Spoilers ahead for episode five of The Acolyte. The Acolyte is racking up quite the body count. The latest Star Wars series , created by Leslye Headland, began with the death of Carrie-Anne Moss’s Jedi master, and in subsequent episodes Jedi have been dropping like mere stormtroopers.
And yet last week’s fifth episode , which saw the deaths of not one but two major characters — including the best Padawan of the High Republic era — still came as a surprise. Dafne Keen, who broke out playing a young clone of Wolverine in 2017’s Logan , traded her claws for a lightsaber to play The Acolyte ’s Jecki Lon, Padawan to Jedi Master Sol ( Squid Game ’s Lee Jung-jae). While attempting to prevent the murder of another Jedi master, Jecki and Sol come face-to-face with a terrifying masked Sith Lord, whose identity Jecki manages to reveal following an intense duel with this much more seasoned warrior.
But then Qimir (Manny Jacinto) pulls out a second lightsaber and kills the young Padawan, and soon after he kills another young Jedi knight, Charlie Barnett’s Yord. It’s a shocking moment that Keen says speaks to the central tension of The Acolyte : Jecki had so much potential, and it all disappeared in the flash of a red lightsaber. Seeing you playing another badass girl with spiky parts felt very natural.
Did you see parallels between X-23 and Jecki? I always enjoy playing the trope of cub and lonely older man. That’s a fun thing to play, especially when you work with suc.
