With Two Episodes Left, The Acolyte Has Us Wondering Who the Villain Really Is

This article contains spoilers for The Acolyte. 

Ever since the release of Star Wars: The Last Jedi (and to a lesser extent, the Prequels), the galaxy far, far away has been delving into the realities of the Jedi Order and the many, many mistakes that they've made throughout history. While Rian Johnson's film expanded on the idea of who can access the Force, it's far from the first time that fans and creators — including George Lucas himself — have wondered about just how fair and equitable the Jedi really are. Both The Clone Wars and Rebels series added to the complexity of the Jedi. And, in The Acolyte, Leslie Headland is taking that one step further, presenting a far more authoritarian and secretive version of the Jedi during the High Republic era. In the dialogue-heavy sixth episode "Teach/Corrupt," we have to ask whether the Disney+ series will go even further and pose the Jedi as the true villains of the series. 

After the shocking events of Episode 5, "Night," which saw the masked villain revealed to be Qimir (Manny Jacinto) — who quickly went on to kill two major characters in Yord (Charlie Barnett) and Jeckie (Dafne Keen) — "Teach/Corrupt" is far less action-packed but no less impactful. With Mae and Osha (Amandla Stenberg) doing the old parent trap gambit, the former is now on the Jedi ship with Master Sol (Lee Jung-Jae), and we find the latter being cared for by the masked mass murderer on an island that immediately evokes Ahch-To (where we found Luke Skywalker at the end of The Force Awakens). "Teach/Corrupt" is an episode of reflections as Osha finds out more about her sister's mysterious master while Mae attempts to get a grasp on Sol and his ever slipperier behavior as she aims to hide her true identity from him. 

Turns out they're equally as unreadable as Mae and Osha try to get truths out of the men who shaped the other's lives and use of the Force. But while we just saw Qimir kill multiple people last episode, Sol somehow manages to come off as the more suspicious player as the two men address their respective twins throughout the episode.,. Meanwhile, we learn that Qimir was indeed once a Jedi,   as Vernestra (Rebecca Henderson) had suggested in Episode 4, and has the scars to prove it. He claims that his old Jedi Master was the one to give them to him, painting an empathetic picture of the ruthless man. As he tells Osha, "I only kill Jedi. They don't believe I should exist." So in his mind he's practicing a certain kind of self defense. But while Qimir speaks to Osha as an equal and allows her to wield a weapon, attack him, and cooks her a meal, the show's leading Jedi master has an entirely different approach.

Sol’s demeanor changes once he learns the truth about who is on his ship. After immediately stunning and restraining Mae and turning off the transponder so that they can't be found, Sol clearly has something to hide, and it's obvious that it's tearing him apart. There's been a long running question of whether or not Sol will end up being the one to turn to the Dark Side, seeing as he already has many of the signifiers of someone who could be turned. He's emotional, has deep feelings for his Padawans, has regularly shown anger, and almost killed Qimir after he killed Jeckie and Yord. Whether or not that comes to pass will likely be answered in the last two episodes, and there would most certainly be fan frustration given not only that Sol has been a lovable character thus far, and those Jedi rules are pretty ridiculous. But, whatever the case, he's acting worryingly as he traps the young woman on his ship with no means of escape or help on its way. 

As for what we can expect in the next two episodes, there are a few clues. There's an overriding theme of the importance of memories throughout the episode. Both men use memory to their advantage, not just their own personal recollection, but the memories of Mae and Osha themselves. Qimir teases his own haunted history to Osha, using them as cryptic warnings of just how dangerous and intolerant the Jedi can be. With the young Force user so doubtful of herself, we can see in her face as it recontextualizes her own memories of Jedi training. Sol, on the other hand, uses his memories as a motivator, a driving source of (gasp!) emotion and torment that eventually pushes him to capture and restrain Mae in what appears to be a pretty threatening way. 

Sol’s trap is itself made possible by memory, namely the clever scent recollection of Basil. The other passenger on the Jedi ship, he easily recognizes that the sisters have switched places and does his best to utilize the fact that Mae doesn’t recognize Pip to catch her out. In the season premiere, Qimir asked the Jedi "not to mind wipe him," and in the last episode Mae told Osha that she'd been "brainwashed." As this episode comes to a close, we see Osha putting on Qimir's helmet as her breaths echo inside (evoking our own memories of Darth Vader and Kylo Ren). That means she's probably going to use the Force to reconnect with her own memory of what really happened all those years ago on Brendok. 

While Qimir seemed more reasonable in this episode, the reality is that he still killed many Jedi and is dropping Sith hints throughout "Teach/Corrupt." He says that he's looking for "the power of two," which is an adaptation of the Rule of Two. It's a notorious law of the Sith that means there can only ever be two Sith lords at any time, a master and an apprentice, with the assumption being the apprentice will eventually kill their master. So did Qimir kill his master? Was that master a known Sith like Darth Plageius the Wise? Does he want an apprentice so the two of them can take that final step and kill his master? Is he actually not really a Sith at all and instead has just learned from Sith teachings? We know that he was once a Jedi, and he asks Sol how he couldn’t remember him before killing all the other Jedi, so how does the show’s alleged hero father figure play into his training and subsequent fall from grace? Could Vernestra and her Force whip behind those scars? 

It's a lot to cover in two episodes, but with the next entry likely focusing on Sol and what really happened on Brendok, we can probably expect to have to wait until the finale to truly get a grasp on the reality of Qimir's plan and who the real villain is in this story.

Rosie Knight is a contributing freelancer for IGN covering everything from anime to comic books to kaiju to kids movies to horror flicks. She has over half a decade of experience in entertainment journalism with bylines at Nerdist, Den of Geek, Polygon, and more.