Disney’s new Star Wars project, The Acolyte finally premiered on Disney+ on June 4, 2024, with two episodes, and despite all the controversies and review bombing, the series is still one of the most talked about shows currently. The critics are more or less satisfied, seeing a lot of potential in the series, while the fans are polarized, with some liking the show and others hating it. The latter group is mostly filled with those who don’t like the so-called “woke” content in the show, which makes absolutely no sense. But, whether you think the show is too woke or not, all fans agreed that the opening scene of the series was a complete shocker, and showrunner Leslye Headland was asked to explain the scene in question.

Spoiler alert! For those of you who don’t know what we are talking about, it’s the scene involving the death of Master Indara (Carrie-Anne Moss), which happened before the show even opened. She had a fight against Mae but was struck down and fans are afraid that this was all they would see of Master Indara, which would be a shame going forward, although it is likely that she will be present in further flashback scenes.

This was a shocker, something that Star Wars fans are not used to, and the Internet went absolutely crazy over the scene. Many fans wondered why Headland decided to kill off one of the show’s best characters immediately, and the showrunner decided to provide us with a certain explanation:

“From a filmmaker perspective, I just felt like with the cold open, especially with a new story, that you just have to go hard. You have to say the Jedi are going to take some Ls; you’re not going to know who the good guys and the bad guys are. And it’s going to feel very visceral.

Even if you already know it’s going to happen, it doesn’t have to be a big gotcha moment. It just has to be a moment where the emotional and the physical – meaning the fights – melt together. Carrie-Anne, not just being an action legend, is also a phenomenal actress. She was able to play all those beats within the fight as well as, of course, her death scene.”

Source: GamesRadar

Whether or not you agree with such an approach, this is Headland’s stance on the issue, and we can certainly confirm that it was effective in the sense that it attracted attention and made everyone talk about the scene. As for the inspiration behind that approach, Headland named arguably the best series ever made:

“Not to compare myself at all to Vince Gilligan, but the cold open to Breaking Bad is one of the best cold opens ever. So whenever I sit down to write anything, I’m like, ‘Well, I won’t be able to top that, but in my show, what’s the version of that?’ And it felt like the best I could come up with was killing Carrie-Anne Moss. It was icing Trinity and just having everyone go, ‘I’m sorry. What’s happening in this?’”

Source: Entertainment Weekly

And while we can agree that The Acolyite is nowhere near Breaking Bad, it seems that the inspiration was taken from Gilligan’s masterpiece and that is fine in our book. The Acolyte is one of the hottest shows at the moment, so be sure to keep following us for all the updates in the upcoming weeks!

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