‘Keep shining queen’: The actor behind ‘Star Wars’ most-hated character steps up for Amandla Stenberg

Remember The Acolyte? The Star Wars show that premiered back in June, and proceeded to inflict irreparable nerve damage on everyone who watched it before draining their bank accounts, killing their families, and running the economy into the ground as it orchestrated the global takeover of a totalitarian regime that promised only despair?

The Acolyte didn’t actually do any of that, but you’d be forgiven for thinking that it did considering how severely it was lambasted by audiences and swiftly canceled by Disney.

The cancelation was no surprise to Amandla Stenberg, who starred in the show and condemned the bigotry aimed at The Acolyte. Like clockwork, the usual suspects pounced on them for this, so in stepped the world’s leading expert on navigating hatred from the Star Wars fandom.

Indeed, Ahmed Best—the man who shouldered the role of the infamous Jar Jar Binks back during the prequel trilogy (and who he’s voiced in a handful of projects since)—took to Instagram with a post of his own shortly after Stenberg posted their Instagram story, stating “I will always stand in solidarity for artists who give 110% to their work and art. Keep shining queen.”

It’s a class act from Best, whose Star Wars roles also include Jedi Master Kelleran Beq in The Mandalorian, and who knows a thing or two about being subjected to nonsensical outrage solely for participating in a Star Wars project in a way that someone didn’t like.

Was The Acolyte a good show? No, not really. It started out fine, the action sequences were genuinely excellent, and you could tell it had a lot of love for the IP, but the writing only seemed to get worse as time went on, and anyone who’s anyone knows that a shoddy script can sink the mileage of any show or film in one fell swoop.

Was Jar Jar Binks a good character? No, not at all. He was teeth-grindingly annoying and narratively useless aside from his role in giving Palpatine such potent political power. His presence was a net negative, without a doubt.

But most importantly, does it make any sense to subject actors (who largely have nothing to do with the creation of the actual material) to relentless abuse just because they happened to be in a piece of Star Wars media that’s not precisely the Star Wars media that you want that piece of Star Wars media to be (up to and including the Star Wars media that just isn’t very good)?

All I’m saying is that if you think Osha and Mae’s presence ruin the character of Anakin Skywalker, then Anakin Skywalker probably wasn’t that good of a character to begin with (he is, but I’m just making a point). The Acolyte could have only ever ruined Star Wars if you didn’t think highly of Star Wars to begin with. Go to therapy.