Warning: This Leisure Weekly cowl story accommodates spoilers for episode 5 of The Acolyte.
Manny Jacinto has been holding an enormous secret. However there’s only one downside: “I am the worst liar,” he says in between sips of an virtually comically outsized water bottle. Nevertheless, the time has lastly arrived for Jacinto to come back clear, and the sudden explosion of truth-telling is positively intoxicating, it doesn’t matter what is definitely in that bottle.
“I have been mendacity to individuals for the final two years — to their faces,” he confesses. “A few of them, they straight up name me out they usually’re like, ‘I do not belief what you are saying.’ A few of them consider me. However I have been mendacity, and it provides me a variety of anxiousness, having to mislead individuals.”
The basis of the aforementioned deception and explanation for Jacinto’s pants being continuously on hearth for the previous two years facilities round his true function on Disney+’s The Acolyte. However the June 25 episode has freed the actor as much as lastly embrace one thing his character actually has not: pure honesty.
“I imply, proper now I am tingling,” he says, smiling. “Simply because that is the primary time that I am truly capable of discuss it.”
Discuss what? The truth that his beforehand established a part of shady apothecary Qimir was all a ruse and that he’s truly a Sith Lord recognized solely because the Stranger? That the dude simply brutally murdered a number of Jedi, together with a Power-using Wookiee and two different principal characters in a lethal blur of ultraviolence? That his hair may nonetheless look so on level even after carrying a creepy helmet straight out of a horror film?
As a result of followers are speaking about all that and extra after feasting their eyes on the largest motion spectacular in streaming Star Wars historical past. Clocking in at 32 minutes, episode 5 of The Acolyte was the sequence’ personal Fury Street: basically one nonstop battle scene from starting to finish. In the course of the melee, the mysterious, red-blade-wielding grasp of Jedi murderer Mae (Amandla Stenberg) was lastly unmasked as Jacinto’s Qimir — an unmasking that got here proper as he was cruelly hanging down Jedi Padawan Jecki Lon (Dafne Eager), and shortly earlier than he way-too-casually snapped the neck of Jedi Knight Yord Fandar (Charlie Barnett). The episode then concluded with Mae knocking out her twin Osha (additionally performed by Stenberg) and deceptively assuming her place alongside Osha’s former Grasp Sol (Lee Jung-jae), leaving her sister to be discovered by the Stranger and fully resetting all of the items on the sport board with solely three episodes left.
To paraphrase the famend poet LL Cool J, that’s a variety of destruction and terror and mayhem for a single episode, a proven fact that present creator Leslye Headland reveals made some of us behind the scenes a wee bit nervous. “I acquired some suggestions after we have been writing and prepping the episode that stated, ‘Gosh, it is simply a lot preventing. Do not you assume the viewers will tune out sooner or later?'” laughs Headland. “And I stated, ‘No, I really feel actually assured that they will love this.'”
Charlie Barnett on ‘The Acolyte’.
Lucasfilm Ltd
The installment was the end result of what can solely described as the largest onscreen Jedi genocide since Emperor Palpatine went full hologram mode and issued the dreaded Order 66. The very first scene of The Acolyte set the tone as Carrie-Anne Moss’ Indara was actually stabbed within the coronary heart. An episode later, Dean Charles Chapman’s Torbin ended his decade-long Barash Vow to suck down some poison willingly.
Then it was the Wookiee Kelnacca’s flip to chew the mud, the Jedi hermit ending up on the receiving finish of the Stranger’s laser sword. Including harm to insult, poor Joonas Suotamo needed to play lifeless in a Wookiee swimsuit for manner too lengthy. “It was truly very uncomfortable,” recollects the actor, who has additionally performed Chewbacca in three movies. “The place that I’m in, I used to be capable of face up to that for about four-and-a-half minutes, after which I needed to simply rise up as a result of these house chairs are usually not all the time that comfy.” (Rattling house chairs.)
However none of that would have ready followers for the carnage to come back in episode 5. For Headland, it was the physique rely she wished to shock individuals with, not the precise identification of the Stranger. The showrunner anticipated many would determine the Qimir/Stranger connection earlier than the unmasking, and was completely cool with that as a result of she wasn’t attempting to idiot anybody within the first place — deliberately leaving breadcrumbs alongside the best way. “I believe an excellent twist isn’t about hiding all the pieces from the viewers after which throwing it on them like, ‘Hey, that is what you did not see! We hid it so effectively that you just did not see this!'” says Headland. “I believe an excellent twist is telegraphing what is going on to occur, after which as soon as it does, executing it with out an oz. of pity or sentimentality.”
Amandla Stenberg on ‘The Acolyte’.
Lucasfilm Ltd
Headland did have one trick up her sleeve, nevertheless — lulling the viewer right into a false sense of safety by sending some new (and clearly expendable) Jedi into the fray alongside her sequence stars. “That is what I cherished about beginning with the purple shirts,” she explains whereas momentarily slipping into Star Trek parlance. “You are form of like, ‘Oh, he’a simply going to kill a bunch of purple shirts, and everyone goes to be effective and… OH MY GOD, JECKI’S DEAD! Okay, I am listening.'”
As for the brutality of the deaths — decapitations, Power pulling one sufferer onto a lightsaber protruding from the again of an already slain accomplice, snapping the neck of a defeated foe — even Headland was considerably shocked by what she was capable of get away with on the family-friendly franchise. “I simply figured somebody would cease me and no person did,” she says with amusing. “I figured somebody would say, ‘That is too far!’ However they did not.”
The solid was actually bowled over by the savagery. “We have been all like, ‘Leslye, the best way that you just take them out is so brutal!'” laughs Stenberg. “‘What the hell? What sort of sick, twisted masochist are you?'” (Responds Headland: “I assume I all the time thought, ‘Nicely, Anakin killed a bunch of kids, so…'”)
Manny Jacinto, Dafne Eager, and Charlie Barnett of ‘The Acolyte’ at Star Wars Celebration 2023.
Rachell Smith
However even the victims themselves appreciated the intense demise toll put in place to boost the stakes. “There are such a lot of administrators in blockbuster sagas which might be so scared to kill off their characters, and are so comfy with bringing characters again to life, and all of those little author methods that I believe are fairly cheeky,” says Eager. “And I actually like that she was truly killing individuals. As a result of in the event you’re not making it harmful, then why are we even right here? Why are we involved by the story? Why will we care? Leslye has such a spine as a author, to make you fall in love with these characters after which slaughter all of them like pigs and be like, ‘Yeah, that is our villain. We’re not simply saying he is so massive and scary, we’re truly exhibiting you the way massive and scary he’s.'”
Stenberg notes that it was clear to all throughout filming that the sequence was reaching a turning level by means of all of the carnage. “There was positively this vitality on set that we have been reaching some form of climax and heading in the direction of a special future. We have been dropping our solid members that we love a lot, and I positively felt like, ‘Oh, now it is time for me to go on a extra solemn journey,’ which form of displays the characters too.”
Certainly, when the mud storm kicked up by the Stranger lastly settled, each single character on the finish of the episode was in a a lot totally different place than when it started. Nicely, those that have been nonetheless alive, anyway.
Pure born killer
Whereas the deaths of Jecki and Yord could have shocked viewers, it was no shock to the actors, who have been knowledgeable of their premature demises by Headland once they first took the roles. “Truthfully, that is what actually bought me,” says Eager. “That was the very first thing she stated to me in our assembly. She was like, ‘You is likely to be enjoying an alien, and also you die fairly early on,’ and I used to be like, ‘I am in! I like enjoying lifeless!'”
Burnett used the information to assist inform his efficiency. “Nobody ever desires to be minimize out of a present,” he explains. “However whenever you’re enjoying a personality that you recognize goes to die, it is somewhat extra enjoyable. If it is a shock to you and your job is gone subsequent week, it sucks. However when you recognize what you are strolling into, you get to have somewhat extra management over it. And I attempted to search out the lemonade by means of the lemons.”
The 2 partners-in-death bonded over their (duel of the) fates. “Me and Charlie have been joking about that on a regular basis,” says Eager, recalling their time filming with a smile. “Each time we have been on set and anybody could be complaining, me and Charlie could be like, ‘Peace out, we’re dying in two weeks!'”
Charlie Barnett and Amandla Stenberg on ‘The Acolyte’.
Lucasfilm Ltd
Even Lee Jung-jae acquired into the enjoyable on the expense of his onscreen Padawan. “We would been doing a extremely lengthy day, and I used to be like, ‘Ha, I die tomorrow,’ to JJ,” recollects Eager. “And JJ simply seems at me and went, ‘I want.’ Everybody was in on the joke that me and Charlie have been so excited to die.”
Nonetheless, when push got here to demise, Barnett couldn’t deliver himself to witness his good friend getting repeatedly lightsaber-stabbed into submission. “They requested me if I wished to go watch Dafne’s demise, and I used to be like, ‘No, are you f—ing kidding me? I like her. I do not need to see her die 4 occasions over. It is simply visceral and f—ed up and unhappy. No, I do not want all that.'”
The particular person doing the dying in that scene had a considerably rosier tackle filming Jecki’s remaining breaths. “I had a lot enjoyable doing the demise,” says Eager, whose finish additionally coincided with the identification reveal of the Stranger when her lifeless physique crumpled to the bottom. “It was an enormous honor to get to be the individual that took the helmet off him,” she beams whereas heralding her character’s remaining act. “That was one thing actually thrilling to me.”
Dafne Eager on ‘The Acolyte’.
Lucasfilm Ltd
And thrilling to Jacinto, who had been patiently ready to strut his stuff because the lightsaber-wielding menace. The Stranger was truly impressed by the character of Drunken Cat from the 1966 Hong Kong martial arts movie Come Drink With Me. A seemingly inebriated goofball involved solely with discovering his subsequent beverage and infrequently breaking into music, Drunken Cat is later revealed to be a robust Shaolin grasp who takes down a gaggle of hostage-holding bandits. Nevertheless, Headland wished to flip the script, making her ruse character a pressure of evil. As soon as she began fleshing out her villain in hiding, “Manny instantly got here up for me as the right particular person to do that.”
It appeared like a pure match. In any case, Jacinto had already fooled audiences as soon as as a Blake Bortles-loving Florida DJ posing as a Taiwanese Buddhist Monk on The Good Place. But it surely was truly his function on one other sequence that caught Headland’s consideration. “I watched 9 Good Strangers throughout the pandemic, and when he first got here on display, I used to be like, ‘Who’s that man? How do I do know him?’ After which I used to be like, ‘Oh my God, that is Manny Jacinto! What the f—?’ So seeing that dichotomy of him having the ability to do two ends of the spectrum, I felt a variety of confidence in him.”
So assured, it seems, that Jacinto didn’t even need to audition for the half. And as soon as he signed on, he and Headland labored in shut collaboration to deliver the evil Drunken Cat to life. “We talked lots about how you are taking a low-status character and convert him to a badass,” says the actor. “He is a man that’s so beneath the radar, that no person is listening to, and impulsively he is truly the man pulling the strings.”
Manny Jacinto on ‘The Acolyte’.
Lucasfilm Ltd
In fact, pulling these strings — and pulling no punches — took a variety of behind-the-scenes work. “I had virtually 4 months to coach for that flight scene,” says Jacinto. “This was the primary time I actually acquired to dig into one thing with a lot motion and actually make use of my dance background. We labored on all the pieces. We did boxing, we labored on kicks, we labored on all of the choreography. It was robust. They conditioned my physique in order that I may get by means of this five-person battle scene.”
He did not simply get by means of it, he owned it. That’s certainly Jacinto beneath the masks for nearly each shot, because the actor requested — and was allowed — to do nearly all of his battle stunts.
“He had been ready for this second the entire shoot,” says Stenberg. “Manny put in a lot preparation, he fully remodeled bodily. He grew to become extremely expert at lightsaber work. He put in months of prep within the time that he wasn’t filming his different character. So I simply felt so completely satisfied for him, that he was capable of display all the pieces he had been working in the direction of.” Even when that meant killing virtually all the pieces and everybody that moved.
Lee Jung-jae, Amandla Stenberg, and Leslye Headland of ‘The Acolyte’ at Star Wars Celebration 2023.
Rachell Smith
However there may be one other factor to the Stranger past mere pressure… and Power. “We wished a personality that was not simply oppressive and highly effective, however whenever you see him, you are feeling disturbed by him,” says Jacinto. “We wished a personality that is not only a Darth Vader sort of man who overpowers the display. It is the idea of the uncanny. It may be a stumble in an individual’s stroll or a twitch in any individual’s eye. It’s totally refined, and it is identical to this uncomfortableness that individuals expertise — and that is what we wished to hone in on for this Sith Lord.”
That disturbance extends to the Stranger’s outfit, and even the best way he enters the display. “His helmet’s not that totally different from a [classic] Star Wars villain,” notes Headland. “However the grin is like this smile that lasts too lengthy, and was meant to be actually unsettling to the Jedi. It isn’t that they are afraid of him, it is that they discover him unsettling. Even his intro, when he floats down on the finish of episode 4, we shot that in reverse as a result of we simply wished the viewers to be like, ‘What is that this?'”
The Stranger’s final line of the episode, as he covers up a passed-out Osha, suits in completely with that eerie and disconcerting vibe: “What extraordinary beings we’re. Even within the revelation of our triumph, we see the depth of our despair.”
What does it even imply? “I believe it is basically our introduction into the third act,” says Jacinto. “It is mainly summing up all the pieces that you just thought you knew in these first episodes. Now we’re going into fully totally different territory. Now it is a totally different world that we’ll introduce you to, and never only a new story, however new motivations for all the totally different characters.”
The chaos after the storm
Even with the reveal of the Stranger… and the brutal slayings of Jecki and Yord… and the lifeless Wookiee within the hut… and a scene-stealing tracker named Bazil (who has Disney Retailer top-seller written throughout his cute little rodent face), the largest game-changer transferring ahead is the twins swapping locations, with Mae dramatically shearing her personal hair with a lightsaber to impersonate her sister and infiltrate the Jedi.
“Belief me, you do not know what number of conversations there have been about this,” Stenberg snickers in regards to the hair-cutting scene. “Even going into episode 1, we have been like, ‘Okay, so episode 5, she has to cut off the hair. Meaning it must be executed with the saber. How can we create two hairstyles the place if chopped by a saber it could fall into the opposite coiffure? And are we going to do it at this angle? And if it is CGI, and we put within the hair at this angle, then it will not cowl the lightsaber to look correct.’ Oh my God, so many conversations!”
And now the dialog turns to what occurs as Mae works undercover proper beneath the nostril of the ultimate entry on her hit checklist, Sol, whereas Osha has been discovered by the Stranger. “The ability dynamics and buildings that we have seen thus far have now form of been invested,” says Stenberg, “which units up each of the characters to go on a very totally different journey. The whole lot that they each have believed to be true has been challenged not directly. And so now the query is: What do they do with that info?”
Amandla Stenberg of ‘The Acolyte’ at Star Wars Celebration 2023.
Rachell Smith
That would result in a reckoning for Lee Jung-jae’s Sol. “Mae says, ‘They’ve brainwashed you,” Headland notes. “A part of her mission isn’t just to complete her kill checklist. Now that her sister’s alive, a part of her mission is to show how the Jedi, and particularly Sol, are usually not what not who Osha thinks they’re.”
That info could possibly be coming from totally different instructions as effectively. “Osha goes to need to hear among the issues that the Stranger has to say,” Jacinto teases ominously.
Clearly, there are nonetheless solutions as to what truly occurred on Brendok that should be answered. Why did Torbin willingly take the poison and apologize? Why did Kelnacca go into hiding and scribble these coven symbols throughout his partitions? And what was Sol going to inform Osha once they returned to the ship? These solutions could presumably come within the type of one other flashback installment: Whereas The Acolyte was filmed with totally different administrators dealing with two-episode blocks, episodes 3 and seven have been each helmed by Kogonada. Requested whether or not which means we’re heading again to Brendok in episode 7, Headland will solely say, “It’s important to watch to search out out.” (A lot for our Jedi thoughts methods.)
Lee Jung-jae on ‘The Acolyte’.
Lucasfilm Ltd
One other flashback would appear to be required viewing, nevertheless, if for no different motive than to provide followers the joys of seeing a lightsaber-wielding Wookiee, which might in any other case appear unlikely now that Kelnacca simply acquired ended by the hands of the Stranger. “It will be attention-grabbing if we get to have a look at the previous,” says Suotamo. “The Jedi are these highly effective individuals, however what do they do when confronted with tough selections? The entire sequence displays that, and is asking that query. So I believe it may be attention-grabbing if we get to see what occurred to those Jedi earlier than the occasions of the present.”
These selections have plainly haunted Sol. “I consider that every one all through these years, Sol was full of a combination of feelings, together with regret and deep remorse,” Lee Jung-jae says by means of an interpreter. “And likewise a really robust willpower to by no means let one thing like that repeat itself. The query that he has struggled with was: How a lot sacrifice is required with a purpose to defend peace?”
For a present that has been killing off Jedi at a really alarming price, that final level may bear critical consideration transferring ahead, particularly when the creator attracts a parallel to the franchise’s most well-known sacrifice of all. “One of the crucial iconic relationships in Star Wars is the father-son dynamic, the place the daddy is redeemed on the finish of Return of the Jedi,” says Headland. “Our story is the father-daughter dynamic with Sol and Osha, and that is a really totally different dynamic than father-son. So you are going to see us discover that and get into that relationship much more deeply than the primary half of the season, which centered extra on sister-sister.”
Manny Jacinto of ‘The Acolyte’ at Star Wars Celebration 2023.
Rachell Smith
No matter occurs within the final three episodes, don’t anticipate Headland to sluggish her Boonta Eve Basic tempo. “One thing that I’ve observed is first seasons will finish on what ought to have been the break into act two,” she says. “It seems like everybody’s actually anticipating [their shows] to get a second season, and I do not really feel that is a good suggestion. I threw all the pieces into season 1, as a result of who is aware of what is going on to occur?”
Headland does say she has “4 or 5 main mysteries” she’d prefer to hit in season 2 if the present will get renewed by Disney+. And he or she could must discover a method to preserve the sequence going, if solely to maintain her newly revealed villain employed. “When she first informed me in regards to the character, I used to be like, ‘That is an actor’s dream function to have the ability to do this change. I would like to do that,'” recollects Jacinto. “And that keenness simply fueled me right through till the tip of filming. I do not actually know the way I can do the rest after this. I believe I ought to simply retire as a result of I believe that is it.”
What else would you anticipate him to say? In any case, solely a Sith offers in absolutes.
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