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Hello! And welcome back to House of R. I'm Joanna Robinson, joining me today
Neither of us are marked by a tattoo, though we might be before the summer is over. We're making some plans. Yes, absolutely. For some ceremonial tattoos. Yeah. Some like real plans this time. But it's Mallory Rubin. Hello, Mallory. Witches, arm yourselves. Witches, go. Witch stuff, go. Always witch stuff, go. Hello. We're here today to talk to you about Acolyte Episode 7, Choice. And we've made a choice today.
Yeah. In how we want to talk about this episode. We're going to do our usual sort of opening snapshot where we talk about what we, you know, our broader strokes, thoughts and feelings about the episode. But then instead of going B by B as a usual deep dive, we got just a ton of emails from listeners about this episode. So we thought we might exactly, but like triple it. And so we thought we might...
do a sort of an acolyte episode seven mailbag, answer your questions, because we had so many questions, comments, and concerns from people about this episode of television. So we thought that's how we would approach it this week. Love it. Before we get into that. Yeah. Some programming reminders. Hit me. What do you got? Next week is bananas. Because in addition to the Midnight Boys and House of R, covering between us, House of the Dragon,
Acolyte finale. Yeah. And the boys. Yeah. We also have Deadpool and Wolverine is on the horizon as well. Mm-hmm.
We also have ButtMash doing College Football 25 and the State of Sports Games. Are you hyped for that? I am genuinely. The return of the college football game is like a global celebration. It's been on my calendar. It has been on mine. For years. Same. Genuinely. I don't care. Okay. I do. I do.
So all of that is going on, and probably most crucially to your day and mine is the Sunday Night Talk the Thrones immediate post-drop episode. Instantaneous. The second. You, me, Chris Ryan. I think we're going to have to talk to Chris Ryan about the fact that you and Mitchell quoted Heat. I know. It's a win for CR. I know. He won no matter what.
Well, we'll see this Sunday on Talk the Thrones. That's a lot. There's a lot going on. Yeah. Yes. Across the ringerverse and the House of R feeds. Yes. How can folks keep track of all of that? I would recommend that you follow the podcast. Sure. Follow the House of R, follow the ringerverse on Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts. And while you're at it, follow the new ringerverse YouTube channel because Talk the Thrones, House of R, Midnight Boys.
Full video episodes up on the new YouTube channel and also available to watch on Spotify. While you have your phone in your hands, while you're at your computer, follow The Ringerverse on the social media platform of your choosing. The Ringerverse is on Instagram, TikTok, Twitter.
Then, while you're at it, send us an email because the inbox is always open. Hobbitsanddragons at gmail.com. And you never know when we're going to hit you with a surprise mailbag episode. Could happen literally at any point. The night before a podcast, at any point, we could decide it's tomorrow on mailbag. Maybe, right? And then your work's not done. No. No. It's not work. It's a joy. It's a pleasure. The pleasure of using your phone battery to engage with us is not done. One more thing. Live show. Live show.
Head to TheRinger.com slash events because The Ringerverse crew will be at the El Rey Theater in Los Angeles next week, Wednesday, July 17th. We're going to be there. Midnight Boys, House of R. Some tickets, a couple tickets still available. Just a few. Yeah. So get in there while you can and come hang out with us. It's going to be a blast. We can't wait. It's going to be really fun. Yeah. I'm very excited.
All right. Spoiler warning. Spoiler warning. What a good point. Listen, all of Star Wars. Everything. Anything. Anything that's ever happened in Star Wars. Nothing's ever happened in space. Yes. Sally Ride will be brought up many times in this episode. Not the finale. We haven't seen it. We don't know what happens in it. We might have some guesses and speculation, but... Perhaps. But no actual facts. So everything up through Acolyte Episode 7 and anything that has ever happened in Star Wars ever, literally. That's right. Great. Great.
Episode seven, Choice. Directed by Koganata, who directed episode three, Destiny. Yes. This is the Destiny slash Choice, two sides of the same story. But we'll get into that question. Written by Jasmine Flerney, Jen Richards, and Charmaine Desgratais. And let's just do an opening snapshot of the episode.
Mellie Rubin. Joanna Robinson. Hit me with your snapshot.
Are we doing that now? Nope. How did it feel? It felt bad. It felt good in real time. Let's never do it again. Incorporate it into the graphics package team. It's done. I loved it. I loved it. Unlike this episode of The Acolyte, which was easily my least favorite of the season. That's my opening snapshot. This episode did not work for me. There were things in it. I think part of why we felt the mailbag would be a useful framework for today, in addition to the fact that we got a lot of questions from people, is because the episode does provide
pose some interesting topics to noodle on. So there's still plenty to talk about, plenty that's running through our minds. We'll go through as we answer some of the questions what we bumped on and what did not work. But yeah, I'd say by a comfortable margin, this was the least successful episode of the season for me. How about you? Yeah, I think it's tough because we had anticipated so much of it. Yeah.
And once again, maybe if you're watching in a binge, we've talked about this before, but maybe you're watching in a binge this season, you don't have time to like sit and think about what's the other side of the story that we haven't seen. There's a, it doesn't quite fulfill the Rashomon sort of promise. And we'll talk about that. That's like sort of the first question we want to get to. Yeah. There are things that I loved. I thought the lightsaber battle once again was pretty sick. Yeah.
I thought Jodie Turner-Smith, again, was a wonderful presence in the episode. I thought this was our most enjoyable time with Carrie Ann Moss. You disagree? Great, we'll talk about it. But...
I think there are ways in which this episode was successful in challenging my expectations, which is what it was trying to do. And then there are ways in which it definitely missed the mark for me. And I think a big problem that we're, you know, something that we had asked or worried about last week is we were like, we hope this isn't just like a full-blownsies flashback episode without checking in with...
you know, Chimere or May and Osha as adults or Sol this many years later. What's Basil up to? What is Basil up to? How's Pip doing? How is Pip doing? Sweet Pip. Pip. We got to get a Pip for the set. Okay. 2025? I mean, if the Stranger Helmet is any indication, yeah. Maybe props made to resemble Cortosis take longer. Who can say? It's a rare... Who can say? It's a rare resource. Okay. Let's start...
With our very first question, which I think is one of the most crucial questions about the success of the episode or not. Okay. Which comes from our listener, Dawn. Whose POV is this?
Dawn may be British. I'm not going to do an accent, but here we go. Where the bloody hell was Saul telling his side of things to Mae? What we got was bizarre decisions that he made. Are we really supposed to believe that he thought the witches, especially their mother, were going to sacrifice them? Baffling decisions by Indara afterwards. Hasn't Osha suffered enough? Now we have to ignore the council and make her the Padawan for a Jedi that she just said was not ready for the responsibility of
That key question, though, of, like, whose POV are we in? Yep. We had this question about episode three. Yeah. When we were, like, it doesn't feel like a pure what Osha saw POV because there were scenes without Osha in it. Yes. And similarly in this episode, you could say this is quasi-May's point of view, quasi-Sol's point of view. Like, those are sort of the two POVs that we're reckoning with here. But...
The promise of Rashomon, which was cited several times by Leslie as an inspo for this idea, is you see the same thing again, but you see it differently because what you're seeing is being influenced by the person who saw it. Right. So it's...
It is one thing and somewhat interesting for Saul to see just a snippet of the thread practice, the part where Anastasia knocks the girls over. And he's like, that looks violent and threatening to me, whereas we saw the whole sequence and it doesn't look that threatening inside the context. That's...
Somewhat of a certain point of view kind of storytelling. Right. But what true Rashomon would be if the dialogue was different, if the demeanor was different, all that sort of stuff. And I don't think we got – I think I understand both Anisea and Indara differently. Yes, for sure. And I certainly understand Sol differently. Yeah.
After this episode. Yeah. But it didn't come from performance or rewriting. It just came from, like, filling in the blanks that we had already kind of filled in for ourselves, but just, like, a little differently. I don't know. What do you think of this POV idea? Yeah. I think that this was so absent in, like, a fully realized –
final proof of concept that it makes the core decision to revisit the same flashback a second time a failure. Yeah. Like, I just, I think that if you're going to do this, you need to go all in.
Do the actual full Rashomon and give us, I mean, it seems downright ludicrous to say this out loud, given that this, I think, for many viewers didn't work. More time on Braddock. Give it to us, like, actually four times. Yeah. Give us the full sequence, truly, like you're saying, from anchored, focused, clear, and undeniable point of view. Subjective. Make sure we understand that we are
in Osha's point of view. Make sure we understand that we are in Mei's point of view. Make sure we understand that we are in Sol's point of view. Make sure we understand that we are in Torben's point of view. However... Oh, you're like, give me the Torben episode. I've got some notes and questions for our guy, Tommen. So I would kind of like to understand that maybe we know everything we need to know, which is that he just really has a thing for... Going home. Crowded cities and can't wait to get back to Coruscant. So...
Because we don't have that subjective quality, which I think you're right heightens, especially given how much of this ended up hinging on individual decisions, I think that that kind of structural approach and framework would have unlocked...
what is clearly a thematic interest for the show, which is like the choices people make. Yeah. It's called choice, right? It's called choice. We love that. So there's a way to do that that I think really unlocks something scintillating about the decisions that people make and how for literally the better part of two decades, they would be feeling the ramifications of that, right? But that's just simply not what happened. And so it ends up being this kind of muddled thing where like –
This didn't even feel like just soul slash made me. I mean, there are scenes where, you know, like Ana Seya making the pitch basically to the coven. Like, there are scenes that don't really involve either of those characters. So it's just kind of piecemeal. I could do without. Any coral. Any coral, let alone a coral point of view. Correct. Witches, harm yourselves. So...
The concept can't be brought to life, and then the potential inside of it can't be unlocked if you don't actually do it. I think this connects then to our next question about order and structure, because some of it is about the...
the determination to see that point of view full throughly. And I think that is ultimately inextricable maybe from like how these episodes were deployed and how our time on Brendock was parceled out over the season. I agree. So our listener Blake says,
Would swapping the order of the flashback episodes have been more effective for overall storytelling, audience reception, and our understanding of the characters across the episodes? Would seeing this version before seeing episode three have been better? We can answer that in a second. I'm...
a lot of the coverage that I've seen of this episode, this particular episode, is people like trying to fix it. And I think offering up like how we could have tweaked it this way or that. And I think that's actually somewhat of a compliment to the episode. And I think what it means is that. And to the premise of the series. That the ideas are there. Absolutely. Some of the performances are so there that we want the great version of this. There are some
things you watch where you're just sort of like, this is a lost cause, I don't really care. That's not what we're talking about here. We're talking about like, you know, how can we tweak and shape and rework? So would seeing the like
Witches that vaporize into black smoke and enter a Padawan's head and all that sort of stuff like that. The villainous sort of witch slant work better than first. Here's my quick fix. Because we weirdly want more time on Brendonk.
I also was like talking to myself this morning. I'm like, can I possibly say the sentence to Mallory? I want more time on Bread Dog. Because we really want more time on Bread Dog. I want more time. I want different time. I would almost. Yeah, I don't know that I would do more. I would almost make it like the cold open of every episode. So here was my I don't know if I can say the sentence out loud to Joanna. Yeah. Sounds like we each had one of these. All right. Buckle in. Are people too afraid to do the lost?
Oh, the character POV episodes? Yeah. Like, have we gotten to the point where because Lost is so... just such a pantheon experience that, like, you know, you always have the imitate... you have the wave after something great. Yeah, yeah. Lost Thrones, where everybody's chasing it. But I feel like we've now entered...
We've overcorrected. And all of the shows where flashbacks are a part of it, we talked about this a little bit with season one of House of the Dragon. Yeah. I think ultimately we both opted into the structure in a way that certainly didn't work for all fans. Yeah. So I don't know actually that this would have been the better path for Hat D, but...
would a parceling out of backstory and this key inciting moment in time across the season have been more effective because it gives us, one, contextual insight into each character. Two,
Two, does not do the thing that we are really, really bumping against in both episode three, which we thought was more successful than this one, but certainly here, pull us away completely from the present-day narrative and the other characters who are not on Brendock, who are ultimately the most successful part of the show. And I think, well, two problems. One, they didn't know that Sol and Chimere would be...
You know, Sol we're with the whole time, but the Chimera certainly, and we, I think, agree, Sol being our, like, secondary sort of favorite part of the show. I love this, and especially since it's already built in. Like, you have an Indara episode, you have a Torben episode, you have a Kel'Naka episode. Exactly. You know, the episode where Mae tries to kill them, we get what happened on Brendok from their point of view. Right. And I also think that a structure like that would have perhaps...
helped to identify and then rectify the areas where after two of seven episodes have been devoted to going back to the same stretch of time, we still don't understand crucial things about certain characters. But, I mean... Do you understand any better after watching this why Mae in the fourth episode was like, I'm just going to turn myself over to the Jedi now? No. A great line of Ben Lindbergh's recap. I also don't understand necessarily why Andara was like, we got to cover this whole thing up when she is like...
the voice of reason throughout most of this episode. It feels like a real screechy U-turn for her. And so part of that is a flaw. And then part of that is also the intention that Leslie Hedlund has said, at the end of the day, I want you to not feel like you fully know what happened on Braddock. But I think that's still very available to us in that more extreme point of view structure that we were sort of
longing for. Yes. Of like, who's got the true-true, that's a Cloud Atlas reference, who's got the true-true of what happens on Brendock, you know? Before we continue to analyze sort of like what didn't work for us, we got, I thought, a really interesting email from our listener, John, who's sort of like in defense of the episode. Yes. And I thought he made some really good points. And again, this is sort of
why we're so preoccupied with this. It's like, there is good here. I can feel it. Okay, so John says, episode three was institution... So the flashback in episode three, our first time on BreadDoc, right? He says, episode three was institutional level Jedi, capital J, versus witches, capital W. And the POV assumed everyone was accurately representing their organization's point of view. Philosophical clash...
Quote, look at the Jedi being all entitled or quote, look at Osha chafing against her community's rules. Episode seven stripped almost all of the system systemic elements out. The council's only involvement is saying, no, don't do that stuff. Everyone thought was bad in episode three. And the witch community is predominantly concerned with the girl's role in their survival. This shifts the point of view of the episode down to individual and internal conflicts.
quote, knight versus lonely would-be master, quote, mother versus leader, quote, homesick kid versus student. Even Mother Coral, Mal's favorite character, takes on a more sympathetic point of view in her desperation to protect her home. I like...
This makes the story of dark versus light less about the class of institutions like Jedi versus Sith or witches versus the man and more about the insidious nature of fear on one's own point of view. Hedlund and the writers took the Jedi out of the equation and left us with a story of a man with a fear of loneliness who saw what he needed to justify what he wanted.
We saw Mother Anisea was going to let Osha go, but only Saul, her killer, hears it. Torben's fear proves the easiest to manipulate to get the Jedi to leave, but also makes him the eagerness to grab at the, quote, excuse of the virgins.
It's virgins. We're sacrificing virgins, not virgins. Okay. The virgins to be able to go home. In the end, it's all the characters. Sure, we can talk about virginses and one soul and two bodies, please let's. But in the end, to the characters, that's all they were, excuses. And in the end, it's Sol's terrible choice, motivated by his own desires, that create the conflict, not the Jedi. Okay.
Quick addendum. I think it's so important that Saul saw the twins using the Force before he saw the, quote, child abuse because it creates the potential for his yearning for a pupil to cloud all subsequent events. What if lonely dad energy was the path to the dark side? Makes him and Chimera perfect foils over Osha. I love this. You know, I love this at the heart of the best version of what this story could be, which is this idea... I completely agree. I think that the... I think...
The stunner of this episode, and I'm talking about an episode wherein people turn into clouds of black smoke, something we've never seen in Star Wars, right? Is the Jedi being like, don't get involved. And this whole time we've been like, this is going to be this massive critique of the Jedi as an institution, which we haven't, we're not done with Vern, your other favorite character. So like, it's possible that that is something we're going to get in the finale. Yeah.
We thought we were getting this condemnation of the Jedi as an institution, but that's not what's happening here, right? This is a critique of individuals and their individual mistakes. And I think that is... That was shocking to me, and in a good way, where I was just sort of like, okay...
And Saul especially, Saul who we like immediately latched onto. He was so tender and he was our favorite and we loved his performance so much. And he continues to be tremendous. But that tenderness is a huge part of the disaster that happens in this episode. I think that's great. We both agree it wasn't executed to the level that we would wish it were. But like, how do you feel about this idea of like,
Taking a larger view and thinking of it as institution versus institution and then bringing it down to the individual people. I have kind of a complicated – I think this is a great email from John. I'm glad we got it. I'm glad we shared it. My feeling about this is a little complicated. I'm trying to work through it. Okay, on the one hand – my water bottle fell over. Sorry. One of my three water bottles fell over. Sorry. On the one hand –
I don't think any version of a story that is rooted in the institutional level examination could work and grip us in full if it lacked this. Like, if it didn't entwine with characters, people behaving like humans, erring, longing, striving, and then being consumed by either their...
desire, their regret, the seduction, all of that. Like, you need that. We can only care about bodies if there are people inhabiting them that we care about. So we were always going to need to care about the people. I think, like, what I'm bumping on two parts of this, though.
And again, it gets back to, I think, the through line that you've noted and that we'll continue to mention today, probably. This is less about, like, prompt than execution in terms of what I think isn't quite working and resonating. One. Okay, because, like, I was thinking about... I won't get into particulars necessarily with House of the Dragon because I don't want to spoil anything about that show for people who aren't current on it, but we've been talking a lot, both at the end of season one and now in season two, about how...
The fact that a lot of that story is hinging on mistakes.
misinterpretations has for us actually heightened the enjoyment and the dramatic tension. So the fact that like a lot of this story now is we understand and can see clearly that it is stemming from and unfurling from grievous errors that key characters in the story made is conceptually compelling to me.
I think that in House of the Dragon, that is working so well for us because we understand who those people are when they make those mistakes. Yeah. And I don't think that's the case here still. Because, and that's again, all of these questions feel connected to me because like the mistake being the origin rather than the thing we build toward.
requires us to stitch together out of order a clear picture of who a person is. So our understanding of who a character like Sol is comes later. But what do we know about who he is at this point that would lead him to behave this way? We know how maybe the longing that led him to this kind of like instant, very alarming, obsessive, kind of possessive attachment to Osha, like...
The only thing we've heard him say about who he was before this was him telling Osha on episode three his brief little origin story about how special he felt to be snatched from his family and be a part of the Jedi. So that's like part of why I think it's like slightly hindered. More broadly, though, this is the big thing for me. I'm going to try. I don't know quite how to articulate this. Like if the story at the end of the day is about the mistakes people make.
I'm always going to find that interesting. Always. Yeah. However... Greatest teacher. Failure is. Truly. However, another Star Wars story actually not being like a sweeping indictment of the Jedi as an institution, but instead being... And I'll issue a caveat inside of this momentarily because I think it's an important one to make sure I identify. Instead being...
this one person didn't know how to control their emotions feels to me a little contrary to the mission of the show. But I agree with you. And I don't think it's just this one person because I think a number of people were not able to control their emotions in that episode. Yes, but like, Sol becomes kind of the Anakin figure, right? Where this is less about... And not that they're mutually exclusive. But like, a lot of them are Anakin-coded. I think Torben's also Anakin-coded in this. But I hear you and I agree with you. But I think that...
I mean, I think that what I would say to that is that I think that is the show that Leslie wanted to make, and I think Lucasfilm wouldn't let her make that. It increasingly feels like that's what happened here, right? And, like, who could say for sure? But that does feel almost undeniable. Something that I heard was that
She wanted it to be a Sith hero from the beginning. Yeah. And that, again, rumor, rumor, wanted to be a Sith hero from the beginning or a Sith main character from the beginning and that Lucasfilm bumped on that. And so then we got Osha, a character who starts heroic and is...
We don't know what's going to happen in the finale, but it's definitely being pulled to the dark side. It feels good to hold one in your hand. Yeah, it does. You know? Or even someone like Saul who starts her own. You know, that Lucasfilm was perhaps afraid that people wouldn't want to – when we were so excited to tune in for that, we couldn't wait when we saw the blood smear on the poster. Think about how we felt hearing Kai Mercedes' soul like –
I've looked at my own darkness, right? What have you done with yours? What an incredible idea to be able to parse over eight episodes. So the caveat I want to issue is just like, I do think there's a difference between, oh, people feel things and long and then the Star Wars says, bad, no, back to the dark side. Right. As we just discussed a few minutes ago.
What we're seeing from Saul here is, like, actively disturbing. Yes. And that is an adequate compliment. And I think intentionally. Yeah, in an effective way. Where there's not just a, oh, I want to have a connection to another person. There's something that feels unnatural about it and feels, like, beyond the scope of— It's, like, covetous. Yes, yes. You know? And what I actually like— Mm-hmm.
is that you and I have gone back and forth on this idea of attachment. I always bump on it. And you are frequently trying to gently guide me towards like, there's attachment and then there's like,
a natural obsessive attachment. But you know I feel the same way about the attachment part of it, and that's why I'm, that's actually what I'm, yeah. I agree, but I like that this is like, I can, when I'm like, what's unhealthy attachment? I mean, certainly Anakin and Padme, but that is complicated by a number of other things. But I could point to this episode and be like, hey, guess what? That's a fucking unhealthy attachment. I can identify it. Totally, yes. And maybe, so maybe that's handy for us as Star Wars fans.
But the reason that I'm bummed out by that instead of like buoyed by it is because this isn't a movie. It isn't a binge. It's an eight week experience. And we spent six of those weeks until this point saying that the emotion that we saw from soul, the attachment that we saw from him was a good thing. Now, on the one hand.
I kind of like this. I was going to say, making us complicit in our assumptions is effective storytelling. And I have a lot of room in my heart to explore that. And I'm still open to that through the finale. So I'll kind of assess this in full after we complete the story. But I was really, I was going to say excited, but honestly enthralled by the idea of one of the protagonists of an eight-episode series being
Not falling into the like, we've got to shake our finger at you and condemn you because you feel something. I just, it does feel to me like it's falling into that. And this gets back to what you were theorizing about Lucasfilm. Like every Star Wars story has to feel the same. And we're not just living in the post-Lost era. Like are people too afraid to do flashbacks in the way Lost did?
when will we break out of the post Last Jedi era? And like, when will Star Wars have the confidence to let people make the stories that they want to make? I so could not agree with you more. That being said, I do think there's something slightly different here because when I watch Osha in the last week's episode, getting pulled towards something by Chimera. Yes. Or the Stranger. Yeah. Yeah.
I'm like, I'm not sitting there saying, no, girl, don't do it. I don't know if that's something wrong with me, but I'm just sort of like... That's exactly what I'm saying. Well, but that access to emotion, I'm like, I'm not shaking my finger at any of them. I'm like, yeah, the Jedi are incorrect. Or similarly, like the witches, you know? Like, I'm prone to be... You don't think this episode undercuts some of that then? I don't think the witches...
And the way that they choose to engage with the Force, which is outside of the rules of the Jedi, I don't think they are, other than Mother Coral, painted in a bad light in this episode. No, but with, like, Sol and Torben. Torben is rash. Yeah. And...
Torb is an idiot. Eager. Yeah. And yet somehow still made Jedi Master. Wow. I have to assume that that was an accelerated promotion plan based on this cover-up. And he was like, don't worry. I'm going to be out of your way soon. I'm going to go take the brush battle for 10 years and then I'm going to eat a boot to leaf. Or just don't be a Jedi anymore. That's an idea I have. Did the scarring...
Did you find it helpful because it distracted you from the wig? It drew the eye away from the Padawan era wig. The wig was so bad. Can I, I'm going to engage with, I'm going to, I think this is a good segue into something that, another question we got from our listener, Duren, who I'm just going to assume is Prince Duren, is, is,
is yes anding something that you've said today and you've been saying. They write, the major issue with these flashback episodes is that we do not really learn anything about the characters, so their decisions on Brendock have no grounding in the story. If we knew more about Sol's backstory, it might make his inability to think clearly with respect to Osha make sense. In the beginning of the season, we see that he still carries around a hologram of Osha. That's fucking weird behavior. Right. That plays very differently. We were like, how sweet! Well, again,
Yeah, I kind of like that. Okay. Sure. This is something that Legion J said in an interview. Something an actor says in an interview is no replacement for actual storytelling that we are watching on the screen in front of our eyeballs. Right. But this is how Legion J is thinking about Sol. And I really liked knowing this. He said, I think there's an inherent sadness in the relationship between a Jedi and their Padawan. And I think because younglings are scouted at such a young age and separated from their families for their special abilities...
They kind of are forced to live in an unfamiliar place with unfamiliar people, and that harbors a sense of loneliness. I think it's very admirable that Jedi have to sacrifice for the sake of peace, but also Jedi really understand this inner loneliness of the youngling. This ability to empathize, to understand, to become one with the Padawan really shows the depth of the relationship.
Some of this is stuff we understood about soul, but this idea of the profound loneliness of soul, which is not something that necessarily jumped out to us when...
We saw him surrounded by students when Vern walks in and she's like, you're so great with the kids. We were just like, this guy's Saul. He's the best. Everyone loves him. Jackie loves him, as she should. He's wonderful. He's pining for a former Padawan, but that's sweet. And now we're like, this guy is just like, he's not of the constitution to be a Jedi. He's too soft.
His heart bleeds too profoundly, and the emotional reserve and the isolation that comes with that emotional reserve is just not something that he can handle. Meanwhile, Indara's like, I don't give a shit. I'll go to a noodle bar, not really know anyone or be friends with anyone, but I don't care. You know, like she's built. Really worked through her. Yeah.
What I was going to say worked through her guilt, but maybe she didn't have any over instantly slaughtering legions. I don't feel like she meant to do that. I don't think... I don't know that... No, but if you didn't mean to kill 50 people and you did, would you not feel bad about it? It's just... Slide me the ramen. Is it intense? Give me the Dan Dan noodles. I feel like the guilt would actually be more profound if you did it by mistake instead of actively seeking to kill them. It's an interesting point. I...
I think, again, to me, that was part of what was actually compelling about this is, like, it doesn't seem... He's so unconventional, right? That, like...
Hard on the sleeve. I'm pounding the console, the control panel in my rage. The tears are welling up in my eyes. The idea that there would actually be space for somebody like that in the Jedi Order was exciting to me. So that's part of what I'm struggling with. I think in terms of Dern's question...
And this idea of, like, our sense of who he is. You know, I guess, like, in terms of what we are able to see inside of this episode, like, the one, like, new nugget we have is that conversation. He doesn't have a Padawan. Yeah. And Adara's like. Exactly. That's why I have a Padawan and you do not. Yeah. Do not confuse Torben's feelings with your own. I do not tell him answers to ease his mind. I teach him to seek the answers for himself. Yeah.
And he's like, hmm, you disagree? That's why I have a Padawan and you do not. Now, this is also when they're like, basically fucking. That brings me to my next question. Which was a part of the episode I enjoyed. From longtime listener Mallory Rubin. Are Indara and Sol fucking? This was the first thing I texted Joe about the episode. We had obviously a lot of actual stuff to discuss, but that was truly my first comment. The vibes are strong.
I actually just think Carrie and Moss has vibes with everyone. That's possible. It's possible that they just both are like emanating charisma and sexual energy. But the number of times that they, there's like a, even in a very tense moment, like at the end when Sol is trying to walk past and she kind of grabs him. There's a lot of touching. There's a lot of touching. Yeah. And a lot of crackling energy and chemistry between them.
It was actually not the only part of the episode that had that kind of charge. This will be a weird thing to say and a weird transition, but I did think that the, I want to say a Torben. Oh, yeah. The seduction of Torben was, yes. And it felt very connected to that idea we talked about
at length last week, seduction. Yes. And even though it ended up quite literally being about, like, say you want to go home, not, like, who do you want to fuck? But, yeah, but Jodi Turner-Smith was like, Yes. I'm giving you my best, like, siren energy here. Yes. Yeah. And, like,
You have natural desires you suppress. That's one of the things she says to him. That was riveting. Of course. And it felt so entwined with what worked so well for us last week. And again, that gets back to what you were saying earlier, which I agree with. This is definitely a broad critique born out of
The fact that this show has so... Has presented us with so much raw material that is, like... I think not just interesting, but potentially really special. Yeah. Like, we have seen the makings of something with Soul in various parts of the season. With...
Chimera, what we got in that Anisea Torben, like that was real. Is Galadriel here? Stuff for me, right? It's like moving inside the intimate headspace of each member of the fellowship. Like what is there for you alone? What is your seduction and your pull or push into like the better version of yourself? That is incredible. And it's subsumed by choral
Like, shrieking. It's not a great performance or a well-written character at all. I would like... Yeah. Okay, I would like more time with Coral because I would like to understand better. Yeah. We got some exposition about this in episode three, but I would like to understand better, like...
I would like to understand better her fear that is provoking her to her aggression. You know? Like, we understand that they've been persecuted. So there's, like, an understandable thread there. But what we're getting from her 24-7 in her depiction of the show is aggro. And I need to see some vulnerability from her behind closed doors to understand...
sort of what John in his email was sort of like filling in the blanks of, this fear that leads to the aggression. And as it pertains to... Which we do get from some of the other members of the Coven in this episode. To again, Monday Morning Quarterback
How we could have done this. Look at you. Thank you. How we could have done this season. Look at you, sports ball fan. Thank you. I've never said, I don't say sports ball. That's not a me-ism. No. And you know what? You have a passion in your soul for our many past times. No, I just have respect for other people's hobbies. You know? I don't need you to ride your hobby to not engage with it. I've had the pleasure of sitting in the stands with you.
Once. Okay. And it was memorable and meaningful. So listen, not to Monday Morning Quarterback, but I think this idea that like having, there's so much you can accomplish in the medium of television storytelling without even dialogue. Like if you think of all the montages we've gotten or moments we've gotten, like,
With characters to depict loneliness. Yep. We talked about a little bit with Oshah here. I do think one of our shared favorite versions of this is Rey in The Force Awakens. Definitely. I think there's a way to see Sol, if we wanted to, as like a Padawan, as like his journey through the Academy and how actually quite like he talks about...
how wonderful it was for him to join and feel part of this larger institution. But if we then saw what that reality was via even montage of actually how quite lonely and isolating it can be to suppress your natural human emotions in order to move through the academy successfully and how that primed him for this immediate change
frankly, psychotic attachment to this little girl that he just quickly glimpsed in the woods. It's difficult for us to understand how that could be, how he could feel that sense of, I mean, again, the title of episode three is destiny, but feel that sense of like, this is the thing that is supposed to happen. This is the Padawan I'm meant to have. And then the irrational decisions that he makes in the wake of that. Like if we had been, if we had been prepped for that by understanding that
And it's interesting, too, because I think actually part of what's been fascinating about Sol is that he does seem to—and then there's a difference ultimately between, I don't know, life-affirming bonds with people and just like a coworker. You say, I do in the hallway. I'm not implying those are the same thing, but—
We've actually seen – he seems like quite, you know, chummy with a lot of people, right? We've seen him interact with a lot of people. So we don't have an understanding other than our kind of core understanding of what it means to be pulled out of your – you know, in that line about like raised by an institution instead of a family was like an interesting one to think about, both because it is –
it is a way to interrogate what it means to take these kids from their homes and put them in this training program. But also because there's like, you do have to sort of say, well...
how different is what the coven is doing where they've created these two beings 50 women raising two kids to sacrifice them well and port their life force into i don't think that's what's happening what do you think i feel so firmly about this okay tell me what do you think is happening um because i've seen this interpretation right like the witches were definitely going to sacrifice these two girls and suck up their life force and that gives them eternal life or whatever yeah but and
Anastasia says, do you promise after my death to continue the traditions of this coven? Yeah. That's not something you say to children that you're about to sacrifice and gobble up their energy. No, I was viewing it almost as the opposite. It's like they were going to kind of port their smoky, plumy essence into the kids. That the kids were going to become like the new vessels to carry on the tradition. Because...
So we have a few interesting lines, right? And then we have like an interesting visual to parse. We have one of the members of the coven saying the girl has yet to discover the power she holds. It's not her decision to make. Obviously, there's all the virgins and symbiont stuff. Yeah.
You sacrifice our future for the wish of a child. So that implies that, like, they are the ones, again, continuing on. So I didn't think the witches were going to soak up their essence more the other way around. Again? The idea of the thread. Again, I am very pro-witch in general. Yes, yes, yes. But this idea of our future could easily just the same mean. And again, I think these are exact arguments that Leslie wants us to have. What does it mean? What does sacrifice specifically mean? Because when May says sacrifice. Yes, yes.
Soul heroes putting them on a, you know, cutting their throats and putting them on an altar or whatever. But like, I think what it, my pro-witch interpretation of our future was our lineage, our heritage, passing our traditions on to another generation of children who will grow up. You know what I mean? Like it could, yes, we could be dealing with some smoky essence going in and out of certain people, but like, but I think, I don't think that they were going to
kill these children i think which is not what you're saying but what are plenty of people are saying and many people are saying this and i also don't think that um i think their main sin was not letting it be a choice which is what anisea eventually comes around to it's her choice right may wants this so may so whatever happens with may that's something may has opted into and
even if she doesn't understand the full ramifications of it, Osha doesn't want this, you know? And so, like, are the witches villains? They're not not. But I think there is... I think there's been a tendency... Again, I'm not accusing you of this. I think there's been a tendency outside of the reactions of this episode for people to take the Saul interpretation, which is that these girls are in immediate danger. And I choose not to see it that way. I don't... Yeah, I don't know that I...
Yes, I mostly agree with you. I did not view it as they were going to soak up their life force so that they could continue on. I think the idea of the kids being the pathway to the future in whatever form that takes, like...
The choice thing is interesting when Anastasia says, like, I choose mother. She's making a choice, too. And she makes that choice to allow the kids to make their choices. So that's good. I think ultimately nobody is a cut-and-dry villain, and that's part of why the show is, in theory, really energizing and interesting. Yeah. Because everybody has things that they do that...
make our eyebrows go up and feel a little off or maybe very off. And then everybody has something that they do where we're like, we understand. Yeah.
That seems right. Or at least I get why you would do something like that. But, you know. Scale a mountain twice. Again, if I had the Force, I would use a little Force jumping to make that easier on me. I have some thoughts, once again, on the use of the Force in this episode. But, like, when we get that line when May shares, Mama said everyone must walk through fear. Everyone must be sacrificed to fulfill their destiny. Like, you were alluding to this.
The follow-up is like, hey, what's that mean? I don't know. Like, that does give pings a little bit. They are being groomed for some purpose that they don't understand. Now, part of what I thought was interesting about the episode, actually, I'm not saying these are like apples to oranges, totally of a piece, but...
Torben has been there for seven weeks and they've never had a conversation about the fact that they're looking for a vergence. So there's a lot of like everybody's kind of the younger. That's so clunky though. That's just exposition. It is. Serving us exposition. But it has the added kind of like effect of, okay, everybody's sort of keeping the next generation in the dark about what is actually happening here. I'm going to hit you with another what if we spent more time on Brendock proposition. Okay.
What if the Jedi had been there longer? I would have loved for this not to all go sideways in 48 hours. Wouldn't it be interesting if, like, this were a longer... Yes, ultimately, the Jedi misinterpreting or misunderstanding the witches, but a longer... Yeah.
chipping away at Torben, I think would have been interesting. Like, you know... Yeah, I mean, it's just kind of silly for this big of a thing to hinge on him hurrying on a speeder because he can't wait to go back to Coruscant. And then a longer opportunity for Sol to know Osha and Mei, but probably more specifically Osha. Like, if he kept...
meeting her in the forest or something like that right outside of the... Well, again, if we were getting these flashbacks kind of scattered, dusted, they could be vignettes across a longer stretch of time instead of concentrated into such a burst. So on the, like, turning into the smoky... Smoke monster. Very smoke monster coded. The smoky plume. Yeah.
When Anisea starts to, we'll see Coral obviously do it later, and then there's the connection of the entire coven. So that was one thing where, because I was thinking again about how they describe their power and the force as the thread. So when you think about like, okay, what does it mean to be the future? What are we thinking of sacrifice? There's this idea of like literalizing that, right? The coven is connected. Person to person, being to being, they are stitched together. Yeah.
When Anisea transformed, we cut to May, and she is turning into Plumie Smoke 2, seemingly not of her own doing. Correct. So that pinged is like a little sinister to me where it's like,
Oh, are the kids just like, is there a force power there to just be like absorbed or deployed without them even understanding how? I didn't think NSA was prompting that. To me, it felt more like May doesn't understand or have control of her powers. Yeah. This is like accidental magic, right? It just sort of like, she's like, what's happening? I don't know what's happening to me right now. And is that something that's possible for her because she's gone through the Ascension ceremony, but is it possible for OSHA? Yeah.
We've been with these people for two episodes and don't actually understand how their magic works. Can I offer a finale theory? Hit me. Please. Does this season end with Mae and Osha becoming one person? Collapsing back into each other? Yeah. Just absorbed? Yeah. Power of one, power of two, power of many. Power of one. And if the idea, I give you, you give me, me. Yeah. The idea that... Yeah, seems plausible. Um...
If part of this Ascension ceremony, you know, the vision of, like, the two planets coming together and stuff like that, like, if part of this Ascension ceremony is we have these two powerful, force-powerful clones. They're not a dyad. They're clones of each other. What if they smoke monster together to form power of one, the power of two, the power of many? Like, if they become, like...
like together are they their own midichlorian Jesus or whatever and will lead the coven to the future or something like that. That's pure speculation but seeing seeing seeing May dissolve into smoky mist just opens up this idea to me that like these two could become one. Theory Corner I like it feels in play. Thematically I'm like what is the point then of giving us of devoting time in the series to
And the young versions of these two who are like, I don't have to do this. I don't actually want to be with you all the time. I don't want to be the same as you. I want my own life. I want to make my own life. I agree. I know. I know. I hear you. I kind of don't want that for Osha. But at the same time, I think it might make me feel better about how thin I find the character of May if she's just sort of like upped into Osha. You know what I mean? Slurped up.
And it's just sort of like... Like a soup in the stranger's cave. Embrace the totality of yourself. One quick diversion here. Could happen. Yeah. Mm-hmm. I'm calling it a Cobb-Vanth diversion. I always welcome a Cobb-Vanth diversion. Our listener Tim says, I understand the Acolyte is set 100 years before the prequels, which is roughly 30 years BBY. And Book of Cobb-Vanth is what he's called it. Book of Cobb-Vanth is set roughly 10 years after Return of the Jedi. So...
We're at roughly 140 years BCV before Cobb-Vanth. Does that BBY math work out for you? I think the Boba and Mando stuff is 9 or 10 ABY, but that puts it like half a decade after. We're over 100 years before Cobb-Vanth. Yes.
Can you even fathom the tension if the Snack-O-Lite visits Moss Pelgo for a drink and shares a booth with our guy, Tim? Thrilling to think about. Great diversion. Here's a quick update. It has been 883 days. Unthinkable. Since we last saw Cobb Vanth. A scandal. A scandal. When do you think we will see Cobb Vanth next? Ever? Do you really think never? Unless they get Tim for the movie. That's the only option. Do you think we're going to get that movie?
I can't wait. Can't wait. Speaking of movies, Becca asks, would this have been a better movie? Becca says, pulling way back between Acolyte, Obi-Wan, and Andor, maybe. I'm starting to feel so many of these shows would just work better as movies. Star Wars seems so allergic to theatrical releases now after the failure of Rise.
that it's almost like they're dumping stories into streaming to keep the IP alive and then bulking them up with useless side stories to make them last two months on a weekly drop. I think out of all the live-action Star Wars content that's emerged post-Rise, the only titles that truly seem to work in series form are The Mandalorian, Ahsoka, and Boba Fett. This is mainly because, in my opinion, both Mando and Ahsoka require animated series knowledge to understand the full scope of the story, and Boba Fett, well...
I just don't think Boba Fett should have existed regardless, but let's be nice here. I don't hate that we're still getting live-action Star Wars. I just miss having movies to watch, especially since we don't have another one coming down the pipeline for sure. Maybe this is just me being bitter that Patty Jenkins' pilot movie got tossed into the Forever in Development's Sarlacc pit. Who knows? But it's still frustrating nonetheless. So I don't agree with Becca's whole point, and I certainly think that Andor works very well as –
a week-to-week show. Yes. I think that is the most successful thing by far that they have done on Disney+. Well, and yeah, I mean... I wouldn't touch a hair on his head. Yeah. Season two of Mando is dynamite.
I think season one is Mando's best season. Oh, really? Yeah. I mean, they're both great. They're both great. I think season one is the best season. I like season two better, but they're both fantastic. But not only furthers the point. Those two seasons of TV were great. But would this, we've just been saying like, I wish we'd spent more time on Brendock. I wish we had more time with this. I wish we understood Sol's backstory more. So could we have gotten all those things that we're wishing for in a movie? Is there a version of this that works in cinematic form?
Sure. Sure. Yeah, there's a version of it that works in cinematic form. I don't think the issue here, though, is the medium or the even total volume and length. Like, I think this works as a TV show. I think it works as an eight-episode TV show. I think it's how those eight episodes were used, not the fact that that's, like, the form the story took. Do you think this would have been better as a movie? Yeah.
There's a part of me that does, because I think we would have trimmed out. I mean. But the focus of the movie for it to work would have been Chimera. I couldn't possibly agree more. That brings us to this question from June.
Oh, man. Who sends us this quote from Inverse, where Leslie Hedlund said, quote, originally, even up until shooting, the stranger was not in a lot of the rest of the season. He was much more of a tee-up for a second season arc. But I saw Manny's screen test early on in pre-production, and I just thought, there will be rides in the street if I don't go further. Here we go. I guess I'm rewriting an episode. Manny was so impressive in every aspect.
She said to Entertainment Weekly, because it's Osha's story, you don't know much about the stranger's background and you're not really going to learn much about it. But there are a bunch of things in episode six and episode eight that are really big clues as to why he is the way he is and why his philosophy is the way that it is.
And she says, at least two Sith characters, there's going to be at least two Sith characters that we meet this season. Because people keep saying about the, like, Chimera's master. And I just want to reiterate, I mean, that might be true. I just want to reiterate, that's something that we've made up. That's not in the text of the show. I know, I'm not telling you. Like, you don't know. But, like, people keep talking about this, like, this is a done deal. Like, who will the Sith master be? Chimera's master, the stranger's master. We don't know that there is one.
I'm not saying there isn't. I think it makes plenty of sense. But I feel like when people are talking about, they're like, who must it be? And I'm like, who...
Could it be? Will we get one? Is saying two Sith characters, do we count May and Chimera? Or will we count Osha if she, you know, falls fully to the dark side and Chimera? Or do we need another person in a, you know, in a dark robe to show up or something like that? Right. And then this idea of like how much Chimera... Or no robe, ideally. How much Chimera are we going to get in the finale? It seems like... Yeah.
All our speculation of like, what's his backstory? Was he at the Jedi Academy with Sol? Was Vern his master? All this other stuff, we may not get any. We need to, I think, emotionally prepare ourselves for not getting any of that. And that all the Chimer that we've received has been added to the story that Leslie originally, like she accidentally stumbled into Chimer.
the real power of this show, which is manage Cinto as a stranger. And everything we've gotten has just been sort of window dressing on the story she actually wants to tell, which is about Osha and May, which unfortunately is not the part of the story that is working as well for us. Saul works for us mostly, you know? So I just wanted to emotionally prepare everyone for that eventuality, set the expectations for the finale. I'm going to just...
turn into black smoke smoky plume here and then become the meme of vader at the end of revenge of the sith no uh in my best john snow voice i don't want it i i need more so i'm holding thank you i'm holding on to the but there are a bunch of things in episode six and episode eight that are really big clues as to why he is the way he is clues makes it seem small admittedly
But they're big clues. They're big clues and they're something. This is interesting because, like, on the one hand, having something inside of season one that is not the primary focus but becomes this really rich, fertile, creative. He's the baby Grogu. Wow.
I mean, he is. Took the world by storm. And people who were just not interested in the Acolyte at all saw clips from episode five and were like, what the hell, and tuned in. You know what I mean? Like, I think that actually happened. And the same thing happened with Baby Grogu when...
He shows up and people start dropping memes of Grogu. I mean, Manny Jacinto's arms and Grogu's same level of allure, apparently. People are like, oh, I guess I'll watch this Mandalorian show that I had no intention of watching because I don't really care on that level about Star Wars. And back in season one, there were, you know, more moments than...
Maybe we actively remember where, like, the din quest of the week is just, can someone else babysit Grogu? But at least he's always there for a bit. I think that this is an interesting, like, on the one hand, saying that there was something so vivid, something that jumped off the screen so much that, like, an episode had to be rewritten to kind of capture and harness that. Yeah.
You love to know that we got more than we would have otherwise and that there was like a recognition of that. On the other hand, it actually makes me like feel weirdly more bummed out because I think there was a clocking in real time that they had something magical in their hands and then not an ability to like... No, that doesn't mean somebody should scrape the story they intended to tell just because something else is like exciting and interesting. But...
There's an ability to identify, like, clearly for viewers, for the people making the show, what is uniquely good and compelling about this. This is the advantage of the 22-episode season of television where you're continuously writing, and this happened all the time on longer seasons of television, is that you would hit on, oh, people love Chimere, and then that character becomes central, more central to the show. Gardening. This is like...
Sawyer on Lost. You know what I mean? Like you hit the jackpot with the charisma of an actor or the depiction of a character and all of a sudden like, you know, that character can take over the show in a way that I'm sure the lead actor is like, wait, isn't this my show? And like low as I am to say like this show centering on like two young women should be taken over by like a dude or whatever. But like, but the element that's working is
If this were a longer season of television and made in the way that television used to be made, which is in a more reactive to audience kind of way. Yeah, that could be a pivot. One thing that actually confuses me a little bit about this is if Chimer was even less present in the original plan, I'm even less clear on the Sith point of view. Promise. Because I don't... Are we getting that from any other character? Well, let's say...
Again, I don't know. Now I'm just doing fan fiction, and I will talk about fan fiction in a second. Now I'm just doing fan fiction, but if he disappears at the end of episode five, if he just doesn't show up to spout some poetry as the episode ends and is not in six, seven, or eight, but is what Osha saw there or is what she then quickly learns from Saul, he finally tells her the story or whatever, is that her...
own independent pull to the dark side. But I agree. This is point of view, no matter what, we are floundering to accept that as the actual premise here. AO3. Yeah. Archive of our own. Yes. Fan fiction hub site. Yes. Is full of Chimera and OSHA fan fiction already. There's a ton of it. Amazing. How many under...
hundreds of work under this tab already. I just sorted to find the most popular one. Yeah. It's called And the Flesh That Sings. No notes. Bad baby. No notes. Should I read this like the... Okay. I mean, I'm like, look how I'm like leaning in.
It's tagged as explicit. Nothing here is going to be explicit, but it is tagged as explicit, the story in general. It's currently at 14,000 words. What extraordinary beings we are, he muses, kneeling to set down his helmet to the ground.
He extends a hand to her body, fingers caressing the force around her as if it is flesh. He leans into it, twisting the power between his fingers and dragging her body until she lays flat on the ground, her eyelids facing the sky. He tries to keep his voice from wavering and fails. This is just a description of the end of episode five. Even in the revelation of our triumph, you see the depth of our despair. Chimera puts his cloak on her shivering figure and rests a palm on her waist, mind exhausted.
And that's, we go from there. Keep going? No, we're done. Continue. And the flesh that sings is the most popular current Chimera OSHA text on AO3. I feel like I am like blushing tomato red. We bled the kyber crystal of my face. Okay. Dawn asks, did the witches actually die? What do you think about this?
Are we meant to understand that Indara killed all the witches by breaking their control over Kilnaka, or are we going to find out that only Mother Anisea is going to wind up dead? Did they really take Osha away from everyone else? Or if Indara did cause all the witches to die, why aren't they grappling with that? Okay, great question. Do we know those ladies are dead? Maybe they're just taking a nap before some more spice cream. What could be better than a... But yeah, if they go back to Brandok...
And the coven's still there. I mean, we kind of feel like Coral's going to be there. I feel like Coral is going to be in the finale. Because her separate disappearance was so conspicuous. Hashtag Mother Coral lives is alive and well in all of our minds. But what about the rest of the coven? Like, it seemed deathly.
But did anyone check their pulse? No, they got out of there in a hurry. Yeah. Right quick. Now, it did seem like Indara had sensed through the force that, you know... She didn't say that. The life essence. She seemed so disturbed in that moment by what happened. I read it as like she can feel... That she just killed a bunch of witches. Yeah. This is her Alderaan, you know? She can just feel the...
But yeah, like, you know, again, they get out of there so quickly. No one checked. I guess we know that Mae is still there because at the end of episode three, we see her like by the bunta tree. So I guess if they're alive, there's a question of like, would there have been a moment of discovery? But maybe Mae...
Didn't go back into the vaginal mining fortress. That was on fire? Because it was on fire and had exploded. That would be reasonable. Another idea is maybe the witches were just passed out, but they certainly would not have survived the raging fire necessarily. Anyway. What kind of accelerant is in that stone, man? Um...
That was another thing, by the way, about this episode. I know. I'm saying another thing. Like, we've already sort of talked about this with what we have or haven't learned about May. But, you know, on the one hand, we get some clarity. Like, not that we were surprised by this. This was our expectation. She didn't intentionally set the fire to kill everyone. They used that as this cover-up. It never looked like she did, but yeah. But even, like, the moments where, you know, she's staring into the lamp. Yeah, it gets out of hand quickly, but she is, like, still, you know, transfixed by the flame. She doesn't.
Most of her reactions to what happened were consistent. She, like, threw the lamp on the fire that she had already started. You know, the pages. Like, what's that sketchbook coated with? Because that really, boy, that did get out of hand. It escalated quite quickly. Quite quickly. Oh, man. Yeah. Let's wrap up. Okay. We haven't talked about The Virgins. Is there anything you want to say about The Virgins?
I really like how you're going out of your way to enunciate this so that nobody thinks you're saying virgin. Some people have been slurring it. You're a virgins who can't drive. Virgins. Should we say, okay, we should say that Qui-Gon says that Anakin is the embodiment of
of the vergence but that usually it's a place it's a place right it can be an object it can be a person it can be a place because you've you've cited the anakin example the skywalker lightsaber that like calls out to ray that's a vergence most of our experience in the canon with a vergence is going to be a place like mortis yes and some of the terminology dig about are wondering a nexus a locus like yes these these locations these deep concentrations of energy i was
thinking, I was like, this is like our Hange conversation. Yes, you said Dagobah, Mortis, the Sith cave on most of our fans of the Vader comic run. We get a lot of great Force Nexus canon inside of that cave. There's the, of course, for Rebels heads, the gateway at the Lothal Temple. Mm-hmm.
The Wellspring of Life, which is where Yoda in Clone Wars learns to tap into the Force ghost power. A place that's like chock-a-block full, a place or an item that's chock-a-block full of... Makes me think of Colin in Love Actually saying chock-a-block full of condoms about his backpack. But instead of condoms, it's midichlorians. Well... It's the Force. We're creating a life or... One way or another. So this idea that these Force clones...
Were created on a virgin's site. Virgin's site. Yeah. That's what we know. Will we learn more next week when they goo into each other? Who's to say? Nothing could be more important to the Jedi. That's what Sol says when explaining why they are on this mission looking for... Your question of like, are we going to get more...
Are we going to get season two of Acolyte even? There was a lot of discussion of this idea of like, as Mando, as the Mando saga unfolds,
is wrapping up. They're going to make this movie and that's sort of like, this is the end of it. Right. And then we go to a different point in the timeline and look there. Is the Acolyte the flagship for this era of like, what are the Jedi? The Jedi are after this life-creating wellspring idea. Yeah. Is this the flagship for things to spin off from? We're not sure we're going to get a season two because Lucasfilm tends to be quite skittish when it comes to
any kind of backlash on something. Shout out. One more reason not to save more of the best thing in your show for a season two you might never get. But that's exactly what Leslie was saying is like, she was like, she has said in multiple interviews that,
I wasn't saving anything for season two, but that's because she did not know what she had in The Stranger. So in her view, the finale wraps up in a way where you're sort of like, if that's it, I'm not going to be left like dangling off a cliff. Right. There's going to be a resolution. The soul is there to catch you. Yeah, yeah, yeah. There's going to be a resolution of some kind or another.
that you're like, well, if that's all the story I get of that person, that's fine. Right. It's not like we're left there thinking, when is Cobb Vanth going to get it on the back of his head? Like, you know, exactly. Right. No countdown coming for...
No. How many days since? Yeah. And I do think that if they got a season two, it would be much more, and provided, we don't know if he will, but provided that Chimera survives out of season one. Right. Like, it would be much more Chimera-focused. That sounds great to me. I would remain very, very interested in that. So, Lucas, so if you're listening... Please give us season two of The Acolyte. Don't be scared of doing season two. Acolyte. There you go. Hadn't gotten one in yet today. Just the one. Um...
Like, don't be afraid of season two, but take notes about what worked in season one and just...
Yeah. From there. We also, like, we got some High Republic connections here with the hyperspace, right? Yeah. The Great Hyperspace Disaster. And, like, that's from the very first text of the High Republic publishing era, Light of the Jedi, begins with the inciting event there. So that felt like maybe that's just an Easter egg for, you know, the Lindberghs of the world who are like, I did all this homework. Give me something. Spang up. Give me some connection. But that's what it is.
That also did feel like potentially a little bit of a, oh, yeah, maybe we're going to spend more time in this era on the screen. Something Leslie said about a potential season two is she says the idea that cortosis is a finite resource is something she's interested in exploring in season two. That's tantalizing to me. Absolutely. Yeah. Should we wrap up with this question of who's the most to blame and what went down on Braddock? Let's do it. This came from our listener, Jake. Hi.
He's got his list. We can go from there. I saw this before I saw that Ben did something similar. Let's quickly share Ben's percentages for contests, for Ben's. It's like he's with us here. We're a virgins in the force. Power of one, power of two. Not a virgin in the force, yeah. So Ben did this in his great recap on TheRinger.com, what a great website, and he assigned blame. Here are the percentages. And then we'll say if we agree or we want to re-calibrate here. I don't, but...
51% way too high symbolic majority share Indara 10% Mother Anisea 10% Torben 10% far too low Coral 10% May 5% Kelnaka 4% that's it yeah
What do you think? Incorrect. Okay, give me your math. I refuse to do math under this duress, but I think it's way too high for Sol. I think he needs to parcel out, like, Sol should be the highest. Yeah. I actually agree with that, but I think over 50% is way too high to give to Sol. You putting him at, like, 49? He's in the lower 40s, I would say. Higher 30s at the least, but probably lower 40s, and I would bump up
Coral. Yeah. Way higher. Yeah. May I'm comfortable keeping kind of low because she's a child. Anisea, a bit higher. Indara, a bit higher. Torben, much higher. When Torben just like jumps on his goddamn speeder. Wild stuff. Shocking stuff. Also, it was like terribly shot because they're just like, wait, no, stop. Like they don't even really try to stop him. They have so much time to stop him and then they're like go after him.
Quite silly. Yeah, I think we got to boost the blame. Similar place, I think. I also—Soul is the most culpable party, undeniably. 51 does, I think, feel a little high because part of what feels just difficult to argue with is that there's a lot of blame to go around, you know? A lot of blame to go around. I think Torben, even though he's in this—
sort of sad teen, you know, my boss, like, won't really tell me what my job is about. Yeah. State, um,
It's just absurd that his desire to go back to Coruscant could be this big of a part of this, like, defining moment in the history of the Jedi and the Sith. It's astonishing to me. So I have to boost his number. And, you know, only one character in the episode shouts, which is, arm yourselves and fight me and get mad. Right.
So, yeah, I'm always ready to blame Coral. Always. Yeah. This is what Jake says, our listener. Whose fault was it? Sol killed Anisea primarily, also gave up on May. May, fire bad. Anisea, hey, maybe don't possess Padawan Tommen and this doesn't happen. Padawan Tommen,
sped off to play hero ball against Indara's order. And then our listener Emily wrote in, in defense of Torben slash Tommen, who among us has not taken extreme measures to get out of camping? Emily is saying. Very funny. Indara maybe wasn't trying to, but also kind of definitely killed like 40 people by winning the battle for Kilnaka's mind. Kilnaka fucked up Tommen's face. Coral started the fight. Osha, nothing yet. The other Indara thing that ups the Indara... The cover-up.
Yeah. It's not the crime. It's the cover-up. It's confounding. It's also confounding. It's just doesn't make sense. It's also, I don't want to spend a lot of time on it because it's completely nonsensical. Why Seoul would not just pull OSHA and may force pull them off the bridge. I can't. I can't. Right. I can't. I was like, oh, thank God they're showing he didn't use the force blade. What? No.
What? And also why Osha and May would just stand there and reach out to each other rather than like scrambling back to safety. Also, they can use the Force. Like, Force jump. Do something. Maybe when we get our third full Brendock episode in season two, we'll see that somebody else was using the Force in yet a different way there. That was Acolyte episode seven. An episode of television we really wish had been better. We do still have...
Episode 8. I won't be surprised if the finale is great. That's kind of the thing about this season of TV. Yeah. Like, a less successful installment has not in any way precluded the next episode from being dynamite. Like, we had notes on 3 and 4, and then 5 and 6 were broadly riveting. I'm hopeful. I mean, especially if the majority of the finale is... Vernon Corll. Yeah, I'm with you. Yeah.
Can you imagine? What if they're in a scene together? What will I do? What will I do? What will I do? We would prefer the women not be involved in the finale and it just be Kymer and Sol. Just kidding. If it's May and Osha and Sol and Kymer, that sounds like a party to me. That would be great. Vern and Coral are not invited, but they'll probably come anyway. Okay.
So many people helped put this episode together. Yeah. We got a new member of our thank yous here today. Corey McConnell. Corey McConnell. Corey McConnell. What a house of ours for Corey to be here for. It's a little atypical. Chaos. Steve Allman here, always, in our hearts and on the soundboard and everything else. Our generous pal for making sure that the studio is arcticly cold the way that Mallory likes it.
I thought it was a perfectly pleasant 62 degrees in here today. Thank you, Regina. The part where Anisea goes inside Tommen's mind and they can see their breath. Do you think it's a frosty 62 degrees or whatever? I was like, they look like they're
court. However you say 62 degrees in Star War. And join me at dinner on the social. Yeah. Always. Thanks to you. Thanks to you. Thanks to me. Yeah. Thanks to Preston, our new rat. Here's a plant. You think if Torben came in here and said there's some plants here, big deal. That's a great line. That made me laugh. He's like, do not make me put more moss in a box. I beg of you. Um...
Thanks to Kalnaka for the lightsaber fight, which was pretty sick. Good stuff. And I've heard there's incredible lightsaber action in the finale, so that's something to look forward to. Thrilling. We will see you on Sunday, right after House of the Dragon is over, for Talk of Thrones with Chris Ryan. Until then, bye! Bye!