With the announcement of Star Wars: The High Republic came the reveal of a new villainous organization that could potentially provide a connection to a long-time fan favorite Sith Lord. This endeavor will look at an era of the Galactic Republic and the Jedi Order set about 200 years prior to the events of The Phantom Menace. These stories will be told across a variety of different types of books (including YA-novels and more adult-skewing literature) penned by a whole slew of prolific authors including the likes of Claudia Grey and Cavan Scott.
Just as wide-ranging as the number of authors tackling this material is the amount of characters that will be covered throughout the assorted High Republic texts. Among those new characters will be a group called the Nihil who will serve as the primary adversaries for the Jedi protagonists.
Related: Star Wars: What The High Republic Means For The Next Movie
Being described as "Space Vikings" and adorned with distinctive steampunk-esque armor, these mysterious individuals have already captured the minds and imagination of Star Wars fans. Partially, this is due to rampant speculation there could be some sort of connection between the Nihil and a similarly-named adversary from the Star Wars Legends continuity, Darth Nihilus. First appearing in the video game Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic II: The Sith Lords, Darth Nihilus - alongside Sith allies like Darth Traya and Darth Sion - was a formidable force for ancient Jedi to reckon with. Though he became a fan-favorite character, his appearances were limited exclusively to Expanded Universe content.
When Disney bought Star Wars in 2012 and relegated all EU content to the non-canon classification of Legends, Darth Nihilus was no longer officially a part of Star Wars mythology. For years, there's been speculation surrounding if a new version of the character will be incorporated into Disney's Star Wars canon much like fellow beloved EU character Thrawn was reworked into a Star Wars: Rebels antagonist. Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker may have done just that, but it has yet to be officially confirmed beyond this initial tease.
Such speculation has only gotten more intense now that The High Republic has introduced Nihil, an order of characters who share a similar name to Darth Nihilus and, much like this Sith Lord, are antagonistic towards the Jedi. Though those parallels are intriguing, it's unlikely the Nihil are paving the way for the introduction of a canon-version of Darth Nihilus. For one thing, the Nihil appears to be a gaggle of individuals predominately populated by aliens whereas Darth Nihilus was a human male. For another, in his original incarnation, Darth Nihilus existed thousands of years prior to The Phantom Menace. Meanwhile, the Nihil and all the other characters in The High Republic takes place a mere two-hundred years before the inaugural Star Wars film. It isn't impossible to imagine a new version of Nihilus being shifted over to a new time period but this drastic of a shift is unlikely.
To boot, even the naming similarities between Darth Nihilus and the Nihil are likely coincidental. The identical names can be chalked up to both fictional creations originating their names from the term nihilistic, a grim term meant to indicate they both lie in direct contrast to the more hopeful Jedi Order. While all signs currently point to there being no connection between Darth Nihilus and the Nihil, that doesn't mean it's impossible for the former character to emerge in The High Republic. Perhaps the eventual overarching storyline for the Nihil organization will lead them to the origin story for a new take on the Darth Nihilus character. Much like the powers of the Force itself, nothing is impossible when it comes to Star Wars storytelling.