Star Wars: The Acolyte Creator Breaks Down Mae and Osha’s Power, Teases Darth Plagueis Connection

The seventh episode of Star Wars: The Acolyte, “Choice,” was released on Disney+ this week, and it featured some shocking reveals. Not only did fans finally learn the truth about what happened on Brendok 16 years ago, but more was revealed about Mae and Osha’s (Amandla Stenberg) history. We learned in the third episode, “Destiny,” that Mother Aniseya (Jodie Turner-Smith) created the twins using the Force, but turns out, there’s more to their creation. Sol (Lee Jung-jae) and Indara (Carrie-Anne Moss) determined a vergence (a unique concentration of Force energy around a single location) was used to split one consciousness into two, meaning Mae and Osha are more than just twins. ComicBook recently had the chance to join a press roundtable with The Acolyte creator, Leslye Headland, who was asked about Mae and Osha’s connection as well as their creation’s potential connection to Darth Plagueis.

“I would say I would leave that up to future chapters of the story,” Headland teased when Screen Rant asked if Osha and Mae could live without the other. “But what I can say is that I believe that because Aniseya utilized this power, which is I think all of Aniseya’s power is very potent, but a lot of it is unknowable … She knows the extent of what she’s capable of, but not exactly sure when she experiments with it, what will happen.”

“So for example, she’s playing around with powers that could create life, that can create life, and instead of creating one life, it ended up being two lives,” Headland continued. “So I think her intention, and one of the reasons the Coven is so obsessed with keeping the twins together, is that they believe that this very special miracle that was able to happen under their roof, it could be broken if the two of them are separated. Now in our story, they are separated and they’re separated for a very long time.”

“So it seems unlikely to me that if one of them came to harm, the other one would drop dead,” Headland added. “But I do think that because their power and their essence has been split, they both feel incomplete without the other one. And whenever another person notices one of them as different, or their whole selves, the way that Sol responds to Osha, the way that the Stranger responds to Osha, I think that also means that while they’re split, they are not solely dependent on each other as one half and one half, even though that’s what their family of origin would say. And I think it’s the way that the Jedi understand their creation to make sense.” 

Are Osha and Mae’s Powers Tied to Plagueis?

Darth Plagueis is well-known in the Star Wars universe thanks to Palpatine’s monologue about the character in Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith. In the film, Palpatine details “Darth Plagueis the Wise”  and his ability to create life using midi-chlorians, and defeat death. During Headland’s roundtable, she explains how Plagueis’ quest for life-giving power ties into Osha and Mae’s creation. In fact, she compares the situation to the real-life events depicted in Oppenheimer. 

“Of course they do. I am surprised more people haven’t asked me that question. I’m like, ‘Obviously,’” Headland said when asked by Screen Rant if the twins’ powers are connected to the powers of Darth Plagueis. “The Sith are looking for the atomic bomb, they’re looking for ‘What’s the card that we can have over the Jedi? What is the Force power that the Jedi do not have?’ And so, as far as the Sith are concerned, they’re in an arms race and the Jedi don’t even know that arms race is happening because the being that can get the power that Aniseya has started playing with will start the Manhattan Project.”

Stay tuned for more from the roundtable interview ComicBook attended with Leslye Headland. The season finale of Star Wars: The Acolyte drops on Disney+ on July 16th.