The Jedi Council Needs You to Come into the Office

These people are just the worst.

Earlier this week, Disney+ launched its newest Star Wars show, The Acolyte. The first two episodes of the eight-episode series take place near the end of the “High Republic” period, or 100 years before the Empire comes to power in in the Star Wars prequels. If you haven’t seen the prequels or haven’t seen them in a while, you should know that the prequels really take the shine off the Jedi order. In the original trilogy, Jedi barely exist, so they’re mysterious and cool, and the only ones we ever meet are Obi-Wan, Yoda, and eventually Luke Skywalker (Leia can use the Force, but she’s not a Jedi in those movies). In the prequels, George Lucas had to map out what the Jedi actually did, and so he envisioned them as monastic peacekeepers who reject emotional attachments and serve various odd jobs like working as envoys or investigators or simply trying to maintain balance in the Force.

They’re duties are vaguely defined (and the more you seek to define them, the weirder it gets like how Qui-Gon Jinn in Episode I doesn’t seem too bothered by slavery on Tatooine, and simply wants to free Anakin because he believes Anakin will fulfill a prophecy about bringing balance to the Force), but their personalities are particularly grating. They’re basically aloof, smug do-nothings who get called into a war they failed to prevent in the first place. Oh, and the Sith Lord who orchestrated the whole thing was a politician who they’ve known for years. Do you really need to be attuned to the Force to notice old Sheev Palpatine twisting the political machinery of the Senate to his will? Gotta do some meditating on that, do ya?

The Jedi are ready to debate you in the marketplace of ideas. | Image via Disney and Lucasfilm

So now we’re 100 years prior to that in The Acolyte and…the Jedi still suck. To the show’s credit, the series is strongly hinting that the Jedi have always kind of sucked, and that the assassin Mae (Amandla Stenberg) has a valid vendetta in killing a few specific Jedi. But that whole backstory of what happened with Mae and her twin sister Osha is still shrouded in mystery; we can easily tell the Jedi suck because of what happens at the end of episode two.