Star Wars: The Acolyte Suggests Anakin Skywalker's Virgin Birth Might Not Be The First

There will be mild spoilers for the third episode of "Star Wars: The Acolyte," so beware.

"He can see things before they happen," Qui-Gon Jinn tells Shmi Skywalker about her son Anakin in "Star Wars: The Phantom Menace." He explains to her that if he had been born in the Republic, he'd have been identified early and trained as a Jedi. Then, curiously, he asks her who the boy's father was.

"There was no father," Anakin's mother tells the venerable Jedi. "I carried him. I gave birth. I can't explain what happened."

Qui-Gon explains later that this is a vergence in the Force and that Anakin (whose age was a struggle for George Lucas to decide) was conceived of the midi-chlorians themselves; the building blocks of life and a pathway through which living things can hear the will of the Force. This virgin birth took audiences by surprise, but it took the Jedi Council by surprise as well. "You refer to the prophecy of the one who will bring balance to the Force," Mace Windu tells Qui-Gon incredulously in response to this revelation. Then he asks, "You believe it's this boy?"

Qui-Gon died believing that Anakin would bring balance to the Force because of the nature of his birth and the prophecy. But where did the prophecy come from? And could there have been others before? The third episode of "Star Wars: The Acolyte" seems to indicate as much.

In the latest episode of "Star Wars: The Acolyte", high in a mountain monastery reminiscent of Powell and Pressburger's stunning and rich "Black Narcissus," we are introduced to two characters of significant importance to Osha and Mae: their mothers. One is a Zabrak named Mother Koril, played by Margarita Levieva, and the other, Mother Aniseya, played by Jodie Turner-Smith.

Slowly, over the course of the episode, we learn more and more details about the exact parentage of the children beyond just calling these two women their mothers. First, we learn that Mother Koril is the one who carried Mae and Osha during pregnancy. Then, it's implied heavily that the Force was used to compel the conception and birth without a father.

In fact, the birth of the girls is taken as a miracle to the coven, and is something they keep secret from the outside world. Disaster only strikes when the Jedi learn of their existence. "Where is their father?" Master Indara asks Aniseya, echoing Qui-Gon's question to Shmi. "They have no father," Aniseya responds coolly.

As the witches argue about if they are going to allow these "deranged" monks to test Osha, Mother Koril puts a foot down. "I carried them." But Aniseya retorts, "I created them." To which Koril fires back, "And what happens if the Jedi discover how you created them?" There is no response.

If the midi-chlorians conceived Anakin Skywalker, it was heavily implied by Palpatine that his master had some hand in convincing the midi-chlorians to do so, though that always seemed a lie of the Sith. But what if Aniseya had learned to manipulate the midi-chlorians to create life the way Sidious implied the Sith were capable of? It seems as though Sidious exaggerated the power of the Sith, but there's nothing to say Aniseya doesn't have that power.

During the course of "Star Wars: The Clone Wars" we were introduced to a planet called Mortis, redefining what we knew about the power of midi-chlorians and the prophecy of the one who would bring balance to the Force. We learn of Mortis, a nexus through which all the Force flows and is as much a metaphor as a real place. There, we see Son and Daughter, two Force wielders exhibiting opposite sides of the Force, light and dark. And we have Father, the entity representing balance between his two children, keeping light and dark in check. 

These episodes of "The Clone Wars" re-contextualize the prophecy of the Chosen One and the reason for the midi-chlorians to create Anakin Skywalker in the first place, by insisting that to fulfill the prophecy he must stay on Mortis to balance Son and Daughter.

As we look at layers and ripples of the ramifications of Mortis, it feels like Mae and Osha, both conceived in ways similar to Anakin Skywalker, could be connected to that sibling balance of light and dark. Twins have long held a symbolic place in the world of "Star Wars," as have siblings. It seems as though these things further connect Mae and Osha to the story of Anakin Skywalker.

But if he's not the first Force-wielder to have been conceived of the midi-chlorians, Mae and Osha could have interesting and far-reaching consequences for the rest of the "Star Wars" mythos.

Where we see these ties between Mae and Anakin Skywalker, it forces one to wonder if they are on a similar path story-wise. Both Osha and Anakin Skywalker, conceived of the Force, wished to become Jedi and were both taken from their families and trained as Jedi at about eight years old. Both wanted to "see the galaxy" and had connections that could interfere with their training. Anakin stayed with the Jedi and Osha left, but as "The Acolyte" showrunner Leslye Headland explores the echoes of Anakin's story from the prequels in interesting ways, could we be seeing the beginnings of Osha's turn to the dark side in order to save her dark sister Mae?

It would be an interesting turn of events and I'd be excited to see the story play out in that way. Regardless, I'm interested in any story Headland wants to tell us, and we've got plenty of episodes left to see what happens.

New episodes of "The Acolyte" hit Disney+ on Tuesdays at 9:00pm ET.