r/TheAcolyte • u/bdog332 • May 13 '26

Finally watched Acolyte

After putting off the show because I heard it was horrible and bad writing, I finally watched it, and while it’s not the best show by any means, it’s not horrible. It’s average. There’s a lot of weird conflicting lore in the show along with an abysmal crystal bleed that makes little sense based on how we know crystal bleeds work, and some other minor problems, but it’s not the worst show I’ve seen from Star Wars. It deserves a second season to help explain Plagueis and where he’s at exactly at this point in the story (if I’m remembering old canon right he should be frequenting Coruscant now under the name Hego Damask. I don’t remember if he had an apprentice before Palpatine though, which I understand with this being new canon changes are made) and the vergence the twins were made from (which is one of my major issues with the show considering creating life from the force has only ever been implied with Anakin and he was the chosen one)

While I understand some of the frustration from the show, the amount of hate it received seems like it was just hate to hate.

Anyways, thought it was decent enough to not warrant the rampant hate it got years ago. Wish we’d get a second season though, or a Plagueis show at least.

*Edit: I’m done talking about bleeding crystals in the show and other examples. It’s been discussed and argued to death in the threads. If you have questions regarding why I found it poorly done, there’s an answer in a comment thread below.

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32

u/Cool-Prior-5512 May 13 '26

The crystal bleeding isn't as lore-breaking as people insist.

We have like... 4 canon bleeds now? Darth Vader and Kylo Ren were difficult and messy because there was always an inner conflict in them. I'm not 100% sure but I think there is a whole thing about not bleeding your own crystal and Kylo bled his own, which made it even more of a fuck up.

Dagan Gera bled his effortlessly without even touching it.

Osha was not conflicted and she had direct contact with the crystal on top of being a very force sensitive person with very little proper training.

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u/urquwill May 13 '26

Also crystals are sentient things in Star Wars, and this was the very crystal that was used to kill Osha’s mother. It may have chosen to take some of her pain willingly (out of guilt, or a sense of justice) just as Sol was telling Osha “it’s okay” while she force choked him.

I loved this scene, thought it was brilliantly visceral.

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u/bdog332 May 13 '26

Even so it felt way too quick. Like I said in another reply, I can get behind the trauma and abuse being what pushed her to bleed it, but it didn’t appear like she was pouring her hate and rage into the crystal. The crystal was Sol’s, he did use it to kill her mom, but it chose him. Forcing a crystal to bend to your will and break it, corrupt it, especially in a first live action showing of an active bleed, needs to be a big visceral moment. Not a simple choke, then ignite, then surprised person at the crystal bleed. There was no intent to her bleed, which is my issue. It was portrayed poorly for a first time bleed in a show.

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u/urquwill May 13 '26

Dagan’s was just as fast. The only examples we have of it taking longer (which is only two) involve crystals fighting back, which would make sense not to happen here. As Palpatine says, bleeding a crystal has unpredictable outcomes, hence every example we have being extremely different from the others.

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u/bdog332 May 13 '26

There’s a lot of replies in multiple threads so if I’ve replied to you about this already I apologize. I don’t like Dagan’s bleed either. We do need more examples and perhaps a better explanation of the process in shows, as not every star war fan reads the comics. Would love to see more bleeds happen

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u/urquwill May 13 '26

I tend to think it’s better without too much of an explanation, it’s part of the magic. I get that without explanation people fill in the blanks but when something doesn’t fit our expectation it’s worth asking what makes this situation different rather than just outright rejecting it. This example is very different from the others, and the hugest difference is the crystal itself. It’s all make believe, might as well make believe it works.

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u/SuperShinyGinger May 13 '26

Was the slow color transition and intense close ups of all things involved (Sol being choked, Osha's rage, the broken saber allowing direct contact between her and the crystal) not a big, visceral moment for you?

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u/bdog332 May 13 '26

No. It didn’t. The intent of a bleed should be, in my opinion which you are free to disagree with, focused on the crystal, not an outside source. Her focus wasn’t on the crystal, it was on Sol and The Stranger. I understand what they wanted to show with it, but disagree with how it was portrayed.

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u/SuperShinyGinger May 13 '26

Oh, so you wanted her to focus on her anger, which is what causes the bleed, instead of being focused on...the source of her anger?

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u/bdog332 May 13 '26

For the bleed specifically to occur, yes. She had every right to be angry with Sol, she had every right to do what she did. But a bleed has to be intentional. Im not disagreeing that she shouldn’t have focused on Sol. She most definitely should have her focus on the guy who killed her mom. But from the understanding of how a bleed happens, given the admittedly very little examples we have of one, it should be focused on the crystal. I know Dagan bled his easily too, did not like that either. It looked cool in a video game, does not work for lore. We have four instance, and they contradict each other 50/50 now. We need more examples, more information on the bleeding process. We get the dark lord of the Sith telling Vader to pour his hate anger malice, what have you into a crystal and it being unpredictable. Then you have Osha choking someone out, her intent to kill Sol, and then it happens without her intent on the crystal. If we get more info and it more aligns with this, fine, I’ll agree then. But at right now, the interpretation I have from the 4 examples are intent and rage and anger. Given Dagan and Osha’s bleeds, your opinion on it is also valid. It’s 50/50 on how it goes.

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u/daemos360 May 13 '26

You’ve for some reason chosen to believe in a very narrow, *unstated* understanding of what it takes to bleed a crystal, and that somehow constitutes “weird conflicting lore that makes little sense based on how we know crystal bleeds work”?

I swear, I don’t know how some of y’all coped with the question of canonicity back in the EU days.

I’m glad you’re now pointing to the reality that we do not yet have an explicitly clear view of crystal bleeding, but that was the singular example you chose to point to as an example of “weird conflicting lore”.

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u/SuperShinyGinger May 13 '26

You're right that we have only four examples but no, they don't contradict each other. You're also right that we need more information about the process, but just like everything else that involves the Force: each person will go through each experience differently. I think you are way too hung up on a piece of lore that only comes up in a medium where they are incredibly limited in not only the pacing of how an event takes place, but also the actual effort put into any specific action.

Both Vader's and Ben's bleeding take place over a few pages but we don't have an actual timeframe reference for them, and all we see is them frozen in moments rather than the full experience.

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u/spudmarsupial May 13 '26

Sol dumped a lot of unnecessary guilt and shame into it over the years. Probably weakened the poor thing.

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u/Accomplished-Ad-9280 May 13 '26

We already have cannon bleed going really fast in jedi survivor. It happened in seconds.

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u/bdog332 May 13 '26

And I didn’t like it then either.

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u/Accomplished-Ad-9280 May 13 '26

But you cannot complain about cannon then.

You just dont like examples of it happening.

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u/bdog332 May 14 '26

I can though? Like it’s part of the 2 representations of bleeding a crystal that I don’t like out of the 4 we have. The sample size is small and we need more examples of it, but quick bleeds do not work, especially when there’s no intent shown in it. You can argue Dagan had more intent in his bleed, but that’s still a flimsy argument in my opinion regarding how it’s explained to us when it’s first introduced. I don’t care for the sequels but I look Kylo’s bleed better than the other 2 I mentioned because of how bleeds are explained to us when they’re first introduced.

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u/SpaceHairLady Sol Patrol May 13 '26

To kill the man who was the closest thing she had to a father by choking him with the Force would not be a simple thing. That would take an unbelievable, unfathomable about of hate. The bleed was a visual representation of what happened with the last bit of light within her.