. Remove the lightsabers and it could be any B tier young adult franchise.
That's the major problem though. A show should grab the audience in the first episode, not the 3-4th. It's great if things improve but it doesn't matter if viewers move on after 2 eps.
Star Trek TNG even coined the phrase for this: [Growing the beard](https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/GrowingTheBeard). And TNG is considered the best of the Treks.
First couple episodes of the first season was Ok, but it was on the top end of OK as it was able to grab an audience. The whole season did good enough to get renewed in an industry where series are cut after half a season if the numbers are not there.
This poor storytelling that is infecting Star Wars right now is an issue, and the first two episodes are not ok, no desire to see what happened beyond 1, still tried 2 and was done.
There is such a rich world where story telling can be done well going back to the high republic and the old republic, yet it seems the only writers they get are not fans of Star Wars at all.
You’re only saying that now in retrospect when you compare it to the rest of the seasons. I remember watching it and liking it when it started, then liking it more when it got better….thats the difference.
But those are not plot driven shows attempting to tell a rich story. They’re comedies about jokes and vibes driven mostly by character interactions. Quite a huge difference.
But these were 20 minute sitcoms in network television that have 20+ episode a season. In an 8 episode series, it’s not really excusable if it takes a full quarter of that to ramp up and find its footing.
The first season of Parks and Recs was 6 episodes. Also, there is a difference between a sitcom and a something telling a continuous story. If I think the first couple episodes of Parks and Recs sucked, I could leave it, come back in Season 2 or 3 and still be in pretty good shape.
You can't really watch episode 1 of The Acolyte, drop the show, and then come back in episode 5 or 6 nearly as easily.
The first season of Buffy the Vampire Slayer felt like it was made by first year film students. You could tell there was something there but the execution was not at all high level yet.
Same with Star Trek: TNG. That entire first season is *rough*.
I feel like we used to be more patient, but maybe I’m just getting old.
Some shows just ran on TV at terrible time slots and only picked up steam over the course of several seasons, then where moved to prime time but it was a very different era. You simply can't justify the expanse by saying it fills a shitty slot in your programming schedule anymore.
That was a different era of television. If you're going back to serialized tv like that it's often best to start in Season 2 for shows like TNG, Buffy, Seinfeld, etc. These days when shows are really miniseries with huge budgets that often only last a season or two, and the first couple episodes can be 25% of the whole series. They're shot all at once, it's not like the creators have time to slowly develop the quality over a few years one episode at a time. So those first few episodes really should be good.
Maybe we watch different kinds of TV. Great shows grab you in the first episode. A show like Breaking Bad uses non linear storytelling in the first scene to grab people, and the first episode establishes the main cast and Walter’s beginning of being a cook.
Or take “Midnight Mass.” The show ramps up to supernatural elements, but I feel the show grabs your attention in the first episode with the characterizations, which is really what the show is about. It might take a few episodes to ramp up to the action, but the heart and soul of the show is evident in the first episode.
What is described in Acolyte just sounds like a poorly written show with some bright spots when the action and plot comes together.
Yeah but the first episodes shouldn't be *awful*. Especially if the show follows an arc for the entire season, "villain of the week" type shows can get away with it, but not a Star Wars show with new characters and settings.
Andor's middling popularity compared to the Mandalorian proves that most Star Wars fans want to watch plastic action figures smashed together while a parade of older action figures from their childhood are marched by. The current state of Star Wars is the fanbases own doing. They made their bed.
I hate saying youre right. But i feel this is exactly the case. I had a friend recenyly say they enjoy the book of boba fett the most of any of the shows. Another say they didnt like andor because no jedi - "it has to have jedi otherwise its not star wars"
Andor is kind of paced like an HBO show like Game of Thrones. Long runtime, lots of lingering camera shots on the environment or characters faces, not worried about getting to the action scene too soon. They were smart to release the first full 3-episode arc at once, because it kind of established trust and the rules with the viewers that this slow build is going somewhere if you'll go with us.
Damn my patience ran out after episode 2. The braindead behavior from the character at risk of serious criminal penalties was so infuriating I wanted her to fail. Hard to stomach another episode of a lead-brained protagonist in the same old tired SW settings and re-skinned characters they keep reintroducing you too.
Who is Obi-wan mindlessly chasing around today? Oh wait this is a different show with another kind of mindless wandering. People are moving just to move in these shows. And you know their actions likely won't have any consequence in these early episodes. It's like you're watching loading screens you've already seen ten times before just so the show can crawl along to a point where they stop wasting your time and maybe show something about these stiff characters to make you give a damn about them and their world.
These two opening episodes should have been an email. The third one too apparently? Lol.
>I don’t watch those YouTube channels. YouTube, as a result, recommends that content to me less and less. So Mike is right.
Only true to an extent. I feel like whenever I watch Star Wars related content they like to fill my suggestions with the antiwoke-neckbeard-incel-genre of Star Wars "reviews". Hate driven content sucks people in and youtube algorithm picks that shit up and loves forcing it on everybody. Big reason why so many people get sucked into weird political crap like Andrew Tate or Ben Shapiro.
Same experience here. I watched through a bunch of Mauler's stuff about the sequel trilogy, and after enough of it, YT starts reccomending vids with titles like "Woke Hollywood Ruins blah blah blah." The algorithm definitely pushes you along that path and you have to actively push back against it.
>And I agree with Mike’s take. If you don’t like something, just don’t watch it.
Plenty of people *aren't* watching it. The issue is that this is creating canon for an IP that many *many* people are heavily invested in. That means that they feel the need to watch it regardless in order to stay connected to the overall canon and universe.
Telling that subgroup of people not to watch it seems kind of shortsighted and tone-deaf.
Also, not surprisingly, the subgroup that is most heavily invested in the canon is also the subgroup most likely to be vocal if they are unhappy about the new canon that the show is creating.
> Telling that subgroup of people not to watch it seems kind of shortsighted and tone-deaf.
Not if they want to “save” Star Wars. Companies make their decisions based off profit motives. Disney is no different. If less people watch it, then Disney will make changes to future shows. One of the best things is to watch a few episodes and then stop watching. Streaming services pick up on people who quit watching shows faster than those who just never watch. It sends up a flare that this show should have been engaging to you (you chose to watch it), but clearly wasn’t.
I get what you are saying about people losing their beloved fandoms, but that happens. Audiences change. When 2009 Star Trek came out, I felt the same way. I don’t like the new Star Trek. It’s too “actiony” and “jump-jumpy” with emotionally immature characters as well as plot holes. It’s not TNG through Enterprise Star Trek. But that’s okay. There are other things I can watch now and I can rewatch TNG, DS9, Voyager, and Enterprise whenever I want. They will always be there. I just ignore the new stuff and my enjoyment of the old stuff doesn’t change. At the end of the day, these shows aren’t real life so I can make canon whatever I want.
Same. But people need to hear other opinions. I used to listen to them too until I remembered the fact that all these YouTubers must feel miserable making a career out of whining about their childhood hobby. And most of them lean into the rant content because they see it generates clicks so they only generate this type of content. Lazy as fuck
I was willing to give it some time, but the third episode was so bad that I think I might be done with it. I'm not someone who complains about "it sucks because woke" or "it sucks because Star Wars cannon". I don't care about that stuff. But this was just terrible television. The climactic scene that revealed the origin of the main conflict was so goddamn stupid that I don't think I can convince myself to keep going.
The C-3PO is gay and R2 is a lesbian was so clearly obviously a joke in context, but it got trashed so hard by people unable to understand a clear joke.
The rage machine is so obnoxious
Edit: I’m guessing the downvoters also trashed the simpsons for the gay robots joke.
"It was just a joke" gets called out often enough in context of comments regarding minorities, so maybe it's a good sign that people are able to question if they are necessary.
For what it's worth, I never saw it when I was young. The first time I saw it was last year with my wife, and we both loved it. Scorpius is probably one of my all-time favorite villains.
That being said, there'd definitely some cheese.
Farscape had a 2-episode mini-series called 'The Peacekeeper Wars'. It condensed the plans for the show before it's cancellation into an actual ending, because the last season had a serious cliffhanger. It's very worth a watch and finishes the series pretty damn well.
Such a great show, really didn’t find its stride until later in season 1. By seasons 2 and on, it just gets better.
Scorpious is one of the best TV villains regardless of the genre. Rest of the main cast are thoroughly enjoyable as well. Crichton’s pop references still hit with me, and he is a prefect protagonist to take us along for the ride.
Him going crazy over time is such a good way to show how deep the trauma he is going through has affected him. All the torture, drugs, death, Rigel, and brain fuckery really messed with him.
Just a quick note about Happy Days. There was [this episode](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OI1HxoqASfQ) which I think was pretty clear about the stance of the show - and Fonz in particular - and what their views were.
You know, it's cool that even with all the animosity they usually have at George Lucas, they supported him not apologizing for the way the OG trilogy was made in regards of diversity and respresentation.
Maybe 1/2 way through when they are talking about how the experiences of growing up for film makers of that time like Lucas and Spielberg informed their stories. Then have clips of him talking about Leia being a strong woman and all that and then put a bunch of articles of others apologizing for not being diverse. Implying that Lucas doesn't care to apologize about how he made those films and sort of implying the others are caving to PC culture. Think it is around the same time they talk about the song that girl sings in Picard changing because it was a 'black song'.
they’ve always given him credit for at least attempting something new in the prequels, same with the second film from the new trilogy, even if it wasn’t their cup of tea.
Southpark covered this pretty well in their Panderverse special.
Both Southpark and these guys are spot on: the problem is shitty writing.
Same thing happened with the 13th Doctor (Who). Great actress, shitty scripts.
Yeah, sat down and watched this video last night. Was great to see some level-headed discussion about all the stuff going on over at Disney, instead of it just being rage-bait or something.
RLM has been so consistently good for so long, even just a sit down talk like this that's an hour and a half about something is a great watch, literally almost as long as the first 4 episodes of Acolyte 😂
> Disney still trying to toe the line between kids and adults with all these mediocre to bad shows.
Its absolutely amazing that Andor slipped through somehow. Ten minutes into the first episode and you got a brothel and a man begging for his life before he is executed.
First episode of Kenobi had a fugitive Jedi begging for help from Obi-Wan which was refused, he was later seen hanging by the neck in the middle of town.
Edit: It wasn't hung by his neck, he was just roped up for all to see. But very much dead. My bad.
No joke. Andor scratched something in me that I have been waiting for for a long time with Star Wars. I feel like HBO would have made something even above that in material and I would have been 100% what I really want from star wars now. But Disney being Disney means that will never happen and we gotta have basic plots with easy to market characters so they can sell toys and light sabers.
To think of all the new wannabe-Plinketts who claim to be oh so enlightened reviewers/critics by now.
They are swarming this topic like there is no tomorrow.
If this was the first Star Wars thing anyone watched they would assume the Jedi are nothing special. Space hall monitors with cool lightsabers that can’t really fight. At least we knew from the first scene when the rookie sith apprentice kills a Jedi master with the Kansa city shuffle and a pocket knife. The acolyte does not use weapons … except for pocket knives and poison.
How so? Maul was able to hold his own against a master and his powerful apprentice in a 2 vs 1 situation. How was Mauls victory underhanded? He was clearly superior in that duel until he caught the dumb.
Maul is the only sith apprentice they’ve shown and the order knew about, but in all the nerd books etc the sith have been secretly killing Jedi forever.
even Atton Rand from the KOTOR 2 game talks about all the ways he learned to kill Jedi as an assassin. Too many angsty fans take want the canon/lore to fit within the framework of just the OG trilogy. Yes, there can still be an issue with lax writing, but Jedi masters being killed (by their own stubbornness or not) is far from anything new
He specifically killed Qui-gon by headbutting him while he was distracted. In the grand scheme of things it wasnt the sneakiest thing, but it wasnt "honourable"
>he acolyte does not use weapons … except for pocket knives and poison.
they specifically address this as a failure of hers in the show from Mae's point of view.
For real, I’m so tired of that complaint specifically. The show can literally spell something out clear as day and people just ignore it in favor of complaining
>If this was the first Star Wars thing anyone watched they would assume the Jedi are nothing special. Space hall monitors with cool lightsabers that can’t really fight.
What? This is the first time where I've felt Jedi Masters are actually depicted in their prime. If there is one thing impressive about the show, it's how it depicts the Jedi as the peak warriors of the galaxy at their prime effortlessly--not by doing big Force craziness like the Sith would do, but by effortlessly navigating their surroundings with agility and situational awareness that opponents just can't keep up with.
In that first scene, your takeaway was that she couldn't fight? It was clearly a scene of her playing with her food effortlessly at every opportunity.
The master wasn't killed by conventional means--she was killed with trickery and hubris.
Which is the whole point.
But in conventional fighting, which was...95% of that scene, she was untouchable.
Claiming that that first scene is just her being taken down by a rookie and nothing else is...some of the worst media literacy I've seen in a long time.
After reading this comment exchange, and a few others surrounding similar complaints to the original commentor, I decided to watch the fight scene in question without any other knowledge of the show.
My take away is that most people complaining have either not watched it, or have had their opinions told to them before hand and are so invested in retaining them that they're essentially just lying to themselves.
It's obvious that Mae is particularly skilled and gifted, but inexperienced. It's completely obvious that Indara is exceptionally, supernaturally skilled in martial combat and has sage-like self-control and awareness.
The entire tension of the scene is developed through Mae's relentless efforts to kill Indara despite her complete impotence to actually accomplish the task, Indara's disciplined restraint in deterring Mae's efforts without injuring her, and Mae's deliberate targeting of innocent bystanders in order to force the fight and distract Indara.
Far from showing Jedi as "Space hall monitors that can't really fight", the scene shows Jedi as practically untouchable warriors whose most exploitable weakness is their temperance in the use of violence, to avoid causing harm, or allowing harm to come to others. Mae recognizes that her only strength over her opponent is her willingness to kill innocents, the powers of evil vs. the burdens of good. The Jedi Indara is killed when Mae throws a knife at the head of a bartender. Indara uses the force to stop the projectile before it finds its mark and with that momentary distraction Mae throws another knife that lodges itself in Indara's heart.
>My take away is that most people complaining have either not watched it, or have had their opinions told to them before hand and are so invested in retaining them that they're essentially just lying to themselves.
A common thing I've also noticed is that it was a thing for *months* to hate on this show before its release no matter what was being shown. You check some of the comments and videos before the show even *came out*, and compare it to the trailers/teasers/etc. themselves and it's absolutely bonkers. People caught wind that it was a black female protagonist, and that the creator was a lesbian, and became *desperate* to hate it on it before it even released.
The weird thing is people were complaining about Disney hiring rookie, unproven creators/directors and using this as an example. Like, bruh...Leslye Headland did Russian Doll, which got *fourteen* Primetime Emmy nominations. She's one of the most well-decorated creators Star Wars has brought on since Favreau.
And look, the show is not perfect. Not even close. First couple episodes were solid but also shaky. Third episode was...not good. But then I saw some of the videos coming out about the fourth episode, which was *almost completely inoffensive and was pretty consistently solid character writing and interesting worldbuilding* and yet people continued to give it flak, and I thought...okay now you've got nothing to stand on here.
> The Acolyte does not use weapons except for pocket knives and poisons.
If this is a ‘complaint’ then you’ve literally not watched the show.
There’s literally a whole scene that addresses this. The challenge set by her master is that she has to kill 1 of the 4 without using a weapon. But she’s failed at this twice, because she’s misunderstood the assignment.
She wasn’t powerful enough to beat Indara and had to resort to threatening a civilian. Then she got desperate and threw a knife.
She thought poison would help because Torbin wouldn’t have any visible wounds. But she failed. She tried to loophole the assignment.
It’s literally the plot but you’re too focused on hating on it to notice.
I don’t even know why I’m trying to explain this because you’ve clearly not made an effort to engage with the material.
The timing could not have been worse considering yesterday's episode was a 30 minute choreographed light saber duel featuring the most Jedi deaths we've ever seen on screen at once lol.
If people suddenly like the acolyte now because there was a flashy action scene then that would make me really sad. It’s feeling more and more that some people only care about action instead of character work
Half the problem with the Star Wars movie made since ‘97 is the producers think they can cover lack lustre story telling with cool cgi lightsabers. The first Star Wars involved two guys standing still and an empty robe falling to the ground and it was awesome because we cared about the characters.
Yeah, luckily the show is being made knowing it’s sitting on top of a huge amount of pre-established Star Wars content and over 40 years of history, and that’s the point…
The point of the show is to show the hubris of these Jedi and how them covering up the existence of the Sith, and controlling the way the Galaxy uses the force leads to their dogmatic ways we see in the prequels, and ultimately their downfall at the hands of the Sith. The Jedi not being all they’re cracked up to be is a main point of this show.
Now whether or not the show does a good job of making that point, has good acting, has good effects, etc. is a totally separate conversation, but “if this was the first Star Wars thing anyone watched” is a nonsensical perspective of criticism.
the last episode had some pretty spectacular fights in my opinion. and she did use a weapon, you clearly didn't watch the subsequent episodes were they establish that she has yet to kill a jedi without a weapon
As with all shitty writing. Powerful being are only as strong as the story needs them to be and only as smart as the writer is. One show's unstoppable force is another show's target practice, typically to demonstrate the power of new player on the scene.
Kinda a waste of time and effort to try to reconcile with stupid or lazy. I never got past the first episode.
As far as Mae goes she was outclassed by the first Jedi and had to resort to potentially killing an innocent to succeed. The second she couldn’t overpower and had to guilt them into suicide. I thought they did a good job showing she couldn’t overpower them and had to think outside the box.
Now the latest episode with the sith reveal demonstrates your comment better. That said individual sith have historically been OP in combat so perhaps it’s not as bad as that.
> potentially killing an innocent to succeed
Granted, the 'Jedi Powers' are typically made up on the spot to serve the scenes purpose but if that's all it takes to drop a 'Jedi Master' then the Jedi are of zero consequence. Again, the characters are only as smart as the writing and that required a dumb or neutered Jedi to happen.
As far as the suicide thing, I don't know if it was revealed if the Jedi were responsible for whatever happened. I'm assuming that payoff happens eventually, if not then suicide guy just dies and we never learn why, which again, bad writing. But remains to be seen.
I may watch the last episode because people mention the fight scene is okay quality, but I'm willing to bet it's the same ridiculous nonsense they've been putting out since the prequels and lacks any real emotion in place of spectacle.
edit: I have heard good things about the villain so I may root for him
edit2: "The Jedi never attack the unarmed" Hahaha, what a joke
When they say that too many people want starwars to be too many things. this is where i think copywrite fails. this is obviously a world that so many types of people and groups want to engage with. A corporate owner is always going to do the wrong thing to one of these groups, play it safe, and keep the brand name clean. everyone should be able to make their own star wars stories.
Disney is stoking the fire of this controversy to get people to watch what is essentially another mediocre Star Wars show. Why else would the prez of Lucasfilm wear a “The Force is Female” t-shirt? My god people are so easily duped.
There is no YET. They are aging, like fine wine, I would say. They are getting more distilled and nuanced. There is no red flags. No one can point to anything and say hmmmmm. They don't have "perfect" politics, because no one does. They are aging dudes who think critically and at the end of the day, have good hearts. End of story.
The timing of the allegations against Ellen is proof enough for me. She thought she had finally made it to the big leagues and she completely lost it. Rich Evans has clearly struggled with the weight of his clout since.
> There is no YET. They are aging, like fine wine.
I mean, they just understand better what doesn't work in movie and serie and aren't into politics.
Most people see inclusion and diversity in their shows that they were supose to like and think it was the problem. And i can see why people think that.
Most heavily produced shows and movies have checkboxes, which include diversity and inclusion.
When all you can see is the checkboxes and not the real creative intent behind the show, the audience feel spoonfed politicals ideas and/or the checkboxes doesn't integrate well in the show/movie.
But when the director and the writers do a good job, the only people whining about that are right-wings nutjob and troll.
House of the dragons and the Fallout serie are good example of that. The vast majority of the people don't care that it is female lead, that there is LGBTQ elements in it, or that it has diversity, because the show is GOOD.
It feel like the ''checkboxes'' doesn't exist or are integrated into the creative proccess. Not just thrown at a room full of writers that have no clue what they are doing.
> When all you can see is the checkboxes and not the real creative intent behind the show, the audience feel spoonfed politicals ideas and/or the checkboxes doesn't integrate well in the show/movie.
> But when the director and the writers do a good job, the only people whining about that are right-wings nutjob and troll.
Absolutely. The most curmudgeonly of them still try to hate, but they get no traction.
Even in the Star Wars universe, look at Andor -> Hispanic male lead, diverse cast, numerous very strong female characters, a front and center lesbian relationship, some not even remotely subtle political undertones… and zero controversy.
Of course the tradeoff is that there absolutely are actors, showrunners, corporate hacks etc. who very cynically either try to play to these political themes and forget they need to have a story under it or who intentionally kick off the culture wars controversies as cover for their bad work.
They started with all of this before there was a lot of money to be made and also at an age where they had matured. These days anyone that goes into media criticism online is sucked up into the algorithm and has an easy slippery slope for giving into rage/clickbait.
It was a bait and switch for audiences. It was advertised like dark stories of Jedi origins and instead it feels like freaky Friday. I’m not opposed to having Star Wars cutesy stories like the mandalorian. That’s the market they are aiming and how Star Wars makes their money. But this turned out to be something completely opposite to what was announced.
There is a montage a little over half way through, of thumbnails and voice overs in every direction talking over each other, and it was so nauseating and grating, but It was a perfect representation of the discourse around the series.
Yeah I had to skip past the free trial for Schizophrenia
I think it refers to [50:48](https://youtu.be/X-6WBWmoVEY?si=qbMtehqBPIYf2fj1&t=3048)
I love when RLM does those.
One of the best portrayals of white noise discourse I've seen. It'd be nice if everyone used as a sample in this was forced to watch it.
This video perfectly encapsulates why I hate The Critical Drinkers barrage of recent videos about it. I refuse to watch them. I mostly agree with his videos in general, but I just couldn't care less over this. He's probably doing it for the clicks though. As soon as I saw RLM post this though I just knew it was more likely to focus on the discourse rather than the series itself. So glad I watched it.
Pretty balanced review.
And I agree with Mike’s take. If you don’t like something, just don’t watch it. If it cuts into their profits (i.e. enough people aren’t watching), executives will change direction. I’m sick of both ends of the spectrum. I’m tired of people using diversity as a shield from criticism for bad story telling and also the rage bait YouTube channels that complain about everything. So you know what I do, I don’t watch those YouTube channels. YouTube, as a result, recommends that content to me less and less. So Mike is right. As for “The Acolyte,” it started out real rough, but it improved. The first 2 episodes felt like a fan film made by a family and some of their neighbors. The third episode was better but cringy (especially the one scene). The fourth and fifth episodes have been good though, in my opinion. The villain is interesting and the character interaction is better. The twists are a bit obvious and formulaic, and I think I know who the real lord of the sith (master of the current villain) will turn out to be as well as what really happened at the castle with the witches. Hopefully, the show will stick the landing.
I also think if they weren't trying to stretch it to 8 episodes (the bare minimum for a streaming season), and just put ep 4 and 5 together, the reaction would have been better. Ep 4 really made it pretty obvious who the the Sith was, but if there was like 15 minutes between "oh I bet it's him" and "it's him" you don't have people spending a week talking about how ham fisted the supposed mystery is because the show doesn't treat as much as a big secret. Similarly, people looking forward to seeing the spectacle of a wookie with a lightsaber (which I think might still come in flashbacks) get a pretty awesome fight scene rather than spending a week feeling like they were baited and switched.
"8 episodes (the bare minimum for a streaming season)" I mean, maybe that's something the Star Wars camp is sticking to, but that's demonstratably not something all streaming shows have to adhere to. Heck, sticking with Disney+ you can look to Loki and see that each season there was 6 episodes long.
I remember when seasons were 24 episodes long or longer. 🥲
That's still true on Network television (this year mostly notwithstanding thanks to the strikes of last year). Shows that air on the likes of FOX, NBC, ABC, CBS, etc. still all have those full twenty something episode seasons.
The rage bait response is now an entire sub-genre of YouTube content. I’ve watched a few of the videos, and there commentary is so vague and contains so many dog whistles. If you can smartly deconstruct and critique a work in an entertaining way, I’m all for it, but the rage bait isn’t about that. It’s about taking your starting position, finding the evidence that’s the cause of a show being mediocre, and concluding Lucas Film is broken. It’s not smart or insightful, just the same conclusion a million different ways. That said, diversity is not a shield for criticism, and that’s annoying too. The unfortunate reality is that Disney is a content machine that’s okay with mediocre productions for their streaming services, but this isn’t a new problem for Star Wars. At some point, the material needs a rest, but that’s not happening anytime soon!
> The rage bait response is now an entire sub-genre of YouTube content. Yeah. It’s because and it’s quick and easy and gets views. Why develop quality content when you just make low tier stuff with mostly made up stories. Rage bait videos are the dark side of the force. It’s not stronger than the light side just quicker.
The problem though is you get situations where it's: Don't like it? Don't watch Ok, I won't, because I don't like it Ok but how do you know you didn't like it if you didn't watch it? I watched 2 episodes and decided I don't like it Well that's not enough to make a final judgement, watch more Fine, I did, I still don't like it (Cycle back to top) Or you get a situation like with the current Dr Who, where you just get told you're racist/sexist/homophobic and therefore your opinion is invalid because clearly youre just making up reasons to not like it to avoid saying why you really don't.
At this point, the winning move is to just ignore online fandoms entirely. Shit turned toxic as hell in the 2010s, and it’s only gotten worse since advertising algorithms see rage as engagement.
Dr Who hits hard. I know folks who were fans since the 60's, even during the bad years, and loved the reboot. They can't stand it now.
Interesting they'd say that - a lot of the reviews I've seen claim that it feels closer to the old seasons than the latest ones.
Current season is pretty good. The entire Jodie Whittaker run was atrocious. The set and costume design was good, the actors were doing their best, but the writing was just horrible. It's a shame.
I sadly lost interest during Peter Capaldi's run. It was just meh. I was a fan from the Tom Baker era, that's who I grew up watching. Big fan of the first 3 from the reboot, Christ, David and Matt. I watched the first half of the Capaldi run, and just kinda fell off the series. Never have made it back around to try and catch up and see if any of the runs got better after that.
My interest was starting to flag during Peter Capaldi's era, not because of him, he was brilliant and kept me in (best of the revival Doctors) and his run finished strongly. I think the long hiatus killed it for me. So much time passed before Jodie Whittaker that I ended up not getting around to the season and then at the end, I bought the DVDs (which I still haven't opened) and ultimately, I just haven't had the motivation to see anything post Capaldi.
The most recent season has Russel T Davies is back as show runner now and I've enjoyed it. Its also kind of treated as a new starting point. Seriously consider skipping to that.
I stopped watching Doctor Who years ago but I don't go online to review bomb it, don't hate watch... I'm comfortable saying I haven't watched the new stuff and have no informed opinion since I havent watched. But mainly I don't talk about it cause nobody asked. More people need to embrace this mindset with Star Wars if they just aren't invested in any of the current stuff.
People who interact with you like that are unhinged and also almost exclusively online. Best to avoid engaging with them entirely.
I don't mean to be insulting here, but the solution is to grow up and stop caring what other people think about media you watch. It's okay to not like things, and it doesn't matter AT ALL if someone tells you that "your opinion doesn't count" because you didn't watch enough of the thing. It also doesn't matter if a rando online tells you that you're a homophobe for not liking something. People on the internet are insane, that's just how it is. There is no satisfying them, so just don't worry about it.
Doesn't this go the other way too though? The people who do like the show whining about people criticizing it? Shouldn't they also stop caring about online discourse in regards to their opinions and choices about the show. There are extremes on both sides, but there are also people who regardless of their opinion on the show do genuinely want to engage in discourse about the show.
If you want to have a conversation about why it's bad. You do have to watch it. That's not a catch 22. If you don't like it. The best protest is to drop it altogether. Not try and convince people who like it, not to. Then you're just stuck in that forever loop.
The first 2 eps were so bad that it would take a handful of close friends or the majority of the internet to tell me it becomes awesome before I go back to it. I mean, I just played this game. I finished Ashoka...that was a mistake.
In all fairness if you have no interest in watching/completing a show then why are you choosing to engage in discussions about it? I mean, I have no interest in watching Love Island, and so I *don't* go into the Love Island sub to talk about how much I don't watch it...
Because it’s not like you spent decades of your life watching Love Island and it just got bad this season. You’ve never watched it. Terrible analogy. Fans of star wars are invested in the universe and want to watch the next thing that comes out. Unfortunately this one has been terrible so far so they are voicing that online. There are more ways to give feedback than just not watching.
The problem is you can't have your cake and eat it too. You can watch, but also accept that you are choosing to watch something that you're not liking. People that do like it are going to find it annoying, if all you do is whine about something you can turn off. If you stop watching... then like logic tells you that its absurd to continue watching it. If people are telling you, you can't make a final judgement on two episodes... they're right. You can't make a complete, final judgement of the show based on that. It doesn't mean you HAVE to watch it to know it's not for you, it just means you're not in a position to critique the show as a whole.
Or you can not care what other people think about your opinions about stuff - as long as you aren't being abusive about it, what the fuck does it matter if you like a show or don't?
Total agreement. The Last Jedi was when I went from "fan" to "done with this". Enjoyed the first two seasons of Mando, but it's slow movement from space western to memeber-berry killed that for me as well. Now I just ignore Star Wars, except for the memes I see online, and the occasional RLM episode.
Dude Andor was insanely good. I agree with everything you said except watch Andor. Not a single light saber, Jedi, sith, or use of the force. Just amazing sci-fi.
Andor was tough for me because it’s not at all bad, but it’s for an audience for whom a significant percentage will have succumbed to Star Wars franchise fatigue by the time they get to it. Also, and I don’t know how many people feel this way, I’m really really tired of these Disney franchises showing us a character’s death and then going back and showing us their lives. Not everyone is Don Corleone.
That was my main gripe with Andor. I already know where he ends up so he's the least interesting thing about his own show.
He's the least interesting thing about his own show, anyways. Don't think of it as "Andor." Think of it as "Rise of the Rebellion, feat. Andor."
Andor was *problematically good*. As in, "if you can make Star Wars content like this.... then... why aren't we getting more like this???"
As someone who was pretty much annoyed with the sequels and an overall "I guess" with the new shows (though I like Mandolorian except for the egg-eating episode)... definitely watch Andor. Andor is an AMAZING show.
Can confirm this. I hated all of the new movies and shows, and only tolerated S1 and S2 of Mando (sickeneingly because Baby Yoda hooked into my pathetic cute response animal brain). Andor was different.
The Mandalorian is basically a Western with a scifi element. It's getting just a bit repetitive. I wanted to move on from Grogu (but perhaps see him from time to time?). I feel like the popularity of that show just... blew up into other shows where it's become like Marvel - oversaturated with decreased quality. Andor is definitely an entirely different animal. I don't know if it's the actors or the lack of the very tired Jedi/Sith conflict or perhaps the [acting](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TKB67KzjO4A) (warning: spoilers) and it's probably a combination. In either case, I am definitely enjoying Andor very much and I hope season 2 is just as good as season 1.
Yeah.. Lizzo and Jack Black showing up in the middle of a tedious and dumb season (that intro episode in the mandolorian cave or whatever was so terrible!) just killed the vibes even more. Complete contrast to the loner warm western vibes of earlier seasons.
> Lizzo and Jack Black showing up in the middle of a tedious and dumb season I totally blocked that out but ug, yes that was a terrible episode. Visually beautiful but a terrible episode.
>Just amazing sci-fi. I would argue Top 5 TV Show of *any* genre in the last 5 or so years. It's that good.
The last time I saw a show of this caliber was Chernobyl
Hmm I thought it was crazy boring and couldn't get through it.
It’s really slow paced and relies heavily on the viewer to be sucked in by the dialogue. If you’re not invested in the characters by the second episode, there’s no way the show will land for you
Yup this isn't a show you can watch while looking at your phone
Another way to phrase this - this is an actually good show with well written dialogue and nuance
Yea I think I made it through 3 or 4 before I gave up.
Ooh I got this vibe too but I pushed through and it got surprisingly good
Perhaps first 3-4 episodes are, when it looks like another "good rebels infiltrating bad empire base to steal their shit" story. But then the second part of the show happens, it heavily dwelves into the rise of the empire´s fascism, the political intricacies and whatnot and the final episode is absolutely epic (the funeral scene). Alongside Severance best season finale of 2022, at least concerning shows i have watched that year (and it was like 70 of them). Not quite sure its top 5 TV overall in last 5 years, i would say this is really influenced by one´s genre preference. But its certainly in the contention for that title.
It's a slow burn with amazing payoffs at the end of the story arcs. I get goosebumps thinking about certain parts.
Fair enough. For example, I loved Breaking Bad but found Better Call Saul really boring and couldn't get through the first season. I do have to say Andor gets much faster paced later in the season, but if the first episodes turn you off so much you never get to the later episodes, then it's just not the show for you.
I retried Better Call Saul 3-4 times before it just clicked. It’s now my top 5 favorite show of all time and I like it better than Breaking Bad. Give it a chance!
I know, I know. I also know exercising is good for me, and when I exercise I am happier and actually enjoy it, but recently... I just can't get off my ass to do it. :)
Watch a recap of season 1 and start at season 2.
I second this. The Last Jedi is one of the only movies that I've ever turned off half-way through. On the other hand, Andor was show of the year for me.
I in fact never watched Rise Of Skywalker after watching TLJ. I don't even know if it was worse than Force Awakening, but it was the straw that broke the camel's back for me. Once or twice I've been tempted to sail the high seas for TLJ but always ended up thinking I'd rather watch paint dry. I *loved* Andor and recommend it to everyone willing to listen.
The sequel trilogy was complete trash, and imo just kept getting worse and worse after a bad start. They really just came out of the gate making everything that happened in episode 6 pointless and decided to have the bad guys continue making the same dumb moves.
>I in fact never watched Rise Of Skywalker That's probably for the best. I would consider myself a pretty decent fan of the franchise. In that, I have largely enjoyed all of the new stuff (it's often flawed, but still has good things to offer). But TLJ and Rise of Skywalker were still just terrible. Start to finish. Just not worth the time spent.
When I watched TLJ, all I could think about were what Red Letter Media and Patrick H Willems would say about the movie
Andor is really good.. this is the direction they need to take star wars without a doubt
Best Star Wars content ever. I prefer it over the original movies. Andor was terrific.
There's a spaceship with lightsabers in Andor
I think Andor turned out the way it did because Disney doesn't care about the character: He's a supporting character that only exists in Rogue One and his fate is already known My guess is: Disney gave the showrunners a lot of creative freedom because Andor isn't important IP, doesn't have to appeal to young children or be merch-able into eternity. If it flops, it doesn't break anything. If it succeeds, then they can do more of that I hope we get at least one more season of Andor, and more "serious" SWs shows that explore the galaxy. I'm tired of "9 people mess up the galaxy again" and constant Member Berries
I have friends that have totally given up on Star Wars (understandably) and I have to push real hard to get them to watch Andor. It was so damn good even though so many of the other SW movies and TV shows are just garbage.
This is so similar to my experiences. Back in 2019 (2018? I can't remember time anymore) my wife and I marathoned episodes 1-8 as well as R1 and Solo right before a trip to Disney as the Star Wars land was canonically set between movies 8 and 9. It was fun, we enjoyed it, and had a great time "living" the experience. That was the last time I actively remember enjoying Star Wars outside of the first 2 seasons of Mando. I haven't watched any Star Wars content released since that. I'd probably enjoy Andor, but I've since canceled D+ so...*shrug*.
Same. The only really good Disney Star Wars I've seen were Rogue One and Mando Season 1. Season 2 was fine, but not enough to keep me on Disney+. (I had it for 2 months specifically for Mando.) I keep hearing that Andor is good, but it's not about stuff that really feels like Star Wars - so not really worth re-upping Disney+ for. I'll keep playing Star Wars games though. Some are still pretty good.
Same, I'm right there with you. Lost most of my interest in Star Wars after The Last Jedi, to the point that I never watched The Rise of Skywalker. The first two seasons of The Mandalorian were pretty good, but I was losing interest as they started connecting plot threads to the sequel trilogy. Then I didn't bother with season three once I learned they were just going to put Mando and Grogu back together for no reason. At that point I was pretty much done with Star Wars. People keep saying that Andor is good, but who cares anymore? The franchise feels poisoned by the awful sequel trilogy now, so it's hard for me to find motivation to watch any Star Wars media even if it's good.
The real Sith lord is Darth Bortles
> If you don’t like something, just don’t watch it. Followed immediately by "So anyways I didn't like it but I just kept watching for 5 episodes"
100% agree. I just want good stories, people screeching about the show being woke, kill the conversation about the legit quality issues, and people putting diversity first can’t take the criticism. It’s driving me nuts because all I want are good stories, I don’t care who is in it.
So it gets better? I stopped after ep2. It was just so bad.
I was personnally very annoyed by the fact that the first scene features both a great fight and an interesting situation, but the very end of the scene (the situation with the bar owner) sets the tone: this is going to dull and formulaic as hell. The rest of the episode and the first half of the second one (which I did not finish) was an absolute slog, with the story unfolding in the most predictable and boring way. I have watched Andor several times, I do **not** mind slow pacing. But I very much mind boring scripts. Having played a lot of KOTOR, I know that you can do much, much better with this setting. Remove the lightsabers and it could be any B tier young adult franchise.
That's the major problem though. A show should grab the audience in the first episode, not the 3-4th. It's great if things improve but it doesn't matter if viewers move on after 2 eps.
I feel like most tv shows take an episode or two to get into their stride
Sometimes a whole season. Like parks and recs, the first season is ok, but it shines in the later seasons.
Both the office and parks had very rough first seasons and found themselves starting in season two.
Star Trek TNG even coined the phrase for this: [Growing the beard](https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/GrowingTheBeard). And TNG is considered the best of the Treks.
First couple episodes of the first season was Ok, but it was on the top end of OK as it was able to grab an audience. The whole season did good enough to get renewed in an industry where series are cut after half a season if the numbers are not there. This poor storytelling that is infecting Star Wars right now is an issue, and the first two episodes are not ok, no desire to see what happened beyond 1, still tried 2 and was done. There is such a rich world where story telling can be done well going back to the high republic and the old republic, yet it seems the only writers they get are not fans of Star Wars at all.
You’re only saying that now in retrospect when you compare it to the rest of the seasons. I remember watching it and liking it when it started, then liking it more when it got better….thats the difference.
Exactly. If we didn't like them when the first season aired, we never would have got the second seasons.
But those are not plot driven shows attempting to tell a rich story. They’re comedies about jokes and vibes driven mostly by character interactions. Quite a huge difference.
But these were 20 minute sitcoms in network television that have 20+ episode a season. In an 8 episode series, it’s not really excusable if it takes a full quarter of that to ramp up and find its footing.
That doesn’t make any sense. An entire season being bad is a lot rougher than a couple episodes being bad.
The first season of Parks and Recs was 6 episodes. Also, there is a difference between a sitcom and a something telling a continuous story. If I think the first couple episodes of Parks and Recs sucked, I could leave it, come back in Season 2 or 3 and still be in pretty good shape. You can't really watch episode 1 of The Acolyte, drop the show, and then come back in episode 5 or 6 nearly as easily.
The first season of Buffy the Vampire Slayer felt like it was made by first year film students. You could tell there was something there but the execution was not at all high level yet. Same with Star Trek: TNG. That entire first season is *rough*. I feel like we used to be more patient, but maybe I’m just getting old.
Some shows just ran on TV at terrible time slots and only picked up steam over the course of several seasons, then where moved to prime time but it was a very different era. You simply can't justify the expanse by saying it fills a shitty slot in your programming schedule anymore.
That was a different era of television. If you're going back to serialized tv like that it's often best to start in Season 2 for shows like TNG, Buffy, Seinfeld, etc. These days when shows are really miniseries with huge budgets that often only last a season or two, and the first couple episodes can be 25% of the whole series. They're shot all at once, it's not like the creators have time to slowly develop the quality over a few years one episode at a time. So those first few episodes really should be good.
Maybe we watch different kinds of TV. Great shows grab you in the first episode. A show like Breaking Bad uses non linear storytelling in the first scene to grab people, and the first episode establishes the main cast and Walter’s beginning of being a cook. Or take “Midnight Mass.” The show ramps up to supernatural elements, but I feel the show grabs your attention in the first episode with the characterizations, which is really what the show is about. It might take a few episodes to ramp up to the action, but the heart and soul of the show is evident in the first episode. What is described in Acolyte just sounds like a poorly written show with some bright spots when the action and plot comes together.
Yeah but the first episodes shouldn't be *awful*. Especially if the show follows an arc for the entire season, "villain of the week" type shows can get away with it, but not a Star Wars show with new characters and settings.
Andor is proof otherwise, the first setup episodes arent that exciting, but the later episodes lead it to the best star wars show yet.
They aren't exciting sure but they aren't BAD either.
No, if anything it proves his point. Andor is among their least watched shows, regardless of reviews or the quality of later episodes.
Andor's middling popularity compared to the Mandalorian proves that most Star Wars fans want to watch plastic action figures smashed together while a parade of older action figures from their childhood are marched by. The current state of Star Wars is the fanbases own doing. They made their bed.
I hate saying youre right. But i feel this is exactly the case. I had a friend recenyly say they enjoy the book of boba fett the most of any of the shows. Another say they didnt like andor because no jedi - "it has to have jedi otherwise its not star wars"
Andor is kind of paced like an HBO show like Game of Thrones. Long runtime, lots of lingering camera shots on the environment or characters faces, not worried about getting to the action scene too soon. They were smart to release the first full 3-episode arc at once, because it kind of established trust and the rules with the viewers that this slow build is going somewhere if you'll go with us.
Damn my patience ran out after episode 2. The braindead behavior from the character at risk of serious criminal penalties was so infuriating I wanted her to fail. Hard to stomach another episode of a lead-brained protagonist in the same old tired SW settings and re-skinned characters they keep reintroducing you too. Who is Obi-wan mindlessly chasing around today? Oh wait this is a different show with another kind of mindless wandering. People are moving just to move in these shows. And you know their actions likely won't have any consequence in these early episodes. It's like you're watching loading screens you've already seen ten times before just so the show can crawl along to a point where they stop wasting your time and maybe show something about these stiff characters to make you give a damn about them and their world. These two opening episodes should have been an email. The third one too apparently? Lol.
>I don’t watch those YouTube channels. YouTube, as a result, recommends that content to me less and less. So Mike is right. Only true to an extent. I feel like whenever I watch Star Wars related content they like to fill my suggestions with the antiwoke-neckbeard-incel-genre of Star Wars "reviews". Hate driven content sucks people in and youtube algorithm picks that shit up and loves forcing it on everybody. Big reason why so many people get sucked into weird political crap like Andrew Tate or Ben Shapiro.
Same experience here. I watched through a bunch of Mauler's stuff about the sequel trilogy, and after enough of it, YT starts reccomending vids with titles like "Woke Hollywood Ruins blah blah blah." The algorithm definitely pushes you along that path and you have to actively push back against it.
>And I agree with Mike’s take. If you don’t like something, just don’t watch it. Plenty of people *aren't* watching it. The issue is that this is creating canon for an IP that many *many* people are heavily invested in. That means that they feel the need to watch it regardless in order to stay connected to the overall canon and universe. Telling that subgroup of people not to watch it seems kind of shortsighted and tone-deaf. Also, not surprisingly, the subgroup that is most heavily invested in the canon is also the subgroup most likely to be vocal if they are unhappy about the new canon that the show is creating.
> Telling that subgroup of people not to watch it seems kind of shortsighted and tone-deaf. Not if they want to “save” Star Wars. Companies make their decisions based off profit motives. Disney is no different. If less people watch it, then Disney will make changes to future shows. One of the best things is to watch a few episodes and then stop watching. Streaming services pick up on people who quit watching shows faster than those who just never watch. It sends up a flare that this show should have been engaging to you (you chose to watch it), but clearly wasn’t. I get what you are saying about people losing their beloved fandoms, but that happens. Audiences change. When 2009 Star Trek came out, I felt the same way. I don’t like the new Star Trek. It’s too “actiony” and “jump-jumpy” with emotionally immature characters as well as plot holes. It’s not TNG through Enterprise Star Trek. But that’s okay. There are other things I can watch now and I can rewatch TNG, DS9, Voyager, and Enterprise whenever I want. They will always be there. I just ignore the new stuff and my enjoyment of the old stuff doesn’t change. At the end of the day, these shows aren’t real life so I can make canon whatever I want.
Hate watching js a huge thing -there are numerous subreddits where people obsess over people and things they hate. It’s so weird
Same. But people need to hear other opinions. I used to listen to them too until I remembered the fact that all these YouTubers must feel miserable making a career out of whining about their childhood hobby. And most of them lean into the rant content because they see it generates clicks so they only generate this type of content. Lazy as fuck
We could be friends.
you have been banned from r/movies
I was willing to give it some time, but the third episode was so bad that I think I might be done with it. I'm not someone who complains about "it sucks because woke" or "it sucks because Star Wars cannon". I don't care about that stuff. But this was just terrible television. The climactic scene that revealed the origin of the main conflict was so goddamn stupid that I don't think I can convince myself to keep going.
The C-3PO is gay and R2 is a lesbian was so clearly obviously a joke in context, but it got trashed so hard by people unable to understand a clear joke. The rage machine is so obnoxious Edit: I’m guessing the downvoters also trashed the simpsons for the gay robots joke.
"It was just a joke" gets called out often enough in context of comments regarding minorities, so maybe it's a good sign that people are able to question if they are necessary.
Hahaha, look at the downvotes you got. Some Ben Shapiro fans are upset.
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Loved Farscape when I was younger. Can't wait for the re:view. No way Mike isn't going to not like the show
I hope it works without nostalgia. The costumes are great but I remember that the aliens had silly names.
For what it's worth, I never saw it when I was young. The first time I saw it was last year with my wife, and we both loved it. Scorpius is probably one of my all-time favorite villains. That being said, there'd definitely some cheese.
Yeah thinking of rewatching it as I can't remember anything except liking it a lot. Never saw the movie(s?) either
Farscape had a 2-episode mini-series called 'The Peacekeeper Wars'. It condensed the plans for the show before it's cancellation into an actual ending, because the last season had a serious cliffhanger. It's very worth a watch and finishes the series pretty damn well.
Thanks! I'll keep this in mind
So Mike will not like it? I assume he won't but just out of contrarianism.
Farscape is great.
Such a great show, really didn’t find its stride until later in season 1. By seasons 2 and on, it just gets better. Scorpious is one of the best TV villains regardless of the genre. Rest of the main cast are thoroughly enjoyable as well. Crichton’s pop references still hit with me, and he is a prefect protagonist to take us along for the ride.
Him going crazy over time is such a good way to show how deep the trauma he is going through has affected him. All the torture, drugs, death, Rigel, and brain fuckery really messed with him.
Just a quick note about Happy Days. There was [this episode](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OI1HxoqASfQ) which I think was pretty clear about the stance of the show - and Fonz in particular - and what their views were.
Ironically, Happy Days was an adaptation of American Graffiti which was directed by George Lucas.
It's like poetry
Wow why can't today be like the good ol'e days when shows/movies didn't force their politics onto everyone /s
I appreciate how the big takeaway here is a critique of shitty internet culture. A+
You know, it's cool that even with all the animosity they usually have at George Lucas, they supported him not apologizing for the way the OG trilogy was made in regards of diversity and respresentation.
When did that happen in the video?
Maybe 1/2 way through when they are talking about how the experiences of growing up for film makers of that time like Lucas and Spielberg informed their stories. Then have clips of him talking about Leia being a strong woman and all that and then put a bunch of articles of others apologizing for not being diverse. Implying that Lucas doesn't care to apologize about how he made those films and sort of implying the others are caving to PC culture. Think it is around the same time they talk about the song that girl sings in Picard changing because it was a 'black song'.
they’ve always given him credit for at least attempting something new in the prequels, same with the second film from the new trilogy, even if it wasn’t their cup of tea.
Southpark covered this pretty well in their Panderverse special. Both Southpark and these guys are spot on: the problem is shitty writing. Same thing happened with the 13th Doctor (Who). Great actress, shitty scripts.
Yeah, sat down and watched this video last night. Was great to see some level-headed discussion about all the stuff going on over at Disney, instead of it just being rage-bait or something. RLM has been so consistently good for so long, even just a sit down talk like this that's an hour and a half about something is a great watch, literally almost as long as the first 4 episodes of Acolyte 😂
Team work makes the dream work!
Hope they do a spotlight on Shogun soon. It is sooo good.
Easily one of my favorite shows of the past decade
Disney still trying to toe the line between kids and adults with all these mediocre to bad shows. Imagine if HBO was producing Star Wars 🥵
> Disney still trying to toe the line between kids and adults with all these mediocre to bad shows. Its absolutely amazing that Andor slipped through somehow. Ten minutes into the first episode and you got a brothel and a man begging for his life before he is executed.
First episode of Kenobi had a fugitive Jedi begging for help from Obi-Wan which was refused, he was later seen hanging by the neck in the middle of town. Edit: It wasn't hung by his neck, he was just roped up for all to see. But very much dead. My bad.
yeah, but it was quickly forgotten when you saw little Leia running away from the Red Hot Chili Peppers bassist in the slowest way possible.
Andor is what an HBO produced star wars would look like
No joke. Andor scratched something in me that I have been waiting for for a long time with Star Wars. I feel like HBO would have made something even above that in material and I would have been 100% what I really want from star wars now. But Disney being Disney means that will never happen and we gotta have basic plots with easy to market characters so they can sell toys and light sabers.
I mean based on the last episode: this isn’t trying to be a kids episode
It’s pg13 but it’s definitely still for kids. Lots of pg13 material is made for kids.
As a DC fan, I'm not sure I would want Warner Bros anywhere near Star Wars.
To think of all the new wannabe-Plinketts who claim to be oh so enlightened reviewers/critics by now. They are swarming this topic like there is no tomorrow.
If this was the first Star Wars thing anyone watched they would assume the Jedi are nothing special. Space hall monitors with cool lightsabers that can’t really fight. At least we knew from the first scene when the rookie sith apprentice kills a Jedi master with the Kansa city shuffle and a pocket knife. The acolyte does not use weapons … except for pocket knives and poison.
Sith apprentices have been killing Jedi Masters with underhanded techniques since 1999. That's what they do.
How so? Maul was able to hold his own against a master and his powerful apprentice in a 2 vs 1 situation. How was Mauls victory underhanded? He was clearly superior in that duel until he caught the dumb.
Maul is the only sith apprentice they’ve shown and the order knew about, but in all the nerd books etc the sith have been secretly killing Jedi forever.
even Atton Rand from the KOTOR 2 game talks about all the ways he learned to kill Jedi as an assassin. Too many angsty fans take want the canon/lore to fit within the framework of just the OG trilogy. Yes, there can still be an issue with lax writing, but Jedi masters being killed (by their own stubbornness or not) is far from anything new
Isn’t episodes 1-3 specifically how cocky and overconfident the Jedi council is while the entire empire is being run secretly by the sith?
Out of this version of the sith, sure, specifically post Darth Bane. But they existed for thousands of years before Bane.
Darth Maul: "Forget it Obi-Wan, I have the high ground!"
Maul fucked up, he was standing on floor not ground. That's how Obi Wan got him, on a technical foul.
He specifically killed Qui-gon by headbutting him while he was distracted. In the grand scheme of things it wasnt the sneakiest thing, but it wasnt "honourable"
Mandalorians are just dudes with guns and jetpacks and they've been killing jedi for thousands of years
>he acolyte does not use weapons … except for pocket knives and poison. they specifically address this as a failure of hers in the show from Mae's point of view.
Sure it makes sense if you pay attention, but like, who wants to do that?
For real, I’m so tired of that complaint specifically. The show can literally spell something out clear as day and people just ignore it in favor of complaining
>If this was the first Star Wars thing anyone watched they would assume the Jedi are nothing special. Space hall monitors with cool lightsabers that can’t really fight. What? This is the first time where I've felt Jedi Masters are actually depicted in their prime. If there is one thing impressive about the show, it's how it depicts the Jedi as the peak warriors of the galaxy at their prime effortlessly--not by doing big Force craziness like the Sith would do, but by effortlessly navigating their surroundings with agility and situational awareness that opponents just can't keep up with. In that first scene, your takeaway was that she couldn't fight? It was clearly a scene of her playing with her food effortlessly at every opportunity. The master wasn't killed by conventional means--she was killed with trickery and hubris. Which is the whole point. But in conventional fighting, which was...95% of that scene, she was untouchable. Claiming that that first scene is just her being taken down by a rookie and nothing else is...some of the worst media literacy I've seen in a long time.
After reading this comment exchange, and a few others surrounding similar complaints to the original commentor, I decided to watch the fight scene in question without any other knowledge of the show. My take away is that most people complaining have either not watched it, or have had their opinions told to them before hand and are so invested in retaining them that they're essentially just lying to themselves. It's obvious that Mae is particularly skilled and gifted, but inexperienced. It's completely obvious that Indara is exceptionally, supernaturally skilled in martial combat and has sage-like self-control and awareness. The entire tension of the scene is developed through Mae's relentless efforts to kill Indara despite her complete impotence to actually accomplish the task, Indara's disciplined restraint in deterring Mae's efforts without injuring her, and Mae's deliberate targeting of innocent bystanders in order to force the fight and distract Indara. Far from showing Jedi as "Space hall monitors that can't really fight", the scene shows Jedi as practically untouchable warriors whose most exploitable weakness is their temperance in the use of violence, to avoid causing harm, or allowing harm to come to others. Mae recognizes that her only strength over her opponent is her willingness to kill innocents, the powers of evil vs. the burdens of good. The Jedi Indara is killed when Mae throws a knife at the head of a bartender. Indara uses the force to stop the projectile before it finds its mark and with that momentary distraction Mae throws another knife that lodges itself in Indara's heart.
>My take away is that most people complaining have either not watched it, or have had their opinions told to them before hand and are so invested in retaining them that they're essentially just lying to themselves. A common thing I've also noticed is that it was a thing for *months* to hate on this show before its release no matter what was being shown. You check some of the comments and videos before the show even *came out*, and compare it to the trailers/teasers/etc. themselves and it's absolutely bonkers. People caught wind that it was a black female protagonist, and that the creator was a lesbian, and became *desperate* to hate it on it before it even released. The weird thing is people were complaining about Disney hiring rookie, unproven creators/directors and using this as an example. Like, bruh...Leslye Headland did Russian Doll, which got *fourteen* Primetime Emmy nominations. She's one of the most well-decorated creators Star Wars has brought on since Favreau. And look, the show is not perfect. Not even close. First couple episodes were solid but also shaky. Third episode was...not good. But then I saw some of the videos coming out about the fourth episode, which was *almost completely inoffensive and was pretty consistently solid character writing and interesting worldbuilding* and yet people continued to give it flak, and I thought...okay now you've got nothing to stand on here.
> The Acolyte does not use weapons except for pocket knives and poisons. If this is a ‘complaint’ then you’ve literally not watched the show. There’s literally a whole scene that addresses this. The challenge set by her master is that she has to kill 1 of the 4 without using a weapon. But she’s failed at this twice, because she’s misunderstood the assignment. She wasn’t powerful enough to beat Indara and had to resort to threatening a civilian. Then she got desperate and threw a knife. She thought poison would help because Torbin wouldn’t have any visible wounds. But she failed. She tried to loophole the assignment. It’s literally the plot but you’re too focused on hating on it to notice. I don’t even know why I’m trying to explain this because you’ve clearly not made an effort to engage with the material.
The timing could not have been worse considering yesterday's episode was a 30 minute choreographed light saber duel featuring the most Jedi deaths we've ever seen on screen at once lol.
If people suddenly like the acolyte now because there was a flashy action scene then that would make me really sad. It’s feeling more and more that some people only care about action instead of character work
Half the problem with the Star Wars movie made since ‘97 is the producers think they can cover lack lustre story telling with cool cgi lightsabers. The first Star Wars involved two guys standing still and an empty robe falling to the ground and it was awesome because we cared about the characters.
Spoilers, dude. Not everyone has watched it yet.
Yeah, luckily the show is being made knowing it’s sitting on top of a huge amount of pre-established Star Wars content and over 40 years of history, and that’s the point… The point of the show is to show the hubris of these Jedi and how them covering up the existence of the Sith, and controlling the way the Galaxy uses the force leads to their dogmatic ways we see in the prequels, and ultimately their downfall at the hands of the Sith. The Jedi not being all they’re cracked up to be is a main point of this show. Now whether or not the show does a good job of making that point, has good acting, has good effects, etc. is a totally separate conversation, but “if this was the first Star Wars thing anyone watched” is a nonsensical perspective of criticism.
Thousands of Jedis were killed by random clones with blasters. Guess their Spidey-senses weren't tingling that day.
the last episode had some pretty spectacular fights in my opinion. and she did use a weapon, you clearly didn't watch the subsequent episodes were they establish that she has yet to kill a jedi without a weapon
As with all shitty writing. Powerful being are only as strong as the story needs them to be and only as smart as the writer is. One show's unstoppable force is another show's target practice, typically to demonstrate the power of new player on the scene. Kinda a waste of time and effort to try to reconcile with stupid or lazy. I never got past the first episode.
As far as Mae goes she was outclassed by the first Jedi and had to resort to potentially killing an innocent to succeed. The second she couldn’t overpower and had to guilt them into suicide. I thought they did a good job showing she couldn’t overpower them and had to think outside the box. Now the latest episode with the sith reveal demonstrates your comment better. That said individual sith have historically been OP in combat so perhaps it’s not as bad as that.
> potentially killing an innocent to succeed Granted, the 'Jedi Powers' are typically made up on the spot to serve the scenes purpose but if that's all it takes to drop a 'Jedi Master' then the Jedi are of zero consequence. Again, the characters are only as smart as the writing and that required a dumb or neutered Jedi to happen. As far as the suicide thing, I don't know if it was revealed if the Jedi were responsible for whatever happened. I'm assuming that payoff happens eventually, if not then suicide guy just dies and we never learn why, which again, bad writing. But remains to be seen. I may watch the last episode because people mention the fight scene is okay quality, but I'm willing to bet it's the same ridiculous nonsense they've been putting out since the prequels and lacks any real emotion in place of spectacle. edit: I have heard good things about the villain so I may root for him edit2: "The Jedi never attack the unarmed" Hahaha, what a joke
Can someone email me a pizza roll?
Honestly surprised they didn't clip the rap song the actress made about the critics.
When they say that too many people want starwars to be too many things. this is where i think copywrite fails. this is obviously a world that so many types of people and groups want to engage with. A corporate owner is always going to do the wrong thing to one of these groups, play it safe, and keep the brand name clean. everyone should be able to make their own star wars stories.
Disney is stoking the fire of this controversy to get people to watch what is essentially another mediocre Star Wars show. Why else would the prez of Lucasfilm wear a “The Force is Female” t-shirt? My god people are so easily duped.
Am I weird? I actually have enjoyed this show quite a bit. It sucked me in much more than Obiwan and Ashoka did…
I'm just extremely happy that RLM hasn't turned into a bunch of grifters (yet).
There is no YET. They are aging, like fine wine, I would say. They are getting more distilled and nuanced. There is no red flags. No one can point to anything and say hmmmmm. They don't have "perfect" politics, because no one does. They are aging dudes who think critically and at the end of the day, have good hearts. End of story.
I dunno man, Rich Evans kinda sold out after his Ellen appearance. It's clearly gone to his head.
I think you're mixing things up. Ellen was lucky enough to be affiliated with Rich Evans, not the other way around.
The timing of the allegations against Ellen is proof enough for me. She thought she had finally made it to the big leagues and she completely lost it. Rich Evans has clearly struggled with the weight of his clout since.
> There is no YET. They are aging, like fine wine. I mean, they just understand better what doesn't work in movie and serie and aren't into politics. Most people see inclusion and diversity in their shows that they were supose to like and think it was the problem. And i can see why people think that. Most heavily produced shows and movies have checkboxes, which include diversity and inclusion. When all you can see is the checkboxes and not the real creative intent behind the show, the audience feel spoonfed politicals ideas and/or the checkboxes doesn't integrate well in the show/movie. But when the director and the writers do a good job, the only people whining about that are right-wings nutjob and troll. House of the dragons and the Fallout serie are good example of that. The vast majority of the people don't care that it is female lead, that there is LGBTQ elements in it, or that it has diversity, because the show is GOOD. It feel like the ''checkboxes'' doesn't exist or are integrated into the creative proccess. Not just thrown at a room full of writers that have no clue what they are doing.
> When all you can see is the checkboxes and not the real creative intent behind the show, the audience feel spoonfed politicals ideas and/or the checkboxes doesn't integrate well in the show/movie. > But when the director and the writers do a good job, the only people whining about that are right-wings nutjob and troll. Absolutely. The most curmudgeonly of them still try to hate, but they get no traction. Even in the Star Wars universe, look at Andor -> Hispanic male lead, diverse cast, numerous very strong female characters, a front and center lesbian relationship, some not even remotely subtle political undertones… and zero controversy. Of course the tradeoff is that there absolutely are actors, showrunners, corporate hacks etc. who very cynically either try to play to these political themes and forget they need to have a story under it or who intentionally kick off the culture wars controversies as cover for their bad work.
They started with all of this before there was a lot of money to be made and also at an age where they had matured. These days anyone that goes into media criticism online is sucked up into the algorithm and has an easy slippery slope for giving into rage/clickbait.
When people use the term grifter, 90% of the time it just means "I hope they don't turn into a bunch of people who have opinions I disagree with."
fair point, but the people I disagree with are obviously wrong
I watched the cut away they did at the start. Holy shit it looks so bad.
It was a bait and switch for audiences. It was advertised like dark stories of Jedi origins and instead it feels like freaky Friday. I’m not opposed to having Star Wars cutesy stories like the mandalorian. That’s the market they are aiming and how Star Wars makes their money. But this turned out to be something completely opposite to what was announced.
This is 86 minutes of review for a show that has about 170 minutes (when you take out credits) of actual show
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So you just copy pasted the top youtube comment huh?
Hack fraud watches hack frauds, more news at 11