For all the attention they get, there are surprisingly few Sith in the Star Wars universe. Darth Vader and Emperor Palpatine are iconic, Count Dooku and Darth Maul had their moments in the sun, and Darth Bane and Darth Plagueis lurk on the sidelines. Qimir, the villain and heartthrob at the center of The Acolyte, was only recently added to that short list. And now that the series he stars in has come and gone, a surprising truth about the character will change how you think about The Acolyte — and the prequel trilogy before it.
Twitter user @sw_holocron pointed out that we’ve seen Qimir kill more Jedi than any Sith before him. Most of the murders came in Episode 5, “Night,” when Sol and a group of Jedi attempted to track down the mysterious Sith serial killer, only for him to turn the tables on them in deadly fashion.
It’s a big claim, especially since Revenge of the Sith contained the brutal Jedi purge that was Order 66. However, a big caveat is that Qimir has the most on-screen kills. In terms of sheer body count, the dubious trophy would probably go to Anakin, considering he butchered Jedi younglings offscreen. Or, to look at the subject from another angle, the real death toll would technically be Emperor Palpatine; while he only personally dispatched a few Jedi, he ordered his clone troopers to execute hundreds. And if you credit Palps with plunging the entire galaxy into bloody conflict, the fatalities go off the charts.
Regardless of the technicalities, Qimir should still be considered the deadliest Sith for one reason: only a handful of the countless Jedi casualties in Revenge of the Sith were speaking roles. The rest were expendable, red-shirt Jedi who existed merely as blaster fodder. Qimir, however, brutally murdered Jecki and Yord, two Jedi who were fully-formed characters. While we only knew them for a few episodes, they were far more fleshed out than most of the prequel Jedi.
While many prequel Jedi like Ki-Adi-Mundi and Plo Koon would feature in future series like The Clone Wars, they were nothing more than a name and face when they died in Revenge of the Sith. Qimir may have killed his fair share of nameless Jedi too, but it’s the loss of Jecki and Yord that packed a punch because fans got to know them.
That was part of the appeal to Acolyte showrunner Leslye Headland. “That's what I loved about starting with the red shirts," she told Entertainment Weekly. "You're kind of like, 'Oh, [they're] just going to kill a bunch of red shirts, and everybody is going to be fine and… OH MY GOD, JECKI'S DEAD! Okay, I'm listening.'"
So while the claim of “Deadliest Sith” may be subject to debate, Qimir’s kills packed the biggest punch. Vader may have defeated an Obi-Wan who embraced his own demise, but Qimir’s sudden, nonchalant takedown of two fun Jedi was the gut punch he needed to secure true villainous status.
