The Star Wars galaxy continues to expand on the small screen, specifically on the Disney+ streaming service.
Following up such titles as The Mandalorian, Star Wars: The Bad Batch, and Star Wars: Visions comes Star Wars: The Acolyte from showrunner Leslye Headland. Based on promotional material for the series so far, it’s safe to say that the Star Wars RPG-inspired program is quite a departure from most recent franchise endeavors.
Set long before the events of Star Wars: Episode I – The Phantom Menace, The Acolyte sees a period of relative peace interrupted in the worst way. Mysterious forces are conspiring against the Jedi, killing those within its ranks. Thus, it’s up to a few brave members of the Jedi Order to figure out who is responsible for these heinous acts and put a stop to them before it’s too late.
The Acolyte puts a host of new characters front and center for this mystery, from Jecki Lon (Dafne Keen) to Master Sol (Lee Jung-jae). However, it’s no secret that Star Wars loves nothing more than tossing viewers cameos of their favorite legacy heroes and villains. In fact, it has come to light that a staple of the Star Wars: The High Republic multimedia initiative, Vernestra Rwoh (Rebecca Henderson), will appear on the program. Can fans expect more preexisting characters to appear?
Though it takes place far ahead of the Skywalker saga, one might think that characters with long lifespans like Yoda (Frank Oz), Yaddle (Bryce Dallas Howard), and potentially Plo Koon (James Arnold Taylor) could appear on The Acolyte. In reality, however, this isn’t the case. Headland herself revealed to ComicBook.com that cameos from such characters, specifically Yoda, who has appeared in High Republic stories already, aren’t on the table.
With that said Headland did mention that she and the Acolyte team pulled from existing Star Wars material to fill out the show’s roster. “We are pulling characters from the High Republic and characters from the EU, but that’s it,” she said. So, one has to wonder which other High Republic-era characters besides Rwoh could pop up, and, more intriguingly, who from the Expanded Universe could do the same.
This time period could allow for Emperor Palpatine’s (Ian McDiarmid) Sith Master, Darth Plagueis, or even his master, Darth Tenebrous, to appear. After all, The Acolyte is about the sudden and violent reemergence of the Sith to the galactic forefront, so if there were ever a production for them to make their live-action introductions, this seems to be the one.
Time will tell which High Republic and Expanded Universe names could be on the table as The Acolyte unfolds across its eight-episode debut season. For those curious, here’s the series’ release schedule.
