When Yoda was about to turn 900, he told Obi-Wan Kenobi and Luke Skywalker that he had been training Jedi “for 800 years.” In the Disney+ animated series Young Jedi Adventures, we see Yoda doing just that, two full centuries before A New Hope, which would be roughly 600 years into his 800-year Jedi Master gig. And, because The Acolyte takes place even closer to the films (a century before The Phantom Menace) then that means the chances of seeing Yoda in this series are really high, right?
Wrong. In The Acolyte Episode 4, one line makes it very clear that we’ll not be seeing Yoda anytime soon. And unless this situation changes, our little green friend will remain busy for the duration of this series.
Spoilers for The Acolyte Episode 4 ahead.
As Vernestra Rwoh and various Jedi discuss the next steps in tracking down Mae, and her mysterious master, the idea of taking matters to the Jedi High Council is briefly suggested, and then immediately shut down. It seems that the High Council can’t be bothered with this specific problem, because otherwise, it will explode into a larger political problem for the Galactic Senate.
While this detail has all sorts of implications about the bureaucracy of the Jedi and the Senate at this point in Star Wars history, it also very neatly closes the door on a Yoda cameo. Although Yoda is very much active at this point in the Star Wars timeline, if he’s serving on the council at this moment, and the council is off limits, then that means we’re almost certainly not seeing Yoda in this series.
This detail also checks out with what Acolyte showrunner Leslye Headland has said about cameos in the series in general: “We are pulling characters from the High Republic and characters from EU but that’s it,” she said in an interview with ComicBook.com. “No, there is not [a Yoda cameo].”
While some fans have wondered if Headland was serious, and that a Yoda cameo is a very, very well-kept secret, this line in Episode 4 seems to truly confirm that no members of the Jedi High Council from this time period will be seen in the series, at all.
On some level, the fact that Yoda is totally excluded from The Acolyte helps to maintain Phantom Menace continuity. If no Jedi in this series is even telling Yoda about the existence of a red lightsaber-wielding warrior, or of possible Sith-ish implications, then it would stand to reason Yoda would have zero knowledge of it a century later. In The Phantom Menace, Qui-Gon Jinn went straight to Yoda and the High Council after the discovery of Darth Maul and young Anakin Skywalker. But, in the era of The Acolyte, it seems the Jedi don’t want to bother Yoda and the Council with this stuff until they have more specific details to report.
That being said, there are still four episodes left of The Acolyte Season 1. The decision to exclude the Jedi High Council in Episode 4 might not seem like such a good idea by the events of Episode 6. We don’t actually know how any of this will play out, but if Yoda is sidelined for the entire series, that will make a certain amount of sense in the larger view of the Force. That said, there’s still time for him to come back. Even though The Acolyte takes place in the Yoda’s past, its future is still in motion.
