'The Acolyte' Episode 4 Deep Dive
02:03:41 Share

Welcome to Naughty Yotta Island. This season on Naughty Yotta Island. When we were new, they spoiled me. They even gave me a phone. But then, it's like I didn't exist. Don't take Yotta Yotta from your wireless carrier. Now with Metro, get that new customer feeling again and again. Introducing MetroFlex. Free 5G phones when you join, same deals as new customers when you stay. Only at Metro by T-Mobile.

Just bring your number and ID and sign up for an eligible plan. After 12 months, trade in and get our best deals on select devices. This episode is brought to you by The Home Depot. It's that time of year, so spread more joy with The Home Depot's giant holiday decor. Go big this holiday season with larger-than-life decor that really hits home. Be like my wife. She'll just go to Home Depot to see what they got cooking. She's always ready to plan for the holidays. Maybe that's a tree.

You can put together in a few clicks like the grand Duchess. That sounds great. Or a huge eight foot towering Santa with posable arms that a flame effect lantern that might be in front of my house or an eight and a half foot towering reindeer with illuminated flashing bells. That's the holiday spirit at the home Depot shop in store online. Now at home depot.com. I can't hesitate a second time. I've known you since we were younglings. May has always been your wound. Maybe so brought you here to face her.

But maybe he brought you here to face yourself. Hell, welcome back to House of R. I'm Joanna Robinson. That's Mallory Rubin. Hello. We're two sides of the same coin. And we're here today to talk about Acolyte, episode four, Day. How you doing, Mallory? Great to be here with you again. Uh-huh. My favorite piece of Jedi scum. Oh, yeah, yeah. Thanks. Welcome back to the Hive of Scum and Villainy. Here we are to talk about the Acolyte. Before we get into the Acolyte, though...

Parking reminders. Yeah. We're covering Acolyte. Yes. Every week we will be here covering Acolyte. Four more weeks to go. However, we are also covering House of the Dragon. Yeah. Ever heard of it? We're here every week covering the Acolyte. We've got four more weeks to go. With that, we're at the midway point. Woo!

I know. I'm not ready. Where's the time gone? It's flying. Like a spooky, helmeted Sith person eerily out of focus in the background. We're also covering House of the Dragon. Yeah. Have you heard of it?

I've yelled at it, lads. Twice a week. That's right. Okay. So, Sunday nights, right after the episode wraps. The moment. Talk the Thrones. Yes. You, me. CR. Chris Ryan. The best. The best. You can listen to it with your ears. You can watch it with your eyes. Where? Watch it on Spotify or the new Ringerverse YouTube channel. Listen on Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts. Okay. House of our deep dive.

Same drill. Same drill. Tuesday nights. Tuesdays. Yeah. Yeah. Evening. Night. Nights. Depends how long it takes us to record. Depends on what you mean by night. Our poor, our poor production team. They're the best. You can listen to it. You can watch it. And that's true of this pod as well. You can listen to it. You can watch it. Yeah, that's right. Subscribe to the YouTube channel. Thanks to everyone who has been listening and watching. Yeah. What a thrill. A delightful summer so far. Speaking of also on camera, the Midnight Boys, pew pew. Pew pew.

They're doing Monday breakdowns of House of the Dragon. Yep. And then they're also doing combo the boys' acolyte discussions later in the week. That's right. So two video slash listen check-ins with the Midnight Boys, three with the Mal and Joe combo House of R. Woo!

It's a lot to keep track of. Yeah. How can folks keep track of all of that? My first recommendation would be to follow the pods. Great idea. So follow the pod on Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts. Follow the New Ringerverse YouTube channel while you're at it, wherever you are, wherever you're consuming us. Follow, subscribe, like. Yeah. And then give us the five stars. Yeah. We want them. We want them. It helps. We would like them. And we're not too proud to ask. Ain't too proud to beg.

Yeah. Also, if watching us on YouTube or Spotify is not enough for you, guess what? Live show next Tuesday at the El Rey Theater. Mere days away. Mere days. June 25th. Yep. Tuesday, 8 p.m. Get your tickets. Tickets still available. TheRinger.com slash events. Yes. You, me, Chris Ryan. Yep. We tried to bully Andy Grunewald into coming. We'll see if he will. We'll see how it goes. We should say.

If anyone is wondering, wait, Talk to Thrones is a live event. Will you be doing the exact same show that you did on Sunday night? No, it's not going to be a Talk to Thrones breakdown of episode two of House of the Dragon. We're just hanging out in Westeros. Oh, yeah. We're just going to be doing a thronesy night of fun to be determined things. Yes, we've definitely come up with a plan for that. It's going to be a blast. Please join us. I think it's going to be really, really fun. So join us for that. Spoiler warning. Yeah.

Yes. All of Star Wars? Everything that's ever happened in a galaxy far, far away. Great. Acolyte up through episode four. We have not seen beyond that. Thank you for your serenade. Remember that moment when you revealed to Chris Ryan and yours truly that we both made the same Dave Matthews band acolyte joke? But neither of us. We were both anxious that we had plagiarized off each other, but neither of us had.

And I could show my work because mine went back weeks and weeks ago. Great moment. Great moment that we all got to share. But Chris was like, I didn't steal. And I was like, no, just I have mine. Okay. Yeah. We were like, we know, Chris. We know you don't listen to House of R. Yeah. And now he knows I don't listen to Watch. I do sometimes. Just not all the time. Everyone's very busy. All right. Emails. Hobbitsanddragons.gmail.com. Keep booming. The amazing team. The beautiful, wonderful House of R family who we will be gushing about constantly all summer and beyond. A little animation, Jo.

For the emails. Oh, I know. There is now a raven with a letter in its beak. Okay. Just in case you're listening and not watching, it's about to come. Here we go. We got an email from Sarah. Steve, maybe instead of the animation, you should just cut to Mallory doing her little like.

impression. I'm going to do that next time. I'll make sure I'm wearing my Lamar jersey and a Ravens hat. And then I'm going to, I'm going to do this. And that way you have it as a backup in case you need it. Sports. Um, Sarah, sports. Sarah, Sarah is basically ready to ask. Yeah. As an avid listener, as a bad baby, but as someone who doesn't usually watch podcasts on YouTube, she's like, do you want me to basically the question is what do we most want our listeners to do?

I based on your face I would say the answer is whatever you want to do absolutely however you want to consume it yeah whatever's right for you we're trying to give you options yes so if you want to watch amazing here we are if you want to listen that's great right that's great but there's no one or the other that we're if you want to watch and then listen if you want to do better if you just want to have that the youtube playing on a clip in the background to drive up those views

Who am I to say no? Sincerely, though, there is no right or wrong way to consume House of R, Talk the Thrones, Midnight Boys, anything we do here at the Ringer Podcast Network. We are just delighted that you're spending your time with us at all. The video is additive. It's not either or. Okay. Quick facts. Hit me. Bring it. I mean, if you're not watching the video, though, you didn't just see Mallory Rubin, like, bat her eyelashes at me, which was astonishing stuff. Episode four of Acolyte. Yeah. Acolyte.

Day. Okay. You really got in my head with the... I did. I just... I actually, like, it's... I have broken you. Pavlovian now. And I apologize. I can't help it.

There's no duality in the episode title again this week, right? Right. Is this because the twins are still together again? Do we think next week's episode will be titled Night? Seems likely. Do we think Day Slash Night was originally one episode because this episode is only 27 minutes long? This is about as compact as Star Wars television gets. Yes. So on the one hand, the quite

dramatic, cliffhanger-y conclusion makes you think maybe it was always meant to end that way because what a propulsive way to leave everybody wanting more and ensuring that everybody tunes in next week. Correct. But the combination of the length, the fact that, yes, the sun...

We're really on that like draft day clock. Yes. Working toward the perilous, ominous settling in of not only night, but this rot, this darkness in many forms. Something rots in the forest. In the forest. And so it did feel like maybe this was supposed to be part of a longer meteor shared installment, day slash night installment.

I don't know. I guess we'll see what we watch next week. Because I don't know what else they would add to this episode to make it longer, except for more Coruscant stuff, which would not be my preference. Absolutely not. I think we all agree on the fact that this episode ended right when it was getting super juicy, which is, yes, a compelling reason for us to tune in next week. But since we were going to do that anyway, we were like, what?

I was watching that as they cut to commercial. Closing credits. Okay, written...

By Claire Keischel, I think, who worked on Watchmen and The OA. Oh, you remember the dance they did in The OA? Okay, here's a fun fact about me. Do you know every step of it? Do it right now. We're on camera. Do it right now. I have never watched The OA. Not a frame, not a second. But here's one of my favorite podcasts I ever did. Back when Neil and Dave and I, who do Trial by Content together, back when we recorded a different show...

By the way. Yeah. Very quickly. While we're talking about programming reminders, check out Triadline content. Wonderful pod always. I just want to say thank you because within the first few moments of this week's episode, you made a filthy sex joke and then you said, yeah, we've been working with Mal for a few years. And it's just nice to know what impact we've had on each other. Your legacy.

I give you Dave Matthews band year words. Do you know what legacy is? That's my version of Tywin's speech. Dave and Neil and I used to have a show and one week they wanted to do the OA and I said, listen guys, I have no interest in watching the OA. So the premise was Dave and Neil explained to Dorana what the OA is about. The moment when they told me that OA stands for Original Angel is the moment you can hear me live on a podcast saying,

lose my mind. My brain dribbled out of my ear. Anyway, that's my association with the OA. Other writer of this episode, Cor Adana, who wrote Mr. Robot, who wrote on Mr. Robot, is working on Dune Prophecy. Co-exec producer on Acolyte. So big deal. And then Alex Garcia Lopez directed. Alex Garcia Lopez, if you look at their CV, it is

all shows, ringerverse shows, Punisher, Daredevil, Luke Cage, Witcher, the original UK Utopia, which rules if you've never seen it. So that is the team behind this episode, 27 minutes. Zippy. Zippy. Should we go to the opening snapshot? Let's do it. Valerie. We talked about

The way that this episode sort of cuts off. Yeah. There's also the other big sort of critique people seem to have about this episode is May makes an awfully rapid turn towards the light. Face turn, which is a phrase I learned from you years ago. I thought you just heel turned in all directions. That's what I thought. I didn't know. You've always been a wrestling enthusiast and an enthusiast of all associated vernacular. Yeah, clearly. So what are your overall thoughts on this episode? How'd you feel about those elements or anything else you want to say?

I thought this episode was okay. I'm pretty on the fence on the show, right? About the show right now. There's stuff in every episode that I like. And then there's stuff that I am...

struggling to totally understand. And I remain excited to see where the story goes. I remain on the mystery front quite compelled. But now that we're four episodes in, I am starting to slightly shift from can't wait to see how the mystery unravels into whether or not the mystery ends up being satisfying and compelling and

I am a little concerned that it is just coming at the expense of us understanding the characters and the decisions that they make. And so like a lot of the things that happened in this episode fell into that bucket for me. And then you kind of compound that with what I think is still like in certain, mostly in the Jedi temple, uh, Coruscant sequences, quite odd, clunky, stilted dialogue and, um,

And it's and then the tone like this was an interesting actually microcosm of what did we think the tone of the show was going to be? Does that matter? And what is the tone of the show entwined with that question of like, is this a show from the Sith universe?

point of view like we thought it was going to be because we're still spending a lot of time with the Jedi. Now, obviously, in this episode, we move scene by scene from the Jedi contingent to the Chimera May contingent. And so we're getting a little bit more of that. And I, you know, enjoy our moments with Manny now and always. The first third of the episode, I just was not a huge fan of. Yeah. The final stretch was

Still had some of those, like the May point you made. Wait, what is going on? And again, we might get the answers to that in time. This felt like another version of what happened on Brendock with the fire where I actually don't doubt that the answers will come and we will have plot explanations for why did a person do this thing? But I don't know that that's going to mean it was a satisfying viewing experience every week. But in terms of the dark forest, like tonal shift and the energy and the...

Feeling like something really nefarious was settling into the bones of the story, that was exciting to me. The last few minutes...

Darth Venom teeth levitating down behind Osha. Osha suddenly seeming to be in a very similar transfixed state to how we found May looking into the flames last episode. All of the Jedi activating their blades in one. That was riveting. This was the trailer money shot that they showed us a million times. And the fact that we had seen it in the trailer didn't diminish the impact at all for me. So if that's where we pick up next week and that's what it's like the rest of the way...

Great. But so far, I think it has just been an uneven experience. Yeah, I will say that I think I actually liked this episode a bit better than I liked last week's. Same. I think the...

And this is something we've mentioned a few times, but the landscape, the external shots, the nature of it all. Beautiful. Definitely like out there hiking up and down mountains, the fog, the sun going down into the cloud cover over the ocean. Yeah. Thanks for reminding me of my favorite Avengers movie. And all of that.

is stunning, gorgeous, wonderful, loved it. And then I also liked the design of, you know, the soundstage forest. I thought that looked really cool too. Like I thought all of that was good.

um and i like i kind of like this idea of journey in tonight same but i think if you cut the entire chorus on sequence out of here which i would heartily recommend yeah and gave me a combination episode that was like the journey in tonight and then what happens in that forest what happens next in that forest in the nighttime that's

Star Wars, right? That feels like sort of more what I want to see. The Coruscant, the return to Coruscant, I found to be an absolutely baffling move. We're on the chase. We're on the hunt. Let's go back to a meeting that could definitely have been a hollow. That is just... That was tough for me. But there was a lot to like... And I'm not upset...

Some people are like, oh my God, we were promised this Wookiee Jedi and then he's already dead. We feel so certain that we're going to get so many more flashbacks. Yeah. We're going to see more Carrie Ann Moss. And that feels very of a piece with Indara and Torben in the present day timeline. We meet them and then they're gone. So yeah, I didn't bump on that at all. Yeah. Okay. Let's go to the deep dive. Okay. Dateline.

Kfar. Kfar. Some number of hours before sunset. Yeah. You love a sunset. I do. Mm-hmm. Kelnaka. Like many a lonely Star Wars character before him. Thinking of Rey with her like powdered bread bowl thing that she makes. I always thought that looked delicious, honestly. It does. Yeah. As does

Tough circumstances. I think Kelnock is like a little wheatgrass bowl that he's putting together here. So he's just enjoying a life of solitude in the forest. Sounds peaceful. Except it seems like perhaps he is haunted by dreams. Because like lovely Helena herself on House of the Dragon, a show we're covering extensively, tune in. He has graffitied his dreams on the wall. The spirals, the witchy spirals are everywhere. Yes.

The Ascension Coven imagery. I do feel that part of our shared experience here making the podcast is just radical transparency with each other and with our wonderful listeners slash viewers. I did initially, like, right away, I was like, are those boobs? What time did you watch this episode? Um...

8 Pacific on Tuesday maybe? It was dark enough in the room that I could see. But I did pause and say that well other than the fact that I'm definitely in need of corrective lenses. Other than that I could see as well as I typically can. Are those boobs? Oh no yeah okay. And in my notes a little bit from boobs question mark to yin yang dot dot dot.

Ascension slash coven imagery. And I got there and it was a rapid journey. Say it all happened in about 40 seconds, but it was a journey that I went on and I wanted to let you know. Because, you know, Kelnock, I mean, it's lonely out there. A lot of talk about those uncharted forests. Like, who are we to judge? Oh, I would never judge. If you want to pass the time drawing chalking boobs on the wall in your isolation as you recover from something traumatic. This is Kelnock's version of Fast Times. Like, the wall is just plastered.

I'm sorry that this is such a gendered experience, but it is. But guys who are just slightly older than me and how they love to talk about finding porn in the woods, which they always do. They're like, you would go out in the woods and there would be a Playboy under a log somewhere. It was a different time. And I'm like, I don't. Okay. Anyway. Yeah, we're here to talk about Star Wars, but also Playboys in the woods. What are you talking about? There's literally yin yang on there, which is interesting because that didn't seem to be part of the imagery at all.

of the witches, though it is similar to the design on the floor of the Temple of Ahch-To. Felt like accentuating the idea of duality, the dyad discussion that we've been having, this question of opposites or balance or connection or cycles, like depending on which lens you want to view that from. So Kelnaka being a part of this very deeply

and in some cases for poor Torben, literally scarring experience. For others, more emotionally, spiritually, mentally scarring. For Indara, it's just brewskis and noodles. Indara's like, who's got the menu? What are tonight's farm-to-table seasonal offerings? Indara went on and lived a life. Yeah. Yeah, you know, we do learn elsewhere in this episode, this was interesting to me, because the Jedi know...

that not only know that Klonak is on Kofar, but say that he was posted there. So that was a little bit of an update. He's supposed to be there, but he just went off the grid one year ago. Off the grid, not responding to communication. That's kind of an interesting thing to continue to think about as we assessed with the Barash Val for Torben. Like, when is the guilt hitting a tipping point for everybody? And still that question of what is the source of the guilt. But it does seem like...

And we have, as we talked about last week, we have our theories about what role Kelnacka might play in the other point of view perspective that we assume we'll be getting from the fire and the flashback. But not just maybe guilt and trauma, but.

A sense that he needs to be kept away from other people. Like a worry of what he might. Yeah. Either how somebody else might use him as a weapon or what he might do to other people because we were like maybe they took over his mind. Oh yeah. That was our theory last week. Our theory last week is that maybe they took over his mind and the fact that he's drawing spirals on the wall makes me think that there's like sticky residue of witchiness in his brain still. Do you know what I mean? That he hasn't like. Yeah.

fully recovered from having his brain taken over. Again, theory corner fodder. All right. And now reluctantly we go to Coruscant. The same day? Here we are. Yeah. This baffling narrative decision as far as I'm concerned. Um,

But we do start. Like, Mike, re-watching this episode a couple times, I was so baffled by this move that I was like, did they feel like they needed to do this to give Chimera and May a head start in the woods? Right? Everyone's leaving the last planet around the same time. They all know where they're going. But Chimera and May are there first. Did they have to go back to Coruscant? I'm like, they only have a few minutes to head start. That's the thing. They end up. Yeah. I don't know how long it takes. We're ten minutes away.

To get, yeah, like, it's... If that was the case, I don't think they needed it. I think I would have totally accepted that the Jedi were just, like, some minutes behind May and Kymer. Yeah, and in addition to the actual substance of the conversation among the Jedi, which we'll break down. Got some thoughts on Vern now and always. It positioned characters like Sol and Osha to say things...

That didn't, again, totally... The soul ones become more interesting to parse. The ocean ones, which we'll get to, like, I just... It doesn't feel like the characters are on an arc that is moving in a way that we totally understand, which, like, I think maybe...

If you send them to Coruscant, you send them to the temple, then they have to say things like, well, I'm going to go now or like, I can't I can't do this. And if they're just on the ship heading there, you eliminate the need for these kind of odd like half step back. Was was the reason that they had to go to Coruscant was to pick up a handful of red shirts that are going to feel like the red shirts could have just come on another ship. Love it. OK, well, call us Lucasfilm. All right.

The upshot of being a Coruscant is we get a hot bearded ginger Jedi. I am calling him Tormund Light. Okay. I wrote Charlie Weasley in the notes. Either way. Yeah. Rugged bearded ginger.

giving some lessons here. The Padawans are chaining Jackie Lon, who is like rapidly becoming honestly my favorite. I really love Jackie. This is, this is master, Jedi Master Lakshay is the character name. And here's the instruction. Keep each movement tight yet subtle. Diminish areas of vulnerability. Maximize, maximize your defenses without the need to strike. That's how I choose to pod. Okay.

Yeah, tight yet subtle. That's famously our brand. Definitely is. Oh, man. But the... I think you could...

Apply that to the way in which we've seen Indara and Sol fight this like high republic. I don't draw my saber right away. I sort of dodge and weave and all of that. But is there any sort of larger emotional reading that you have of this? Or does this just feel like, you know...

standard Jedi mumbo jumbo. Yeah, I thought the part that stood out most to me was maximize your defenses without need to strike. Priming us because there's so much talk in this episode about the kill without a weapon idea. Priming us again for this idea that the Jedi are reluctant to initiate violence. Because it's Pride Month, actually, just kidding, I would do this 12 months out of the year.

I am forced in this moment to ship Jackie and Osha in this actually kind of frustrating goodbye. I hate a goodbye scene that is immediately undone. Like, I do not understand why this scene is here. Except to...

Give us this moment between Jackie and Usha, which feels like a little flirtatious. Don't tell me you'll miss me. Did you pick those vibes up at all? How did you feel about it? Absolutely. I did find myself wondering how old Jackie the Padawan is supposed to be. But I do think the vibes are there. I was wondering if it's maybe supposed to be... Are we supposed to be reading it as flirtatious? Are we supposed to be reading it as too old?

Of the same Jedi Master. Soul control. This unique bond that they share. But obviously, like, they have... Yeah, there's an energy in all of the scenes that we've seen them share before. And also, we got Jackie, like, going full Craig and Stark in this episode. I was just doing my duty. Big Craig. I was just doing my duty. But, yeah, I also found this... While it's nice to see Osha and Jackie in a scene together, I also found this odd... For the reason you mentioned...

It's kind of then compounded by the fact that Osha says she's not going to go say goodbye to Sol, which just... Some people have a hard time with goodbyes, but honestly just didn't make sense to me. It's like, you guys were just reunited. You clearly have this deep abiding bond. You're not angry with him about anything yet. It just didn't make sense. It felt like it was this thing introduced to kind of create this forced little... I found out you were going to leave without saying goodbye brief moment that ended up not really having any bearing. Not mattering. And...

Then inside of this conversation, Osha says, May is the Jedi's problem now. And I'm not a Jedi. And I was like, what?

What was supposed to happen for us there? Like, were we supposed to receive that in an Ahsoka-esque I am no Jedi way? Because that was just not at all my response or I think probably anybody's response to it. She just found out. And again, we almost in terms of just the sequential nature of the present timeline, we eliminate in this respect episode three because that's a flashback. So she...

just found out. Yeah. This is Osha's first scene after finding... Like, basically, first real scene of substance after finding out that her sister's alive. Just found out. And her response is, now, the I can't because she's afraid of what this will do to her and she's carrying this resentment cell. That makes sense. But I'm not even gonna try to go find my sister. I'm just gonna leave that to the Jedi? I think...

I think it felt very strange to me. I don't feel that that's that strange if we connect it to her conversation with your later where she's just sort of like, you got to take the shot. I can't take the shot. I failed to take the shot. If she's like, my sister's a murderer. Yeah. And there's no, no redeeming her. And I can't be the one to bring her in. So this needs to be something that the Jedi do because I'm incapable of doing it. That part I get. And like, we saw her miss the stunner blaster shot. So either she's,

incapable of doing it or she maybe fears what she actually could prove capable of. That part makes sense. But just literally like accepting that a person who lived their entire life thinking this, the other part of their being, the other member of this like refrain, right? Always one, but born as two. You find out that person's alive and you're good to just not be a part of it the rest of the way. I think there's a difference between saying, I don't think I'm the one who can take the shot. Yeah. And saying, I don't,

I'm good to not like I'm good to let someone else handle this completely. I think especially because it's early in the run of the show when we're trying to understand like who the characters are, why they do the things they do. Why did Osha leave the Jedi Order, et cetera, et cetera. All the stuff that we'll talk about more today and have been talking the whole time like

We're getting a lot of lines that are there for exposition or to move us from scene to scene, but not a lot that is enhancing our understanding of what is driving a character. And this one felt like an example of something where we get part of it. The I can't part tells us something that I agree. And then the other part, it's just we move one step forward, we move one step back with the show so far.

It's also possible that it's there to give Jackie more information about May and her reluctant nature or about Osha, her wound, this sort of this idea of like time lost with her sister. Like, because if Osha finds out, I think what's interesting about this show, and this is true of everyone I've seen covering this show, is that.

There's so much mystery and so little substance sometimes that we've all been driven into like 24-7 theory corner. So I'm just sort of like projecting into the future rather than like analyzing the present. And that's a tendency I have by nature anyway, but...

uh i think especially with this show and so that i'm just trying to pitch it forward and i'm like okay is this line here this idea of talking about time lost with may so that we understand that if osha finds out the truth about what happened on brendak so we don't know the full truth yet but she finds out the truth the idea of what she lost is not just like my coven went up in flames the fortress went up in flames she wanted to leave anyway you know but like time with my sister

that's what she lost, you know? That makes, I agree, but like that makes it even stranger to me that she's like, I'm good. Okay. She doesn't even say like, let me know what happens. I don't know. It just, it just felt like incomplete as a sentiment. But yeah, also just a goodbye that is not going to be a goodbye, you know, mere minutes from now is, anyway. Okay. We're doing all the Coruscant together. Okay. They cut back and forth between Coruscant and Kaffar, but we're going to do all of Coruscant. So this truly genuinely could have been a hollow. Yeah.

Or if you prefer, they ask for Yoda. Who do we get instead, Mallory? Our guy Mundi is here. Yeah, Mundi's here. Yeah. Some interesting conversation online this week about this. Oh. This is not a bother to me personally. I actually feel it's very intentional. I feel so intentional. Let's start there, okay? Yeah, take us through it. So...

Mundi's here. Mundi is the character who sits on the Jedi Council in the prequels along with Mace Windu and Yoda. Yep. And is the one who says, you know, the Sith have not been heard from. The Sith have been extinct for a millennium. Impossible. The Sith have been extinct for a millennium. Impossible. Okay, so the Sith have been extinct for a millennium. And this was like a line that people brought up

a lot when they were like, how can you do from a Sith point of view before Phantom Menace? And who brought it up the most in interviews? Leslie Hedlund. Leslie's like, I'm aware this line exists. I know this line exists. I have built this story so that on the other side of it, I feel like all loose ends will be tied up. And the fact that the Sith still get to grow their influence in secret will be part of this. You know, the same way that like, I'm not saying every character in this show is going to die, but

But it's possible. Or we have Chekhov's memory wipe. Right. That was brought up in episode two. Right. So are memories going to be altered or are people going to die? Who's to say? But at the end of all of this, it will be plausible that Mundi says this in the prequels. And I feel like Leslie puts him here to be like, I know, guys. I'm aware. Totally. 100%. It has to be. Because it could have been anybody. Yeah. Anybody could have been...

occupying the role that he occupies in this episode. So that choice feels so deliberate. Obviously, in terms of how many people might die, he's not going to die. We know that. So the idea of maybe everybody who's part of this co-firm mission, maybe not making it back and some newly gleaned or glimpsed truth dying with them and not making it all the way back to the Jedi Temple or some characters who may be in possession of certain facts, not...

sharing it more widely i think the idea of some sort of conspiracy if it is only with a couple characters is something we're certainly primed for not only because we've been talking a lot about what conspiracy might have unfolded on brendak but like our our our old friend vern who we'll talk about for a few minutes today uh have have some thoughts as always on vern but the

Oh, let's not tell the Jedi Council. The High Council will be obliged to inform the Senate. A scandal like this would inspire fear and mistrust. We should handle this ourselves. Now, Vern is always on PR spin. Always. The idea of the Jedi continuing to make the same mistake over time is actually very dramatically interesting to me. So could Vern and a few other people actually...

receive this truth and decide not to pass it on and pass it up because they think they're working to protect us.

the sanctity of the Jedi that seems possible to me now I don't think it would make sense if Mundi was one of the people who knew that no no but I don't think he's so far that hasn't happened yeah so I think I think and I wrote this in the notes this idea of what happens on Kofar stays on Kofar yes your memory your memory wipe theory is feeling increasingly probable cover up a lot of people dying uh the Jedi just thinking that wrongly perhaps think

thinking that they've dealt with and eliminated the threat also seems totally possible. So we have a lot of possible explanations. Just a guy being a dude with a red lightsaber and he's off the board so we're safe. Something like that. I don't know. It's very interesting to me. Let's go back to the start of this scene. We get another... We get equating weakness with emotion. Yes. Fast but weak, her emotions guide her every choice in combat. And I think that is something...

given interviews that Leslie has given this idea of the Jedi being allergic to emotion is something she's really compelled and fascinated by. Same. One of our favorite aspects of the story to parse. We talk about attachments specifically, but I think it's just this idea of like all emotion. Like, no, I mean, we've talked about other emotions other than attachment and certainly Jedi Yoda gives like a fun little list of them in the prequels, but like,

This idea of asking the Jedi to not be human beings is such an

Oh, yeah. I mean, side of this organization completely like your attachment, which if you see if you seek to then channel some sort of unnatural, like unholy control over life as Anakin did. OK, you've maybe tipped the scales, but why should attachment to other people inherently be bad, especially if compassion is supposed to be one of your guiding totally ideals? Fear the most human thing. Why do we have to frame that as the path to the dark side instead of like, hey,

buddy, let's work through this together. It's just a really interesting part of the story. So I love, I do love the different aspects of the canon that are interested in interrogating that. I think inside specifically of just like the character set in this show, they're talking about May here. So when we think of this dyad, as we will continue to refer to them until formally proven otherwise, told not to, if it's true for May.

Could it be true for Osha? For certain. What will her emotion, not that we think emotion is bad, but what will it drive her to do when she learns what really happened? We go back to the butterfly gummy bear sequence in episode three. This idea that like May, they both have this sort of like power thing.

And OSHA tamps it down. And May doesn't. But what happens when all those layers that OSHA has her emotions rolling under explode? Yeah.

I'm really closely tracking this idea, this assumption that Sol is the fourth Jedi on the list here, on the kill list, because no one has ever officially said it. People just keep assuming it. I went back and like rewatched scenes, right? In episode two, Mei says, I have two Jedi to kill after Torben. And Chimera mentions Kilnaka. He says a Wookiee, you know, you think a...

you know, a hibernating Jedi is tough. Try a Wookiee, right? But no one says Sol that's on Team Darkseid. This is Osha's assumption. You're one of four that was stationed on Brendok that you're on the list. This is Vern's assumption. She says, yes, but May targeted these three, four, including you, Sol, the four Jedi stationed on her home planet when she was a child. How odd. Can I just say something? Yeah. Yeah.

how the how odd was the low point of the season to me vernon it's a tough it's a tough uh tough road to hoe for burn honestly um where am i way overthinking this or well so play out the string for me if it's not if it's not soul if this is a assumption that everyone is leaping to yeah where does that misread of the board take us

Who could be fourth on the list? I mean, we talked about this a little bit before and earlier I had said maybe Vern would be fourth. Really does seem to me that Vern is not part of the cover up, given the conversation she has with Sol. She seems genuine when she's like, how could you not tell me? Yeah. That didn't seem like someone who was like pretending to be shocked. Yeah, it played in this episode certainly more as deeply...

concerned about the reputation of their order and the optics and the spin cycle and less like I am a part of this directly. Yeah, I agree with that. I, other than that, I don't have, you know, is it May? I mean, is it Osha? Who's not...

Jedi scum. Who's not, I mean, she is Jedi scum, I guess. Well, no, she was like ready to sign back up. And Sol was like, actually, no, which we'll talk about in mere moments. Oh, you want me to join the order? That was actually a fascinating, fascinating exchange. Much to parse there. Okay, so you're on, you're on who is the fourth watch. I don't know, just because they've never said it. And especially later in this episode. Right. When Chimera is like talking.

taunting her. Seemed really super fond of and deeply invested in and attached to. That one Jedi, what's his name? Sol? Yeah. But that made me think more so that, more that it was definitely him because he seemed to be like, again, guiding toward that's the one who we need to make sure we're like taking care of and eliminating. But I like the theory that maybe that's a misdirect. I guess it's just like, it just keeps being an assumption that people are making rather than like we have

may herself or chimera saying one two three four these are the four on the list you know i like so i like it's a reasonable assumption and again i'm perfectly happy to admit that i often overthink these things um splinter order something worse something worse an apprentice who doesn't know their master it's absurd if they're a splinter this actually made me chuckle i enjoyed this this was a good little moment for star wars fans if they're a splinter order we'd know

Would you? Would you, Jedi? Would you? If everybody could just time travel and please watch The Phantom Menace when Mace Windu said, I agree, the Sith would not have returned without us sensing it. Absolutely classic. And this part, while the Coruscant scenes were also not my favorite part of the episode and have not been my favorite part of the season, that recurring misstep from the Jedi is... I want to talk about this, about you just drew a parallel between...

Jedi and mace and other folk in the prequel series. We have this really interesting from email from Maddie, uh, spent more time with the high Republic, uh, you know, texts than I have. Um, and I'll be curious. We don't have Ben Lindbergh on Laura's segment this week, but I'll be curious to ask him maybe, uh, in future episode, if he agrees with this, but, uh,

I cut this email way down. It's still quite long. I'm going to do my best to sum it up. But basically, Maddie says, the acolyte feels so totally different from the other stories that make up the earlier High Republic-era publishing initiative.

And she also says she understands this is the end, the tail end of the High Republic era. She understands that. But she says in those, the Jedi are just plain cool. They're strong in the force, but heads with the doctrines of the order. Because many of the High Republic stories take place on the galactic frontier, the Jedi aren't as closely bound to the tenants.

They have best friends. They fall in love, act on their emotions and their attachment to others. Some of them even have sex. They do. In some, they're not a monolith. They're individuals with hopes, dreams, and loves, and they feel fully human and fleshed out in a way that the Jedi in the prequel era and the Acolyte, at least to me, don't.

Do the Jedi still take children away from their families? Sure. Are they perfect? Definitely not. They make a lot of mistakes, both as individuals and protectors of peace who always seem eager to eager to jump headfirst into battle situations. I'm more interested in how we got from those super cool Jedi, the main High Republic stories to the more dogmatic Jedi, the acolyte.

Then I am in understanding how we get from the acolyte to the prequel era. In my mind, the Jedi of the acolyte are already the Jedi of the prequel era. Moreover, although I've only read two books with her in it, the Vernestra Rove, the early High Republic stories feels very different from the Vern we get in the acolyte. She's calm, diplomatic and rational, even as a teenager, but I would not describe her as distant, which is how she comes off to me in the show.

It's possible something later happens that we don't know about, et cetera, et cetera. And then the last point that Maddie made is that the Jedi of the High Republic books and comics don't seem to have the same views of the Jedi of the Acolyte with regards to who is allowed to use the Force. There's a young adult comic titled High Republic Adventures. There's a character named Zine Mrala who is identified as being a Force user, too old,

as they like to say to be trained but is allowed to come and like train with the padawan learn the ways of the force wield the force but is not allowed to call themselves a jedi so that is very different from indara being like we heard you're training children and it is our right to do that not yours as our own um so what do you make of what maddie is saying here

Yeah, I think that this is part of what, again, has and I am reluctant to keep harping on this because I actually don't know how valid this is as a critique, genuinely, because our expectations for something don't really matter. What matters is the success of the text we end up getting, whatever text, whatever platform that text is on, if it's literally a text in our hands, if it's a show, a movie, whatever. Yeah.

That said, I am having, clearly, and I think other people are too, a difficult time shaking the framing and positioning of the story before it came to us. And this is, I think, related to what Maddie is raising in the email because part of what we were excited for not only was the Kill Bill meets Frozen energy of it,

But what it meant to be in a different part of the timeline. Yeah. What that would potentially unlock. Yeah, yeah, yeah. What that would afford us as viewers and the creators who are playing in this very vast galaxy and very wide timeline in all directions. And so...

The fact that the Jedi feel more familiar and similar, the fact that the question of, oh, yeah, we are actually... We're interested to see how we will end up, like, forging that path to somehow Palpatine rose and then somehow Palpatine returned. Yeah. Into the...

I don't know how we can actually say this feels like so separate from the Skywalker saga, ultimately. Like a lot of just the tonal... A lot of what Ben was saying from the start, you were saying this as well, yeah. And so this is part of it too, is like seeing the Jedi in a completely different part of the world in terms of just how they act and behave. And when they subvert our expectations for the decisions that they make, I don't think that's what's happening here. Behind the scenes concern I have is that...

This is something that prospect of from a Sith point of view, very different time for the Jedi. All of that is something that the show creator, Leslie Hedlund wanted to do. And then what was Lucasfilm allowing her to do given how much Lucasfilm, uh,

Sort of likes to keep it safe and familiar, at least in its sort of live action storytelling. So that's a question we don't know. We won't know the answer to until, you know, THR or someone else writes an expose on it. But like, I think I think that's kind of interesting. Okay.

Vern and Sol have this conversation. As I said already, I... After Vern makes the observation, by the way, trained by one of our own. Right. She's so sure. Not just force user. Right. One of our own means Jedi. I can tell. Yeah.

By this footage. I didn't need to read the email. Yeah. I didn't need to look at the holo to know that. This, I mean. Or even a holo. You're so right. That's probably the character who gets mentioned the most in our document here today that I wrote is Jackie. Because I do think it's interesting to contrast the assumptions that the Jedi in that room are making. Yeah. And also. Right. So let's actually go do some fact finding. Well, Jackie is always like, what are the facts? Yeah.

We saw this in episode two, like contrasting her approach to Yord's approach. She's very clear eyed. She's the best, like clearly the best detective in the bunch here. Yeah. Oh, yeah. She makes several observations in this episode alone. And so I think that like contrasting that, like clear eyed, sort of like what are the facts?

versus the Jedi entrenched. Exactly. What are our assumptions? Yeah, like it makes sense. It feels right that that would be coming from a Padawan, coming from somebody who is still newer to this life and has not necessarily like absorbed all of the rigidity or cynicism or sort of like rote deductions that maybe define some of the older characters. So yeah, that part of it, that feels like a deliberate contrast that I have enjoyed. And Jackie has been

Just a delight. A delight. A delight. We get this exchange where Vern says the thing about, like, 16 years ago, why didn't you tell me there was a chance this poor girl survived? Who I just asked you to bring in the power of cold a couple weeks ago. I did like the kind of, like...

oh mundine and holding or watching they can hear us the kind of like paranoia in the corridor energy of like who's observing what and again kind of that helps to fuel the sense that like there's something at stake reputationally here that feels very keen for verne how do you feel like soul who says if i thought there was of course i would have but i saw her fall no one could have survived that how do you think he would take the news about darth maul um

Yeah, I've got some animated Star Wars television episodes that I'd love to show Saul. I actually feel like I'm coming off like... I didn't actively dislike the episode, so I feel like I'm slightly surprised by how every scene that we've talked about so far is quite critical. Well, we're still on Coruscant. It's tough. That's true. We'll get to the more compelling stuff soon. But this again, no one could have survived that. All right, a couple things. One, we see May at the end of the episode last week. And May looks, I would say...

Emotional trauma aside, unharmed. Not like, how are you clinging to life? Slightly smudged. A smattering of soot. Yeah, chimp chimp churro. Which I think, again, feels emblematic because...

When we think of that as a puzzle piece in our mystery box, it's interesting. One of the characters is certain that that fall would have resulted in death. And the character actually experienced that plummet is it barely has a scratch, right? Maybe literally doesn't have a scratch. And so then it kind of gets our theory brains going. Does that just mean May used the force to matter? Did somebody else pull her out of that fall? Was somebody waiting right away to snatch her up?

But if that were true, I don't feel like she would be alone by the tree at the end. Who knows? Maybe maybe it's right after the Buntu tree that it's like, hey, come on over. You know, maybe I'm going to save you and then you need a little moment to go to your poison tree and I'll let you perhaps pull the wings off a gummy bear fish. I feel like some of the questions that we're asking are not going to have answers. Probably. But so, OK, regardless. Yeah. Let's say we get that answer. Let's say we don't.

I don't understand how Sol could be so sure. That just doesn't make sense to me. And in part because I we talked about this a little bit last week. I don't understand why nobody is sensing anything through the force.

Well, he is in this episode. He's got some sense for stuff. And Osha does. In the forest. In the forest. But back there. And so again, it's like, is it because there's going to be a mystery driven answer? Like there was a block in place. Something was thwarting their ability to understand what unfolded. Is it because he, because we get his like Ned Stark-esque, I promise. Right. Next time I see you. Yeah.

Which indicated that Sol knows more about what happened than we maybe hoped he did. I know. Bummer. It's a bad look. Or is it because he just...

didn't try to save them with the force and then didn't feel with the force that there was some sort of like lingering life this just really feels like something we're not gonna get an answer to that's just sort of like she's fine this happens to us all the time in these star wars shows where we like concoct these big like larger conspiracy this this show is definitely trying to feed our conspiracy brain more than most other star wars shows are but i just feel like

I guess here's what I'll say. I'll be perfectly happy with this idea that the coven who used the thread, not the force by any other name, that the way that they use the force is something that the Jedi don't understand. And may as someone who has been marked by that ceremony is someone, um, I don't need there to have been a secret Sith involved in all of this. Those certainly there could have been. Yeah. But like this idea that like,

Theoretically, it makes sense to me that if the witches use the Force in a way that the Jedi just can't understand, that's interesting. Because, again, it's like these assumptions that Vern's making. She's trained by one of our own. Yeah. A master... A princess who doesn't know his master, that's impossible. Right. Right? It's impossible! But it gets back to, again, how much of it is just plot versus, like, something more deeply human. Because we talked about last week, like, Osha waking up and saying, like, Jack Shepard, we have to go back. Yeah. And Sol's like, we can't, sorry. Here, too...

Okay, yeah, that looks like a bad fall. It did. Go check? Yeah. Like, sure, there's a really very robust fire and the vaginal cave complex is collapsing in real time. It seems intense, but... The VCC? The VCC. Oh, the VCC, the structural... Well, no one checked the structural integrity of the VCC.

You think an eight-year-old kid died and there's no time to just be sure. Nobody has time to just check. And again, a connection to the mystery and the plot because there was some reason, something that made them have to leave quickly. Okay, but then how do we latch that on to what we're learning about how these characters function as people?

people independent of what that mystery is this is interesting okay we're gonna return to some questions on theory corner but i just want to say this right now saul who is it is it that you um you think that there's a plan that's difficult to see some sort of shift something to tip the scales but you've decided to keep it to a really tight circle and not mention it to anyone this is even though you think it's a tipping just tipping the scales caliber situation it's just an us problem let's just keep it in a tight circle need to know only okay need to know only um

Saul's my guy, my beloved, my favorite. Big fan. On the one hand, we're delighted to learn that he's committed to bringing in Mae warm, not cold, right? Yeah. He's still in a savior complex beat. I love that for him. He's also quite focused on capturing her master, right? Or perhaps he's just saying that to get the green light from Vern. Yeah. On the other hand, I do not like the way that he talked about Osha as bait.

Mei's not going to do this unless we give her something that she wants. Do we have something she wants? Yeah, her sister. My most precious and beloved Padawan, who I have a hollow of that I stare at longingly. Let's dangle her on the hook as bait. It's not a good look for my guy. Tough one for our guy's soul. Yeah, that hurt. That hurt. He seems very...

very keyed up in this stretch. There's a lot on his mind, clearly. This is an intense stretch for Sol. This is what we were alluding to earlier, because this is when he goes to find Osha. Very upset that she was going to go without saying goodbye. Were you excited to see Pip? Thrilled to see Pip. Thrilled to know that Pip got a tune-up. Always love a little Pip chirp.

We were a few minutes away from being treated to a fun little interlude with Pip and Basil. Wonderful stuff. Delightful. Just an absolute joy. But this, you want me to rejoin the Jedi? And Sol's like, eww. Well,

Not exactly. But this was interesting. So he literally will say, not officially, oh, you need me so you can get to her. But this gave us a sense that we did not necessarily previously have that Osha has maybe some regret about leaving the Order. We had...

we had conflicting narratives. We have this idea that she got drummed out of the service and then this line from her in episode one where she was like it was my decision to leave. Leaving the Jedi was the hardest thing that I've ever done so that makes it that makes it clear that maybe you would be tempted to come back but it was my decision no one else's and this pinged us like oh no maybe she needed someone else to open the door for her so that was

That was interesting. Like, what level of desire is there to return? Or she wasn't telling the truth. Yes. To Yord. Totally possible. Who would lie to Yord? I don't know. Couldn't be Mae. Couldn't be Mae. The more interesting part of that ultimately was the different place Sol is in. Because, I mean, really, like, where just they are in their relationship. Because in episode two, Sol wanted to keep Osha away from Mae. Right? Right.

I will confront her. No, I must face her alone. You brought me here, right? Yeah. We both knew this is where this trip was headed. I didn't know you were still so angry. We build toward the, this is grief, let it go, et cetera.

That was before he fought Mae, though. It was, yes. And saw the softening in Mae's eyes that he mentions that leads him to say here there is still good in her. The part that loves you. Positioning, of course, in that moment, the idea of attachment is a good thing, which is part of what we're drawn to Sol about. Where have we heard that before? There's still good in her? Is that a Star Wars refrain? Okay. Pip and Basil.

Who do you pick if you had to pick one? Pip. Easy. Wow. Yeah, that's easy for me. Do you think Van would pick Basil? Probably. Droid over cute animals? No, typically, obviously. I love a cute animal. I love a cute creature. I love a critter. And I did enjoy Basil. Okay, what if Pip is chirping, but Basil is sniffing with his little snoot?

I'm into it. Yeah. It's a spinoff I would watch. The chirp and the sniff. The chirp and the sniff. The sniff and the chirp. Yeah. I really enjoyed later when May stumbles into the... Oh, yeah. And Bounce is just like...

That was great stuff. Loved that. Okay, so Yord, Horde, Rejoice. Some great stuff from Yord in this episode. Our guy is back in form, giving a debrief. I'm sure this is his... He's made a whole PowerPoint presentation. He's very excited to do this. Yord is giving this presentation. Jackie's there, of course. Why would we go anywhere without her? Sol is there. Pip, Basil, Osha wearing those civilian whites that she did not want to wear. And then a whole team of red shirts. Uh-huh.

We might as well be heading out beyond the wall. That's not great. Oh, man. There is a Keldor there of the Keldor species. Not Plo Kloon, though. A lot of people are wondering if that was Plo Kloon on the ship. It's not. Ken emailed to ask us,

Where is Tassie Loa, Yord's Padawan? Do you think it means anything or did they just not get the actor for more than one episode? It's very weird that we got Yord's Padawan, got her name, got like a sense of her personality. Yeah. And then she just vanishes from the story. I find that very odd to be sort of functionally replaced by Jackie. But like, I mean, they're very different personality wise, but in terms of like the young, curious Padawan, like, yeah.

Jackie's here and Tassie Lowe is out. Yeah. So we don't know who all of the red shirts are, but it does seem like Jackie's the only Padawan on the mission. So I think we can assume that...

This is considered the fact that they need to bring Basil in the first place. The fact that we hear from Chimera, like this is an uncharted world. This is going to be difficult to navigate, time sensitive and dangerous. And maybe Padawan would typically not be welcomed outside of Jackie. Do you think there's a cut scene from Coruscant of Tassie Loa ironing Yord's robe, steaming out Yord's robe? I don't think Yord needs any help with the steaming. He has a routine completely unlocked. Shining Yord's shoes? I think he probably did rehearse his PowerPoint with his Padawan though. Oh, with her. Okay. Yeah.

He's like, pause for applause. He did seem so annoyed that they were distracted and not paying attention to everything he was saying, which was very amusing. He's like my presentation. As we mentioned, we have the timeline of Kelnaka being off the grid for one year only. The station on Kfar for a while now. Osha, as per usual, is not interested in paying attention to a debrief.

And just want to say about Basil, designed by Critter Goat Neil Scanlon. I love a Neil Scanlon design. Basil's great. This is an EU character. And one of the many things that Leslie was like excited to bring into like actual, actual canon. So I hope that many people make it off of Kofar alive. If we see harm befall Basil or Pip, I will be distraught.

If Osha breaks bad, will she take Pip with her? Will Pip go to the dark side? Remember when Lola went evil? I do. Yeah. Oh, I was going to mention this earlier when you were like,

When people were sort of stressed about how can like Mundi be in a story that involves a Sith and then say this thing in the prequels. I'm like, we've all lived through Obi-Wan where Obi-Wan and Leia knew each other. We were just asked to look the other way at the end of it. So I don't know. Okay, man, let's go to K'Far. Let's do it.

How are you pronouncing it? I keep pronouncing it nine different ways. You're saying Kofar. I'm saying Kofar. But I can't. I can't claim that that's right. And I don't know why. Anyway. I can't claim that that's right. Three. Dateline. Kofar. Three hours before sunset. Tick. Tick. Tick. Okay. Beautiful there. Absolutely gorgeous. Wonderful. Ominous forest. I loved. I actually really loved it. Lovely hillsides. It was like very old school.

Endor where we're getting because they filmed Endor and yes Mallory is wearing a shirt that has Endor on it I was like I gotta get something Star Wars forest I could do it and sure enough I could so they filmed Endor in the Northern California Redwoods beautiful but then also there's like matte paintings to make it look

Slightly alien. And this is what we get here is like, they're walking both team Jedi scum and team Chimera is definitely the bad guy, uh, are walking over these beautiful mountains, uh,

conflicting reports of where they filmed either Portugal or Wales I'm unsure but like a beautiful real world location and then Chimera's like that's the forest and that's definitely like a matte painting of like an alien looking for it but I liked that I thought it looked like very old school Star Wars to me I thought that was beautiful and also I mean you know we're treated to the most important visual in the episode and in the series to date which is not this resplendent setting Chimera's bag it's the duffel

Chimera has a massive leather duffel satchel backpack thing. This is Mystery Sound number one from Steve, please. Because she's brought a ludicrously capacious bag. What? What's even in there? Huh? Flat shoes for the subway? Her lunch pail? I mean, Greg, it's monstrous. It's gargantuan. You could take it camping. You could slide it across the floor after a bank job. Well, whatever. Whatever.

Sensational Tom! Shout out to Bad Babies on Twitter for reminding me of that section of Succession. Absolutely sublime. Welcome to Naughty Yotta Island. This season on Naughty Yotta Island. When we were new, they spoiled me. They even gave me a phone. But then, it's like I didn't exist.

Don't take yada yada from your wireless carrier. Now with Metro, get that new customer feeling again and again. Introducing Metro Flex. Free 5G phones when you join, same deals as new customers when you stay. Only at Metro by T-Mobile. Just bring your number and ID and sign up for an eligible plan. After 12 months, trade in and get our best deals on select devices.

This episode is brought to you by the 2025 Lincoln Aviator SUV. Nice car. The 2025 Lincoln Aviator exudes confidence with its updated grille, headlamps, and daytime running lights. Powered by a twin turbocharged V6 engine, it moves with commanding presence, a luxurious three-row interior, available massage seats. All that ensures you're revitalized for whatever comes next. Explore more at lincoln.com.

Some models, trims, and features may not be available or may be subject to change. Check with your local retailer for current information. Lincoln and Aviator are trademarks of Ford or its affiliates.

This episode is brought to you by Opel, the first over-the-counter daily birth control pill available in the U.S. Opel is FDA-approved, full prescription strength, and estrogen-free. Plus, there's no prescription needed. Finally, the days of needing a prescription for birth control are over. Opel is available online and at most major retailers. Take control of your health and reproductive journey with Opel. Birth control in your control. Use code BIRTHCONTROL for 25% off your first month of Opel at opel.com.

So, Khmer is here with a ludicrously capacious bag. Goddamn, chew it. That could definitely fit a helmet and some robes. And at least, like, a poncho situation. I would say that this is not...

Just a bag. Oh, and the saber. The red saber. That could fit that. It seems to be a bag specifically intended to hold the Venom Tooth helmet. Yeah, the bottom is just like round and helmet-y shaped. Oh, man. This is just great stuff. That being said, I actually love every... I mean, you already said this. I love every second we spend with Manny. And actually my favorite part of this episode was being so convinced that Chimera is underneath that helmet. Mm-hmm.

As we have been since before the show started. Ever since that Empire interview. Yeah. Just you being a guy. Yeah.

Parsing everything that he says with that understanding actually was quite fun for me. Yeah, I agree. I like this part. And also watching his Fumble Bumble performance, which we got a taste of in episode two. Yeah. Just ratchet up to a new degree when you're in nature. So him stuffing things into the bag on top of the helmet, the robe, and the saber that are definitely at the bottom of that bag. And then just knocking, patting.

Ailan's over or whatever, just sort of like being his like doofy-goofy, my bangs are in my face self. Yeah. I loved it. The same. The bumbling over the locker. Yeah. It was just so funny to me. And so was the... And it was hard. Yeah. All the hunters don't even come here and I did it. It was hard. It was so hard. Like we see a fellowship of Jedi needing to deploy Basil the Tracker. Yeah. Yeah.

Further evidence as we theorize that Chimera is, in fact, Venom Teeth, that not just, like, oh, this is how you know this, this is how you did this, but his power, right? Like, he was able on his own to do things that they... Just float his way through the forest. But not, just kind of, like, levitate his way through. So he says he did this not for the master, but for her. Mm-hmm.

He also says this thing about deals. This is really interesting. What did you make of this? You made a deal. And that's on the heels of, you know, your sister being alive doesn't change anything. You need to kill the Wookiee. You made a deal. His language throughout this, and we're going to parse all of it, but his language throughout this is...

reminding her of the mission, trying to keep her on mission, trying to remind her of these specific rules of the mission that, again, I still don't understand about what it means to... Of the danger that awaits if she should lapse in her agreement. He'll kill you. He, I mean me. Like, all of that is really fascinating. But you made a deal with...

We talked about deals last week when we talked about the Covenant Mother Anisea. When she says about the birth of Ocean May, she says, and then we were blessed with a miracle. The gift of life. And we were like, how'd they get that? What did they do? What did they trade for that? What deal did they make? So what deal did May make? Kill the four and get what? Or I'll kill you.

But I don't feel like that was the thing. That can't be the terms to start with. So is it the official... You get a saber. Sanctioning that you are my acolyte? You get a helmet. You get a helmet big enough that you can fit all of your beautiful hair underneath. I don't know. The helmet, I mean, we'll talk about when he hovers down later, but it is...

sensational i love the design is absolutely incredible incredible incredible um okay speaking for those of us at home chimera says how do you kill a jedi without a weapon and we're all like same it's just the same way that damon was like rainies why didn't you kill all those royals when you had a chance

Chimera and May literally just host a Theory Corner podcast for multiple moments in this stretch of the episode. And guess what? I don't have an answer on the other side of it, but I want to hear it anyway. So why don't you, whether or not you believe us that Chimera is Venom Tooth, which we are just so convinced of, but why don't you listen to this just thinking that he is and enjoy how fun it is. Steve, will you play this, please?

How do you kill a Jedi without a weapon? It has to be some sort of test, right? You engage unarmed but can use their saber if you disarm them? Or is that cheating?

I'm just curious how you're going to do it this time. You failed so much. I didn't fail. I killed Indara and I killed Torben. But you killed them your way. You have to kill the Wookiee without a weapon. Your master wants you to... What kind of deal did you make with him? I didn't. We didn't. Exactly. I just owe him. You know how he is. He collects people. I've never seen his face. Have you? You know I haven't.

Fanny Jacinto, I have no notes for you. Just a guy being a dude. Just a dude being a pal, being a guy. Just a lad being a bro. You've failed so many times. You have failed me. What was your favorite part of that? I think the thing that, because there's so much delicious text and intentional misdirection or deception to parse there. But I think the emphasis, like the word choice of your way. Yeah. Really good.

struck me when we when we try to think about like what is what is the deal but also what is what will killing without a weapon look like like we talked in prior pods about will that

I mean, you know, because like does a force choke count as a weapon or no? Is that a different thing entirely? Do you have to give your is this about succumbing? Is this about giving yourself over in full to not only the darkness, but to this Sith creed to this way of of life? It's so weird to me, though, that he says your way. Mm hmm.

When he's the one who like made the poison for her, for Torben. But she asked. She did. She brought the Buntali. But he wasn't like, no, you can't use poison. Those aren't the rules. I mean, he was like, but he was like, here you go. And here's what you have to do to manipulate him and take in himself.

And that's exactly what she did. So this is one of the things that I actually really like about the show so far and I'm enjoying because we get to think about this. What is it like for May to go through these trials? What is the deal that May made for May? What promise is waiting on the other end? Right. And for May, what history has driven this? But for Chimere slash...

Venom teeth slash I we it seems apparent that this is the same person. Maybe we'll be wrong. Maybe it is so obvious that it's a misdirection, but it just seems clear that that's that's where we're heading. And we will we will remain on that corner until again forced to vacate it. But from from Venom's perspective.

And we talked about this in episode two when Mae entered the apothecary and was just like kind of like treating him with such ridicule, which is very present throughout this episode too. And there's a level of just like kind of being like rude, just sort of being a dick. But also then there's this like holding somebody else in lower esteem. Right. And so like not only if Chimere and Venom Teeth are the same person. Narrator. They are. Yeah.

Then he has access to the way that the candidate he has selected is behaving. Yeah. So a couple of things. Will he like what he sees? Will he decide that Osha is the candidate he wants to win instead? You look just like her, but you're a little less rude.

Dude, another, I know I'm now I'm jumping ahead, but you know what gave me like a chill in a great way? When Venom Tooth gets like half an inch from Osha, it felt like so parallel to that moment. Like getting right up in her face and looking at her. Yeah. Exactly. Like her just felt like the same. Yeah. Like this is the same. It's the same shot. This is the same. It's the same. Okay. So to your question, a couple of things strike me here.

I keep coming back. I didn't put this in the notes, but I keep coming back to this idea in recurring idea in fairy tales where enchantresses will appear as like crones to test, you know, the first is always the youngest son who like passes the test and treats the the crone kindly. But the first born son, the second born son usually are like, get out of my way, crone. And the youngest son is like.

Let me help you. And she's like, surprise! I'm an enchantress. This was the test. You're nice to me. So now you get a wish. If you don't spend a lot of time with fairy tales, you may at least be familiar with this from the prologue of Beauty and the Beast. So, like, that is...

That's sort of what I was thinking about. I've seen a few people use the undercover boss idea. Again, if you're not familiar with that show, perhaps you're familiar with the Kylo Ren SNL sketch. One of my all-time favorites. Undercover boss. So good. So, like, that Kyra's undercover bossing his way through this. But what's interesting about that is, like, what would he be looking for? Right. Because it's not to the, like, youngest son, oh, will you treat people good?

kindly it can't be that so but it's like what is your metal what is your metal and also if one of the assumptions that that is made that actually ends up being correct is like verne's this was a jedi yeah trained by a jedi and that means that venom slash chimer slash i we they're the same uh was a part of the order at some point then what's that wound what's

What's that origin story? What's that exodus, right? And so like what, I mean, obviously we get the kind of like spine tingling, the speech and how to kill the dream. Yes. But what specifically is the, we hear like the idea in this episode that the forest has this rot and that's from the light side thinking of the dark, but what's the flip side of that? This is still what's so interesting about the promise of what the show might do. The Sith point of view on what the rot is for the Jedi is,

making sure that your candidate is not inclined toward that would be like one of the things you're watching for. The rod of the light. I love that. I have some, we'll get to another Chimera May exchange later that makes me wonder if,

what he needs out of this we'll talk about that one more like comp i want to talk about really quickly because you know i can't resist a shakespeare comp um it's talking about the bar the professor's always welcome and so is the bark so is the bar so it's the bar uh henry the fifth act four good old king henry puts on like someone's cloak yep and walks among his soldiers here at the house of our oh we really do invisible or no

murder or no he walks among his men the night before battle in disguise because at that time they did not all know what the king looked like right we didn't have the stamps or the money to tell you and um and he's just like he's there actually to like boost their morale right um

Can I read some Shakespeare too? I would honestly be thrilled. Please. That every wretch pining and pale before, beholding him, plucks comfort from his looks. A largesse universal like the sun, his liberal eye doth give to everyone. Thawing cold fear that mean and gentle all, behold as many unworthiness define, my favorite part, a little touch of Harry in the night.

uh one of my favorite shakespeare lines a little touch of harry in the night prince henry prince hal um etc so uh king henry prince hal um the idea that chimera is here yes to sort of get her true measure i think that's true but also as we mentioned from since episode two dispensing wisdom bolstering

You're having... Yes. You're losing your nerve. We can't have that. You know? And there are ways in which he does it actually encouragingly and gently. And there are ways in which he's like, you failed so many times, though. What's your plan? So... And that was interesting, too, that maybe, like, there become... We hit the moment of the shift where we've exited, like, clear eyes, full hearts, can't lose. Kind of. Yeah, I'm here to pep you up before the big game territory into, like...

The rush from Chimera's perspective. We're so close. Yeah, 10 minutes away. Could it be the setting of the sun and whatever? That's the night triggers, maybe. Could it be that Chimera...

Clearly a very powerful Sith Lord. Senses the Jedi on their tail. And so the urgency shifts. I had so many questions about this ticking clock. But then this is where we get back to episode two and him seeming like, oh, you want to show me back? Yeah. Where it seemed like he was trying to just like not evade them, but actually bring them into this web. Maybe this is the confrontation he wants. Right. We got to get there, kill Naka. Because we're wondering like, what is his OSHA scheme?

And how much is the Force dyad involved in all of this? Yeah. He collects people. It's right there on the text. He collects people. I mean, me. I collect people. What did you think of on the memory wipe front and your tracking of the memory wipe possibility? What did you think of May saying that she can't believe her sister is Jedi scum? Did you read that as like a...

Oh, I knew when she was a kid, this was what she wanted. And she made this decision and she was drawing the drawing the Jedi Crested notebook and she decided she couldn't lie through the test and she didn't want this. And then like you go all these years later in your life, 16 years later, you're like, I can't believe that this was what my sister wanted. Or did you see anything in there that was like, remember how we talked about last week? Osha wakes up in the medical bay.

and actually doesn't seem to totally remember what happened. Like, do you think there is a little aspect of potentially Mei not holding on to some... Oh. Not retaining something about their past and what Osha's true desires toward the Jedi were? Right, because, I mean, because that last fight they have...

When she's like, I'll kill you. You can't leave, I'll kill you. We're not sure that that was Mae in full possession of her faculties. In fact, currently we are inclined to assume that it wasn't. Yeah, that's a good flag. I don't know. It's a really problematic line, though, because she says Jedi scum and then mere minutes later she's like, just kidding, I'm handing myself over to the Jedi. Very strange. Very bizarre. Extremely odd. Okay, I take you now.

To Jekyll on private eye. My favorite. She's chasing down leads. She's using Siri translator on her phone to get some information. And what is her question? We're looking for a Wookiee. He's big and hairy. This is rude.

All true, though. Rude. Don't you think she's keeping things quite simple? What about, we're looking for a Wookiee, he's consumed by guilt. He loves wheatgrass. Lost in trauma and potentially doodling some ample tits on his wall. Have you seen him? Have you seen Chalky Bosom's on the wall? Chalky Bosom's. Chalky Bosom sounds like a menu item in the bowels.

Okay. Jackie just doing her job being great. Yep. Yord being, sorry, Yord Horde, quite. I love Yord. I'm all in on Yord. He's like, give that blaster back. What do you say in episode two, it violates 13 precepts? Yeah, 13. To give that blaster to Osha. She's like, sorry, it's mine now. I just love this. Like, you're the rule follower. This is absolutely wonderful.

Jackie's leads don't lead anywhere. Thankfully, Sol remembers that someone in this show has the forest and he's like, he's in there. That spooky looking forest. Let's go there. That's where, that's where Kailnaka is. Okay. So they're on the way there. Again, the scenery looks amazing. Um,

Yord and Osha have another conversation where Osha's like, listen, and we heard this at the top of the episode, this is our opening clip. If I can't do it, you have to do it. I can't fail again, blah, blah, blah. Yes, I can't hesitate a second time. We know, and he's like, you've failed so many times. And he's like, don't worry, they've been setting me up as a trigger-happy character the entire season. I'm already at the blade. I'm always ready. Um...

But Yord apparently has seen Luke and Dagobah or he's seen Rey and Octo in that cave. And he's like, maybe you're not out here to find Mae. The face under the helmet is your own. But maybe you're here to find yourself inside a dyad with your twin sister. Yord. I like this idea, this use of wound, right? Yep. I've known you since you were a youngling. Mae has always been your wound. Yeah.

We've often discussed this idea of like the wound as the weapon in storytelling, like when you talk about Clark Kent leaving Krypton, that's like the wound. He lost his people, his planet, except when he's on Earth.

That exile from Krypton is his strength. That's literally where, you know, he draws his strength from the Yellow Sun, obviously. But like, you know, being Kryptonian is his strength, but it's also his wound. This is like a recurring mythological idea. So May as the wound could also be the strength if we think about them. The power of one. The power of two. The power of many. Like to parse this really quickly. Yeah. You're like, I've always known about May your whole life. Yes.

So then I had to go back and rewatch the scene. Oh, a twin. Surprise. Where Sol is like, she has a sister, Mae. She's a twin. And you're like, a twin? So he knew about Mae as her sister, but not that Mae is a twin, which is a wild detail to leave out of the whole conversation, I would say, if they were younglings together talking about their wounds. And I know she's like...

I would. My twin sister is sort of how I would say it. Anyway, let me tell you that I had a twin and we were conceived by the force itself. And perhaps we are a dyad. Mayhap. We are witches. She's got a tattoo. I don't. There's this whole theory. We're going to go to theory corner. There's this whole theory that may and Osha are the same person, which makes me absolutely bananas.

And a lot of it is predicated on this idea that we don't see Osha's forehead. That is wildly untrue. Mallory and I clocked this from the first episode. When she wakes up, we see her untatoed forehead. So anyway, we're going to get, well, we may or may not. Basically, I hate that theory. We can talk about it later. Sounds like we just did Theory Corner. Cool. Horse Projection Fight Club. I hate it. Okay.

I can tell that Van is kind of into it. I heard him like reference it. It's a pretty popular theory. I heard him reference it. I'm in that voice. I was like, no, I'll have to talk to him in person. Okay. I thought the umbra moths that we meet here in this episode were going to be nightmare fuel for me. But that was before I heard you sing acolyte 20 times in a row that hopefully Steve has cut from this podcast. You were able to sense that creature. Me singing. There's something rotten in you, Mallory. But unlike the umbra moth, it's not yet dead.

Oh man, what did this feel like to you, Mora? Mirkwood? Forbidden Forest? Which haunted? Oh, Acromantula? I hate things that skitter. If they're skittering in a crevice, Temple of Doom's a real tough one for me. Here's the thing. I'm going to throw this your way. You ready for this?

They weren't skittering. They were resting peacefully until disturbed another poor innocent creature slain in Star Wars by a Jedi happening to stroll through. I kind of agree, but at least Osha says that. Osha's like, they were just hanging out and I sensed it and now it's dead. What I don't understand is why she touched it. This gave me Strong the scientist and Prometheus just sticking their head in.

In the face of some sort of like hissing, spitting alien creature. Why she touched the tree bugs. In a moment like that, wish that the characters would have a stronger sense of self-preservation. I felt it too. Weren't me. Weren't me. Why did it twirl so simple?

I would not put my hand on the nesting, resting creature in the forest that has near moments before been described as something where a rat is setting in. But in terms of the text and what this tells us about Osha, when she says to Jackie after, her sensing is returning. Yeah. I was able to sense that creature, but I disturbed it and now it's dead. Okay. So a few things here.

The framing, what this framing implies, and then some of the questions that it raises. We've been talking about this the whole time, this idea that Osha has been cut off from the Force. Right. She couldn't reach Pip with the Force. She had to wait for gravity to help her out. So is that because of her own... A great unblockening. Yes. An unblockening is happening. An unblockening is upon us. We're unplugging the Force drain. This podcast is presented by liquid plumber Drano.

No free ads. No free ads. Is Osha being cut off from the Force something about her emotional, mental, spiritual state? Is it a block that somebody else has put into place? So this is still a very interesting thing. And when did it happen? Because we were speculating that's perhaps why she was kicked out of the orders. She could not access the Force. Right. She chose to leave of her own accord. Hardest thing she's ever had to do. It does seem like that is why she left, right? Because she was cut off from the Force, so how could she stay? Yeah.

Did something like the force vision on Karlak seeing and hearing May, which we believe still a part of our vision said to her corner has been that this is right. Planted vision. Yeah. Did that not ping to her as a rekindling?

Like, did she not perceive that as, oh, I'm having a connection to the Force here? Is this the first moment that she's felt it? Or is her voice and it's allowed to Jackie here because this has started to build? Like, okay, this is happening to me again. Something is like, something is awakening. And then that last part, and now it's dead. We'll talk about Jackie's reply in a minute here. But just from Osha's perspective.

osha associating the force with death oh yeah both in the trauma right that past trauma and then what that might mean in the future potentially as soon as next episode for what she is willing to do whether she is willing to tap into her power very interesting i think also this idea that is there anything about proximity to may or proximity to uh venom teeth

you know, is this a dark side influence awakening? What Jackie does say is it's always an honor to get to witness anything or anyone transformed to the Force, which is an absolutely psychotic thing to say, and it is something that Yoda said to Anakin, too. It was psychotic then, it troubles me then, and it troubles me still. Okay, good Queen Joanna, good Queen Alysanne over here. So...

This is an interesting one. Like, I... Yeah, I think in a moment like this, where this is Jackie's, like, reflexive response to a moment like this, it does... I think sometimes the Star Wars fans were like, oh, man, you really bump on it. Yeah. But...

sometimes like when we hear yoda say death is a natural part of life rejoice for those around you who transform to the force mourn them do not miss them do not attachmentless to justice it's like no i cut off there but there's something in it and in general how the jedi think of death you know this transition from the living force to the cosmic force this idea in the jedi code that there is no death having us it's like having a celebration of life ceremony instead of a funeral

But I don't think you need to rejoice. Yes. That's the word choice. Some of it is interesting to me in terms of how, okay, for the Jedi, this can be an embrace and a celebration of the larger sense of what the Force is and can be. Whereas for the Sith, the...

don't think about death as more like the pursuit of immortality. It's an active, evil, unnatural thing. And then fearing loss. So the idea of that being the path to the dark side. So there's like the canon kind of connection there. There's a little, there's a part of this sometimes to me that feels like this is a version of like to the well-organized mind, death is but the next great adventure. And that's, there's comfort in

yeah like there's something there that i think can give people a sense of like that's certainly that's certainly how jackie meant it peace she's like don't mourn for the giant roly-poly bug that you disturb by by touching it oh we should say you're like a harmless creature yes when it's slumbering it seems like it intended some harm as it was flying towards them okay jackie uh detective jackie private eye jackie says they're attracted to light uh-huh

Yep. Photophilic, I think, is how you say that. I have a bug story to tell you later about how I lived with some entomology students in... Anyway, we'll talk about that. You're talking like Helena? It was the most horrific night of my life. I'll tell you about it later. I'm not sure I want to hear about it. It involved bugs coming towards the light. So, yes, similar. But Jackie saying they were attracted to light makes me hope and think if next week is...

night where shit goes sideways in the forest i really hope jackie uses the information she gathered here to set those bugs to draw the number mom yeah and draw them toward madam tooth yeah like throw a saber and they'll like dive bomb wherever the light went something like that that's my hope that'd be fun i think that'd be really fun that'd be fun though i'd also like them to just go about their restful evening undisturbed

What if they love doing a murder and they get to murder some baddies? We only have two baddies in the wood. We don't want the baddies to die. You're right. You're right. Currently. Chelsea says we're not defined by what we lose. We're defined by what we survive. We are what they. Okay. Anyway, why are we running? We already talked about this. Why is there such a ticking clock on this? May says at the end of the episode, three hours till sunset. Yep. There's a clear explanation of this, which is you don't want to go through the bugwoods in the dark.

And that's an explanation that I can accept. Right? We gotta kill this Wookiee by sundown, seems like, especially given what happens later when Chimera is tied up and then we believe easily handily escaped and floated over and slashed Kilnaka in the chest right before sundown. Perhaps this is all a coincidence, but it just felt very, an odd emphasis to me.

Yeah, I think it certainly could be something on the planet and that would be fun and cool to watch unfold next episode. But it just it feels like the Jedi. That's the clock. The umber moths are coming out. Shadow moths. But if it were only that. When the lights go down, do the shadow moths come out?

umbra moths what other creatures are we like it's probably not just going to be the umbra moths what are those little pod things that yeah with like presumably some sort of like yeah noxious spore the if it were just that if it were just whatever threat is lurking in the forest like set up camp and wait till morning we're just gonna make it that's what he says we're just the jedi who i sense because i am a sith lord i'm willing to accept that that it's that simple okay

Should we do another round of let's overanalyze everything, every single thing Chimera says? I'd love to. Let's hit it, Steve. I have to fight a Wookiee after this trek. I'd like to rest for a minute. Is that so right with you? It's not, but okay. It's not a test. What? It's not a test. He calls it the final lesson. He says your final lesson is when you teach yourself. You will kill a Jedi without a weapon. Attacking a defenseless person goes against everything the Jedi stands for. How do you kill someone like that?

It's not a test. It's impossible. It's not impossible. You know that. I want this more than anything, but it's impossible. And if I don't do it, they'll kill me. You don't even care. I care. Here. I'm gonna find you more water. You're right. You need rest. You're losing your nerve. And we can't have that, can we?

Shout out to May using the Luke, it's impossible line here. Since this all feels like a gambit for her to set up her trap, I'm not going to quibble with any of her language here. I'm obsessed with the way that Manny decided to do the line read of it's not, but okay. It was the perfect balance of exasperation, impatience, masked with friendly helpfulness. I just loved that

That combo there. The Chimera stuff was great.

I agree that given the second he goes to get the water, she looks up to see where she's going to set her trap. It seems like this is intentionally done to set up the eventual exodus. But I don't think that makes sense. Because why go to the planet in the first place then? I don't think the whole thing was a gambit.

She says, when we were running through the woods, I made this decision. Yeah, but like, I don't know. It's just none of that makes sense. None of that makes sense. The timing of the face-in for May is confusing. It's so abrupt. And like, even the, I'm going to go turn myself in to the Jedi. Like, that's the plan? Like, we could just go right to that next part, right? When she's got him in the trap. Yeah.

After running through that forest for an extremely long time, I realized something. I don't need to do this anymore. I don't need to kill a Jedi without a weapon. I don't need to keep this deal. What? Hey, cut me down. You were wrong. Osha being alive changes everything. My loyalty is to Osha, not your master. Okay, that's at the 23-minute mark of the episode. I want this more than anything, the gambit scene, 21-minute mark of the episode. Whether or not she came to this great epiphany while wandering through the uncharted forest...

Just in terms of us receiving it, again, this gets to how much is kind of mystery or the way that the reveal is being positioned to us versus like, are we able to understand what a character is doing at any moment in time in the story? It just feels quite clunky. I just really don't think that there's going to be an added layer to what May decides to do here. Mm-hmm.

I do not think this is a case of mystery obscuring a character decision. You know that's a pet peeve of mine. I don't, I think it's just slightly clumsy writing. And that's why I say why get the planet? Because by that read, the thing that shifted was her seeing that Osha was alive. No, but her processing it. She sees Osha's alive. She's like, okay, but I'm still on mission. I'm still on mission. She's running through the bugwoods and she's like, wait.

why am i still doing this this isn't my priority anymore my sister's life i'm not justifying it i'm just saying i think that's what the show is asking us to believe that when she landed on the planet she still was like okay i'll kill kilnaka or maybe the plan is maybe why come to i don't i don't want to spend too much time on this because i really don't think we're gonna get another layover explanation yeah but like perhaps the plan is i would like to turn myself over to kilnaka

So I need a guy through the woods to get to him. But I don't think she's pretending from the beginning. Yeah. And she does say like... I did need you. Yes. Like they'll put you in prison not after I tell them who I know. Yeah. He'll kill you. He'll have to find me first. And I don't know if even he could make it all the way over here without a guide. I agree that gives us some perhaps justification or explanation. It was just another thing. And this was in the stretch of the episode that I really liked. Yeah. Like...

Did it seem that hard for everyone to make it to this point? Well, you needed Basil or you needed Chimere. She doesn't think her Sith master could figure that out, but she believed that Chimere could? Does that make sense? It makes sense if you're May and you haven't figured out that the guy right in front of you is your Sith master. I don't know. Regardless. Regardless.

She is positioned to threat to him. Yes. The reason, I think the reason that Kelnaka gets a slice to the chest as quickly as he does is because she has put this threat here. Oh, without question. Right? Yeah. That's why that line is there. She's ready to spill. And he has to race her to Kelnaka. Absolutely. And again, it's a good thing he can fly. She takes a little tumble. She does. She falls over that spore. That buys him seconds. Yeah.

But also, I guess he can fly. Yes. So he got there first. Again, we are so certain that Chimera... Well, first he had to put the helmet and the poncho on. This was hilarious when he went to go get the water. Yeah. Took the bag with him. Oh, yeah. Don't leave the bag behind. She might wrestle through it. Sensational stuff. Um...

He'll kill you, though. His delivery of that was quite... Yeah, he really shook out of chipper-duper mode in a hurry. He'll kill you. Kill you. So this gives me a preview. This is why I'm excited for the back four. Because I really... If we find out in episode five, which we really should, that Chimera is under that helmet, watching Manny Jacinto cook on that level...

and give us some Sith philosophy and like why the Sith think the Jedi are fucked up. That's the juice that I'm really looking forward to. I mean, I know we've been waiting to watch. I know we're going to get Bright Knock flashback. I know we're going to get some drama with Sol. I still love Sol. So I am interested in all of that, but I'm really interested in some Sith monologues. And as much as I've enjoyed the clumsy bumbling performance, I really want

the he'll kill you energy for the rest of the season same okay as you already mentioned Saul says this thing right where he says once we get made safely the ship I'll explain everything I promise we've got a second mystery sound here but you know what it is Steve will you play it the next time we see each other we'll talk about your mother I promise

can't do the Ned Stark promise you just can't so does this mean that Sol is going to die in episode five or does it mean that Chimera will get a chance to tell Osha or May will get a chance to tell Osha what happened someone else will reveal before Sol will get to yeah and it was interesting too to even the way that like Sol is sensing something and looking into the distance and almost like panting

And Osha asks what it is and he says, it's nothing. This is right before the promise exchange. And it was interesting. Like, is he sensing just a general rot, rot and darkness? General rot. Yeah. General rot. Or is he sensing something familiar? Is he sensing something that he hasn't sensed since? Since Brendock. Perhaps. Oh, I like that. And it has to remind us thinking about Brendock.

of that moment where the witches are like what's all that then did i leave a stove on in the force in the thread and they're like i guess it's nothing and then later bad shit happens right so he's like what's that rot nothing

Then he makes his promise to Osha. There's a lot of, you know, Mei screaming, Basil screaming. All this stuff happens. Mei walking up and finding Kelnaka with a still-steaming slash on the chest. What do you think that smelled like? Freshly cooked? Oh, I don't know. Like a misused flat iron or something? Ooh. I was thinking of, like, you know those, like, sheepskin rugs? Fake sheepskin rugs. And then, like, a stoner dropped their lighter at it. That's funny.

That's what I was thinking. What do you think, like, when he saw Venom Teeth arrive, was he like, at last, the sweet release that I've been waiting for, just like Torben? You think he put up a fight? Do you think we'll find out? Oh, my chalky boobs. You think he was sitting in that chair wanking it to the chalky dick? Do you think his final words were, oh, my chalky boobs? Sorry, oh, my chalky bosoms? I hope so.

oh man okay the sun goes down right as we get the reveal of kelnaka is dead yep uh at least the one trope this episode well there's plenty of tropes this episode didn't have one trope that i hate that it didn't have and i'm really happy is we didn't get may like monologuing to the corpse before she figures out that the corpse is dead i hate that shit she was just like that's a dead wookie still wookie

Dead wookie. And also I smell a lot of burnt hair and evacuated bowels. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. The other thing, just very quickly, we're almost at the end, but right before I explain everything I promised, Mae said, I feel different. Yeah. I sense things again in a way that gives me the courage to face her. Now... The great unclogging. The unclogging, the great unclogging, presented by the unclogger of your choice. No, Priya.

Because we're about to get to this moment where Yord's like, stay behind. Osha's in the back of the collection of Jedi. She's like sweating, like clammy. And again, like I said earlier, it did remind me of the way we were parsing like the look on Mei's face in episode three as she's staring into the flame in her hand. I was like, is she, again, is this just the great unclogging and she is rediscovering her connection to the Force or...

Is this part of the great puppeteering act that might be unfolding? Is she in a trance? Is she just like, is someone... Or is she just like, my sister is in there. Is everyone about to slice and dice her with a bunch of lightsabers? I'm going to have to rewatch. But I like this theory. I mean, I love this puppeteering idea.

so day is done night is here we get the that coolest shit shot this was great this is amazing of venom tooth darth venom just sort of like floating into frame genuinely creepy and scary and i loved it we got proper spooky we got a bunch of emails from people drawing out the comparison um to alien when uh the xenomorph like

dips down from the ceiling into into frame um leslie headland has said there will be like a predator themed episode it could be this episode i actually think it's gonna be next week's because we're in the we're still in the jungle yep and now it's nighttime and we're gonna see shit in the like we've seen in the trailer like the red lightsaber just sort of like zipping through the woods yeah i'm really excited about all of that so yeah um

Darth Venom, just really quickly, flicks Osha away. Very cavalier if he wants her for something for him to like. I almost felt the opposite. That's definitely fair and true. She could sustain many, many a broken bone and a rib contusion. But he's like, get the Force Dyad out of the way. Yeah. I'm about to blow the earth up. The level of power that we, right, exactly. The level of power that we see if he wants her dead.

It's instantaneous. There's just nothing and no one would stop him. So the fact that he cast her aside while it was a bit, yeah, a bit rough, did feel like I need you for something. Do you think next week's episode starts with just like a bunch of dead Jedi?

All those red shirts? I think they will be alive when the episode begins and then dead in very short order. Food for the umbra moth who was... Maybe like a couple, maybe a couple broke their necks in that explosion of the earth and then like a few more are going to get like eaten by moths or whatever. Did you like the red glow from the saber? Oh, I loved it on her. What's the over under? Jackie Yord...

Saul is everyone surviving episode five. Red shirts aplenty on the floor are our named characters who we know all surviving episode five. So it's an eight episode season. Yeah. We have reason to believe that this was maybe all intended to be episode four initially, perhaps. That feels a little soon to me for Saul to die. I don't think Saul's dying. Yeah. So is Jackie or Yord? Or are all of them getting by? Maybe just the red shirts. Okay. All right. What do you think?

I don't know. I don't think either of them... Maybe... Maybe... Jackie's saying rejoice. Like...

It's always an honor to see. What I do think is likely is that in terms of the Ned Stark promise, I do not think these characters will be together after the next episode. Yeah. And so then maybe the eventual Saul death that we're living in fear of and dreading happens in an attempt to bring Osha back. Yeah. I think Osha leaves episode five with Venom Teeth. Yeah. Is Mae with him? No. She's like left behind again. Yeah.

No one checked if I was just hiding with a dead Wookiee here. Guys, I'm right here. The one thing we have seen in the trailers, and again, skip ahead if you don't want trailer spoilers, I guess, is Vernestra Rowe on Kofar.

with the lightsaber whip so does that indicate to you hey we need reinforcements or hey we followed you because we thought you might need reinforcements or does that indicate uh she's like i sent every single unnamed character that i sent with you has died in the jungle here can i be of some service how quickly can she get to them based on the now canonical i don't know

This is a super hard forest to trek through. Or can she, like, sense them and, like, land right in the jungle? I don't know. Three hours. It's three hours from the landing to the heart of the jungle. We know. Especially if the sun's going down and you're running. Okay. Theory Corner? Let's just do this rapid fire. Top five reasons. Chimera is definitely Venomtooth. Darth Venom. Number one. He's carrying his helmet in his bag. The bag. Okay.

yeah number two the way he said he'll kill you yeah number three i we i we the way he says what does he say says we made i mean i made a deal right the collecting people i just owe him number four the way he evaded

the knife in the alley in episode two with May. May, trained in the force, attacks him and he dodges and weaves and just disarms her. Yes, and I would put in the same bucket, even though this is like seemingly the opposite, like how did you evade the knife and then fall into the trap? That's what made it seem so apparent that he was like,

willing to be duped that this is part of the active display of buffoonery that is meant to keep keep may off her guard and uncertain as to what is unfolding like he knows the forest he's the only character other than the tracker yeah basil who can make his way through he doesn't fall into that situation unless he is willing to number five this is biting off of wig watch but the floppy bangs

There's something about the hair all over his face that makes me feel like this is a guy who's hiding something. I mean, it's part of his surfer dude bro sort of persona, but it also just feels very like...

I've got something in a hide and I'm using my bangs to do it. Follow up question. So while we're on the Chimera front, where are you on this idea? If he is a Sith and we talked about this a little bit before, but if he is a Sith, if Chimera is indeed the guy under the grinning mask of which we are so certain. Yep.

Is he a Sith master looking for an apprentice? Or is he a Sith apprentice looking for his own apprentice so he can overthrow his master? I'm still inclined toward the latter. I think that the idea that he is not necessarily the one in...

total control right now. Like, the Vern line about, you know, this is like a tipping of the scales. There's something larger afoot. Feels like it's not only about the Jedi discovering that, but about, like, us discovering that about the Sith. And...

Who, if he is positioned to May, to us so far, as the primary threat, and we believe, as we fervently do at this point, that his identity is clear, and we believe that we will learn that next week, then that just feels like another reveal awaits. Now, there are other reveals still to come in the show. What happened on Brendock? What happened on Brendock, but...

presumably he will be connected in some way to that at least from just like maybe not maybe he may just makes her way to him later somehow but what his journey to the dark side was and who brought him in and whether that character is still and was he ever part of the official order etc yeah active or um has already been eliminated or is on the precipice of being eliminated i am inclined to think that yeah we will learn that he is an apprentice seeking an acolyte of his own

Um, if that's the case, do you think the master, if he is the apprentice, do you think the master is the character we've already met? Something we discussed last week was the idea that perhaps the actor David Harewood, who is rumored to be in this production, but has been nowhere in anything, uh,

is the master or would it be more satisfying to you if it were the charles holmes theory indara or somehow vernestra i don't think it's vernestra i don't think it's indara but like if it's someone we know if it's saul because we got a lengthy email from one of our listeners jay who's like what if saul is the bad guy

That doesn't feel emotionally true to me based on the story that we've been watching. I feel that Venom Tooth has to be a character we know at this point. Has to be. I don't think that Venom's master has to be. I agree. So that could be season stinger stuff. Yeah. Potentially.

Stay tuned for Acolyte season two. David Harewood is a great get if indeed he is in this show, which again, Lucasfilm has never confirmed. This is just the rumor on the street. Then in the meantime, we have just a guy being a dude under a helmet caught easily in a trap that he is then able to levitate his way using the force out of to very quickly go kill Kalnaka and then do a very rapid outfit change. Oh, you think he put the outfit on after? That's so much smarter.

He didn't stop and put the helmet on. You can't waste a second. You gotta run and kill. You gotta run over. Yeah. Hover over. Hover over. And kill Kelnaka. Do you think he did, like, a big, like, how high can he hover? Oh, you know what? Actually, there's, like, that little... There is a little moment when May has... After May has discovered Kelnaka where we... There's, like, a rumbling. Yeah. It's in the subtitles. Rumbling. The room. There's, like, a little... And...

That, I guess, does leave open the possibility that just genuinely someone else has arrived, like a ship has landed maybe. But I'm going to go with, for the purposes of Theory Corner...

Chimera's just over in the corner changing and like knocked something over. Knocked over on the shelf of- He's so clumsy. He's just a manic pixie dreamer. On the shelf of chalk that Kalmaka's been drawing the boobs with. Oh, not the chalky bosom of chalk. Okay. So that's our like Chimera is-

under the helmet. Anything else you want to say about the helmet? You sort of teased how much you liked it, but... I just think it's a fantastic design. It's menacing, but also like

It's a little goofy, but in a great way. Actually, in a way that I think amplifies and enhances the menace. The fact that there is a smile. This kind of, I'm just a guy smile. There's a little bit of a Joker quality to it, right? The smile that conveys doom. But also the form of the teeth. I've repurposed this from other mechanical things. Formation of the teeth. The seams. Yeah.

on the helmet. Very, very Kylo. Yes. And the color of it too. It's not, well, actually it might just be saber reflection. It didn't read as like pure black to me. It read as like slightly like

But again, that might be Saber reflection. It's like he's been carrying around his satchel since his cliffside monologue. Okay. So that's our... Chimera definitely is under the helmet. It will not bother me one iota. Some people don't like this idea. I'm really into it. I've been enjoying Manny's performance. If it means we get so much more Manny in the back half of the season...

I don't know that we have a we have a ton of evidence supporting the fact that Chimera is Venom Teeth. I don't know that we have a single explanation if that's not the case for any of the skills or aptitude that he is possessed to this point in the story. So.

So that's it. Case closed. Yes. Call Detective Jackie off the case. We've solved it. There's one thing we know about a Sith Lord. They can navigate their way through an uncharted forest. The last thing in theory, Courtney, I want to say is I just want to recap this force projection fight club theory, which I hate, which is this idea that like something happened to unhinge

Either May or Osha or Osha died actually and May didn't or something like that. And the two girls we're seeing is one is the addled mind of a twin force projecting themselves elsewhere. And if you move the bangs on Osha's face, which again, we have already seen them move in episode one, you will find the tattoo there or something like that. The force projection that we saw from Luke is,

on crate uh let us say um that force projection didn't look different for what it's worth it did yeah he had the just for men dyed beard so in theory you could amend yes you you could have one tattoo one not good okay but it's like not that i'm a proponent of this theory to be clear but you could perhaps account and he was like corporeal like he was solid so like this idea that one twin or another is force projecting themselves and we're really just looking at like

one there's no way that may could have survived so osha survives and is has created may out of her own oh no i can see your face you're like coming around to this theory no i don't know no no no i hate this theory okay great i i actually just genuinely don't believe anything in star wars can hinge on a fall being unsurvivable like period great um

I just also think that's not the story that we're watching. Exactly. Like this is about this connection between these two people. Again, there is a mystery element, but I think grasping for content, not content, but grasping for like meaning out of a 27 minute episode. Like I think a lot of us have sort of just got a little too wrapped up in theory corner. Myself included. Guilty always of that. Okay. Let's do wig wash before we go. Will you wear wigs? Okay.

So not just the floppy bangs from Manny Jacinto, but I did want to hit you with this final email from Quentin, who says, I was watching the episode this week, and after seeing adult May and Osha, I can't help but thinking this is setting up a twin switch. The girls had the same hair length as kids, and now they're different. I wonder if we will see May cut her hair, and there will be a twin switch. I don't know about a switch.

But their hair is so... Either their hair is so similar, barring the sort of like underbraid length of Mei, like one slice of a knife away from their hair being identical. So either that's to set up our confusion in the beginning, which was so quickly dispelled as to who killed Indara in the noodle bar, or there will be some sort of... I'm always suspicious of...

twins and like the similar hair is just very interesting to me between this and uh our time with eric and eric yeah yeah we'll talk about this on house of the dragon what a time for you yeah yeah any is that the show we're watching or does that feel too like what is it what do we mean what do we mean by i don't i don't agree with twin switch but like uh maybe like uh i was just saying to may like

wear my clothes and get out of, you know what I mean? Like pretend to be me to get out of here or something like that. I don't know. Yeah. I guess like we have already seen Osha pretend to be May. Yes. In episode two. Badly. Badly. You look exactly like her. Yeah. I don't know whether one of them will choose to, yeah, like have the other pretend in order to evade or escape or something.

it's it's in play i i think this just gets back honestly like i don't know what the characters like want so it's like hard to all i want all i want is episode five to be a bunch of like badass lightsaber shit in the jungle sounds great i want all the umbra moths to make it out alive all the moths survive except that one that died because oh she touched it yeah tough and then just like a lot of sithy monologues sounds wonderful sounds like a great

however many minutes of TV. Great. All right, we did it. That's Acolyte episode four. Don't. All right. That's Acolyte episode four. Thank you so much for joining us. We will be back on Sunday night immediately after House of the Dragon wraps up with Talk the Thrones with Chris Ryan on Spotify, on YouTube, or wherever you get your podcasts.

We'll be back again on Tuesday for the deep dive. Why should people go to TheRinger.com slash events, Mallory Rubin? Because we're doing a live event next week. Tuesday, June 25th.

At the El Rey Theater in Los Angeles, we are doing a live Talk of Thrones. You can still get your tickets and come hang out with us to spend an evening in not only Los Angeles, but Westeros. We have reached the hour of the morning where Mallory is fully capable of singing, and that means it's time to go. So thank you to Mallory Rubin and her broken musical brain. Thank you to John Richter, a recent addition to our team. What a delight John is. Wonderful.

To Stephen Allman, our stalwart, our guy on the cause, on the ones and the twos. Stephen Allman. Arjuna Ramgopal, who got us coffee this morning, among a million other things that he handles for us. Great. And Jomie Adinaron, who put us talking about lip balm on Instagram for all to see. Great stuff. We love you, Jomie. We love everyone. We'll see you on Sunday for Talk the Thrones. Bye.