In episode 5 of The Acolyte, two popular supporting characters were killed off in shocking fashion, but that doesn't mean we won't see them again at some point.
If you're not up-to-date with the show yet, major spoilers follow.
Despite Jecki Lon (Dafne Keen) and Yord Fandar (Charlie Barnett) meeting an untimely end at the hands of The Stranger (Manny Jacinto) in "Night," showrunner Leslye Headland believes there's a good chance both Jedi could return to the Galaxy Far, Far Away.
"Yeah, definitely," Headland told Jedi News at a roundtable (via Total Film) when asked if Jecki and Yord's stories could be revisited down the line. "Pablo Hidalgo and I have talked about that, and since wrapping up the season, there's definitely some stuff that I would love to see come to fruition."
"Obviously, Vernestra already exists in publishing, so also going to do something there," she added. "There was a lot of background done on them both by the actors in the writers' room. Yord Fandar, I've said this before, was a character in a campaign that I played, so there's a pretty large backstory to him. But yeah, it was always the plan to kill them in episode 5 halfway through the season. So it was kind of fun to think about them a lot and then think, 'Well, because we didn't spend a lot of time with them, maybe there's a way we could keep playing around with them somehow.'"
Does this suggest that Jecki and Yord return as Force-ghosts? That seems highly unlikely given their status as supporting players, so we'd say any future appearances will occur either in flashbacks or in future projects set before the events of The Acolyte.
In The Acolyte, an investigation into a shocking crime spree pits a respected Jedi Master (Lee Jung-jae) against a dangerous warrior from his past (Amandla Stenberg). As more clues emerge, they travel down a dark path where sinister forces reveal all is not what it seems.
The series stars Amandla Stenberg, Lee Jung-jae, Manny Jacinto, Dafne Keen, Charlie Barnett, Jodie Turner-Smith, Rebecca Henderson, Dean-Charles Chapman, Joonas Suotamo, and Carrie-Anne Moss.
Leslye Headland created the series, based on Star Wars by George Lucas, and serves as an executive producer along with Kathleen Kennedy, Simon Emanuel, Jeff F. King and Jason Micallef. Charmaine DeGraté and Kor Adana are the co-executive producers. Rayne Roberts, Damian Anderson, Eileen Shim and Rob Bredow are the producers.
Headland also directed the premiere episodes (Eps. 101 & 102). Directors Kogonada (Eps. 103 & 107), Alex Garcia Lopez (Eps. 104 & 105) and Hanelle Culpepper (Eps. 106 & 108) round out the directing duties on the series.
"I really wanted to tell a story about the Sith," Headland told EW in a recent interview. "That was kind of my dream Star Wars idea. But it felt like the time period to do that in would be something pre-Phantom Menace. That seemed to be the most interesting trajectory for the Sith: How did the Sith go from the Rule of Two and being quote-unquote 'extinct' to Palpatine coming into power without the Jedi knowing about it?"
Award-winning composer Michael Abels, known for his work on Get Out and Us, scored The Acolyte.