Review: The Force is not with new Jedi-centric 'Star Wars: The Acolyte'

"Star Wars" is a complicated beast.

Sometimes it's dark, complex and ambitious, like Disney+ series "Andor" or "The Last Jedi" film. Sometimes it's rousing, epic and feel-good ("Return of the Jedi.") And sometimes it's just weird, silly and unsatisfying (prequel "The Phantom Menace").

So perhaps it's only fitting that the prequel to that prequel, Disney+'s new series "The Acolyte" (streaming Tuesdays, 9 EDT/PDT, ★★ out of four) falls into that last category. Full of logical fallacies, hokey dialogue and nonsensical plots, "Acolyte" feels entirely of a piece with the worst elements of the prequel trilogy, which many hardcore fans love to hate, even 25 years later. The series, created by "Russian Doll" producer Leslye Headland, certainly has ambition as it tries to tell a showy story about the mythology and magic of the Jedi and the Force. But even the best of intentions can go awry.

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All the sci-fi/fantasy jargon, dramatic costumes, brightly colored lightsabers, fancy hairdos and ominous villains Headland can stuff into "Acolyte" can't make a good story on their own. There has to be some emotion and depth to the characters and their woes. There has to be more than perfunctory plot points. There has to be a sense of adventure and wonder. And there has to be something that captures the feeling of "Star Wars," not just the aesthetics. "Acolyte" doesn't have it, no matter how hard it tries.

A century before Obi-Wan (Ewan McGregor) and Qui-Gon (Liam Neeson) felt a disturbance in the Force in "Phantom," a rogue "Force-user" is hunting and killing Jedi masters across the galaxy. At first thought to be former Jedi Padawan Osha (Amandla Stenberg), it turns out the Jedi killer is her twin sister, Mae (also Stenberg), long presumed dead after a mysterious fire when the two were children. The blaze resulted in the death of their family and Osha being taken into the Jedi order. (This "twist" is revealed in the first few minutes of the series premiere.)

Determined to bring in Mae or Osha (or both) and figure all this out is Jedi Master Sol (Lee Jung-jae, "Squid Game"), who trained Osha before she left the order. He's joined by a handful of other colorful and utterly forgettable Jedi: Is Mae out for revenge for what she believed happened to her family all those years ago? Or is there a more nefarious power brewing in the galaxy? There's the pickle, and a flashback episode featuring Jodie Turner-Smith as the girls' mother, Aniseya, and the leader of a "witch coven" doesn't provide many answers.

It's all a little too complex (witches, in this galaxy?) and a little too simple (ah yes, the old evil-twin twist). The reveal of Mae comes too early in the series, removing much of the mystery element that makes "Acolyte" unique in the ever-expanding "Star Wars" canon. There are too many characters with too many quirks to make them stand out from one another. You'll be hard-pressed to tell the difference between various aliens paired with Charlie Barnett's Jedi knight Yord.

But "Acolyte" has its moments. The final scene of Episode 4 (the last made available for review) captures a real sense of horror and fear when a villain is introduced. Perhaps that bodes well for the final four episodes in the season. Jung-jae and Stenberg make a great pair, and the former nicely proves his acting chops in English (he won an Emmy for "Squid," which was entirely in Korean). And it's always nice to see "Matrix" star Carrie Ann Moss, who appears briefly in two episodes, wielding a lightsaber as if she's done it all her life.

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Certainly a segment of the "Star Wars" fandom will devour every frame of "Acolyte." For them, the complex mythology is the meat of the meal, not a frilly and silly garnish. But superfans can forgive a lot of sins. Some genre TV series can make their mythology and internal world-building more interesting and engaging than this (Amazon's late, great "The Expanse," among many others). As it stands, though, the Jedi lore is obtuse and dull. It needs spicing up.

Like the young Padawans (the "Star Wars" term for students or apprentices) that are omnipresent in the series, "Acolyte" has a great deal of potential. "The Mandalorian" made "Star Wars" a Western. "Andor" made it a revolution. "Acolyte" could have made it a great work of fantasy and mystery.

But mostly it's a great big sigh.

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: 'The Acolyte' review: 'Star Wars' series all about Jedi is silly