Exclusive third-party data reveals The Acolyte is a true success story for Star Wars after all. The streaming boom has made it very difficult to fully understand how different TV shows are performing – and especially so when they’re controversial. The Acolyte has been subject of a review-bombing campaign, meaning many traditional indicators are pretty much worthless. Although the Disney+ TV show is known to have had lower viewership than Ahsoka in its first week, other stats seem almost designed to confuse rather than shine a light on the situation.
Screen Rant has spoken exclusively to Reelgood, a third-party analytics firm who examiine viewing trends across all US streaming platforms, based on the monitoring of 20 million monthly viewing decisions. They’ve looked through their data to see how The Acolyte compares to other live-action Disney+ Star Wars TV shows. The results are surprising, and indicate The Acolyte may be a lot more popular than many believe.
Third-Party Data Shows How The Acolyte Compares To Other Star Wars Shows
Reelgood compared the live-action Star Wars Disney+ TV shows, looking at the first 14 days since The Acolyte’s release. They found that The Acolyte is the second most successful in terms of streaming and engagement, outperforming the average top 100 TV show by a factor of 6. It is only surpassed by Obi-Wan Kenobi, which outperformed the average top 100 TV show by a factor of 8.
This data gives a fascinating insight into how the various Star Wars Disney+ TV shows are performing. There can be no doubt the positive reaction to The Acolyte episode 5 will also have boosted the show’s performance, but the overall impact will only really become clear when the show has come to an end. Until then, though, this data suggests the online backlash against The Acolyte really isn’t representative of the fandom.
The Acolyte Backlash Isn’t Representative Of The Fandom At All
The Acolyte has been the subject of a massive online backlash, with a very visible review-bombing campaign; at time of writing, the audience score on Rotten Tomatoes sits at an absurd 14 percent, with an improbable 25,000+ ratings (more than all three seasons of The Mandalorian). While some criticisms are made in good faith – the show is far from perfect, with notable pacing and dialogue problems on occasion – others haven’t been. A cameo from Jedi Master Ki-Adi-Mundi sparked a furious online debate over whether the show had broken canon because of his age, never specified in canon.
The problem, though, is that the scale of this backlash has seemed out of all proportion to the actual quality of the show. Now, Reelgood’s data suggests the YouTubers and review-bombers really don’t represent the fandom as much as they claim. That’s good news for The Acolyte, and frankly for the fandom as well.