Finished first eps of #TheAcolyte. As a non Star Wars fan I know I'm not the audience for this but Jung-jae is my focus.

I'm a fan of this perspective ... that the Jedi justify their dominance in the name of peace. They appear to be stoics but they still put tons of energy into ideas like faith and the lie of hope which have heavy emotional foundations, it is the opposite of having no emotional basis for motivation. It always seemed pretty nonsensical how they are portrayed in this way.

1/

The plot of these two episodes is also nonsensical ... the fact that there is a hole in the ceiling of the temple that anyone can come in an out of but they have tight security on the place ... that was a little silly. Yord is highly paranoid, suspicious, and sketchy ... I'm amazed he reached any kind of level of "peace of mind and tranquility" or whatever being so completely dysregulated emotionally. The Jedi have never been that interesting to me. Appropriated by a fanboi mainly.

2/

The writing is a tad puerile. It pushes a lot of predictable emotional buttons but not in a way that makes for powerful performances which is weird because Amandla and Jung-jae can absolutely act the pants off of all these people. The acting is stilted and that's unfortunate. Ahsoka was something I deeply enjoyed and it didn't feel Star Wars-ish at all. The story was powerful and the performances made me speechless and I didn't even know anything about the character or the backstory.

3/

Leslye Headland seems more interested in pushing a specific agenda over just focusing on the best way to simply tell a story. She is writing AND directing AND showrunning. That combination is awful when all you care about is your own bias and message over everything else. She controls everything and the entire thing feels so utterly controlled and not in a Jedi way. I'll keep watching because I support Lee Jung-jae's work especially his "cross over" roles. I wish he was allowed to speak Korean.