Darth Plagueis Was Originally Set-Up To Become The Biggest Threat In Disney's Cancelled Star Wars Show

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Manny Jacinto as Qimir, Amandla Stenberg as Osha, and Darth Plagueis in The Acolyte

Published Feb 3, 2026, 10:00 AM EST

Since 2019, Kevin Erdmann has been one of Screen Rant's Senior Staff Writers, covering all kinds of Superhero and Star Wars media with Easter egg breakdowns, theory pieces, breaking news, and more. A huge Star Wars & MCU fan, Kevin also loves Batman (because he's Batman), but could talk for hours about why Nightwing is DC's greatest hero.

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Lucasfilm has further confirmed that Darth Plagueis was going to be the biggest threat of The Acolyte, the Star Wars series set in the High Republic that was canceled after its first season back in 2024. According to these new reveals, Plagueis was set to become a major big bad for the first time in live-action.

A powerful Sith Lord who trained Palpatine and was ultimately betrayed by his apprentice, Darth Plagueis makes a surprising cameo near the end of The Acolyte's first (and now only) season, tying him to Qimir aka The Stranger and sinister dark side schemes at work 100 years before the prequel movies.

Now, The Art of Star Wars: The Acolyte book features new reveals about what showrunner Leslye Headland had in mind for Darth Plagueis' future in the High Republic Era.

New Star Wars Reveals Confirm Darth Plagueis Would Have Been The Acolyte's Big Bad

Qimir smirking to the right and Darth Plagueis in a circle with a gold outline to the left in front of a red background

According to new comments found in this new Star Wars book, Darth Plagueis was always meant to emerge as The Acolyte's looming threat, a major big bad across multiple seasons:

“I had always wanted the end of the season to introduce Plagueis,” Headland said, bringing the Sith lineage full circle by introducing Sheev Palpatine’s future Sith Master. “Having him come in in the middle felt like it was going to be too loaded. So we decided to establish the era, the main characters, and the storyline, and then put Plagueis in as the larger threat.”

The confirmation that Darth Plagueis would have served as the overarching villain of The Acolyte makes the show’s cancellation sting that much more. Instead, we only got a single cameo in the shadows, teasing a greater arc that we may never see in the franchise's future. However, the one appearance we did get of live-action Darth Plagueis was quite good.

Lucasfilm Nailed Darth Plagueis' Live-Action Look On The First Try

Palpatine and Plagueis Custom Star Wars Image

Visually, Lucasfilm and Industrial Light & Magic clearly understood the assignment. Inspired by non-canonical Legends lore and other alien Muuns seen elsewhere in the Star Wars franchise, Darth Plagueis looked absolutely perfect and all kinds of intimidating in his live-action debut. Furthermore, The Art of Star Wars: The Acolyte confirms Lucasfilm came up with the perfect Plaugeis design on the first try:

"In contrast to the extensive exploration of the Stranger, Plagueis’s design was straightforward. Heavily influenced by the character’s established presence in publishing and other Muuns in live-action and animation, Industrial Light & Magic nearly perfected the design on the first try."

“From the first iteration, when we showed it to Leslye, she cried,” said Carlos Ciudad. “She literally said, ‘This is exactly what I had in my head. You just made my dreams [a reality].’ If there’s anything that reminds me how lucky I am to have the job, it’s being able to make somebody cry out of happiness by making a character that she loves. It’s a reminder that what we do is very special.”

Again, if this perfect single appearance was any indication, Darth Plagueis was poised to become a defining villain at the end of the High Republic Era in the decades before his apprentice's eventual rise as the galaxy's emperor with the fall of the Jedi Order.

Whether Lucasfilm will ever revisit Darth Plagueis remains one of Star Wars’ biggest unanswered questions following The Acolyte's cancellation. Based on non-canonical materials, there's so much potential to be had with Plagueis (and Headland was a self-professed fan of Legends and the pre-Disney Expanded Universe).

With any luck, Lucasfilm will find a way to make up for this lost opportunity by continuing Darth Plagueis' canonical story via some other means.

Set 100 years before The Phantom Menace, in the waning days of the High Republic, The Acolyte tells the story of a Jedi Master and their former Padawan as they investigate a sinister threat. Starring Amandla Stenberg, Lee Jung-jae, Manny Jacinto, Dafne Keen, Jodie Turner-Smith, and Carrie-Anne Moss, this series marked the first time the High Republic era of Star Wars appeared in live action.

Filled with interviews with key creatives from the series and never-before-seen art, THE ART OF STAR WARS: THE ACOLYTE offers a firsthand account of working within this new era. The book also features a foreword by Leslye Headland, creator, writer, and executive producer of The Acolyte.

All episodes of The Acolyte are streaming on Disney+.