Warning! This article contains SPOILERS for Star Wars: The Acolyte episode 1.

The newest Star Wars series, The Acolyte, has introduced the general Star Wars audience to the High Republic, an era never-before-seen in live action – and with it, a lie from the original Star Wars trilogy. This era was considered to be an age of peace and justice, with the galaxy firmly under the reign of the Galactic Republic, the same government seen later on in the prequel trilogy and Star Wars: The Clone Wars. This era of peace, however, was not exactly as peaceful as some have led others to believe.

In the beginning of The Acolyte episode 1, several lines of blue text appear over a field of stars, akin to the “A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away.” This information acts similarly to the opening text crawls as seen in Star Wars movies, and is very much like the opening to Solo: A Star Wars Story. In this text, the Republic is described as having not seen war for generations, and this is similar to how Obi-Wan describes the Republic in A New Hope, as a golden age of peace – but this is technically a lie.

The High Republic Has Revealed A Time Conflict Blazed Across The Galaxy

The Nihil Fought The Jedi Order & Republic

The High Republic era was first explored in 2021, in The High Republic books and comics, which take place 100 years before The Acolyte. A majority of those books actually document a semi-large scale conflict happening in the galaxy. The Jedi Order & Republic are up against the Nihil – a group of pirate marauders bent on destroying the Jedi out of a generations-long need for revenge spurred on by their leader, Marchion Ro.

This conflict flared up over the course of over 4 years, with the Jedi and local defense forces of Republic planets up against a whole fleet of Nihil ships. The Nihil generally operated in a less formal sense, giving authors some room to justify still calling it an era without “war,” but it still feels just a little bit hollow to describe the High Republic as a completely peaceful era. At one point, the Nihil even carved out their own part of the galaxy, sectioning off countless planets and their inhabitants before being defeated by the Jedi.

The Acolyte Repeats The Oldest Jedi Lie

The Republic’s Era Of Peace

Through repeating the emphasis on there being no “war” for generations, The Acolyte has both reinforced a Jedi lie and brought up the idea of what “peace” can actually mean in the huge Star Wars galaxy. The High Republic books confirm that there have been many smaller conflicts over the centuries, just nothing on the scale of the Clone Wars. Thus, overall “peace” to them means that the entire Republic was not at war by the time of The Acolyte – and besides, without conflict, the Jedi would not be the Republic’s “guardians of peace and justice” as Obi-Wan describes them.

The Acolyte episodes 1 and 2 are now available to stream on Disney+.