The Nielsen Streaming Charts For The Acolyte - Week 3 [UPDATED!]

UPDATE: Luminate have already released their numbers for week 7 of The Acolyte, i.e. for the series finale. And episode 8 also failed to enter the top 10 Luminate original series like the previous two episodes. The #10 entry on the Luminate charts has 228.5 million minutes viewed (Sausage Party: Foodtopia, which is a sequel series to the movie) which is just embarrassing. The Acolyte must have had less then 228 million minutes watched, maybe even less than 200 million. According to Luminate the finale was watched by maybe as few as 4.4 million people (or even fewer)! In the update I also discuss some statements made by Headland in a Collider interview that reveal she literally considers Qimir aka Smilo Ren as somewhat of a self insert. You find the Luminate update and the interview quotes at the end of the original article!

Well, that escalated rather quickly… while The Acolyte remained in the top 10 Luminate Original Series charts until week 4 and episode 5 and only dropped out when episode 6 was released in week 5, The Acolyte has already dropped out of the top 10 Nielsen original series charts in week 3 with episode 4! The #10 show has 298 million minutes on the Nielsen charts. The Acolyte must have less than that. According to Luminate The Acolyte had 262 million minutes in week 3 (episode 4). Click through for a short commentary.

The Acolyte is as dead as this wookiee

The #1 show on Nielsen is of course Bridgerton with 2,465 million minutes, about 10x as much as The Acolyte probably has. Just let that sink in. Netflix has about 82.7 million subscribers in the US/Canada. Disney+ about 45 million. If we account for the larger subscriber base Bridgerton still has 5.5 times as many viewing minutes, relatively speaking, when compared against the subscriber base.

Even delusional people on X clamoring for a second season are now transported back into the real world. The Acolyte is a massive flop for Disney. It is the least watched Star Wars series ever… with even lower viewership than Andor.

Andor had 356 million minutes in week 3 (episode 5) and that was the season low even, so the worst Andor ever performed, that week the middle part of the Aldani heist arc was aired. If we use Luminate’s numbers we get the following if we assume all people only watched the new episode that week:

Andor: 356 million minutes – 8.28 million views
The Acolyte: 262 million minutes – 8.18 million views

It’s close, but worse than Andor which already had a very low viewership to begin with. In the week before Andor also had more viewers than The Acolyte. In the following week Luminate would report only 232.4 million minutes for The Acolyte, even less. The show kept shedding viewers.

If we use week 4 numbers from Luminate and Nielsen it would be like this:

Andor (Nielsen): 405 million minutes – 8.1 million views
The Acolyte (Luminate): 232.4 million minutes – 7.26 million views

In short: in week 4 The Acolyte lost almost 1 million views and is lagging Andor by almost 1 million views. And the gap will only widen, because Andor mantained this 8-9 million average and never really lost viewers, in fact, the season finale would see an increase even (it performed better than Ahsoka!), episode 7 had 418 million minutes viewed and The Acolyte dropped out of the Luminate charts in week 5 and must have had less than 220 million minutes (Luminate’s #10 original show). So maybe even less than 200 million minutes viewed.

That Star Wars is now not even popular enough anymore to crack the Nielsen original series top 10, or the general top 10, is just embarrassing. Andor dropped out of the charts exactly once but recovered (it had about 400 million minutes that week). The Acolyte may never enter the charts again. And just to remind everyone: Lucasfilm spent 180 million plus marketing on this. So probably in excess of 200 million.

And to add insult to injury House of the Dragon, which is also released on cable, so not even exclusive to streaming, has 1,226 million minutes on the Nielsen streaming charts for aquired shows. Let that sink in too. House of the Dragon, which cost about the same as The Acolyte, has 5.3 times the viewing minutes. Even if we account for the much longer episodes, 58 minutes, House of the Dragon has 21.14 million views in the US. Compare that to The Acolyte’s 7.26. House of the Dragon, which also has several female lead characters, one of the actresses is also LGBT like Amandla Stenberg… and not only does House of the Dragon not get review bombed, it’s a huge hit. Despite there being a massive overlap between fanbases.

Star Wars is not even in the same league anymore as other genre shows now, Star Wars is minor league, or maybe not even that, little league.

But this is what happens when you hire someone to write a Star Wars show who hates Jedi and wants to portray them in as bad a light as possible and instead wants people to sympathize with psychopathic murderers.

Why does Kathleen Kennedy still have a job? She’s about to bury Star Wars now too. Under her Star Wars went from major league to minor league. After the short high The Mandalorian gave us it’s been downhill ever since. But the downhill trend may not be over yet, maybe Star Wars will only hit rock bottom with the Rey movie. If Iger has any sense left in him he will veto the project before it can enter production. Word now is it will no longer film in 2024. But 2025, if they have a script by then. How about “never” instead?

Also, as sad as it is, Skeleton Crew may pay the price for all this just like Solo was also affected by The Last Jedi backlash. Skeleton Crew could turn out to be a complete flop with even lower numbers than The Acolyte. Once you lose the trust of your audience it is very difficult to regain it. But Lucasfilm was on the right track with The Mandalorian… and then Kennedy derailed the train nevertheless. And here we are now. Star Wars is not even good enough anymore for a top 10 original series streaming charts. A service with 45+ million subscribers in the US has not a SINGLE original show on the charts. Netflix has seven. And a spin off of an unfinished book series and of a show that had a super controversial last season is wiping the floor with Star Wars.

Seriously, why does have Kathleen Kennedy still have a job?

UPDATE: so now we have the Luminate numbers for the finale. And it’s bad. It’s lousy. How far has Star Wars fallen? On paper The Acolyte had all the people at Lucasfilm and probably Headland herself thought a Star Wars show needs to get views: Jedi, Sith, lightsabers, cameos. But apparently they believed their potential audience to be more stupid than they are, because, as it turns out, most potential viewers of a Star Wars series actually want likable characters, a good plot and overall just good or at least competent writing, jangling keys in front of them won’t cut it.

The Acolyte maybe had just something in the ballpark of 200 million minutes viewed for a 46 (almost 47) minute episode! That means the finale may have had as few as 4.43 million views! Even if we assume the show had 220 million minutes viewed that number only goes up to 4.78 million views!

This is not even embarrassing anymore. This is an outright disaster of epic proportions. Lucasfilm should panic now. Because The Acolyte is the biggest Star Wars flop on Disney+ ever and it cost so much money. It may have actually damaged the entire franchise. Because while not so many people watched the show, many will have followed the discussions on social media and YouTube, especially the one fan demographic that makes Lucasfilm the most money: the hardcore fans.

As an addendum I would like to mention that Headland, in one of her many interviews, said the most enlightening things… that Qimir is basically a stand in for her, a “shadow self”. The following are quotes from her Collider interview earlier this week!

In her own words, when she talks about the Qimir unmasking scene and his speech about wanting freedom and what her message here was, what she wanted to express:

I wanna say that people do not want me to exist as a gay woman, as a woman in this particular space, working in this wild sandbox. There was a whole crew of people who believed in me, but deep down I felt like, I am unaccepted for who I am because of what I believe in and wanting to wield my power the way I’d like without having to answer to a legion of people that just exist out there.

And:

When he (Qimir) says I want freedom, that’s what I want, I just want freedom. I want to be able to be just out there and be myself and be the type of artist I want to be without having to answer to anybody.

And:

That’s why I feel so close to him (Qimir) … I am truly so impressed by everyone who has put their faith in me. That is why he represents the avatar.

Also this:

I very rarely put myself into the protagonist because I think the protagonist has to be the protagonist. They might have a sprinkling of me, certainly Osha and Mae, the family conflict, the switching of sides, being really certain that you know one thing, the betrayal of the father, the rejection of the fraternal protectionism, and saying, “I am now my own person.” That stuff I definitely relate with, but The Stranger (Qimir) is my shadow self, for sure.

This is from her utterly bizarre interview with Collider earlier this week, following the finale.

These statements by Headland let you know what kind of person she is. She sympathizes with the Sith, her mass murdering psychopathic character, because she wants the freedom to do just anything (as an artist) just like he craves freedom. Maybe someone should tell Headland that unless you are maybe Steven Spielberg there will always be people in Hollywood who tell you what you can and can’t do, because that’s the business. Money rules!

Also… Sol is a stand-in for a father who “betrayed” her and thus she literally had him force choked to death??? That woman needs therapy and professional help maybe, but certainly should never have written a Star Wars series.

Also, Leslye, in case you read this (she won’t): people do not reject you for being gay or being a woman, people reject you for making the single worst piece of Star Wars content in history, with a very questionable message that perverts everything George Lucas ever wanted to tell with Star Wars. People reject you for being Harvey Weinstein’s former personal assistant and because people simply do not believe you when you say you knew nothing.

But here she is… feeling oppressed and persecuted. When all of the US and most of the western world in general is all about celebrating LGBT people these days and very few people bat an eyelash even anymore, even more so in the circles Headland moves in. The poor, oppressed woman who only got to make a 180 million Star Wars series. Unaccepted. Well, that part is at least true. But when you twist and pervert Star Wars to your liking this is what you have to live with. People will not accept your work and by extension will also not accept you, because you apparently lack any self awareness or talent when it comes to writing a Star Wars series.

I suppose Headland will get to make more things in Hollywood. Even if based on her work on Star Wars she should never work in Hollywood again. There are countless much more talented people out there who could do a much better job than her. Even some Star Wars fan movies have better acting and writing.

The Nielsen Streaming Charts
The Luminate Streaming Charts

Collider Interview with Lesyle Headland

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