The Acolyte – Episode 8 Recap, Review & Ending Explained

Episode 8

Episode 8 of The Acolyte begins with Qimir approaching Osha while she’s wearing the helmet. He struggles to grab the helmet for some reason and then rips it off her head. Osha claims she saw Mae and her visions show her killing Mae. She saw the future where she had a saber in her hand and didn’t use it.

Osha believes she can stop Mae so they decide to go together. At the same time, Sol doesn’t watch Mae who activates Pip and breaks free from her binds. Sol points out that Mae was the one who started the fire and locked everyone in. “Because you broke into our home!” Mae screams back. While Sol is in the middle of telling Mae that she’s not a twin, Mae breaks free, hits Sol with a stun-gun and races into the “escape ship”.

What happens in the asteroid belt?

Sol activates the ship and flies after her as they enter an asteroid belt. Of course, the writers don’t know anything about science (stone is flammable and campfires can thrive in outer space) and the belt is more like two lines of rocks rather than what we’ve seen in Empire Strikes Back with rocks all over the place.

Sol catches up to Mae, while getting battered by rocks all the way. However, Bazil inexplicably pulls the wiring out and stop the ship, causing them to crash. As for Mae, she enters the planet’s atmosphere and touches down.

Over on Coruscant, Pickle Head Vernestra is met by the Senator who asks about her sickness. She doesn’t mention the Sith or anything that’s been going on on the planet. She decides to “keep things internal” and refuses the Senator’s questions. He does learn that multiple Jedi are dead but goes on to mention that the Jedi are unchecked and their emotions will snap in the end. It’s interesting that the Senator says “him” rather than “them” here.

Vernestra is pretty cold with this guy, as he decides he’s going to report her lack of transparency and she may need to speak to the Senate regarding this.

Who is in the cave?

Meanwhile, Osha and Qimir walk together over to the ship. Despite seeing all her friends murdered in horrible ways right in front of her eyes, Osha believes that Qimir is a “fair” person. Osha refuses to be trained by him though and after really trying to emote, we cut across to a cave for a bit of key jangling. It’s Darth Plagueis.

Over on Brendok, Sol manages to make it down to the planet’s surface, somehow. Last we saw his ship it was seemingly trashed in the asteroid belt. Bazil is still onboard and there’s no dialogue here explaining exactly why he did this.

What happens during the final fight?

Vernestra learns that Sol is on Brendok and decides to travel again back to this planet. Sol shows up at the witch coven’s stone structure and has a look around, right as Osha and Qimir do the same thing. Sol and Qimir end up fighting through the hallways and courtyards, and Sol uses the force to levitate across to the ground. Sure would have been handy to do this alst episode to save the not-twins right? He apparently also has the power of a shockwave too, which knocks him back.

While this fight is going on, Osha and Mae come face to face. As Mae mentions that Sol killed their mother, Amandla Stenberg does her darn hardest to emote but the only thing she manages is a little scream. Remember, this woman didn’t audition for the role.

Outside, Qimir is bested by Sol but Mae shows up and begins fighting. She grabs Sol’s lightsaber and then we get a repurposed scene from Return of the Jedi with Mae in Luke’s position. Anyway, she throws the lightsaber away and tells him he needs to speak to the Senate and the council about his crimes. While Sol talks about her origin, he admits that he did kill Aniseya… but doesn’t mention that she turned into a crazy smoke monster and looked like she was going to control one of the twins.

Who kills Sol?

With a lightaber in hand, Osha approaches Sol while he apologizes. Unfortunately, Osha uses a Force Choke on him and kills the guy outright. So both twins are murderers now and both look like thyey’re turning to the Dark Side. To confirm this transformation, Osha turns the lightsaber red. Mae watches on, as we cut across to Vernestra and the others.

Vernestra immediately senses Qimir without his helmet on (sure would have been handy to use that power in episode 6 when she touched down o nthe planet) and they head off to find him. As the Jedi do their best to track them down, the twins, after confirming they’re both murderers, head deep into the coven to break free.

The pair rush into the forest, while Bazil (after sabotaging Sol’s ship) heads off as the Jedi tracker. Sure would be handy to have tracker droids in this universe right? Oh wait, they do. 180 million dollar budget, by the way.

What happens to the not-twins?

Mae and Oha both reunite in the forest and have a good cry. Qimir shows up and interrupts them, pointing out that they’re foolhardy in trusting the Jedi. Osha decides she’s going to train with The Stranger and let Mae stay with the Jedi. Qimir is going to wipe her memory permanently so she has no knowledge of the pair of them.

Qimir is successful in wiping her memory, just as Bazil and the others show up in the forest. They find Mae, who surrenders as she’s under arrest. She’s brought to Coruscant, where she has to answer for the murder of several Jedi Masters. Vernestra brings her into the main chamber, where Mae’s restraints are removed. They’re left alone and Mae’s last memory is from when she was 9.

What does Vernestra tell the council?

Vernestra speaks to the council and explains that a secret coven of Force witches were infiltrated by the Jedi who wanted to try and save two children from being indoctrinated into their coven. She berates the Jedi for keeping these actions a secret and throws Sol under the bus, claiming that he killed his accomplices to maintain a cover story.

Now, we know there are genuine witnesses to these murders, harking back to episode 1 where they even brought an eyewitness in from the bar, not to mention dozens of people there to see the fight between Indara and Mae. Anyway, enough of those pesky facts!

Wht key jangling do we get at the end?

Vernestra condemns Sol’s actions but doesn’t mention the Sith, covers up Sol’s death and claims he commit suicide, along with deciding she needs her help in finding a pupil before he turned evil. And that being Qimir I’m guessing, given the scars on his back.

As the episode closes out, Qimir and Osha look out over the ocean while Vernestra heads in to see Master Jedi, deciding they need to talk.

The Episode Review

So lets recap on the state of Disney Star Wars right now. Reva is still alive and around the universe doing god knows what, Baylon and his apprentice are also on the loose, while we have Qimir and Osha now also on the loose. Vernestra is one of the worst characters in The Acolyte and clearly a horrible woman, and it’s obvious that Qimir was her apprentice in the past before he “turned evil”.

The fact that none of these Jedi have told the High Council or anybody else about the deaths of all those Jedi is pretty alarming, while the show contradicts itself constantly, forgetting important details that have already been established and using powers that come and go depending on how the writers feel.

Apparently Qimir can wipe memories, while Sol can use the Force to levitate. Meanwhile, Osha turns to the Dark Side and kills Sol, while we’re supposed to sympathize with the twins, who are both murderers and killed.

The situation with Mae is rather puzzling given there will be records of her being arrested, plenty of eyewitness reports confirming her hostile fight with Indara, not to mention all those people in town witness to the big fight in the town square. But yet, the show completely forgets all that, making for a really frustrating watch.

If that wasn’t enough, the show also forgets basic science too and the editing is atrocious. Why did Bazil cut off the power in Sol’s ship? Why did he sabotage the ship so he didn’t get near Mae? And how did he end up on the surface of the planet? It’s never mentioned again but oo we get a glimpse of Yoda instead!

Ultimately the little bits of key jangling in this episode may be enough to convince fans to overlook the huge narrative woes in this show but this is easily one of the worst written shows of all time. I’m not even being hyperbolic here either. Given the 180 million dollar budget, it’s an absolute embarrassment that the show has released in this state.