Star Wars: The Acolyte announces June release date, trailer imminent

It's been a quiet start to the year on the Star Wars front. Unless you've been immersed in the final season of the beloved animated series The Bad Batch, you may be wondering where have all the lightsabers and blasters and spaceship battles gone? While the past few years have overflowed with Star Wars series like Ahsoka and Obi-Wan Kenobi and The Mandalorian and Andor, 2024 has been a year of slowly building anticipation for Lucasfilm's next live-action entry in the galaxy far, far away.

Now, we know when it'll be gracing our screens: June 4. That's the date that Disney+ will premiere The Acolyte, a story set in the glory days of the High Republic when the power of the Jedi was at its zenith...and the Sith were just beginning to rise. The official Star Wars Twitter account announced the news with a cryptic poster which sports the catch phrase, "In an age of light, a darkness rises." Check it out:

The Acolyte trailer is probably coming tomorrow!

The image in the poster shows a lightsaber handle, except instead of a beam of energy coming out of the end, it's a streak of blood which runs up the background from the hilt. Ominous! I can't recall the last Star Wars poster that went this hard, and I like it.

The Star Wars account's post is simply captioned "tomorrow." It seems pretty likely that in less than 24 hours we'll be watching the first public footage of The Acolyte in a trailer. Or a teaser. Or a teaser for the teaser. You know how these things go.

Deadline bills The Acolyte as a "mystery-thriller" which will see a Jedi Master (Squid Game's Lee Jung-jae) reunite with his estranged former Padawan (The Hate U Give's Amandla Stenberg) to investigate a string of horrific murders. As with all good murder mysteries, that string of deaths will lead them ever deeper down a dark rabbit hole of revelations and danger. We're expecting this series to depict the beginnings of the Sith and the end of the High Republic, so it could get very heavy.

The Acolyte is created by Lesley Headland (Russian Dolls). In addition to Jung-jae and Stenberg, it stars Dafne Keen (His Dark Materials), Manny Jacinto (The Good Place), Jodie Turner-Smith (The Last Ship), Rebecca Henderson (Inventing Anna), Charlie Barnett (Russian Doll), Carrie-Anne Moss (The Matrix) and Game of Thrones alum Dean-Charles Chapman, who played Tommen Baratheon in seasons 4 through 6.

Presumably, we'll learn more about The Acolyte tomorrow. Stay tuned.

To stay up to date on everything fantasy, science fiction, and WiC, follow our all-encompassing Facebook page and sign up for our exclusive newsletter.

Get HBO, Starz, Showtime and MORE for FREE with a no-risk, 7-day free trial of Amazon Channels