On May 4th, 2020, The Acolyte series being announced had me absurdly ecstatic. For as much live action content as Star Wars has, there hasn’t been a Sith-centric movie or TV show. The stories have always been Jedi-centric and I am sorry to say; the Jedi are boring. I have always found their ways to be too rigid and cultish.
There are so many stories Disney and Lucasfilm before them
have not tapped, particularly from the Expanded Universe, where we get an
excellent POV from the Sith with their ideology and methods. Several good reads
to get up to speed are the Darth Bane Trilogy, the Darth Plagueis novel, The Labyrinth of Evil, Dark Lord: The Rise of Darth Vader and others, which include
a few Darth Maul novels.
To dig into the details of The Acolyte, it is important we understand
the premise and try to speculate from there. Here is what we know about the
plot:
“The Acolyte is set at the end of the High Republic era
in a world of ‘shadowy secrets and emerging dark side powers’, approximately
100 years before Star Wars Episode 1: The Phantom Menace. 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.”
Now, given the time frame of 100 years before Episode 1,
that would mean that they set this story around 135 BBY (Before the Battle of
Yavin). From the surface view, that gives some exciting hints because that was
during the time of Darth Tenebrous and the early years of his apprentice, Darth Plagueis (Darth Sidious’ master).
We can take this with a grain of salt because, as we all
know (and detest), Disney has been hard at work ret-conning the Star Wars
universe and relegating many beloved Star Wars stories to the “Legends”
non-canon. So, until they unveil who the Sith in the series will be, I will not
hold my breath. However, it would be a tremendous story if they made Darth
Tenebrous and Darth Plagueis the villains in the story. Even more because it
would be a story where the bad guys end up winning.
Tenebrous was a Bith Dark Lord of the Sith, also known as
Rugess Nome, and a scientific mastermind. Plagueis was a Muun, also known as
Hego Damask, who eventually would become so powerful with the Dark Side that he
could influence the midi-chlorians in his own and other people’s bodies. Darth Sidious (The Emperor) and Darth Vader are the only Sith that the average viewer
knows about, so it would be amazing to see previous architects during The Rule of Two and their scheming to bring down the Jedi Order.
This is where Disney’s agenda to create their own Star Wars
lore could work because there isn’t any media set during that time of Darth
Tenebrous and then Darth Plagueis outside of brief references in the Darth
Plagueis novel. They could easily weave a story to include Jedi from that time
as they encounter the Sith Lords and discover a plan that was set in motion
1000 years earlier by Darth Bane.
I know Disney likes to keep things light and family
friendly, but considering the Sith remained relatively unknown until the
Phantom Menace, they could really create the dark story we need by having the
Jedi pair uncover the Sith Lords identities but ultimately fail in their
efforts to stop them and be silenced, allowing Tenebrous and Plagueis to continue
with their secret path of revenge.