The United States Department of Nerds Podcast

We are discussing our thoughts on The Acolyte Finale.

What is The United States Department of Nerds Podcast?

USDN podcast is run by USDN_JeffyJeff and the Council of Nerds. We strive to bring you the all the latest news and rumors from the World of Nerds and consolidate it right here at USDN. USDN is for the people, by the people and of the people.

Hello there and welcome to

the United States

Department of Nerds where

we are for the people, by the people,

and of the people.

Let's jump into that intro.

Thanks for watching!

Hello there.

General Kenobi.

Can you hear me?

I can hear you.

I can't hear nothing right now.

Hang on.

Okay.

Can you hear me?

I can hear you.

Can you hear me?

I still can't hear nobody.

I can't hear you.

Hang on while I figure this out.

Let me check my settings.

Says mine is working.

Can you give me a sound check?

Check.

Sound check.

No.

Hang on.

I'm going to leave and come back in.

Okay.

Can you hear me?

I can hear you.

Can you hear?

No.

Hang on.

Okay.

Hopefully that works.

All right.

Let's see if this is working now.

Okay, can you hear me?

No, let me try something might be me.

I have no idea what's going on right now.

And it's not cool.

Let me see what's going on.

All right, give me a sound check.

Test test 12.

Hell yeah.

Okay, cool.

On my end, it's not surprising.

This one's a little temperamental.

So it was on the dark side.

That was on both of ours

because I didn't have the

right headset selected in my soundbar.

Oh, see,

I just unplugged my headset and

plugged it.

I was like,

let's see if that's the thing for me.

I did that three times and

it also slapped me in the face,

which you've probably seen.

Aw, no,

I was kind of messing with my... Oh,

there we go.

Messing with my camera setting just a bit.

Let's see if I can go high

def on this one.

My camera can be a little... No,

you're crystal clear.

I got the lights off in here

and the TV is my only... is

my circle light.

Yeah, the lighting in my office is, yes,

it is.

It is very much the joy of live TV.

Lighting in my office is a little harsh.

It's in between where it's

like I need this lighting to show up,

but it's still a little bit

light enough where I'm like,

if I turn my lamp on,

then I will disappear.

I will pull a Darth Pelagos.

I sweat like a pig if I got

that damn light on right here in my face.

So I'm like, yeah,

I'm not going to use that.

Oh,

and I get to show off at least part of

our, some of our pop collections,

wrestling pops behind me.

Mine's a hot mess back there.

I'm getting ready to redo

this whole thing again.

I'm just done.

Yeah,

we're getting ready to put more

shelves up for our pop.

So behind me is our

wrestling pop collection.

And then we have some like TV pop,

like kind of more pop

culture TV shows back here.

This wall next to me is kind

of a mix of movies, movie pop.

So Lord of the Rings,

we have a few of those.

Of course, you know, Book of Life,

you know, and that kind of thing.

And then facing me is

actually more anime pop.

So a lot of anime pops.

Yeah.

I got certain characters

from the Star Wars universe

and pop figures.

I like it.

Which ones do you have?

See, I got Hu Yang.

Nice.

I got the Ronin.

Luke.

Yes.

Leia.

Palpatine.

Obi-Wan.

And Grievous.

nice yeah our whole living

room downstairs is star

wars themed so curtains

everything and I got the uh

the darth versus luke in

the throne room that one I

actually do not have we

have a pretty good chunk of

found that one randomly at

um shit the emo place in the mall

There you go.

I was like, I was like,

I was going to guess hot topic.

That's kind of my, it's not,

it's not what it is.

Giveaway on that one.

I know, but it was,

it's not the same as when

we were growing up or at

least when I was growing up too.

I was like, so different.

Oh yeah.

One second.

My camera glitched.

Let me check something here.

The joys of live TV.

Let me go back to the Mac.

The Mac comment.

The joy of live TV.

Facts.

This is what we're going to do.

We're going to do... I know

over at the Pop Break,

they like to do their icebreaker.

We're going to do one here

at USDN tonight.

That is... Are you prepared

for Deadpool and Wolverine this weekend?

I'm hoping so.

We have to get our tickets still.

I didn't get our tickets.

It's sold out here, I think.

I have to check.

I think we'll probably go

for a very late night showing.

Usually I wait to see if Brandon's booked.

I have to wait.

He's booked this weekend, isn't he?

He's actually off this weekend.

Really?

And then he's back to being booked,

which is great.

He gets a weekend here and there.

It's good for him to just heal up.

If he is booked, he is working.

Exactly.

And if he's to get all weekends off,

that means he can heal and

do all those things that, you know,

mow the lawn and hang out with the fam.

He's got a honeydew list over here.

But I think we're going to a

con this weekend.

Yeah.

Speaking of cons,

it is San Diego Comic-Con this weekend.

So if y'all are out in the

San Diego area and you're

hearing the sound of my voice,

let us know how it is.

I've been seeing pop-ups all

day about it and it looks

like a fantastic show in

this year as always at San

Diego Comic-Con.

It's one of the biggest in

the United States.

I think it may be the

biggest at this point.

I think it surpassed quite a

few of the bigger ones like

the one in LA and the one in New York.

I think it's like...

gulfed them by now all right

this is I think the

premiere the premiere

comic-con although it's

getting it's getting

challenged a little bit

because I mean you have you

know uh disney's you know

with the d23 coming up you

have you know a star wars

celebration so it's it's

funny now instead of like

because you know they killed off um

That one big.

The gaming one.

Yeah.

Because.

I forgot what it's called.

E23, I think.

I think that is what it is.

Yes.

E3.

There it goes.

They killed it off because

everybody was choosing just

to do their own thing,

which is cool because

PlayStation does a really cool one.

Microsoft's is really cool every year.

So these people are like,

we don't really need y'all

to advertise for us no more.

Plus y'all don't do such a

great job at it.

You know,

it's cause it kind of tinkered off,

you know,

when it finally like the nail in

the coffin was cool.

COVID just like done.

But anyways, but yeah,

I'm hoping to see it this weekend.

Bill, our wonderful friend,

Bill Botkin got the

Wolverine popcorn bucket.

I seen that.

It was really cool.

We'll see if he got the Deadpool one.

I'm going to go for...

Because we're probably

going to try to do an early

morning show when all the

drunkards are asleep.

And try to get in that way.

And I'm just going to buy

everything they got.

I don't care what it is.

Popcorn bucket?

Check.

I'm getting it all.

Cups?

Check.

$100 down the drain.

So be it.

Hey, that's okay.

What I love about going back

to the theaters is it's an experience.

I actually went to see a

different... The plan was...

You know,

I'll probably go see Deadpool and

Wolverine.

That'll probably be the

first time I go back into a

theater for the first time

in a long time.

But my daughter was like, hey, dad.

What was it?

Bad Boys 4 is coming to the theater.

We went and seen Bad Boys 3.

We got to go see Bad Boys 4.

And it was great.

It was fun.

I had a good time.

So for the little kid that

was running around, which irritated me,

I'm like, dude, why are you even here?

This is a rated R flick.

yeah don't bring your kids

to the rated r flicks I'm

sorry or if you do make

sure they can sit still

please let them sit still

but uh yeah I heard good

things about it I haven't

seen it I enjoyed it I

enjoyed it good you're the

third person I've talked to

that says they've really

enjoyed it so now I have to

go see it well let's jump

into something that not so

many people have enjoyed

and continue to treat like a turd

And that is the Alkalite.

That is what we're here for.

So the Alkalite is set about

a century before Episode 1,

The Phantom Menace.

And it's basically the final

days of the High Republic era.

It is a mystery thriller,

murder mystery set on... It

starts out on Brindock,

which is where the Coven of Witches

That this is kind of like

centered around the children of, you know,

two witches.

And I think they're saying

the year was 132 BBY is

what I think it is.

But that, you know,

that's basically the time

frame we're looking at.

It's our first time in Star

Wars history that we are in

the High Republic era,

which is really cool.

And honestly, I've enjoyed it.

I enjoyed it.

I'm not going to lie.

I could have probably done

without the last flashback episode.

That was episode seven, I think.

Seven, yes.

I would have liked to get a

little bit more substance

out of that episode

probably versus giving us

another continuation of a flashback.

See, I'm figuring,

because we were talking

about this over the pop break,

and I liked this idea.

I want to say it was Amanda Clark,

or Amanda Jr.,

as we call her on the pop break,

that suggested the switch order here.

She said it would have been

interesting to see what

actually the flashback is.

I think or you see what

actually happened and then

you get the flashback from

the point of view where you're like,

that's not what really happened.

So it's like you get the

flashback episode.

You kind of see what happened.

And then here's what really happened.

And you're like, oh,

that would see that would

have gave us more substance, though.

Yes.

You know, and that's not what we got.

We kind of got like the same

one from episode three.

I think it was three or four.

It was almost the exact.

It was like.

The same two episodes, basically,

with a little bit more, you know,

sprinkled in a little salt

bae on top of it.

You know, like, oh, here's a little more.

I'm like, you cannot be serious.

This is the episode we're

getting on episode seven

before the finale.

But hey, what are you going to do?

I mean,

a lot of it is the short episode

runtimes.

They were short.

They were very short.

Yeah.

Because I was expecting

about an hour an episode,

and I don't think we got that.

I think we got, what, 40 minutes?

If that.

Some of them were 27, like right at 30.

If you're shaving off time

for the credits.

they were they were short

and um you know I i figured

we'd get at least like one

or maybe two an hour

episodes and we got none

which is surprising I was

like oh bad editing yeah so

that's the um is that

snyder school of editing

right there maybe we have

to wait for the director's cut

uh I'm gonna apologize right

off the bat you might hear

some thunder it's starting

to rain on my end oh no

connection is uh we've been

getting it all week yeah so

just a apology to everybody

out there because I can

hear it I'm like we'll see

if y'all can I can most

definitely hear it if y'all

hear it in the background

I'm sorry uh knock on wood

we're still good connection wise

let's hope we we stay

connected no more incidents

tonight no more we got it

all done yeah it's out of

this system we're good to

go let's jump into the cast

what did you think about

the cast of the acolyte oh

man there were some

definitely some standouts

for sure who's your

standout oh man I'm so torn

I'm so for two entirely

different reasons who are you thinking

First of all, Lee Jung Jae, Master Soul,

nailed this.

He learned English by

watching Qui-Gon Jinn.

And you got that energy right off the bat.

You got it.

He vibed with Qui-Gon for

all eight episodes,

and I was down for it.

It was awesome.

He carried so much of the show.

His emotion sold everything.

It did.

He just,

your heart was breaking with him

so much of the way.

And when he was anxious and

just kind of like, you know,

all over the place and he was,

he was a mess in this whole

flashback episode.

And you,

you felt that I think more so

because of him and just, you know,

I think a lot of that, I don't,

I don't think we would have

got that same type of

energy and emotion from a

natural born English speaker.

Cause I think a lot of that

could have been like him

genuinely being nervous,

delivering lines and that kind of stuff.

So,

and it kind of like fed into his

portrayal of master soul and it worked,

it worked really well in my opinion.

It did.

I mean, just the emotion he portrayed.

And what I would have liked, actually,

one of our guests, Marjani Rawls,

brought this up.

And I actually really loved the idea.

And I wish they kind of had done it.

Was if you had gotten a

flashback of Master Soul as

like a child in the Jedi Temple.

And just to see where this

attachment to Osha in

particular comes from.

And then I'm like, I'm like,

that would have been brilliant.

But then at the same time, I'm like,

that would have been a

clear and like even clear

indictment of the Jedi.

I don't know if we're ready

to quite go that far.

Well,

we know from other media that the

Jedi weren't exactly the

standup citizens of

Coruscant that they are

portrayed as later.

But if you have like crying

baby master soul, I don't know.

I mean, what was it?

Um,

The first season of Legends

of the Jedi or whatever it is,

the animated series.

For Tales of the Jedi.

Tales of the Jedi.

Yes.

When we see three-year-old

Ahsoka Tano being taken from her home.

It's like that vibe.

Because three years old is

like... We see newborns

later on in the Clone Wars.

Bad Batch.

Bad Batch, yeah.

So yeah.

Interesting.

Just to give you a chance to get to know.

We'll see.

It was the empire that took the child,

the baby, not the Jedi.

There we go.

Right.

Who knows?

They may be guilty of it too,

but toddlers.

Yeah.

They weren't off the.

They called.

A lot of their practices

were called into question.

And it's an interesting way

of doing it because then

you see what led to what

happened with Anakin.

Ultimately.

You want a fun fact of the day.

Let's hear it.

The Jedi Temple was built on

the Sith Shrine of the Depths.

And it also explains how the

Jedi were clouded by the

dark side and how their

connection with the Force was corrupted.

Fun fact of the day.

It explains a lot of the stuff.

I mean, you can read it in Legends, but...

It's one of those where it makes sense,

everything that has

happened to the Jedi from

the Acolyte until where we

are now in the Star Wars timeline.

And I'm wondering if that's

something that will come

from Legends into Canon.

Because a lot of people are questioning.

I'm hoping it does.

A lot of people are questioning,

why didn't Yoda sense all of this?

And where was Yoda?

I mean,

Yoda's been living in the temple since,

you know, for 800 plus years.

Yeah, that makes a lot of sense.

He might have been in his

late 700s in this series.

Ooh.

Well, he was what?

900 when he died?

Yeah.

He was into his 900s when he died.

Yeah.

So about 700s.

Yeah.

Sounds about right.

But who was your second?

Manny Jacinto.

Oh, my gosh.

Just went from being, you know,

just kind of this goofy.

He was a side character.

He was.

And then all of a sudden he

was the main act.

And he stole the entire damn show.

Oh, he did.

And all of a sudden, yeah,

he went from side character,

kind of goofy, kind of like, you know,

kind of like you could write off to.

I'm going to steal from, you know,

Ren Sinclair here,

mad main character energy here.

So straight up just just came in.

Shout out to Ren Sinclair.

She's killing it on NXT right now.

Yes, she is.

That's Star Wars now.

Sorry, had to throw it out there.

She's killing it.

You want to put her in the

Star Wars universe, y'all can.

Just saying.

I'd be down for it.

She's killing it right now in NXT.

I'm liking the character.

yeah so you know he's but

manny jacinto came in with

his main character energy

took the internet by storm

it's a whole thirst wave

here was I part of that yes

yes I was he's a short king

I had no doubt about it yes

yes it is short king spring

and also rat boy we call it

rat boy summer he has a

little bit he has a rat boy

features so um that's a

whole thing but I'm taking

your word for it

Yeah, just it's a thing.

It's a thing.

All the guys that are it

right now have all rat features.

So it's a rat boy summer.

All righty.

Y'all heard it here first,

ladies and gentlemen.

But yeah, I just I loved how he came in.

He killed it with the lightsaber bottles.

Those two.

I'm like, I'm here.

Did you see his training?

Yes.

Jesus.

Like,

like how fast he was moving in some

of it.

Well, him and soul both.

And yeah, keep in mind souls in his life.

or Lee Jun Jae is in his 50s, I think.

I want to say yes.

Late 40s, early 50s.

And that dude was getting

down with the lightsaber battle.

Oh, he was born for Star Wars.

He really was.

He was.

That scene in the woods

where he has the initial

fight with Chimera and then he crouches,

gets down on one knee, excuse me,

one leg is out and he's got the saber,

just goes into that pose instinctively.

I was like, that was...

That little movement was pure poetry.

Then we got that awesome-ass

force push toward the end

of the battle and the

finale that was like, dude.

He was underestimated for

the entire eight episodes.

You didn't really see how

really powerful he was until...

Like that kind of cemented him like,

oh damn,

Master Soul ain't to be fucked

with on this.

No, not at all.

And kind of circling back to Manny Jacinto,

what I liked about his performance too,

especially as now kind of,

you may call me a Sith,

but I'm not a Sith.

I'm kind of hoping still,

I'm holding out hope he's a

knight of my predecessor, a knight of Ren,

but that's just me holding out hope here.

But I like that when he was

not in fight mode,

everything he was telling

Osha made a lot of sense.

It was, yeah.

It made a lot of sense.

And he came across as

somebody you could be like, you know,

he doesn't look like the

typical Sith where it is, you know,

you have, you know, we look at Vader.

right even though vader is

super cool obviously he's

iconic nobody can top vader

but he's not the warm

fuzzies in his or you know

you don't feel like well I

can let my guard down or

mall you look at darth maul

again very like

intimidating looking just

with being from dathomir

but he was a talker though

he was you didn't expect

that from him when you your

initial impression of him is like

yeah but didn't he you hear

his words yes all right

dude we're I mean what are

we doing today oh we're

going to take over a course

on all right cool let's go let's I'm down

And it's a different side of

the force with each one,

different aspect of the

dark side of the force.

But both of those interpretations,

although excellent,

and even with Palpatine,

Palpatine is smooth.

He's a talker.

But he was raised that way too.

Exactly.

He was a true politician.

He was.

I mean, from an early age.

I mean, like he was found in...

university learning politics

yeah and so very different

interpretations of the dark

side but not one of them

made you feel like you know

you could you're having a

conversation with someone

and their points all make

sense even though in your

mind you know you know it's

wrong I don't know should

be talking to this guy but

in some ways is he wrong though

He really wasn't.

Not in this case.

And so that's what I loved

about this performance was

that Manny Jacinto called

you to question what the

Jedi did in a whole different way.

And there's something else

that I appreciate about Manny Jacinto.

He put Tom Cruise on blast

in an interview about his

appearance in Top Gun.

He's like, yeah,

all my lines in Top Gun

were rewritten by Tom

Cruise because let's face it,

it's Tom Cruise and it's his movie.

He just flat out like called

him out on it.

I was like, all right, Manny.

Cool.

Now, respect for that.

And I loved that he went from, you know,

we kind of, you know, from a good place.

You know, he's kind of like,

he always plays the goofy

kind of character.

He's the Asian sidekick.

Yeah.

And then he comes in and is just,

leans into the seductive

side of the force.

I was like, oh, really?

We're playing this up.

I know people say Anakin is,

and I know a lot of people like, you know,

Hayden Christensen.

And he's, don't get me wrong,

Hayden is a handsome man.

But I'm sorry, the dialogue,

I don't like sand.

Manny Jacinto turned it up a notch.

Yes, he did.

There's 10,

and there's that little extra

at the end of it.

Manny kind of turned it to

that little extra portion

on the dial and dialed it up.

Yeah, and I loved his wardrobe, too.

The look.

It was simple.

It was.

It was raggy.

It was very efficient.

I guess if you're traveling through,

you're not dragging a cloak

on the ground.

Practical.

The most impractical thing

he had was the helmet.

Which we talked about that

with the introduction.

Knowing you and how much you love legends.

Were you excited to see the

Cthorsis helmet?

Oh yeah.

Without a doubt that the moment,

like it in the preview, I was like, Ooh,

I'm really like Googling, you know,

trying to be like,

dig out anything that's, you know,

morsel of a breadcrumb

that's on the internet

before the show ever

started to find out if

that's what it really was.

And then it was like, Oh, okay.

And then when the show

finally started and we got

to see it firsthand and I was like,

That's the money.

Because the only other time

we've seen that, I think,

in live action was Kylo Ren's.

Because Vader never got one.

That's right.

Was it?

Kylo's was, yeah.

It was, right?

Okay.

Well, huh.

Okay.

I have to go back.

I have to try to rewatch it.

I've watched.

I tried recently.

It's a difficult watch.

It is.

So I tried.

I've watched it twice.

I watched it the first time

when it came out.

And then I'm like, you know what?

Maybe I'm being way too harsh.

Maybe my opinion has changed.

And I'm like,

There were more brighter spots.

You know,

like the fight scene with him and Rey.

You find the Vatorian guards.

It was a great scene.

There were things I'm like,

I think I walked out of

there more frustrated.

Like there was so much potential here.

It really was.

And the fact that, you know,

it took us three episodes

that learned that Rey was a Palpatine.

Oh, I know.

And he still believed in the,

like the way his viewpoints

in the Sith universe.

changed from you know the

rule of two to no it's a

dyad and I need these two

in order to bring myself

back to full power yeah

there's a lot the two most

powerful families in the

galaxy the the skywalkers

and the palpatines

I know, there was so much,

there was so much there.

And of course we see a lot of,

I think the current content

that is in current timeline

Star Wars trying to kind of

work with what's been given

kind of thing.

But so I'm also very glad

we're in the High Republic era.

We get a break to see something different.

And so I love, again,

this interpretation of the

Sith and the Jedi and just

really getting information

to where it's like, oh, here's why.

this, this all happened.

And it's like one or two

sentences said here and

there within the show that

makes stuff make sense from

the original trilogy,

not the original trilogy.

I'm sorry, but episode one.

Yeah.

Which I guess would be the

second trilogy technically.

Yes.

But so much good stuff.

Who, who are your standouts?

Who'd you love?

Um, so Daphne Keene, Jackie,

she was fantastic.

And, um,

Shit, I'm sitting here looking at it.

Yeah,

she was my she was my favorite female

character.

Then it's a toss up between

Manny and Lee Jung Jae

between those two in in Daphne Keene.

Oh, Daphne was excellent.

She was my favorite female character.

She was phenomenal.

And I really wanted to like

Rebecca Henderson's

portrayal of Vernestra.

But I didn't like this

version of Vernestra that

much compared to the comic

book version of her.

See, and I think that's part of it,

is part of the writing.

I feel like I wish we had

gotten a little bit more of

the politics part of it.

And I don't know if the

second season is going

to... If we get a second season...

Well,

if they want stuff to make more sense,

they're going to have to

because they left us with

so many plot holes that we

have to see more of the

politics side of it.

And what I really want to

see is basically the

fallout of the sellout, basically.

Right.

Let's face it.

Well, I guess we'll –

It doesn't matter.

Vernestra sold Master Soul

out as the conspirator to

this whole eight-episode

murder mystery that we got.

I found this was such an

interesting choice that

they went with Vernestra for this.

Because again, like you mentioned,

she's in the comics.

That was my first thought.

I was like, oh, it's Vernestra Rowe.

She's in the comics and the kids books.

For the higher public, the kids books.

And a little bit,

she comes out here and

there in some of the young adult books.

Well,

we didn't really see Master Vernestra

in the comic book yet.

We just see, you know, Vernestra.

Yes.

Or Vern, as everybody calls her.

Yes,

and so it's an interesting choice that

they went with a character

they're currently marketing

in this era that you're selling comics.

And all these are considered canon.

So I'm just wondering how

this is all going to come together.

So I feel like the writing

didn't do Vern a whole lot of justice.

And we only got one light

saber whip crack.

Yeah, I know.

We got a budget.

I mean,

they literally showed us the scars

on Chimera's back.

I have questions on that, though.

Oh, well, we're going to.

We'll get there.

So let's discuss the Sith

Lords that could have

possibly been active during

this time frame.

So we know Dark Plagueis

shows up in the finale episode Creeping.

So that leaves you with more plot holes.

Why is he there?

Is Chimera there?

his current padawan or not

padawan I should say but

his number two I know is

this just before he found

sheev palpatine what the

hell is it because we don't

know because it was just

like oh he's creeping in a

cave like I don't know if

he's creeping he's been

creeping that long

the cave I feel like if he

were kymere's master kymere

would have said something

or would have you know I i

I think he would have gone

to investigate osha while

kymere was not around so my

my thinking of this is is

kymere is a legit rogue yes

he he's still he's still following

What was his name?

Darth Darth Bane,

who established the rule of

two somewhat around 1000 BBY,

which is kind of where it's

been at since the Great Sith War.

And then Darth Bane's like, all right,

fuck this in fight.

Now there's only two of us,

a master and an apprentice.

So I'm thinking Chimera is

just a rogue wanting an apprentice,

an acolyte, if you will.

I agree with that.

I feel like Plagueis is like, wait,

who the fuck's these people, you know,

interfering with my shit?

See,

I feel like you're hitting the nail on

the head here because I feel like, yes,

the rule of two is clearly in effect,

but you have other dark

side or dark force users.

And I feel like Chimera is

more of a dark force user

than an actual Sith.

He gives me the energy like

he's another Ventress.

You had Dooku having Ventress, right?

Yep.

And then Maul having... Oh no,

he slipped my mind here.

Savage.

Savage, there we go.

Having Savage.

So I feel like you're right

that there is a dynamic

with the Dark Force users.

And again, there can only be two Sith,

but there are still the Dark Force users.

It's just who's going to be the two,

right?

But I'm wondering...

Because we saw Pelagius,

and I'm wondering if

Chimera is somehow tied to Venomous,

because he's also alive around this time,

I would think.

Yeah, Tenebrous, yeah.

Tenebrous.

Yep.

Or not Tenebrous, but Tenebrous had two,

didn't he?

He had Pelagius and then Venomous.

Yes, you're correct, I believe.

Yeah.

so I'm wondering if it's not

necessarily tenebrous but

even venomous because

venomous was technically an

acolyte if pelagos was the

main apprentice so I'm

wondering if we're getting

that or here's the thing

and this is probably going

to make people unhappy but

I'm just one second sure

you put it in share

Oh, it's not doing it.

Are you trying to share?

Yeah, it's kind of like stuck in a loop.

I have no idea what's going on.

See, I have a thought on this whole,

because I know the internet

like blew up with the whole,

who is the master?

Who is this?

I have a theory.

Well, an idea.

What is it?

So,

Pelagius was introduced because he's

already been in canon.

The books are canon.

I mean, the whole quote,

which I always laugh when I

see the meme where it's like,

have you ever heard the

tale of Darth Pelagius?

Yeah, that's one of my favorites.

Yeah,

with his earbuds in and on his phone.

But those lines made Pelagius canon.

Nobody else in that line is canon.

So, I mean,

if Disney and Star Wars wanted to...

They can do a whole new Sith lineage.

Well, I mean, they could in Disney canon.

Disney canon.

I mean, it's not going to change legends,

but they can do it in Disney canon.

And they might.

I can see Disney very well

doing that because they

want it to be their thing.

Exactly.

It kind of takes it

definitely out of the George Lucas era.

and definitely like puts

their stamp their disney

you know stamp on that so

yeah I could see them doing

that now I can also see

again like with les what

leslie headland is doing

which I think is smart she

is looking at legends and

she is she does want to do

knights of the old republic

which would be phenomenal

to do which which would be

it's just how much freedom

does she have to do that

because I feel like if it

were up to her she'd

probably pull more than pelagas

You would get more.

I think you would get

actually more of the Sith

lineage from her.

What I do like about the

Plagueis appearance is,

so you know Tenebra, Tenebra,

however you want to pronounce his name,

definitely was into the

darker magic within the Sith.

He was also one of the first

ones to get into the

cloning and trying to

extend his own life.

And then Plagueis picked

that up as well and ran

with it after he off Tenebris.

It continued his work.

He's also the one who

learned how to do the essence transferred,

which he's seen as the key

to immortality.

Which is where Sidious picks it up as well,

who we know did make clones of himself.

Because one of his clones

obviously went rogue and made Rey.

So, I mean, and then, oh, by the way,

this whole fall of the Jedi

order was started by Darth Bane.

Not Darth Bane.

It actually goes back further than him.

It goes back to 2000 BBY, I think.

Because I know that the plan

that Sidious played out was

like a plan that had been

over a thousand years in the making.

Yeah.

So it's pretty cool how you

can go back and you can

start connecting little

dots and the show will make sense.

But if you don't go back and

you don't Google and you

don't do other reading,

you're just kind of like, oh, well,

this show kind of sucks.

If you go back and you

actually look up stuff, you're like, oh,

okay.

I think a lot of the criticism, though,

is coming from people that

are familiar with Legends

and are familiar, like they're here.

And to be fair,

there are shortcomings to the show.

For sure.

We've talked about a few of

them with some of the

structure and some of the... And again,

I kind of feel like Leslie

Hedlund's hands were tied to an extent.

I really do feel like

she's... But were they?

Ish.

Not as much.

I still think she had some freedom,

but I also think... Because

I kind of see... What's his name?

Dave Filoni as being pretty

open-minded when it comes

to the High Republic era.

I think so too.

And that kind of stuff too.

But they also report to Disney.

And that is also true.

I think a lot of the show

that people are complaining about,

if we would have got better

edited versions...

Of things, it could have been better.

Again, the Zack Snyder comparison, right?

Exactly.

Longer episodes.

Again, you know, I think if done well,

you can incorporate

characters like Darth Bane.

You can include Darth Tenebrous.

You can bring them from Legends over.

I mean, look at Thrawn.

Thrawn was technically Legends,

and he shot over very well into canon.

Well,

Thrawn made his grand appearance in

other...

And animated before he

became a live action.

But he translated well either way.

I mean,

anything can be translated with

good writing.

Exactly.

That's what it boils down to.

And I'm not saying this was badly written.

Or am I?

I'm not there was some there

was some some writing I

would have to say that was

that was a little weak and

I think for me that goes

back to OSHA May in

particular and why people

did dialogue but I know

we're we're I'm sure we're

working our way down there

but yeah there yeah we are

Yeah,

but I don't think that Chimera is

Darth Plagueis' apprentice.

I feel like Darth Plagueis

showed up investigating to

look at the virgins.

Yes.

And look into how did they create.

So I heard something happen

here about this life being created.

So that was another question

that I had to myself was,

we know this Covenant of

Witches produced life.

Not only produced it, but they split it.

I don't really think they

meant to split the life.

Because they say it's two people,

one soul.

Right.

Is the saying that they used.

So it becomes one of

those... Did they do

something wrong when they were doing it?

Their whole... That's a great question.

That's a great question.

It's possible.

Plagueis there to

investigate the witches or

he was just observing the

witches from the beginning

and watched them create

this life and was he there

to also try to learn the

secret because hey they

created life maybe that's

another key to unlocking

immortality because that's

what it's all about with

the Sith right it's living

forever for their thousand year plan

Yeah.

I don't know if he was there.

I don't think he was there

watching the whole time

because I feel like once

the kids were created,

he would have jumped in

there or done something.

I think something.

I think you're right.

I think something happened, you know,

kind of with everything

that went on in Brendock

that was like undisturbed

after the witches died.

But the urgence was still there.

It never went away.

Exactly.

And then you have the twins

both back near the virgins.

I feel like he was there to

investigate and look at you know, okay,

and I think OSHA may really

are imperfect because you

cannot control the force if

they were able to do it perfectly,

then correct.

I think it was an attempt.

It was an attempt to do what

the Force did with Anakin.

Anakin is a true virgin, I feel like.

I think that was their

attempt to do such a thing,

but you can't do it.

I think Plagueis learned how to do it.

Anakin was his success story

when it comes to that.

The question is,

was the twins his first trial?

Was his trial an error?

That's very possible.

It's a plot hole.

You know what I'm saying?

Which brings me to my next question.

Were the time gaps slash

holes in the show confusing

to the finale?

And were the two flashback episodes,

did they really bring

anything extra to the series?

Or would it have been better

to use those two episodes?

Or have one episode where we

get a good flashback?

And then the other episode

be used to actually fill in

more plot holes.

If we were going to do a

flashback versus two of the

same flashbacks, basically.

I think it's just, for me,

it came down to placement

of the flashbacks.

Like, I feel like it would have been,

like we talked about earlier,

a very good way to make somebody go, oh,

you know, if they had done the first,

you know,

the first flashback with them on

Brendock and you're like, oh, okay,

that's cool.

And then, oh, that all went down.

Oops.

And then, you know,

get what actually happened.

And it's like, oh, okay.

And that's the thing.

We still never learned what

actually happened on

Brindock outside of Sol

killing what's her name?

Anisea?

Anisea.

Which I think Sol in his bad

decision making all the way

through that episode.

I think a lot of it was his

connection to Osha has to

have something to do with

the way he was brought in as well.

Because it was like a brotherly,

sisterly type of love he had for her,

I think.

It almost felt like a dad.

Or a dad-daughter.

Like a dad-daughter.

He was very protective of her.

I felt bad for May, though.

Yeah,

we'll get into me taking the fucking

short straw on that deal.

No kidding.

Poor thing all the way through.

And we'll talk about that.

But I I'm just I think it

was just a placement.

I feel like you could have

told a better story if you

had arranged the order and

maybe episodes longer,

because I think it's important.

Like if you see, you know,

here's this was.

I mean, shit, the Bad Batch finale,

I think, was an hour.

Yep.

I think all the Mandalorian episodes,

the Sokatano episodes,

I think all of them were 45 minutes.

Yeah.

So this is literally the

shortest series that we got.

Clone Wars episodes were

longer than these.

Exactly.

And I'm like, you know, I think, again,

they could have filled in a

lot of the plot holes.

And I think you could have

effectively set up a season,

more effectively set up a

season two with some of the

intrigue that we're getting

with the Senate.

Because that inquiry,

those inquiries are going

to be interesting.

I want to be in there.

Yeah.

They could do a whole nother

series just on the, you know,

the inquiries from the Senate on this,

you know?

Yes.

I am so excited in here for that.

I'm like, yeah,

if y'all want to do that show,

we'll be watching.

Oh, yeah.

Without a doubt.

You got us.

Without a doubt.

Imagine like Law and Order, like.

Hey, I would be there.

I would be there for it,

which is basically what

this show was or how it started out.

Yeah.

And so I, I mean,

what did you think of the, what, you know,

what did you think of the, the time gaps?

Were you confused by those?

I wasn't necessarily confused by it.

Cause like I said, I, I am the,

the star Wars nerd that

does go and look up stuff

and I can kind of fill in the gaps myself,

but I, I,

Like you said,

an extra 10 to 15 minutes

per episode would have went

really far in making a lot

of more things make more sense.

Lots of credit to Amanda Jr.

here because she came to the

table for us too.

Let's give a shout out to Amanda Jr.

She wanted to be here, but she couldn't.

Oh, Amanda is great.

Y'all go follow her on the pop break.

Amanda.news.

Yes, Amanda.news on Instagram,

but definitely check her

work out on the Pop Break as well.

She's covered The Acolyte.

She's covered a few other shows for us.

Bridgerton.

Yes.

Oh, man.

Her hot take on Bridgerton.

Don't get her started on Bridgerton.

I know.

I get it.

She made a lot of valid points,

and I know it's going to

make some of the Bridgerton

fans out there upset,

but she had some valid points.

um so go check out her work

on thepopbreak.com read her

articles share she does a

great job and she had some

really really good feedback

here on the acolyte like

she actually talked about

originally she thought

about if this could have

been a movie or this could

have been a bingeable if

just release make it a

bingeable show yeah and

this probably would have

worked better and then she

said make it a bingeable

show switch episodes six

and seven which is what I

did and it worked better

for me I have to go back

and watch it like that now

so try that out this weekend

it was good I i felt it

that way junior is picking

this up fast junior junior

is is a wonderful she's a

wonderful apprentice you

know two amandas isn't a

bad thing that's why we

call her junior and when we

finally do get her on the

show though I gotta have

you and her on at the same time

You got to change your name

to Amanda Senior.

She has to be Amanda Junior

for it to work.

We will do it.

It will be great.

I have no problem.

Shout out to Rutgers

University for producing

some fine journalists.

Yes, absolutely.

Absolutely.

I mean,

I can see Bill's head right now

just like growing 10 times his size.

I mean, he's not wrong, though.

He is not wrong.

He's really not.

And shout out to Bill.

He's at his daughter's play tonight,

counseled all his plans,

moved the shows around so

he could be there.

Fucking grade A stand up, Dad.

Absolutely.

We love you, Bill.

Yes, we do.

We love you.

Definitely love you way more

than some of these potholes

and the orders of these episodes.

But again, yes.

No.

Speaking of plot holes.

Yes.

Where the mother coral go?

In this whole fiasco,

this lady just like ninja

smoke bomb disappeared.

I thought she was the one

who possessed Kalnaka.

She did, but then she disappeared.

We don't, she didn't die.

See, I'm wondering,

I had a theory about that too.

I'm like,

I'm wondering if Pelagius and his

research encountered her.

If for some reason, if that, if they,

the twins were his first attempt to

They had to work with someone.

He could have lent that

energy and what he knew and

kind of manipulated those two.

So I'm wondering,

did he teach them or did he use them?

I'm assuming he used them

because he didn't want to

teach them too much.

Welcome back to the network, man.

Hi, Kelvin.

Always good to see you, man.

Plot holes.

I think that was a deliberate plot hole.

I think it is, too.

And I think if we get a season two,

we may see her.

She had a lot of anger.

Oh, she was an angry Dathomirian.

Yes.

And her look was interesting, too,

because I, you know, I was like.

Most of the female

Dathomirians don't look like that.

No.

So it's an interesting.

So she was like a hybrid of them.

She was a very interesting character.

And I honestly feel like

there's something... She is the key.

We miss you too, big fella.

We love you.

Yes.

We have to catch up on all

the summer anime right now.

Because it is an amazing season.

Shika Shika.

If you're watching during Okatan.

I'm literally on season six

of Game of Thrones.

Suffering.

Because we all know season

six through eight is just horrid.

Oh, why?

But I got to get through it

so I can watch House of Dragons.

I don't have to.

Yeah, but I don't.

I get it.

Mental OCD blockage won't

let me do it without.

I get it.

But it is the season.

Both seasons of House of

Dragon have been great.

And I've not heard a whole

lot of bad things said about it.

And I'm kicking myself for

not being already up on it.

But I'm getting there.

But I got to do Game of Thrones first.

Yes, absolutely.

But yeah,

I really feel like with Mother Coral,

I feel like she is the key

between Pelagos and this vergence.

Well,

we do know from Legends that he did

study...

and did have interactions

with the witches of both

Dathomir and I'm sure

others and his travels

because he literally that way,

his life was dedicated to

the dark science and to the

old Sith ways.

So we'll see how that works out for us.

And if we get a season two.

Yeah.

And we already answered the

second part of kind of like

that question I had of,

did the Sith play a part in

the birth of me and OSHA?

So we'll jump to the,

What really set the whole thing off,

which is we learned that

Sol killed Anisea and

finally learns the truth of

what happened on Brindock.

And then she uses that rage

to kill Master Sol before

Vernestra can arrive to save him.

So with this basically

statement slash question,

We know Mei started her

quest to kill the Jedi that wronged her.

And basically, Chimera, the stranger,

gave her, like,

you must kill a Jedi

without using a weapon.

And fucking Osha come out

swinging with that shit.

Yeah, she did.

She did.

That was the force choke of force chokes.

I didn't even put two and

two together that that was

even an option.

I didn't either until she whipped it out.

Yeah.

She was hiding it so well

because she was like, like,

I don't know if it was

something that just happened,

like out of like the pure

rage that she felt in that moment.

But when he grabbed this

throat and I'm looking

around like the screen,

like who in the fuck is

choking master soul here?

Yeah.

I thought it was Chimera at first.

I was like, I did too.

Yeah.

I thought he was helping her.

And then I'm like, oh.

But no,

she was having a full-on teenage

hissy fit,

choking the shit out of that man.

Yeah,

but how about that kyber crystal

bleeding?

What'd you think about that?

Ooh, that was,

so I was saving that for last.

Oh, I'm sorry.

But no, let's just fucking jump into it,

because that was,

so we know most Sith use

synthetic crystals.

Just period.

We have only seen a bleeding

of a kyber crystal in comic.

And I think Kylo did it.

I want to say that's correct.

If I remember.

Yes.

And then the only other time

we've really seen it in

visual media outside of the

comic book was in one of the video games.

Jedi Survivor.

We see it.

Yes.

And the amount of pain.

anger and emotion that goes

into actually physically

bleeding a kyber crystal is

something to think about in

this situation and oh by

the way you have to have it

you have to have it

physically in your hand now

soul's lightsaber broke on

impact so when she's holding his saber

It is broke in a kyber

crystal is actually pushing

into her hand and she is bleeding into it,

like physically bleeding

from her hand into this crystal.

Combine that with the anger

and all the other emotions

she's having and the fact

that she is at the same

time force choking the shit

out of Master Soul.

I don't think I think it

takes a lot longer for a

kyber crystal to actually

be bled and a lot more.

she wasn't thinking about it.

In her anger, she bled that crystal.

I have heard criticism on

the other side where they're like, oh,

it took too long.

It didn't take long enough.

When you see it in the comic

book and other things,

even when Kylo bled his,

he was over angry and he

was... It's a whole thing.

There's a whole...

10 page spread of him

bleeding his crystal in the

comic book and it's it's

intense as hell because he

cracks his with so much

anger because you can't

overdo it you can't underdo

it you know it's got to be

like just right to bleed a

crystal see I did

appreciate that you got it

was happening as she was

going through all of the

things and choking soul

like I feel like it just

lined up it was a

It was like her feelings

bleeding into that.

And I thought it was very

poetic and beautifully done.

Like the moment the camera

shifted and you see that

crystal turn red.

I was like, holy shit.

Like, is there in theory wrong?

Yes.

But was it fucking beautiful

to see on screen for the very first time?

That kind of way.

It was amazing.

I will.

Yeah.

I'm not mad about it.

I'm really not.

In the moment she ignited it.

Technically it should have blew up.

But.

It's Star Wars.

We're not talking about all that.

The wind.

Ideas and theories out.

The wind here.

She lit that damn thing.

It was blue.

And then that red come out of it.

That was cool.

It was beautiful, plain and simple.

It was beautiful and

something to behold because

we had never gotten that before, you know,

and damn, that was phenomenal.

And it was interesting.

I feel like she channeled,

especially when Sol told her, oh,

it's okay.

It's okay.

Like, I forgive you.

And it's like that last bit just pushed,

I think,

that crystal transformation on the edge.

I think that was really the

nail in that coffin, really.

Because it pissed her off

more that she forgave him

or he forgave her on his last breath.

That, and it's an interesting,

we talked about this too on

the pop break.

We were talking about how

it's an interesting choice

that they made was to have

someone who was so full of

regrets and sadness.

And that was the most of the show, guilt,

very guilt-ridden for what

happened to be like, no,

what I did was right.

And stay on the high ground, if you will.

So it was an interesting character shift.

Yeah.

So I can see why she bled

into that crystal a little bit.

Yeah, no, I mean,

it makes sense when you look at it.

But you have to look at it

from an open mind and viewpoint on it.

You can't just walk in the door and go,

I'm immediately going to hate this shit.

And I don't care.

I'm going to hate it no matter what.

Yeah,

I'm just happy we're having we get

Star Wars.

We get Star Wars content.

You and me both.

And we got two good Star Wars shows.

Exactly.

Like back to back.

We got Tales of the Sith

right into Darklight.

Yeah, I mean, I'm here for it.

You know,

anytime there's new Star Wars on TV,

I'm I'm there.

Yeah.

And, you know,

we can have great discussions, you know,

and enjoy talking with each

other and have fun.

And, you know, and again,

there's legit criticisms

out there and that's fine.

We can have a healthy

discourse about that.

Right.

I think there's just a lot

of people nitpicked and focused.

Way too many people

nitpicked and focused on

the wrong parts of this.

Like so many people were mad

about Kiadi Mundi.

I was like, come on guys.

Who cares?

They changed it by what?

20 years or something?

And it was only the only

information we legit had on

his age came from a board game.

Because the Wizards of the

West Coast game.

I'm like, really?

Yeah.

Really?

Not losing sleep over Ki-Adi Mundi.

Yeah.

And it made sense that he

was there because he's the

one that said the Sith

haven't been around for a millennia.

Yeah.

And, you know, again, it's a yes.

Kelvin brought up a great point.

Absolutely.

And I don't know if he was

around when we first started the show.

So he may have missed my fun

fact of the day.

Fun fact of the day, Kelvin,

was the Jedi Temple was

built on top of the Sith

Shrine of the Depths.

And it explains how the Jedi

is linked to the fourth Shrine.

Was eventually corrupted.

So your statement there.

Makes sense with what I said earlier.

On my fun fact of the day.

I hope they bring that into canon.

I think that might be what happens.

It would make so much sense.

For that to be brought into canon.

To explain everything that's happened.

Through all three trilogies.

And TV shows.

Yeah.

I mean, that would make absolute sense,

but we'll see.

We'll see if it, if it happens, but I mean,

you know, speaking of coverups.

Yes.

You want to talk about some

Jedi mind tricks or in this case,

Sith mind tricks.

Let's go for it.

So we see, so they,

they escape souls dead for

Nestor has arrived.

Everybody runs off to the,

the center of the virgins,

which I think is the tree.

And the decision is made

that May will go with the

Jedi and Osha will go with

Chimera to become his

acolyte or his apprentice.

And we see them doing their

little little thing.

They say when they were children,

the I am you, you are me.

We're a big family.

You know, yay.

Kumbaya thing they do.

And then you get that back-facing camera,

or the camera facing the back of Chimera,

and he's just like, and no more.

I was like, bro.

He just pulled a Ben Kenobi,

because he was going by Ben at the time,

and completely wiped her mind.

And then, dude,

I was... That shit was like,

they just met back up.

They just forgave each other for their

For everything, basically.

It made no sense to me.

But... It does play into the

post on Tatooine.

This is true.

But that made no sense to me.

Because I'm like,

this poor girl has drawn

the short end of the stick.

For eight episodes.

I mean, to be fair,

she did kill Master Indara.

you know you know hey r.i.p

r.i.p to master andara she

lasted all of 10 minutes

total true how much did

carrie ann moss make for

this show for 10 minutes

worth of work probably for

the flashbacks that's

probably why that's

probably what she got paid

for well she was on the 10

minutes total this is maybe

12 being if I'm being generous

get on her for that paycheck

man I will that and just

the fact that even if it's

not like a huge part you're

not the main at least you

can say you were in star

wars yeah some people do

that they'll take they're

like you know I just wanted

to be in it doesn't matter

there's a list of

celebrities who have been

stormtroopers their face

were never seen they never

received any type of credit

for it they didn't get paid

they just wanted to be a

stormtrooper on in star wars

And I mean, say they did it.

Exactly.

Just to even say, you know,

I was a Jedi master.

Was I the main?

No, but I'm a Jedi master.

And she even got to do that hand to hand,

get that Trinity energy there.

She did.

And I'm not mad.

No, no.

It was worth it.

10 minutes for me to see her

in something that wasn't

related to whatever that

last matrix movie was.

Cause it was bad.

Yeah, it was pretty rough.

I don't even include it.

I'm like, oh, you mean the trilogy?

No, we don't talk about that.

I just go straight to the Animatrix.

If I don't go for it,

it's like first movie and

then the Animatrix for me.

Or my Matrix for me.

The Animatrix is outstanding.

It is.

It really is.

It's underrated as hell.

Absolutely.

I found it on VHS.

Did you?

I did.

Nice.

I'm so excited about it.

I'm going to actually

probably watch it after this.

So yeah, it's with Seth.

It's going to be fun.

That's going to be awesome.

Yeah,

but we know Vernestra arrives and she

finds Sol already dead.

Basically, May is the only person there.

to take the bullets and she

has no clue what's going on.

She don't even know how to,

what her damn name is at this moment.

And I'm like,

they all could have fled together.

They could have.

So it was,

it was a weird decision for them to,

to leave her there.

And you're,

you're leaving a loose end that

with someone more powerful

can always find that loose end.

Yes.

The last one.

Yes.

yes and I i just I think

that you're leaving a loose

end free and untethered to

the world well and it was

intentionally done but they

were like we will leave you

here and you will be

basically they expected her

to take the blame for all

this stuff like you just

sold your sister out again

again but then vernestra is

like nah stand by hold my beer

We got this.

You don't remember shit, do you?

No, I don't know nothing.

Bet.

Master Soul did it all.

He's been pulling the wool

over everybody's eyes.

He concocted this own thing.

He killed Jedi.

He's killed all these people.

He made a lot of bad decisions.

But then she still gave him a Jedi burial.

A warrior's burial.

That's her guilt.

it is and it's her guilt to

live with because who knows

what else you know exactly

what else is she covered

now I really want to know

so the question is yeah if

we do get a season two do

we get carrie and boss to

come back play and master

indara and what was

originally happening that

was originally covered up

because we really don't see

what originally happened

you know what originally

was covered up and how

everybody actually dies

We still don't know.

I think that we will get a

cameo from her because they

have to connect and Vern

has to know something.

I feel like Master Dara is

going to show up.

She's going to connect the

two arcs together,

but I don't think she'll

have a larger part.

I think it's going to be all Vern.

It's going to be all Vern

and whoever Vern recruits

to help with this coverup.

If she recruits anybody,

she's really... Was

Vernestra the Grand Master at this time?

Or was she just a master?

I think she was a master.

Because Yoda is alive at this time,

so he would be the Grand

Master because he was the

Grand Master for quite a while.

I think she would be a contender for it.

But I kind of look at her as

maybe a Mace Windu type

where she's a more senior

member of the council and

she's calling the shots.

She was the youngest Padawan

to ever become a master at 16.

She's a prodigy.

It's interesting that they

went with her for this.

Her legends is legendary.

She was legit as hell.

And the fact that they kind

of made her the escape goat type.

I'm like, come on, dude,

that's not Renestra at all.

But I'm wondering if we're

going to get another project, whether,

because I want to say

there's another animated

series due to come out.

We don't know.

We get a legends of the high Republic.

Yes.

That would be dope as hell.

I think we're going to get

some kind of backstory to explain,

you know,

what led her to get to this point.

Also,

we got to find out what her

connection is to Chimera.

I think because he's got the

scars of a whip.

The only person that has a

whip in the whole Jedi

universe is Vernestra.

Yeah.

Unless it's lightning.

It could be lightning as well.

Yeah.

I mean,

we know Vernestra never fell to the

dark side.

So, you know,

or or has she not embraced

her darkness like souls?

Yeah.

Soul was definitely conflicted with that.

I mean, he he very much like Mace Windu.

Mace Windu walked a very

fine line between the light and the dark.

Which is why he was so respected by Yoda,

and that's why he was the

number two to Yoda.

Because Yoda,

he says it in Legends that

that's why he not only respects him,

but he also fears him as well.

I mean,

that's why he really was the only

one who could take out

Palpatine if Anakin had interfered.

He had him.

Oh, yeah.

He was done.

He had him.

He was done.

Oh, Annie.

That poor lost boy.

Exactly.

He really was...

a boy still at heart, still a kid.

True.

This is true.

So what do you, I guess,

how would you think about

Vern as a master?

I guess,

what do you picture when you think

about her and kind of, I mean,

kind of being her apprentice,

like what kind of master do

you think she was?

Never had a,

a good relationship per se

with her Padawans.

Like she took on like the, the,

The Impossibles.

I guess you could say.

Like on their last.

Like.

Especially if you go back.

And you start reading some

hard background.

Like she took some broken Padawans.

And some of them.

You know.

One I think turned out good.

And I think the other one

actually fell to the dark side.

If I remember right.

So is that what we're getting here?

I can't say for sure.

There's not enough.

You know.

Story here for us to go off of.

so I mean it could maybe

just after enough time she

maybe just has this bad

track because we do know

they had a forced

connection when he got when

she got off her plane her

uh intergalactic

starfighter so it's a good

question and I think

there's we need that

answered if we get a season two

I think they're going to.

They have to.

They've got to touch on it.

They have to.

And while they're at it,

they could touch on what

the hell was Basil's problem.

Darth Basil.

He has to be a fucking plant

from the dark side.

This dude.

Adorable little creature.

But damn, he has some serious issues.

Bill hates Basil with a passion.

He has every right to hate Basil.

Because what the hell was Basil's problem?

What did Sol do to him?

What did the Jedi... Period.

Why did he have this weird

connection with both May

and Osha like that?

Maybe that's the virgins

that work for that.

Possibly because that was

just like this weird thing.

Basil's like, oh, cool.

And then all of a sudden it's like, oh,

you're trying to hurt her.

So there's an account on

Instagram that I follow.

It's comedian is Charlie Hopkinson.

And he does these.

I don't know if you've heard about him,

Jeff.

If not, I'll send it to you.

but he does these ai

versions so it's him maybe

ai imposes like kenobi uh

qui-gon I don't follow him

but I think I know what

you're talking about send

me the link though after

this I'll send you the link

and they they poke fun at

different star wars content

but it's like they're

reviewing it from the

perspective of kenobi

qui-gon and and it's like yeah

You've seen it.

Yeah.

I've seen it,

but I didn't know they had an

actual like.

They do it regularly for all

the Star Wars shows.

And then he actually does

one for House of the Dragon.

So it's Tyrion, Ned Stark's head.

Nice.

Yeah.

John Snow.

And then they also do Lord of the Rings.

I know what is exactly what

I'm doing after this podcast.

I straight up just binge, but they,

they've done every single

star war show that's come

out and it's hilarious.

But Darth Basil is their theory.

They're like, he's a Sith.

And you know, it's,

it's all science point to that, you know,

cause he did those last two

episodes look kind of like lost his shit.

And it was like, no,

you're not hurting these girls.

I don't know if he was just

trying to protect them

because he felt like they were children.

Or like he knew what they

were doing was wrong.

I'll send it to you too, Kelvin.

It is hilarious because the

head's just like, hi,

and it's just talking.

It's just,

it's so random and it cracks me up.

But their theories with Darth Basil,

they were talking about, you know, well,

the dark side has all these,

they were talking about

Pelagos creeping and they're like, well,

Darth Basil has this house at the end of

are hilarious the dark side

has cookies yes it is it is

good stuff all of a sudden

it's at both y'all it is

hilarious and um but yeah

basil basil you know at

first I wondered if he was

just a plot device in a way

to sell merch you know

because you always have to

have a cute star wars

creature it's true but then

I feel like the little

little elephant elephant

yeah that but I'm like

basil stole that cake

He did.

I'm just like, I don't know.

I haven't seen any Darth Basil toys.

I'm just going to call them Darth Basil.

None of those have came out yet either.

They're still on pre-order.

The Pops are, I think,

finally about to ship.

That's cool.

because yeah so because

you're right I have not

seen any merch yeah because

I've seen them all all up

for pre-order on amazon but

none of them are saying

ready to ship there's still

some ahsoka figures out

there from the ahsoka

series that are still

pre-order yeah so I don't

know what hasbro is doing

but come on hasbro get

together exactly darth is

darth basil at work you know

It has to be Darth Basil,

that little bastard, man.

So let's talk about these

special appearances.

Well, actually,

we technically already

talked about Darth Plagueis and Yoda.

The ending when she comes

into Yoda's room was really

freaking cool.

I liked that.

Although I do want to add

for Darth Plagueis, though,

that I do appreciate he looks like a mun.

He does.

He's a shady looking mun.

But I'm like, I'm glad they kept that.

I know people were harping

about that when he was 15.

I'm like, again, that's legends, though.

Yeah.

And there's nothing that

says he could not be,

we don't know that much

about the mons to know, like,

are they like Yoda?

where they really don't

mature until they're in

well into their hundreds.

Yeah.

Two hundreds.

And his appearance.

I mean,

if he's manipulating dark force energy,

I mean,

that's going to take a toll on you

if you're experimenting.

So, I mean, cause we had the months in the,

in the, in the, the prequel trilogy from,

I think from what I, or no clone wars.

They brought up the months as well.

So, and they look a little,

they look different.

Well,

he was the head of the the banking plan,

I think, at one time.

Yep.

Because he was doing that.

He was the head of the banking clan.

And oh, by the way,

he was a Sith Lord by night.

So it's not maybe he was

still a young man coming up in the world.

And this was kind of like him,

like observing,

like what it is to really

be the rule of two, you know?

Who knows?

You mess with the dark side,

it's going to take its toll on you.

We can't all look like Manny

Jacinto messing with the dark side.

He's a one-off.

He is definitely a one-off.

Bless you.

Bless you, Leslie Hedlund.

Thank you.

She knew what she was doing.

We need the female viewers.

How do we do that?

We get a shirtless little

dude with us all ripped up.

The best part was I think

Brandon had watched the

first episode with me.

And then, you know, he was like,

I know you got to catch up.

You're reviewing it.

So don't don't wait for me.

I'll catch up when I can.

And he did.

He caught up.

We caught up.

He caught up watching it.

And then we got to watch

episode five together.

Had no idea this was going to happen.

So, yeah.

And he's just like,

I can see why you like the show.

I was like, you know what, sir?

That's not what I was expecting.

And he's like, he's joking around.

He's like, you know,

she's totally looking at

the other lightsaber.

I was like, oh, my gosh.

She did.

She did, though.

very subtly I'm like this is

a disney program leslie

headland what are you doing

hand that camera down lower

let's get a butt shot in

there let's see if they do

it they got really they got

they they panned it down I

was like are they really

gonna give an ass shot in a

star wars show like what's

gonna happen stopped I was

like I was ready for the

internet to explode that's

probably one of the most

positive the ears are still

intact that was actually

one of the most positive

And to be fair, it was, I'm like, it was,

and he was turning onto the

seduction of the dark side.

I'm actually okay.

If star Wars starts getting not,

not overly sexual or not overly,

but I think it can get, you know,

more intense.

Like again,

I loved the savagery of the

fight scene in the woods.

That one.

And that final fight scene.

Yes.

Ruthless.

animalistic aggression.

It was like watching

Wolverine fight Sabretooth

the first time.

Yes.

Like it was just raw force

yielding energy.

I felt for Yord.

Yord was not my favorite character.

And the fact that I just

said raw energy live on air

after talking about... This

is your Ruthless era here.

Apparently it is.

I apologize to...

everybody out there.

No, but I'm not sorry.

This is, this is USDN after dark.

Here we go.

Yeah.

We did start the show an

hour later tonight just for this.

Cause we were going to be

talking about shirtless dudes.

Apparently that was your plan.

That this, this was your idea.

You're welcome.

And my boss man just approved.

So we're good.

But I have to say, I do like that.

Like the, even with your,

not my favorite character,

but his death was like downright.

Ruthless.

But so is Jackie's.

She, she at least fought.

though she fought a warrior

he was the surprise that I

didn't see coming she

whooped his ass for most of

that fight he didn't even

use the force to kill yord

that's how little he

thought he fucking snapped

his neck I was like he's

like the only thing that

could have been better is

as he snapped his neck been

like little man

I mean, he's kind of did this almost,

I hear you,

but he still got that same point across.

I was like, Ooh,

that's one of the most like sad.

And I know we really didn't

talk about that episode

because everybody was busy

for the last couple of weeks,

but Holy shit.

That Jedi massacre,

the red wedding of the Jedi.

Yes.

And I'm here for this.

If Star Wars gives us more of that,

I am okay with it because these fights.

If they decide to go back to

the Knights of the Old Republic,

that's going to be some violent ass shit.

And it has to be.

Yeah.

We're talking about there

was a Sith war in there.

And that's why that was,

you're reading my mind here

and I love it because

that's when I thought my exact thought,

it was like,

I wonder if they're testing

the waters here to see how

audiences would have responded to that.

Because if you're going to

go into Knights of the Republic,

you can't tone,

you can't tone it down too much.

Like you're going to have

very well get our very

first rated R Star Wars.

Yeah, we could.

And I'm not mad.

Yeah, same.

And, you know, Star Wars matures.

Yeah, it has to.

It does.

It has to mature.

Disney, no shit,

signed off on Deadpool and Wolverine.

Yeah.

With an R rating.

And not just an R rating,

a hard R. So I'm like,

if they're willing to, you know.

Well, look at Echo.

Look at Echo.

Yeah.

Dude, Echo,

that was a bloody violent

adventure that I was there for.

It was amazing.

Big props to you and Bill

for coming on that show.

Oh, that was fun.

We had a great time

discussing it with you.

That was a good one.

Cause I think y'all did it

on Thursday and then we did

it on like Saturday or Sunday.

I think it was like a Saturday or Sunday.

Yeah.

And it, it, but that's the thing.

Like you don't have to make

every property that way.

I think you can balance the

force if you will bring

some balance to it, have, you know,

the content that we're used to,

but get a little bit.

I think Disney is since they

partnered with Hulu,

they've come to this thing

where they have,

they understand better that,

some things are going to

require a higher rating and

they're becoming okay with

this rated R just in special cases.

Yeah,

and it doesn't have to be every time.

But some of these stories

that we're telling and some

of these eras are ruthless.

I mean,

you're reading in the High Republic

era right now.

Look at what's happening

with the Nile and the Jedi.

The level of intensity there.

I haven't dived into the comics as much,

which that's next on my list to do.

I'm reading the... I've

caught up in the young adult books.

I'm reading the adult books

right now because I've

definitely been kind of

diving in and wanting to know more.

But...

you know that there's so

much there and then again

you have the video games

you have you know if you're

gonna like how like when we

talk about the books the

young adult books the comic

books all those stories in

there all flow together yes

like it's like this nice

sequence of literature

that come in and out of each

other together.

They're all interwoven to degrees,

and they're just great reads.

If you like Star Wars, dig into those.

It's fantastic.

Yeah, they are absolutely great.

And there is a canon.

There is a timeline order

you can read as well that helps a lot.

Just Google Star Wars

timeline in books or

however you want to Google it.

You'll get the same answer either way.

They have an official canon

timeline out there.

And you can sort it however

you wish to read it.

I usually do it in chronological order.

Everything makes sense for me.

There's another one that has

it all from the very beginning.

Yeah.

how to read it,

and then it mixes the shows

into it as well.

So you get... Oh, I've seen that one.

Yes.

And that's a really cool one.

That's a good one.

And then I realized I'm like,

if I want to do that,

I got to go out and find

like 50 different books to read.

Yeah.

I'm like, what can I get?

Because there's a lot out

there that you didn't even realize.

Like there's a whole book on

just Plagueis.

It's a great book.

There's a book on Dooku.

That's really good.

I love my Asajj Ventress and

Quinlan Vos book, The Dark Disciple.

That one is so good.

Damn, that one is so good.

So good.

That one,

and it's not what you expect either.

I mean, it is, but it isn't,

and it was amazing.

But anyways,

let's know we got to start

closing this out.

So what did you think?

What's your overall impressions of it?

And do you think we will

have a season two?

I enjoyed it myself.

I liked it.

There were some structural things.

Again, the episodes were too short.

I feel like the order could be changed.

But I loved the concepts of

questioning the Jedi's

methods and seeing what

happened to lead to the

current events of the Jedi's fall,

their ultimate fall,

the product of the system.

I loved the take on the dark side.

A plan a thousand years in the making.

Exactly.

Just to see all of that come

together and seeing where the cracks are.

We definitely got the cracks.

We did.

It's not the crack I wanted

with Manny Jacinto's.

I had to go there.

I'm sorry.

It was funny.

It was right there.

Now you know what?

Now you know how Bill deals with me.

Brandon,

hit me up if you just need to talk, man.

I'm here for you, Brandon.

That's okay.

He's got lots of cake.

It's fine.

Hey, he's a short king.

I love my short King.

I give him a hard time.

We know, we know, you know, he's my man.

I always will be.

And so, you know, it's,

but I love the seductive

side of the Sith.

It's a different interpretation.

It really was.

And again,

the performances were really

great overall.

Like, again,

I loved the questions I was left with.

And I remember in the beginning,

this was marketed as like

kill bill meets frozen.

Yeah.

And I like that interpretation that much.

It makes sense though.

It, it,

After the finale, it was like, oh, okay,

now I see what the hell she

was talking about.

But she said that very early on.

She did.

And then it took all eight

episodes for us to go, oh, okay,

now it makes sense.

So it's definitely in my

top... I'd say my top four

of the shows so far.

I mean,

I think there were definitely some

improvements that could be made.

But I think it was a

strong... It was a good start.

And I...

I hope they get a season two.

I'm not super optimistic that they will.

But I'm also wondering,

because of all of the dialogue, good, bad,

et cetera,

because I know they were losing

viewers weekly.

But with all the dialogue

and the discourse online,

sometimes that's enough to

keep... It's enough to kill a show.

And you could tell from the very beginning,

from the discourse that was out there,

that that was the intent,

was to kill this.

Which I don't think it

deserved the hate that it has really...

received but for what are

you thinking out of five

puffs how many puffs will

the alkali get from amanda

I'd say four okay I liked

it again I thought it was

really solid all the way

around again there were

structural things but I

loved I loved that it made

me think and question and

I'm here for if you leave

me with more questions and

you're you're you actively

make me think about you

I literally all these

questions come out this

afternoon as I was sitting

down to kind of put the

final nails on the in the

proverbial script coffin over here.

And anytime I get left with

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