Episode 5 of The Acolyte has an obvious villain reveal and lots of lightsaber action

Episode five of The Acolyte picks up straight off where the previous episode ended. Sol, Yord, Osha, Jecki, and a group of other Jedi are on Khofar tracking down Mae when the mysterious Sith shows up, resulting in one of the biggest lightsaber fights we've seen for a quite some time in Star Wars.

Front and center this episode was the reveal of who the mysterious Sith actually is. Or rather, the confirmation that it's Qimir, as most fans have speculated since his first appearance. It's a rather unconvincing reveal as it was pretty obvious from the start, and only became more so after what happened in the last episode. His switching between competence and intelligence to goofy bumbling around was a pretty obvious hint that he was hiding something, and as he's really the only other character from the show who we know is alive and unaccounted for in this scene, there isn't much of a mystery here.

The question now has turned to: what is he? He calls himself a Sith, but there's a sense that he might think that on account of his certain point of view. He has a kind of Kylo Ren energy. Most other Sith Lords, like Dooku and Maul, are calm, intelligent, and in control, but Qimir has an unhinged personality. He doesn't have much of a grand scheme going on as far as I can tell. Could he be part of a breakaway group, similar to Maul and Savage in The Clone Wars? I don't get the feeling that he really is the big bad. For certain, the scene where he got carried off by giant moths did nothing to preserve his 'cool' persona, and was outright hilarious.

The second big thing in this episode was the lightsaber fight. The producers seem to be aiming to top the lightsaber duel between Qui-Gon/Obi-Wan and Maul in The Phantom Menace, and certainly I can't think of a time since the prequels when we've seen this many blades whirling onscreen at the same time. However, it doesn't have the same emotional impact as the earlier fight as we're not attached to these characters in the same way, and the stakes are not as high. There's definitely a lot going on, but bigger isn't always better, and it feels unrealistic that Qimir would take down that many Jedi so easily when he can't be anywhere near as powerful as, say, Palpatine or Plageuis. A lot of the action is obscured by the poor lighting and cinematography, which hides the fight behind trees. Nevertheless, it's a step up from some of the other fight scenes we've seen in recent shows, and I'm even going to go out on a limb and say that Jecki vs Qimir might be the best lightsaber duel on Disney+.

Review: Star Wars: The Acolyte Episode 5, "Night"

In terms of drama, Mae goes through yet another major character change after her decision last week to give up on her mission and turn herself over to the Jedi so she could be with her sister Osha. In this episode she has a chance to surrender to the Jedi but doesn't take it, and doesn't try to protect Osha from Qimir. What's more, she even abandons her and steals her clothes and identity so she can escape with Sol. I can only imagine that there must be something else going on here as it's such a random series of events, not to mention that fact that Jedi can sense the presence of other living things, especially when they are Force-sensitive, so surely Master Sol has to know she's not really Osha? Even Bazil has it figured out by now.

This episode also raises the question of why Mae killed Indara and Torbin in the first place. The only reason to single out these specific Jedi was if she had a personal reason for revenge, which seems obvious from Episode 3, yet she wasn't going to kill Kelnacca. So why would Qimir want her to kill them? This only draws attention to him and has no real effect on the Jedi who have thousands of members, and two of the victims were more or less recluses anyway. The way Sith have always survived is by living in the shadows, manipulating events from behind the scenes and playing the long game.

There were a lot of things happening in this episode, but like the rest of The Acolyte, there's a lack of focus and seemingly contradictory plotting. It feels like there's a storyline that's been cut, a point of view that's missing but should have been included. The fights are big and flashy, but they're not a substitute for a good story, and with only three more episodes to go, this series still doesn't seem to have found its flow. I've no idea where it's going and that's not a good thing, as it could literally pull anything out of its hat at the last minute. Maybe it will turn things around for the finale, but time's fast running out for this show.

Episode Grade: C

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