Even for a saga that has handled sexuality and attraction plenty, it’s uncommon in Star Wars really see folks stripped right down to their naked our bodies in methods meant to invoke intimacy and want. However “Train/Corrupt”, the latest episode of The Acolyte, did precisely that this previous week when Osha discovered herself within the den of the series’ mysterious antagonist, the Stranger–and located herself seeing extra of him than she bargained for.
Early on in “Train/Corrupt” when Osha–having been left to take the place of her sister Mae in a twin sister switcheroo on the climax of the prior episode–awakens on a mysterious island world, we see her observe Manny Jacinto’s Stranger down a seaside to a close-by pool of water. Hiding behind a rock, and having picked up the Stranger’s lightsaber simply in case a battle breaks out, Osha and the viewers alike watch because the Stranger quietly and calmly undresses out of his robes, earlier than stepping nude into the waters. When he makes it clear to Osha he is aware of that she’s there, as they discuss the Stranger retains swimming, earlier than re-emerging from the pool and strolling in direction of Osha to redress himself: once more, solely bare, revealing the scars throughout his muscular physique whereas additionally presenting himself utterly defenseless to her, as he begins to make the case for his personal beliefs to his cautious visitor.
Whereas we the because the viewers don’t see every thing Osha sees–no full frontal nudity in Star Wars fairly but–the implication we’re given is that she herself is seeing the Stranger laid actually naked earlier than her, with a frisson of power working beneath Osha and the Strangers’ scenes after this second that play with the seductive want of each the ability the Stranger has, and in his uncooked physicality. For showrunner Leslye Headland, that sensuality, and presenting the Stranger bare in it, was an necessary component of the episode’s intent. “Lucasfilm actually believed in my imaginative and prescient. From a story perspective, it needed to occur. It had to. He did, like, a Steven Seagal neck snap within the [previous] episode. How do you, in any respect, get from that to humanity? The one means to try this is to point out him in such a wildly weak place, and it must be visible,” Headland recently told Collider as a part of a wide-ranging interview in regards to the episode. “I can’t consider one thing extra weak than somebody holding a lightsaber on somebody who’s that uncovered. I simply don’t. I felt like he was so cruel within the earlier episode that he needed to stand in entrance of her and say, like, ‘You completely can kill me,’ basically.”
Based on Headland, it was necessary to distinction these scenes between Osha and the Stranger with what she had simply seen of him the episode prior–ruthlessly carving his means by means of a complete workforce of Jedi like a silent monster–and presenting that by means of having the Stranger be utterly bare (reminding us and Osha alike that sure, Manny Jacinto is a really good-looking man once we’re not watching him skewer a padawan) was the visible the episode wanted to point out the change of their relationship. “The dynamics needed to be what they’re after what he did in [Episode] 5. He can not appear to be an alpha male-y, intimidating—we all know he’s able to that from [the last episode]—however that can’t be his dynamic with [Osha],” Headland continued. “It wouldn’t make sense! We now have to see this different facet of him, and we’ve to see particularly the best way he’s together with her. He by no means let Mae see his face, and he let her see him bare. You recognize what I imply? The character design was very, very intentional.”
Given the overall household viewers Star Wars normally goes for, nudity and titillation just isn’t one thing we usually see a number of on-screen, even because the franchise broadens the tales it tells and affords extra mature, grownup materials in its method to violence, language, or, as is the case right here in The Acolyte, a transfer in direction of at the least acknowledging that kind of obvious sensuality exists within the galaxy far, distant as a lot because it does our personal. Certain, The Acolyte continues to be cautious to chop round it, and is utilizing nakedness not simply as sexual stress, however as an act of bodily vulnerability. However it’s nonetheless a step in direction of one thing we hardly ever get to see from Star Wars on display–and even will get to throw in a little bit of lightsaber hilt innuendo whereas it’s at it, as well.
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