At Star Wars Celebration Europe today, fans were treated to an exclusive first trailer for the upcoming series, The Acolyte, which will take the franchise well into the past as the stories grow further from the Skywalker Saga.
The series, set 100 years before the events of the George Lucas prequels, which began with The Phantom Menace, will be based around an era known as the High Republic, which has been well documented in various forms of Star Wars expanded media over the years. The era is currently the focus of a publishing initiative which goes by Star Wars: The High Republic. The series, which will star Amandla Stenberg, comes from the creator of Russian Doll, Leslye Headland.
The trailer opened with Lee Jung-Jae as a Jedi Master teaching a class of younglings at the Jedi Temple. The trailer also featured the first look at series star Amandla Stenberg as a masked warrior, entering into a scuffle with Carrie Ann Moss' Jedi knight. While the High Republic is an era largely of peace, its clear a conflict is brewing as Jedi throughout the galaxy prepare to face mysterious threats from all around.
The desire to push out the Star Wars franchise beyond its origins on Tattooine to an expansive galaxy, particularly during an unexplored visual time in the saga, was touched upon when Collider's Maggie Lovitt spoke with Kathleen Kennedy, the current president of Lucasfilm, about the potential of The Acolyte series. Kennedy said:
"We actually were intrigued with that because if that show works, then it really gives us an opportunity to expand on that. And that's what's so great about television because it gives us sort of this larger playground for experimenting."
Who Else Is in the Cast of The Acolyte?
Stenberg was first attached to lead back in December 2021, but their casting was only an internet rumor until Stenberg was at SDCC last year when she was promoting A24's horror film Bodies Bodies Bodies. As time progressed, a suddenly linked with the project, with Jodie Turner-Smith in talks to board the project, alongside Squid Game's Emmy-winner Lee joining in a lead role, Manny Jacinto, and Russian Doll's Charlie Barnett. As production got underway for the series last November, the ever-impressive cast bulked out with more quality after the additions of Carrie-Anne Moss, Rebecca Henderson, Dean-Charles Chapman, and Dafne Keen, all of whom boarded the project. It was also announced that Joonas Suotamo, known for playing Chewbacca in the sequel trilogy and Solo: A Star Wars Story was also announced to be joining the cast as a Wookiee Jedi Master.
Turner-Smith spoke with Collider's Steve Weintraub about the project, and she shared her own thoughts on why she signed on:
"Obviously, the subject matter is different. It's different when everything that you're doing is light-hearted, and that's not what I was doing for Star Wars. But I was working with my favorite director that I've worked with so far, Kogonada, and under the leadership of Leslye Headland. It is incredible to see. I can't wait to see how this show turns out."
The Acolyte will be released in 2024. While the trailer for the series was exclusive to the convention-goers, check out our interview with The Mandalorian's Pedro Pascal.