Not only are there great Star Wars TV shows already available to watch, but there are plenty more on their way. One of my most anticipated, especially since it ties into the stellar The High Republic initiative, is The Acolyte. The official site provided an update on the show, revealing it not only started production in the UK, but also confirmed rumors and revealed some surprising new cast members to join Amandla Stenberg! Head below for the full list and a neat little behind-the-scenes shot!
What. A. Cast!!!! Like, this might be the most stacked cast yet for a Star Wars show production, but more importantly it’s full of various representation and diversity, helping filling out the world of Star Wars more and more, much like The High Republic characters have been since 2021. Joining the already announced Stenberg, who plays the show’s main character (yet unnamed), there’s: Lee Jung-jae, best known for Squid Game, which he won an Emmy for (really got to watch that!); Manny Jacinto, who I absolutely adored in The Good Place and I can’t wait to see more from him; Dafne Keen, who has been excellent in HBO’s His Dark Materials (the final season starts in December), but is probably best known for Logan, a true breakout performance she’s proved wasn’t just a one-time thing; Jodie Turner-Smith is new to me, but I’ve heard good things about Queen & Slim; Rebecca Henderson and Charlie Barnett, both from Russian Doll, are also queer, cast we’ve not really had in the past, and hopefully they can portray it on screen too. I’ve loved both of them in Doll, also from The Acolyte creator Lesley Headland, so excited to have them here as well; Dean-Charles Chapman I almost didn’t recognize, but he was Tommen Baratheon in Games of Thrones and was more recently in 1917; and the last new cast member should need no introduction… Carrie-Ann Moss?!?! In my Star Wars?!?! Her excellent return as Trinity in the wonderful The Matrix Resurrections, expansive role in Horizon: Forbidden West, and role in Netflix’s Jessica Jones have brought her back into the public conscious in a big way, but now Star Wars? So well deserved, to her and this whole cast.
Not only did we get new cast and our first shot of production, but the first synopsis as well, offering our first hints at an official story for the show:
“The Acolyte is a mystery-thriller that will take viewers into a galaxy of shadowy secrets and emerging dark-side powers in the final days of the High Republic era. A former Padawan reunites with her Jedi Master to investigate a series of crimes, but the forces they confront are more sinister than they ever anticipated.”
Since Stenberg is the main character, and we see them with Jung-Jae, they might just be the former Padawan and Jedi Master mentioned in the synopsis.
In case you aren’t aware, The High Republic is a publishing initiative which focuses on the galaxy some 200 years before even the prequels, finding the Jedi at their prime, no Sith in sight, but the cracks are slowly beginning to show themselves. Its initial Phase lasted just over a year and its currently just beginning its second Phase, which jumps back 150 years more to explore events that led to what’s happening in the first and the final third Phase. In Phase I, the Jedi find themselves responding alongside the Republic to the Great Hyperspace Disaster, which sees ships lost forever to hyperspace or flung out like missiles at unsuspecting planets, and later bringing to justice those who perpetrated the event: the Nihil, a dangerous group of marauders in the Outer Rim. Their leader is an enigmatic man with a plan so devious, Jedi die left and right due to ancient, mysterious creatures he’s unleashed, something Phase II is revealing the origins behind. The original creators of the era, Charles Soule, Cavan Scott, Justina Ireland, Claudia Gray, and Daniel José Older (joined by Tessa Gratton, George Mann, Zoraida Córdova, and Lydia Kang For Phase II) have brought tons of diversity and LGBTQIA+ representation to Star Wars through their work, with a few sharing the cast reveal with understandable excitement, so it’s great to see their work and the diversity they’ve championed continue on-screen with a project connected to it. Creator, showrunner, and executive producer Leslye Headland, who will direct the pilot episode (and was behind Russian Doll), is no stranger to bringing such representation to the forefront.
As for the sinister forces the Padawan and Jedi Master encounter, per the synopsis, I’d imagine this would mean the Sith and those they’ve brought to their cause in the intervening years of silence. They’ve not featured in The High Republic so far and I have a good feeling they likely won’t, or if they do, it’ll be a small part. Combine that with Headland’s confirmation The Acolyte takes place 100 years before The Phantom Menace (and THR is 200 in Phase I) so this show exploring their rise leading into the prequels feels very likely.
The Acolyte just started filming and the last we heard is potentially out in 2024 at the earliest, but after a cast announcement like this, it’s going to make the wait for its premiere even harder than it already was! Return to the Manor for more news and later reviews in the future, as we’ll be following this one with great interest!
Ryan is Mynock Manor’s Head Butler. You can follow him on Twitter @BrushYourTeeth. You can follow the website on Twitter @MynockManor and Instagram @mynockmanor.