This article contains spoilers for the first five episodes of The Acolyte on Disney+.

The Acolyte has proven to be a lightning rod of discussion among the broader Star Wars fan base. Many fans find themselves swept up in the show’s multilayered mysteries, while others believe the show continues to fall flat on its face. This divisiveness has resulted in The Acolyte being one of the most talked about Star Wars shows in the last few years, for better or worse. Unfortunately, it has also been the center of hate from some parts of the Star Wars fandom, which have review bombed the series on Rotten Tomatoes, resulting in it holding a 14% audience score on the site. That’s the worst audience score of any Star Wars film or show on the site, even behind the 24% of the Star Wars Holiday Special and the 40% of 2008’s Star Wars: The Clone Wars animated film.

While there has been a lot of unbridled hate directed at The Acolyte, not all the negativity surrounding the show comes from the ceaselessly negative corner of Star Wars fans that feed off hating Disney and Kathleen Kennedy. This show has proven to be divisive even among the more level-headed Star Wars fans. Much of the discourse surrounding the series has focused on how it approaches the mystery at the center of its story. However, some people have entirely misplaced what that mystery is.

So many stories over the last decade, primarily from Marvel and Star Wars, have taught audiences to think that any masked character will have some big identity revelation. Some of the biggest examples are with Kylo Ren's identity as Ben Solo in the sequel trilogy or the Winter Soldier's identity as Bucky Barnes in the second Captain America movie. Because of this, many have assumed the mystery of The Acolyte to be the identity of the enigmatic Sith master, called “The Stranger,” who serves as the series’ antagonist.

If the identity of The Stranger were really the core mystery of The Acolyte, then the disappointment surrounding Episode 5 of the show, “Night,” would be understandable. That’s not the case, though. While there was some minor mystery that invited speculation about The Stranger’s identity, that aspect of the show has never been the crux of it all, and it was never meant to be a big, game-changing plot twist. It’s merely one part of the story that serves the larger narrative and mystery at work.

The Identity of the Sith in The Acolyte

In the fifth episode of The Acolyte, fans are properly introduced to The Stranger. After being teased with a brief appearance earlier in the season and various conversations surrounding Mae’s dark-side master, The Stranger is finally at the center of everything in the latest episode. The episode is mostly built on its incredible action sequences, which show the Stranger defeating one unprepared Jedi after another, resulting in the deaths of two primary characters – Yord Fandar and Sol’s apprentice, Jecki Lon. During this fighting, the identity of The Stranger is confirmed to be Qimir, the smuggler played by Manny Jacinto, who has been assisting Mae throughout her quest to kill the Jedi.

This reveal, while effective in the moment, was also supremely predictable. Pretty much everybody watching the show saw it coming. Throughout the first half of this season, Qimir was always surprisingly well-versed in the desires of Mae’s master, and he was never around when The Stranger showed up. He had already shown a knack for quick-witted villainous behavior, as he eluded the suspicions of the Jedi when they questioned him about Mae and her master in Episode 2. Additionally, his physicality has closely matched that of The Stranger on every occasion we've seen him. The clues were there; audiences picked up on them easily and put two and two together.

How This Reveal Changes The Acolyte

While some Star Wars fans have taken this reveal to be the perfect example of the show’s poor writing and handling of its mystery, The Acolyte was never really trying to hide the identity of The Stranger. Yes, it held back on the final reveal a bit long for the sake of suspense, but the character was masked because he was hiding his identity from Mae and the Jedi, not from the viewers watching the show. The Acolyte was being heavy-handed with its clues as to his identity because it was inviting the audience to make a clear conclusion themselves, a conclusion that the Jedi in the show have blatantly overlooked. This further emphasizes the weakness and pride of the Jedi that contribute to their downfall, which is one of the core ideas running throughout the show.

Unveiling The Stranger as Qimir is not meant to be a major plot twist in the show. Instead, it’s a fairly straightforward development that allows the story to focus more directly on its primary mystery as it enters its final three episodes. Now that the show can move beyond the question of The Stranger’s identity, it can stay centered on the real mystery of the show. Revealing Qimir as the villain, rather than some other unnamed or deep-lore character like Darth Plagueis, allows the show to continue building on the characters it has already established instead of wasting time building a completely new character in its final few episodes.

The Acolyte has already set new developments in motion to do this, with Mae disguising herself as Osha and leaving Khofar with Sol. They are likely to return to Coruscant to report their Sith encounter to the Jedi Council. If they do, that would verge on breaking the Star Wars canon, as the Jedi are firm that the Sith have been extinct for a millennium in Episode I – The Phantom Menace, set 100 years after The Acolyte.

However, there are two clear ways that the show could get around this. The first is that the Jedi Order proceeds to cover up this revelation, as they seek to hide the existence of the Sith to not disturb the broader peace of their organization and the galaxy as a whole. If this were the case, it would be another example of the Jedi not acting as saintlike as they claim. Alternatively, Mae could disrupt Sol’s plan to report the encounter, either by killing him or diverting their journey to somewhere else and ensuring the information about the Sith’s existence never reaches the ears of the Jedi Council.

The Broader Mystery of The Acolyte

The mystery of The Acolyte was never about the identity of The Stranger, nor is it about the Sith and where they came from; it’s about the Jedi and how they have fallen from grace. Time and time again, throughout the series, it has reinforced the idea that the Jedi Order is overconfident, dismissive, and far from being the perfect protectors of the galaxy they claim to be. We’ve seen this from the first episodes, as the Jedi were quick to arrest Osha after the death of Jedi Master Indara, confidently arresting the wrong person for the crime and being too quick to wrap up their investigation.

The specific driving mystery of the show is what happened to Osha and Mae’s family on the planet Brendok. Episode 3, “Destiny,” shows the two twin sisters being raised by a coven of force-wielding witches on the planet. They live in relative peace until the Jedi arrive. The Jedi disapprove of their force abilities and demand that Osha and Mae be taken and trained as Jedi. Osha is excited by the idea, but Mae resists, and the Brendock witches distrust the Jedi Order's true intentions. Ultimately, this coven is eradicated with their home burning to the ground. The end of Episode 3 seems to show that it was Mae who started the fire that led to this tragedy, but the actual truth of that is worth doubting.

The four Jedi who arrived on Brendok – Indara, Sol, Torbin, and Kelnacca – clearly harbor some degree of guilt over the events. Indara apologizes to Mae before her murder, Sol blames himself for failing Mae and her turning to the Dark Side, Torbin willingly takes the poison given to him by Mae in Episode 2, and Kelnacca goes into a self-induced exile on the planet Khofar. There is no doubt that these four Jedi did something wrong on Brendock and continued to carry their guilt with them each day after.

When escaping the burning village of the Brendock witches at the end of Episode 3, Osha and Sol pass a number of the witches lying dead on the ground. Their bodies are not burned, and the fire has yet to reach where they lay. They were clearly not killed by the fire, and Torbin is later seen with a fresh wound on his face, indicating some sort of fight had occurred. All of this points to the Jedi having played some role in the death of the witches on Brendok, whether deliberately or not. This is the mystery of The Acolyte. What did the Jedi do on Brendock? Why did they lie to Osha about it? Why are they ashamed, and to what degree are they responsible? These questions, not the identity of The Stranger or the birth year of Ki-Adi Mundi, are the questions that are important to the show's core story. The Acolyte is streaming on Disney+.