• Hey, guest user. Hope you're enjoying NeoGAF! Have you considered registering for an account? Come join us and add your take to the daily discourse.

Star Wars: Acolyte Reportedly Introduces Pronouns, The Force as a Female Entity

DeepEnigma

Gold Member
It's not exactly the highest rated show ever - far from it - but the viewing figures are enough for Disney to crow about it, and perception is reality. Meaning that this will likely get a second season. And it will be thanks to a bunch of clickbait rage artists and their fans who would rather prop up these terrible shows than let them die a deserved death.

It's become a parasitic industry, where one bunch of arseholes feeds off another, who in turn feed back off of them.
4.8m out of 100m+ subs isn't as impressive as they'll crow about in context.
 

efyu_lemonardo

May I have a cookie?
Activism has invaded every aspect of society, it's really a shame. That said, wouldn't have had interest in the show regardless. I'm all Star Wars'd out.

Ultimately the fans will speak with their clicks/wallets.
Activism invading pop culture isn't inherently a bad thing, it's the execution that matters.

The problem is that instead of offering practical - tried and true - advice about dealing with fundamental and urgent problems, the media is flooded with poor and impractical preaching in an attempt to emphasize issues that are more often than not secondary in their importance.

And even when they do focus on important matters (climate, poverty, abuse etc) the purpose is usually just to "build awareness", which is another way of saying "we have nothing constructive to contribute but hope someone else does". It's very shallow and cynical.
 

DragoonKain

Neighbours from Hell
Activism invading pop culture isn't inherently a bad thing, it's the execution that matters.

The problem is that instead of offering practical - tried and true - advice about dealing with fundamental and urgent problems, the media is flooded with poor and impractical preaching in an attempt to emphasize issues that are more often than not secondary in their importance.

And even when they do focus on important matters (climate, poverty, abuse etc) the purpose is usually just to "build awareness", which is another way of saying "we have nothing constructive to contribute but hope someone else does". It's very shallow and cynical.
I disagree, because activism is having an agenda. That's the very premise of activism. I don't think you can produce the best content you can with an agenda. Especially when in these cases it's not even about trying to say anything. Like some movies and shows have a message they want to get out. These days it's not even trying to get out messages it's just trying to force niche cultural subtleties into your product.
 

DeepEnigma

Gold Member
I disagree, because activism is having an agenda. That's the very premise of activism. I don't think you can produce the best content you can with an agenda. Especially when in these cases it's not even about trying to say anything. Like some movies and shows have a message they want to get out. These days it's not even trying to get out messages it's just trying to force niche cultural subtleties into your product.
TLJ was agenda driven to shit on OG Star Wars fans and the whole mystique/fun of theories in the lore that spanned generations.

That shiteater succeeded. What a hollow husk and total shit "his Snoke" turned out to be. Done on purpose with the "your Snoke theory sucks" red flag all along. Fart sniffing cunt.
 
Last edited:

Trogdor1123

Gold Member
4.8m out of 100m+ subs isn't as impressive as they'll crow about in context.
It was a single day though, that’s pretty big numbers.

I don’t know why people are watching it though. It looks kinda crappy, except the Carey Ann Moss stuff but that was clever marketing as I’m sure lots of people thought she was in the show more.
 

efyu_lemonardo

May I have a cookie?
I disagree, because activism is having an agenda. That's the very premise of activism. I don't think you can produce the best content you can with an agenda. Especially when in these cases it's not even about trying to say anything. Like some movies and shows have a message they want to get out. These days it's not even trying to get out messages it's just trying to force niche cultural subtleties into your product.
It's funny because to me it sounds like we're mostly agreeing.

If you sincerely believe in something and have an original and passionate message to convey on the matter, that's extremely beneficial to producing quality content that resonates with people who share your belief.

The original Star Wars films had agenda which they were successfully able to translate into a message that was meaningful to millions. Most of it revolved around personal development, managing your emotions, the importance of friendship, family etc. Very run-of-the-mill stuff. Even environmentalism and democracy were mixed in there for good measure. It could have easily been a preachy and hollow disaster but it was executed in such a way that people fell in love with it.

If, on the other hand, you neither hold a particular belief very strongly, nor have much to say about it, then your content will obviously suffer. This is modern Disney.
 

DeepEnigma

Gold Member
It was a single day though, that’s pretty big numbers.

I don’t know why people are watching it though. It looks kinda crappy, except the Carey Ann Moss stuff but that was clever marketing as I’m sure lots of people thought she was in the show more.
In contrast, House of the Dragon drew nearly 10m on a sub service that was less than 97m at the time for a much smaller franchise that HBO also burned the fans the last couple of seasons with a wound still fresh.

Star Wars is a much bigger IP, damaged to hell and back now. It's 'battered wife' Stockholm syndrome for some at this point.
 
Last edited:

BlackTron

Gold Member
Where are we on all these predictions? Any of the supposedly offending eps out yet? I haven't even touched the series and won't until it's all out in the open.
 

DragoonKain

Neighbours from Hell
It's funny because to me it sounds like we're mostly agreeing.

If you sincerely believe in something and have an original and passionate message to convey on the matter, that's extremely beneficial to producing quality content that resonates with people who share your belief.

The original Star Wars films had agenda which they were successfully able to translate into a message that was meaningful to millions. Most of it revolved around personal development, managing your emotions, the importance of friendship, family etc. Very run-of-the-mill stuff. Even environmentalism and democracy were mixed in there for good measure. It could have easily been a preachy and hollow disaster but it was executed in such a way that people fell in love with it.

If, on the other hand, you neither hold a particular belief very strongly, nor have much to say about it, then your content will obviously suffer. This is modern Disney.
I guess I don't consider trying to get a message out activism then. To me that's just being thoughtful and opinionated. To me it's activism when the creators try to annoy viewers with their product inundated with things they can't ignore. Even down to the niche aspects of your movie or show. I think most film makers or TV creators are not activists. They are just people with opinions who have something to say and want to share it with people. But when I listen to interviews of some creators these days I see a lot of "Our show is going to have X, Y, and Z, and SO many people are going to be triggered by it hehehe!" That's where I think there's a difference.
 
Last edited:

ManaByte

Banned
Where are we on all these predictions? Any of the supposedly offending eps out yet? I haven't even touched the series and won't until it's all out in the open.

Chris Gore of Film Threat claimed that Kathleen Kennedy invented Force Witches in Ahsoka last year to push the "Force is Female" agenda. He's being mocked by other legitimate reviewers because Force Witches have been a thing in Star Wars since Ewoks: Battle for Endor in 1985 and they were named Nightsisters in the novel Courtship of Princess Leia in 1994. They were a big part of the EU after that (you could go to Dathomir and fight them in Star Wars Galaxies), and then GEORGE LUCAS officially made them canon in a 2011 episode of The Clone Wars and then decided that Darth Maul was from their planet as well. Respawn made a Nightsister Kal's love interest in Jedi Fallen Order and Jedi Survivor. They made their live action debut in Season 2 of The Mandalorian (not Ahsoka like Film Threat claimed), and Season 3 deals with them before they flee to hiding on Dathomir.
 

efyu_lemonardo

May I have a cookie?
The prequel films are now cherished by comparison.
To me at least, despite the very poor writing, they still have something to offer which Disney can not: a compelling and intriguing world, one I'd like to explore. Disney's films are the opposite of that. I haven't seen a single production of theirs that adds anything substantial to Lucas' original vision.
 

ManaByte

Banned
I haven't seen a single production of theirs that adds anything substantial to Lucas' original vision.

Yes you did. People rejected it and called it a disaster and a cinematic catastrophe that destroyed the franchise and characters forever.


In the book, we learn that one of the first meetings to visualize The Force Awakens happened on January 16, 2013 at Skywalker Ranch with George Lucas himself. Among the pieces presented at the meeting were portraits of an older Luke Skywalker training a new disciple named Kira (who was later renamed Rey). The idea was that, 30 years after the fall of the Empire, Luke had gone to a dark place and secluded himself in a Jedi temple on a new planet. The paintings show Luke meditating, reassessing his whole life.

Daisy Ridley actually filmed for several weeks as "Kira" on TFA. They changed her name to "Rey" when they couldn't trademark "Kira" spelled that way. They were able to later change the spelling to "Qi'ra" for Solo, which they could trademark.
 

efyu_lemonardo

May I have a cookie?
I guess I don't consider trying to get a message out activism then. To me that's just being thoughtful and opinionated. To me it's activism when the creators try to annoy viewers with their product inundated with things they can't ignore. Even down to the niche aspects of your movie or show. I think most film makers or TV creators are not activists. They are just people with opinions who have something to say and want to share it with people. But when I listen to interviews of some creators these days I see a lot of "Our show is going to have X, Y, and Z, and SO many people are going to be triggered by it hehehe!" That's where I think there's a difference.
I completely agree with you that having a strong agenda is no substitute for actual talent. Artists who lack the latter may try to compensate by emphasizing the former. But good art has always been the result of crafting a novel and intriguing delivery, rather than about the content of the message. This was as true for Shakespeare and Homer as it is today.
 

efyu_lemonardo

May I have a cookie?
Yes you did. People rejected it and called it a disaster and a cinematic catastrophe that destroyed the franchise and characters forever.




Daisy Ridley actually filmed for several weeks as "Kira" on TFA. They changed her name to "Rey" when they couldn't trademark "Kira" spelled that way. They were able to later change the spelling to "Qi'ra" for Solo, which they could trademark.
Not sure I understand your point. How does this support the claim that Disney added original elements to Lucas' universe?
 

ManaByte

Banned
Not sure I understand your point. How does this support the claim that Disney added original elements to Lucas' universe?
They produced his Episode VII with what they had left over from JJ Abrams' coup attempt. People rejected it and cry that they should've got Lucas' sequels and that Disney threw away his outlines. They didn't and people vehemently HATED his vision for the Sequels.

And it would've been WORSE had JJ Abrams not returned and Carrie Fisher not passed away. George's original plan for Episode IX (after he killed off Luke in VIII) was almost all about the midichorlians ending with Leia being named the Chosen One and not Anakin (and Kira/Rey still took on the Skywalker name).

Rage bait YouTubers are painting a false narrative about Lucas' Sequels, when they would've been hated more than the Special Editions and Prequels combined. It'd be The Last Jedi times 9000.
 

ManaByte

Banned
I've read it all now.

There was already a coup, Kathleen Kennedy and the mind virus board.

They hired Michael Arndt to write a script based on George's Episode VII outline. JJ Abrams threw it out (the hunt for Luke element remained which is why Arndt got story credit) to remake ANH because he thought that Bad Robot would then take over Lucasfilm and he'd be in charge of everything especially the merchandise. Which would've never happened.

And Kathleen Kennedy hasn't run Star Wars for years at this point. Dave Filoni has been in charge of the franchise since before COVID when he got promoted to Chief Creative Officer.
 
Last edited:

DeepEnigma

Gold Member
They hired Michael Arndt to write a script based on George's Episode VII outline. JJ Abrams threw it out (the hunt for Luke element remained which is why Arndt got story credit) to remake ANH because he thought that Bad Robot would then take over Lucasfilm and he'd be in charge of everything especially the merchandise. Which would've never happened.
Ok. So all those "we design our stories by committee and Disney has a strict approval process" they were PRing since buying this franchise, all goes out the window for one man?

You want a total coup and a slap in the face of the brand, lore, and theories... Rian Johnson was that. "Your Snoke theory sucks." was the huge red flag saying "FUCK YOU" to Star Wars fans.

Hell, they had to bring JJ back in attempt to salvage that major fuck up.
 
Last edited:
What I don't understand that it is pretty clear that at this point Star Wars lives and dies by their old fans it just does not resonate with new fans at all as IP. Why they are trying to destroy it the old fanbase?
 

DeepEnigma

Gold Member
What I don't understand that it is pretty clear that at this point Star Wars lives and dies by their old fans it just does not resonate with new fans at all as IP. Why they are trying to destroy it the old fanbase?
They hate the "male power fantasy."

It's all ideological, you see.
 

ManaByte

Banned
Ok. So all those "we design our stories by committee and Disney has a strict approval process" they were PRing since buying this franchise, all goes out the window for one man?

That narrative about the Story Group was never true. Again, it's from rage bait channels. And they didn't even exist when JJ Abrams was starting his ANH remake.

And they don't really exist much anymore now that Filoni is planning everything and it's starting to show since Filoni is directly retconning things from canon before he was in charge. Kanan's origin in Bad Batch is different than the canon version in the Kanan comic. He's acting the way George did where on-screen trumps everything else. The only problem that he ran into was the two strikes in Hollywood that derailed Mando S4 and turned it into a movie.

Everything post-COVID is Filoni. Bad Batch, New Jedi Order, "Jedi Prime", Heir to the Empire, Mando & Grogu, Skeleton Crew, Acolyte, Ahsoka, etc.
 

BlackTron

Gold Member
Chris Gore of Film Threat claimed that Kathleen Kennedy invented Force Witches in Ahsoka last year to push the "Force is Female" agenda. He's being mocked by other legitimate reviewers because Force Witches have been a thing in Star Wars since Ewoks: Battle for Endor in 1985 and they were named Nightsisters in the novel Courtship of Princess Leia in 1994. They were a big part of the EU after that (you could go to Dathomir and fight them in Star Wars Galaxies), and then GEORGE LUCAS officially made them canon in a 2011 episode of The Clone Wars and then decided that Darth Maul was from their planet as well. Respawn made a Nightsister Kal's love interest in Jedi Fallen Order and Jedi Survivor. They made their live action debut in Season 2 of The Mandalorian (not Ahsoka like Film Threat claimed), and Season 3 deals with them before they flee to hiding on Dathomir.

No shit Sherlock.
 

DeepEnigma

Gold Member
That narrative about the Story Group was never true. Again, it's from rage bait channels. And they didn't even exist when JJ Abrams was starting his ANH remake.

And they don't really exist much anymore now that Filoni is planning everything and it's starting to show since Filoni is directly retconning things from canon before he was in charge. Kanan's origin in Bad Batch is different than the canon version in the Kanan comic. He's acting the way George did where on-screen trumps everything else. The only problem that he ran into was the two strikes in Hollywood that derailed Mando S4 and turned it into a movie.

Everything post-COVID is Filoni. Bad Batch, New Jedi Order, "Jedi Prime", Heir to the Empire, Mando & Grogu, Skeleton Crew, Acolyte, Ahsoka, etc.
:messenger_dizzy:

:messenger_weary::messenger_ok:

 

efyu_lemonardo

May I have a cookie?
They produced his Episode VII with what they had left over from JJ Abrams' coup attempt. People rejected it and cry that they should've got Lucas' sequels and that Disney threw away his outlines. They didn't and people vehemently HATED his vision for the Sequels.

And it would've been WORSE had JJ Abrams not returned and Carrie Fisher not passed away. George's original plan for Episode IX (after he killed off Luke in VIII) was almost all about the midichorlians ending with Leia being named the Chosen One and not Anakin (and Kira/Rey still took on the Skywalker name).

Rage bait YouTubers are painting a false narrative about Lucas' Sequels, when they would've been hated more than the Special Editions and Prequels combined. It'd be The Last Jedi times 9000.
I think we're misunderstanding each other. I was comparing Lucas' prequels with Disney's films. In an alternative universe where he produced his own episode VII-IX, I could judge those products. All I'm saying is that as bad as the prequels' writing was, their world building was novel, intriguing and (to me) has hardly been matched even twenty years later.

In contrast, Disney's films introduce almost nothing new to the original trilogy's universe. Had they done so, I might be more supportive, even if the end result didn't appeal to me.

Unlike others, I had no fundamental problem with the idea of the Last Jedi, but as your own sources show, it wasn't a new idea. If episodes 7 and 9 were actually connected to it in any meaningful way, the trilogy might have even had an interesting story. But this is beside my point, which was about world building.

Old Luke Han and Leia, new female Luke, Vader jr., The Empire 2.0, New Rebellion with the same X-Wings, Palpatine at home, the return of The Millennium Falcon, Chewbacca, Lando etc when all put together make for a very dull and derivative experience.
 

ManaByte

Banned
Old Luke Han and Leia, new female Luke, Vader jr.,

That was all in Lucas' version. But in his Vader Jr. was seduced to the dark side by Darth Talon from the Legacy comics. Lucas had some kind of fetish for her because he forced her into the cancelled Darth Maul game. He put a Darth Talon statue next to a Darth Maul statue in a meeting with the devs and said "Look, they're friends". None of the devs were brave enough to tell him the characters lived 1,000 years apart.
 

BlackTron

Gold Member
Episode 3 is out next week.

Thanks much better than a copy/pasted wall of text that we already have.
Also the Nightsisters didn't ever call it The Force either, they called it "Magick", these proto-Nightsisters call it "The Thread" which is part of his meltdown.

Who the fuck cares? Don't you ever get embarrassed? There's a rumor that in this series they literally come out with some "the force is female" tomfoolery. I would like to know the veracity of this rumor before I begin watching the show. I will never know this information no matter how much Dathomir history you peddle as some sort of proof of this show's future.

There can be only one explanation when you can't convince people you know the future with arcane SW knowledge: the thread is a meltdown.
 

efyu_lemonardo

May I have a cookie?
That was all in Lucas' version. But in his Vader Jr. was seduced to the dark side by Darth Talon from the Legacy comics. Lucas had some kind of fetish for her because he forced her into the cancelled Darth Maul game. He put a Darth Talon statue next to a Darth Maul statue in a meeting with the devs and said "Look, they're friends". None of the devs were brave enough to tell him the characters lived 1,000 years apart.
So your argument is that a Lucas produced episode 7-9 would have been as derivative as Disney's? I find that a bit hard to believe, given how wildly different his OT and PT are. Lucas seems to be a huge risk taker, which is the exact opposite of what Disney has done in recent years. I'm willing to give him the benefit of the doubt that he still could have made a much more novel and interesting trilogy revolving around similar character arcs. Nothing about him suggests to me he would have wanted to stick as close to the OT as Disney did. I believe his execution would have been sufficiently different.
 

The Gamer Triple H

Gold Member
I do think it's funny that the same people who joke about "don't question, just consume" are there DAY 1 for these shows because it's literally the source of their content.

Hate-watching is a real thing and I imagine Hollywood knows this. It's why the actors revel in the negativity. The media also benefits from the easy clickbait.

It's a massive circuit. A feedback loop.

It's the reason why I don't watch Nerdrotic, itsagundam or the critical drinker. Hate to say it but they are part of the problem. Someone already mentioned Velma getting a season 2, does anyone think that if people never bothered to cover it, that it would've gotten renewed at all?

Hell, I think the reason why the last of us 2 sold as well as it did after all the controversy surrounding the story was mainly because people were farming content for it, weeks prior to release. At some point people will keep reading the same shit about a show or game and think "it can't be THAT bad" and they tune in to watch or play.

Sometimes it's better to let shit die in silence.
 
Last edited:

IntentionalPun

Ask me about my wife's perfect butthole
All I know is the witches were one of only 2 things I liked about Ahsoka so more of that is fine with me. God that show was bad though, the 1st 2 eps of Acolyte were a lot better.

All Star Wars stuff is silly and not worth getting upset about tho lol
 

efyu_lemonardo

May I have a cookie?
In a Lucas produced episode 7-9, someone like Finn or Poe would have been a fully CG pink florescent alien sea cucumber with a bad stutter and a drug habit, and the other would be a schizophrenic two-headed robot.

There would be a side-plot involving shrinking down to the size of microbes and invading the body of one of the lesser villains, complete with 20 minutes of gratuitous eye-melting cgi featuring one-shot characters that look interesting enough to star in their own adventure, action figures of these being available for sale of course.

Instead of X-Wings and TIE fighters we'd have some kind of new biological ships, the main villain's super-weapon would be a plague that turns everyone into space-zombies and at some point R2 and threepio would show up except they'd be body swapped because reasons.

Parts of it would be cringe, parts would be glorious, most would be highly entertaining when viewed with the right mindset.
 

FunkMiller

Gold Member
The notion that George Lucas would have produced sequels all that better than the shit we got is for the birds. His genius wasn't in creating new or interesting stories and characters, it was his ability to take pre-existing ones and package them in something fresh. That's it. The prequels were fucking terrible because he simply did not have the talent to write anything original. His sequels would probably have been as convoluted, stilted, and badly paced as the prequels were.

The story of Star Wars is those three original movies. The reason why everything else feels like utter shit is because it's all pointless backstory and epilogue - no matter who produced it.

See also: any shit they make about Lord Of The Rings that isn't The Hobbit and the three novels.
 
Last edited:

NotMyProblemAnymoreCunt

Biggest Trails Stan
They hired Michael Arndt to write a script based on George's Episode VII outline. JJ Abrams threw it out (the hunt for Luke element remained which is why Arndt got story credit) to remake ANH because he thought that Bad Robot would then take over Lucasfilm and he'd be in charge of everything especially the merchandise. Which would've never happened.

And Kathleen Kennedy hasn't run Star Wars for years at this point. Dave Filoni has been in charge of the franchise since before COVID when he got promoted to Chief Creative Officer.

George Lucas Sequel Trilogy Scripts sounded way better than JJ Abrams bullshit

I haven't watched Rise of the Skywalker and never will

Fuck Abrams. Glad he's no longer part of Star Wars

BTW The Farce Awakens sucks
 
Top Bottom