The Order 66 timeline across Star Wars, and the open question of who saved Grogu

Order 66 is the most crucial turning point in Star Wars. It started as a tragic gut punch in Revenge of the Sith (2005), starring Hayden Christensen, Ewan McGregor and Ian McDiarmid, and later Star Wars stories kept revisiting it and revealing deeper layers of heartbreak. Here I lay out the complete Order 66 timeline across Revenge of the Sith, The Clone Wars, Jedi: Fallen Order and The Mandalorian, and I look at which mystery person could have rescued Grogu from the Jedi Temple.

We now have way more of the pieces of the puzzle to plug in. The then recent season of The Mandalorian revealed that Grogu escaped the purge. The final season of The Clone Wars showed Ahsoka Tano's arc during these events, and Jedi: Fallen Order showed young Cal Kestis's escape. It's fascinating to see how all of these line up.

The decades long plot behind Order 66, from Sifo-Dyas to Palpatine

Order 66 goes down in 19 BBY, but it was a plot decades in the making. Back in 40 BBY, Jedi Master Sifo-Dyas is expelled from the Jedi Order for foreseeing the galactic war and wanting to raise a grand army of the Republic. After he leaves, he secretly commissions a clone army from the cloners of Kamino. Those cloners implant a chip in the brain of each clone, and that chip is what Palpatine will later use to activate them for Order 66.

Eight years later, in 32 BBY, Palpatine makes his move. He plays the Trade Federation as Darth Sidious and the Republic as Senator Palpatine of Naboo, using that crisis to replace Chancellor Valorum. Ten years after that, in 22 BBY, the Clone Wars begin between the Republic and the Separatists. Palpatine deploys the clone army, pairing each unit with a Jedi commander.

All the while, Palpatine is corrupting Anakin Skywalker. He prods Anakin's passions over his mother and Padmé. Shmi ends up dying, and Anakin and Padmé are secretly wed. Through the war Anakin also forms a friendship with Ahsoka Tano, who gets an insulting exit from the Jedi Order, which makes Anakin question the Order's leadership further. In season 6 of The Clone Wars, Fives discovers the secret chip in every clone and tells Rex about it before he dies. That plants a seed of doubt in Rex's mind that becomes very important later.

The Clone Wars season 7 sends the Jedi Council to the Outer Rim

That brings us to 19 BBY, right before Revenge of the Sith. Season 7 of The Clone Wars shows a Jedi Council meeting with Yoda, Mace Windu, Plo Koon, Aayla Secura, Ki-Adi-Mundi and Depa Billaba, along with her Padawan Caleb Dume, the future Kanan Jarrus of Rebels. This is the moment the most powerful Jedi on the Council spread out to the Outer Rim worlds where they end up during Order 66. That spread was engineered by Palpatine, through Dooku and Grievous, to keep as many Jedi as possible away from the Temple on Coruscant when it happened.

Elsewhere, Obi-Wan saves the life of Commander Cody, the clone trooper who will turn on him only days later. Ahsoka reunites with Anakin and Obi-Wan and asks for their support helping Bo-Katan retake Mandalore from Maul. That request comes right as Grievous kidnaps Chancellor Palpatine, which the Revenge of the Sith opening crawl describes. In The Clone Wars we see them learn about it, and Obi-Wan asks about the Chancellor, only to be told Shaak Ti has been sent to protect him. A deleted scene from Revenge of the Sith shows she doesn't.

So they divide the 501st clone battalion. Commander Rex leads the new 332nd, with helmets painted to honor Ahsoka, to help Bo-Katan liberate Mandalore. Anakin leads the rest of the 501st into the Battle of Coruscant that opens Revenge of the Sith.

Ahsoka and Maul on Mandalore while Anakin turns in Revenge of the Sith

While rescuing Palpatine in the Battle of Coruscant, Anakin follows Palpatine's casual order to execute Dooku with no trial. Afterwards, the Jedi Council still refuses to make Anakin a Master. He's angry, so he goes over their heads to Palpatine, who makes him his personal envoy to the Council. That annoys Mace Windu, who tells Anakin he'll have to spy on Palpatine for them. Obi-Wan and Anakin share a warm goodbye as Obi-Wan heads to Utapau.

Over in The Clone Wars, Obi-Wan catches up with Ahsoka and tells her that Anakin killed Dooku. To learn how Sidious is playing both sides of the war, Ahsoka needs details from Maul. Almec, Mandalore's puppet ruler, warns them that Maul had a vision about Skywalker. During their confrontation, Maul tells Ahsoka about Anakin's dark path, and then Ahsoka fights Maul. It is awesome. Maul screams as he is captured.

The Clone Wars episode 11 dovetails with the Revenge of the Sith Council scene

The timelines converge in a clever way in episode 11 of The Clone Wars, which dovetails with a scene in Revenge of the Sith. Mace Windu, Yoda, Ki-Adi-Mundi and Anakin learn from Commander Cody that Obi-Wan has found Grievous on Utapau. Windu tells Anakin to report this to Palpatine, and Anakin leaves. In that exact moment over in The Clone Wars, Ahsoka and Rex join the call.

Mace Windu mentions the Council's suspicions of the Chancellor, then tells Ahsoka it's none of her business as a citizen and leaves. Ahsoka asks Yoda about Anakin, but she does not share her worry about what Maul told her about Anakin's dark path. It's a fateful choice.

As Ahsoka and Rex leave Mandalore with Maul in tow, saying goodbye to Bo-Katan for now, a lot happens in Revenge of the Sith. Palpatine reveals to Anakin that he is a Sith Lord. Anakin tells Mace Windu, who goes to arrest Palpatine with Agen Kolar, Saesee Tiin and Kit Fisto. Anakin stops Windu by slicing off his arm, Palpatine uses Force lightning to zap Windu out the window, and he names Anakin Darth Vader. Ahsoka and Maul sense all of this, and so does Yoda on Kashyyyk.

Order 66 goes out to Cody, Rex and the clones hunting Cal Kestis

Minutes later, Vader marches on the Jedi Temple with the 501st. As he does, Palpatine issues Order 66 to all clone troopers, activating the chips that make them betray the Jedi commanders they have served for years. What I love about this is that the orders must have gone out at roughly the same time, because Palpatine would not have wanted any delay, so every Jedi would be caught off guard. Yet Cody and Rex clearly got calls specific to them, so Palpatine must have been doing many of these one at a time, as fast as he could.

In rapid succession, Cody fires on Obi-Wan on Utapau. Ki-Adi-Mundi's unit fires on him on Mygeeto. Plo Koon is shot down over Cato Neimoidia. Stass Allie's speeder bike is shot down on Saleucami. Aayla Secura is gunned down on Felucia. We learn from the Kanan graphic novel that Depa Billaba dies helping Caleb Dume escape.

Jedi: Fallen Order shows a flashback of this moment from Cal Kestis's point of view, as Jaro Tapal gets just enough time to take out the clone commander and help Cal escape. We also know Cere Junda was with her Padawan Trilla Suduri and an unnamed Rodian youngling. Yoda senses the order with seconds to spare on Kashyyyk and decapitates his clone troopers, probably confusing the Wookiees. Rex gets the order too, but thanks to Fives he is able to resist his chip, just barely, long enough to let Ahsoka escape. Ahsoka frees Maul to distract the clones, then researches Fives's investigation on a few astromechs so she can locate and disable Rex's chip.

Vader at the Jedi Temple, where Grogu was hiding

Back at the Jedi Temple, Anakin goes on a rampage, which later security recordings show as he cuts down every Jedi he can. We also know from a graphic novel that Jedi Archives librarian Jocasta Nu was among Vader's victims. When he reached her and wanted the Temple beacon, she told him only the Jedi Council could give her orders, then ignited her saber ready to fight. He Force pulled her into his lightsaber.

At some point during this massacre, little Grogu was hiding somewhere in the Temple. In The Mandalorian, Ahsoka tells us that at the end of the Clone Wars, when the Empire rose to power, Grogu was hidden and someone took him from the Temple. She also says he had many masters during his training there, so presumably at least a few people knew he existed. Probably not Anakin, though, because Mace Windu never officially made him a Jedi Master, maybe partially to keep him from knowing about Grogu.

Back to the timeline: Bail Organa arrives and the 501st confronts him, and he's saved by the young Jedi Zett Jukassa, played by George Lucas's son Jett Lucas. The rest of Revenge of the Sith plays out as we remember. Anakin kills the Separatist leaders on Mustafar. Obi-Wan and Yoda clear out the Temple, survey the damage and realize Anakin did it. Palpatine proclaims himself emperor to thunderous applause. Anakin and Obi-Wan duel on Mustafar, Obi-Wan has the high ground and Anakin burns, just as Maul called it. Padmé gives birth to Luke and Leia and dies, and Anakin gets the Vader suit. Concurrently, The Clone Wars ends with a beautiful, dialogue free sequence of Ahsoka and Rex fleeing the clones, Ahsoka letting Maul escape, and the two of them burying their once loyal 332nd. Some time after, Vader comes across that grave, ignites the blue blade and remembers his old Padawan.

Who saved Grogu: Vader, Palpatine, Cere Junda, Obi-Wan or Yoda

All this brings us to the mystery of who saved Grogu in those crucial minutes at the Temple. It had to be someone already inside as Vader arrived with the 501st, because there wasn't any warning time. It could have been Vader or Palpatine, but I doubt it. If Grogu had fallen into either of their hands, I don't think they would have let him go, only for Moff Gideon to be trying to reacquire him five years after the Battle of Endor.

Cere Junda is an interesting option. She told Cal about her escape from the purge: "my padawan and i took several younglings and we went into hiding but we didn't last long." When an imperial patrol was about to find them, she tried to lure it away while Trilla stayed behind with the younglings. One of the younglings she escaped with, and later lost when she was captured, could have been Grogu. In the flashback from Trilla's perspective it's hard to tell where they are. It looks like the ruins of a Jedi temple, but maybe not the one on Coruscant.

Either way, based on Ahsoka's description, it sounds like knowledge of Grogu was limited to Jedi Masters, meaning current or former members of the Jedi High Council. That could mean Obi-Wan or Yoda, who did visit the Temple and might have known about a safe room where Grogu could have been kept. They could have run to check whether he was still alive after Revenge of the Sith cuts away from them. That was maybe a memory the Obi-Wan Kenobi series, which was in the works at the time, could revisit.

Jocasta Nu, Yaddle and Mace Windu as Grogu's rescuer

Another theory is librarian Jocasta Nu, who does hold the rank of Master and might have been trusted with the secret of Grogu. As the graphic novel shows, though, she did not have much time before her deadly encounter with Vader.

Some have suggested former Jedi Council member Yaddle, though most believe she was already dead, or at least not near the Temple, at this point. It's not clear what the canon will end up being with Yaddle, and I know plenty of people insist she's already dead. I'm just saying canon gets rewritten all the time.

The last option is the one I find very interesting: Jedi Master Mace Windu. His arm was severed and he was zapped out of the Chancellor's chambers on Coruscant, but we never saw where his body landed. As someone who knew about Palpatine and Anakin's coming attack, it is possible he could have crawled his way back to the Jedi Temple with just enough time to secure Grogu.