The Acolyte, Disney's newest Star Wars TV show, may be being review-bombed - but new viewership data gives a sense of what's really going on. The Star Wars fandom has always been prone to division, but Leslye Headland's Star Wars Disney+ TV show seems to have become a massive flashpoint. The Acolyte has been review-bombed on Rotten Tomatoes; the audience score there now stands at an improbable 14 percent (lower than the ill-fated Star Wars Holiday Special).
New viewership data from Variety gives a sense of what's really going on, though. Provided by Luminate, this data shows the minutes watched of every streaming original TV show over the period from June 7 to June 13. It's largely a boost for Netflix, but The Acolyte's performance is very interesting indeed.
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Still, Disney will be quite pleased with The Acolyte's performance here. The Acolyte is literally the only non-Netflix show to appear in the top ten for that period, suggesting it's a success. The scale of that success will become clear over the weeks, as we get a sense of whether viewers stuck around or dropped off.
It's because they smell nice and make us have feelings.