‘The Acolyte’ Episode 5 Recap: The Battle of Khofar

They’re Frasiering. I can’t believe they’re Frasiering! After studiously avoiding twin-mixup hijinks for several episodes after the initial question of Osha’s guilt or innocence was cleared up, The Acolyte has decided it best to pull the old switcheroo between its basically good sister Osha and her basically evil twin Mae. I find this kind of stuff hard enough to tolerate when the only people required to be duped for a mistaken-identity plot to work are Martin, Daphne, and Roz. When you’re dealing with an entire order of telepaths, it gets a little harder to swallow.

It’s a shame, too, because until Mae cuts her hair short to pose as her sister, the episode is basically one long, well-choreographed, well-edited, rather shocking fight. The shocks are easy to sum up: Both Jecki and Yord get killed! And I mean dead. We’re talking daylight showing through three visible holes in the former and an audible neck-snap on the latter. No one’s resurfacing from a Sarlacc pit here.

The culprit: Qimir, Mae’s dirtbag associate, now revealed to have been her master in disguise. Or, rather, lack thereof: The creepy helmet he wears while in Sith mode conceals his thoughts as well as his identity from inquiring minds. And he is a Sith, or at least comfortable enough claiming that mantle by default. To hear him tell it, he just wants to be left alone to wield his power his own way, with his own pupils, doing his own insane stuff with them, without big-government Jedi telling him what to do. Hey, are the Sith Libertarian?

Anyway, the fight between Qimir and Mae on one side and Sol, Jecki, Osha, Yord, and the entire squad of Jedi redshirts on the other takes up the bulk of the episode, and it’s pretty bitchin’. Darth Qimir, or whatever you want to call him, quickly reveals himself to be one of the most formidable lightsaber duelists in franchise history; in under half an hour of screentime he kills every single member of Sol’s party of trained Jedi but Sol and Osha themselves, effortlessly fighting several at once on multiple occasions. 

But he’s up against some tough cookies too. It’s sad to see Jecki go so early, because she was a real dervish on the battlefield, especially once she goes double-bladed. Sol winds up throwing down with Qimir hand to hand. Qimir unveils a wrist gizmo capable of shorting sabers out for a brief period, adding a new dimension to the combat. At one point he chucks his saber like a boomerang, only to have Sol knock it back, slowly slicing three trees in half; the effect is very video-game-ish (complimentary). I have no problem with the stately lightsaber duels of Ahsoka — they were one of my favorite things about that baffling show — but it’s impressive to see a fight team really go for it like this.

So again, it’s a real drag to see the show move in a goofy mistaken-identity direction, even if only briefly. Seriously, if Sol and Qimir can’t figure out that they’ve swapped students, they need to hand in their Jedi and Sith badges. (Qimir should probably lose his on principle for saying vaguely wisdom-shaped nothings like “What extraordinary creatures we are: Even in the revelation of our triumph, you see the depth of our despair.” That kind of writing remains a problem for the show.)

However, it’s possible something very cool is about to happen. Let’s say Sol and Qimir blast off to their respective ends of the galaxy, only then to figure out who’s who. (Qimir already knows thanks to the unconscious Osha’s tattoo, but who knows what’s going on with Sol.) At that point, perhaps the Jedi could try to win the former Sith apprentice back over to his side, and the Sith could try to win over the former padawan. 

Then there’s the mystery of what the hell everyone’s alluding to when they talk about the dark secret in Sol’s past, which at this point has passed its expiration date as a generator of suspense. Every time the show comes up with an excuse for Sol not to simply string a two-sentence explanation together, it gets more annoying. 

Did the Jedi really brainwash Osha into believing a lie about the arson incident? Can they brainwash people like that? Or is Mae just delusional? It may be somewhat interesting to see Sol and Mae hash this out, just as it’s somewhat interesting to meet a Sith who’s not trying to conquer the universe or topple the Republic but just be evil on his own. Somewhat interesting is fine, if you just like Star Wars and your main criteria is “Is there more of it?” I still have no idea what this show is about, what it’s trying to say, what reason it has to exist beyond those two four-letter words.

Sean T. Collins (@theseantcollins) writes about TV for Rolling Stone, Vulture, The New York Times, and anyplace that will have him, really. He and his family live on Long Island.