The Acolyte Hate – An Example Of How Social Media Is Destroying Geekdom

I just finished watching the first three episodes of The Acolyte. I won’t say I loved it since the story is still developing, but surely I do not hate it. And especially not for the reasons most voices in social media hate it.

I hate that the political discourse on social media is causing big studios to change how they make movies. I would prefer going back to the good old days when people watched shows like X-Men, Star Wars, and other Disney or DC shows for what is going on screen, instead of what is happening in the back end.

The Disney Extremes

I want to clarify, that I do believe Disney has lately gone overboard to please the liberal progressive side. But for the longest time, the same studio was promoting regressive ideas too. Inclusivity was not something that Disney was associated with, and they were on the extreme right. Now the problem is when they were called out about it, they went the other extreme.

Portraying inclusivity on screen is a great thing but that does not need to be at the cost of fundamentally changing the core of many franchises, neither do we need race swaps that do not contribute to the story itself.

The over-the-top interviews of the people involved in the project with them claiming how they are planning to weaponize the beloved franchises they have been given responsibility are not helping.

The hate for Acolyte mostly stemmed from the interviews of the cast and crew of Acolyte speaking more about feminism in their interviews, and bashing the male fan base instead of talking about the show.

Much of the crew not being a Star Wars fan, and that being considered good did not help either.

My Views On The Acolyte

From what I am reading online most people hate the fact that in the first three episodes, the Jedi are incompetent, and the Force is being interpreted as something different than what was showcased in the Skywalker Saga.

I have always felt the Sith to be more real than the Jedi. Jedi were extremely idealistic, and there was a time when that could have been considered a true hero quality, the one who sacrifices for the greater good, is away from human emotions like love, hate and anger, but not anymore. Especially since people have realised that being ideal does not take you far in life.

The Jedi order was very dogmatic in and before the prequel era. Following the Jedi code to the T and excommunication of those who had different views to that of the order made it like a Church.

In the world of Star Wars, the Jedi are like devout Christians, and extremely conservative. This was probably the reason why the deviation from that by highlighting the flaws of the Jedi order in more recent outings of Star Wars shows like The Acolyte, The Tale Of Jedi, and The Tales Of The Empire is not being taken so kindly by the conservative fans of Star Wars.

As for Force being interpreted as something different in the Coven of Witches, it completely makes sense for an order persecuted by Jedi to have a different belief system than the aggressors. This was again a time when the Jedi were the sole power in the galaxy, and it was bound to be more dogmatic in their beliefs.

In this universe and the era, the Force was like God, with each religion interpreting them differently.

Acolytes has some flaws, but that has mainly got to do with some abrupt time jumps and unexplained events, we are only 3 episodes in with 5 more to go. I hope the story unfolds and reveals more about the events of the third episode.

Social Media Hate

Social media and the race to go viral is something that is causing polarisation of the fans, with some jumping in the talk shit about the show, while others are jumping in to defend it. This is essentially the politics outside of these shows spilling into these shows causing many to review and bomb the show without even watching it.

The same thing happened to the movie, ‘The Marvels’ which I believed to be one of the better movies of the current phase, but received a lot of unnecessary hate. We almost had the same scenario before the X-Men 97 series was released.

I believe the responsibility of fans like us is to judge a show based on its merits, and not the politics around it. The least we can do is at least let the show complete before passing judgment on the notion that it is deviating a lot from the source.

From my perspective the deviation from the source contributes towards the growth of the story, so true fans need not complain about it. But to each their own.

Be A Real Fan

So let’s wait for the series to reach its conclusion before complaining about how it is ruining the franchise. If you still hate it, then please hate it based on what is happening in the show, not outside it.

What are your views on the new series?

Have you watched the first 3 episodes yet?

Do you agree that politics outside has ruined the geekdom around these huge franchisees?

Do let me know in the comments section.