The internet is abuzz with reports about The Acolyte was canceled in August last year; Disney remained silent about the cancelation until Alan Bergman - co-chair of Disney Entertainment, responsible for overseeing the company’s content creation and platforms - addressed it in an end-of-year review. "We were happy with our performance," he explained, "but it wasn’t where we needed it to be given the cost structure of that title, quite frankly, to go and make a season two. So that’s the reason why we didn’t do that."

More recently, viewership data on The Acolyte has prompted a fresh debate. Streamers are notoriously wary of releasing actual viewership data, meaning third-party companies like Luminate are generally seen as the best source, and Luminate's own review of 2024 suggested that The Acolyte was indeed the second-biggest show on Disney+ last year. #RenewTheAcolyte is once again trending on social media. But what is the truth behind these viewership stats?

The Acolyte Was The Second Most-Viewed Disney Plus Show In 2024

According to Luminate, six of the top 10 Disney+ TV shows for 2024 were Star Wars. Data from Luminate suggests that Star Wars is absolutely vital to the streamer's performance, with both new releases and previous seasons hitting the top ten. This has gone pretty much viral, and fans of The Acolyte are stressing their show's own significance; it was behind only Percy Jackson and the Olympians. On the face of it, this does indeed look like a mark of success - but there's a problem.

2024 Was A Disappointing Year For Disney Plus

The issue, quite simply, is that 2024 was a bad year for Disney+ - a streaming service that is overly dependent on franchises. The top 10 alone proves that, because it contains two types of content that really shouldn't be there. Streaming services tend to be dependent on new releases of content, so there shouldn't be so many older pieces of content. Meanwhile, animations aren't supposed to be a big draw either. Jimmy Doyle, Director and Film & TV analyst at Luminate, explained this to us in a 2024 review of Star Wars:

"When you look at the animated titles, they're gonna be a lot lower in of viewership than live action. That's pretty typical. That's not necessarily a bad thing, but that's just they're not as valuable when we talk about Disney / Lucasfilm. They're valuable in keeping fans engaged, things like that, but the live action is what's most important to them when we look at that gross level viewership."

X-Men '97 and Star Wars: The Bad Batch were both tremendous shows. Personally, I considered them highlights of the year (along with Arcane on Netflix). But their presence in the top 10 indicates something about the health of Disney+ as a streaming service, and it's not good. The Acolyte came second in a year in which Disney+ as a whole underperformed.

Some are beginning to speculate that the age of franchises may well be drawing to a close.

It's important to stress that Luminate believe pretty much every franchise struggled last year, not just Star Wars. Their own report points to the MCU, where Agatha All Along and Echo both underperformed when compared to other MCU TV shows (despite appearing in the top 10); meanwhile, Amazon's Rings of Power season 2 saw a 60% decrease in total minutes watched from the show's first season. Some are beginning to speculate that the age of franchises may well be drawing to a close.

How The Acolyte's Viewership Compares To Other Star Wars Shows

If you really want to understand The Acolyte's performance, then you have to compare it to other Star Wars TV shows. There, Luminate's analysis suggests The Acolyte had problems when compared to other recent releases. Take the example of Obi-Wan Kenobi; this launched with 7.52 million views in the first two days, but with a disappointing dropoff to just 3.91 million for the finale. Incredibly, this was still over 1 million higher than The Acolyte's opening. And here's the catch; it gets worse, because The Acolyte saw a significant drop in viewership throughout its run, as Luminate's graph reveals.

It's not unusual to see some kind of drop, but the sheer scale here is horrific, and suggests real problems with retention. The action-packed episode 5 was a step in the right direction, and initial viewership of episode 6 showed signs of improvement, but note the depth of that particular gradient. "The Acolyte... had lower viewership than most of the other Star Wars shows when it premiered, and then it didn't gain viewership," Doyle told us. "It actually lost a little bit of viewership during its run."

The Acolyte's Performance Has To Be Judged Against Cost

The Acolyte's viewership has to be judged against its cost, which was frankly prohibitive. According to tax documents filed by the Walt Disney Company’s UK branch, Lucasfilm spent an eye-watering $231 million on the show, meaning the budget ballooned to an eye-watering $28.75 million per episode. This is significantly over-budget, given previous claims it had been allocated $180 million for filming, and it raises real concerns about why the studio failed to keep costs in check.

Given that kind of cost, The Acolyte really needed to be one of Disney's top performers. Instead, although it performed relatively well for 2024, it was well below what would have been expected - and it wouldn't have justified the cost profile. The Acolyte may have been the second-most-viewed TV show on Disney+ in 2024, but that particular achievement loses its shine when placed in full context. It's a shame; the show was far from perfect, but it didn't deserve this, and it's disappointing to see the story go unfinished after its cliffhanger ending.