Acolyte was by far not even close to Andors quality of storytelling, but I think there is a scenario where if Andor wasn't pre-greenlit for 2 season, it could've been cancelled because of how much it cost and how viewership reflected that. I think we've seen many issues come up in this new era of Star wars storytelling, the live action show era, and it appears that in the coming years we're going to be making a bit of a transition back to the cinematic stories. And I'm fine with that. But I hope they use this experience theyve had over the past 6-7 years of developing these shows and learn from them. Streaming providers are pumping absurd amounts of money into these shows without real hope of making it back. Even if Acolyte had been a 10/10 in every regard the price and viewership would have hampered it. Like season two of Amazon's super expensive Lord of the Rings show releasing to zero fanfare.
Maybe the goal was just to make enough content to where people can justify being subscribed to the platform long term, but we're seeing now that it isn't working--or, it isn't working as well as they hoped.
I think the transition to the live action shows oddly enough came at a good time with covid happening. If they were going to do such a transition, it happened at a time where movie theaters were collectively becoming largely unpopular for real world reasons.
But we're now 4 years past covid essentially and theaters are back, blockbusters are back, and that is evidently their plan now to transition back .
It's one I agree with because while I do thoroughly enjoy star wars television, even if some of the times I don't completely vibe with the show or even like certain decisions, star wars is at its peak in the movie theater
It's a franchise that is fundamentally meant to be on the big screen.