The Acolyte Ready To Redeem Itself With Iconic Star Wars Villain

What, exactly, did Headland say about The Acolyte and Darth Plagueis? In an interview with Nerdist, she was asked point-blank about the Sith Lord–specifically, if she knew “how the whole story of the galaxy far, far away, from The Acolyte to him training Palpatine, connects?”

The interviewer admitted that he was a Darth Plagueis fanboy who felt compelled to ask the question because, like many other Star Wars fans, he had been waiting many years for this legendary bad guy to make an appearance.

Because of this context, it would have been unsurprising if The Acolyte showrunner gave a firm “no” regarding the show connecting to Darth Plagueis.

Instead, Headland surprised us all by saying “If I continue to get to tell this story, I know how I would like that to play out…I think it’s pretty complicated and messy.”

While this obviously doesn’t tell us much, remarks she made earlier in the interview offer some interesting context for how this Sith icon might play into the show’s growing mythology.

Earlier in that interview, well before Headland dropped the tea (or at least spilled a few drops) about The Acolyte incorporating a Darth Plagueis storyline, she was discussing how fans were arguably missing the important part about the Force vergence in the show.

She noted how some fans were concerned that the show was “stepping on Anakin’s creation storyline” but the more interesting thing is that “this is a power that could have existed in the world way before Anakin” and “that power was being pursued by someone.”

In Headland’s eyes, the fans complaining that the vergence storyline somehow lessens Anakin’s origins are “not seeing the long game of the lineage of the Sith pursuing any sort of evidence of this type of power in the galaxy and then tunnel visioning toward it…improving upon it.”

She pointed out that if the show’s twins “are a test run, being able to improve on what that power is and being able to perfect it, that would be something if I were a Sith I would be interested in.”

Again, it’s worth emphasizing that The Acolyte showrunner didn’t say anything about Darth Plagueis until the interviewer brought it up, so these ideas may be completely disconnected. However, it seems implicit that Plagueis would be one of the Sith who is interested in vergences and how the twins in the show were able to access such fantastic powers thanks to the planet they were on.

Based on Palpatine’s description, Plagueis sounds like somebody who would want to have as many Force tricks up his sleeve as possible, so he would be particularly interested in this vergence because it might increase his own power and influence.

While there is no guarantee The Acolyte would show him onscreen, it’s possible that we’d see Darth Plagueis in the next season because his character would have been alive during this time period.

Such an appearance might help redeem the show by answering some of our biggest questions and filling in a crucial part of franchise lore. That’s assuming the show gets another season, though, and given how divisive the series has proven to be, that’s an assumption the size of a rancor.

Source: Nerdist