The fall and later burning of the Jedi Temple was a symbolic image which marked the end
of the Jedi Order as a whole, as nearly all of its members were executed during Order
66.
But what exactly happened inside the Temple when Anakin and the 501st Legion were sent
in to wipe the Jedi out?
As Anakin and the his troopers approached the main gates of the Jedi Temple, they were
confronted by the Temple’s Gate Keeper, a distraught man named Jurokk.
Having sensed that his fellow masters had been killed by Palpatine earlier, Jurokk asked
what had happened.
Anakin ignored his question, instead demanding where Shaak Ti was, as she was the only Jedi
that was still at the Temple that posed any real threat to him.
Jurokk answered Anakin, telling him that she was at the meditation chambers.
Getting the information he needed, Anakin then cut down the gatekeeper and moved on
into the Temple.
At this point the Temple was not at high alert, and because of this Anakin and his troopers
were able to just walk right in and properly position themselves before they made their
main attack on everyone inside.
As Anakin made his way across the outer hallways of the Temple, any unfortunate Jedi that came
across him was quietly and swiftly cut down.
Meanwhile troopers of the 501st were ordered to all the exits of the building and to take
over the main hangers as a means to prevent anyone from escaping once the main attack
would commence.
Anakin’s first task was to take over the Temple’s communication center located within
the Jedi Archives, as a way to prevent an alert being sent out to the rest of the Jedi
that the Republic had turned on them.
When Anakin walked in, he was confronted by Jocasta Nu.
Sensing his fall to the dark side, Jocutas ignited her lightsaber only to be pulled by
the force and fatally stabbed in the chest by Anakin.
The other Jedi within the room were then quickly cut down.
A Jedi named Sha Koon saw this happen from a distance and was able to escape.
Witnessing the death of her fellow peers and being cornered by the clones, she fled into
the underskirts of the Temple through tunnel systems that were only known to a handful
of Jedi.
She would remain there for a few days, and we’ll get back to her later in the video.
Anyway, at this point the clones were beginning to attack the Temple from all corners and
were starting to close in.
Most Jedi were caught off guard as overwhelming numbers of clone troopers rushed each of the
chambers and mowed down everyone inside.
Most of their victims consisted of Knights and Padawans.
The few Jedi Masters within the Temple were taken out by Anakin, who focused on them while
the clones took out the weaker Jedi.
Once every Jedi was aware of what was happening, a few Masters tried to gather as many of them
as they could to make a last stand in the main hall of the Temple.
This fight saw the most casualties toward the clones, but nonetheless they were able
to punch through the Jedi’s last defenses and eliminate them all.
Nearing the end of the attack, Anakin was able to locate and attack Shaak Ti.
Although in an unfinished deleted scene it shows Anakin killing her while she was meditating,
this was later retconned with Shaak Ti instead surviving his attack and later staging an
evacuation mission to rescue as many Jedi as possible before making her own escape.
Most of the padawans and younglings that tried to hide rather than escape would later find
themselves trapped in the Temple with no means of escape, and as such they were all slain
by Anakin as he made his way through all the chambers one by one and slaughtered them like
animals.
At least one Jedi instructor had to witness all of his students get cut down right in
front of him before meeting their same fate shortly afterwards.
Of course there was also an entire group of younglings who were mercilessly slain by Anakin
as well, not knowing that he was in fact leading the very attack before it was too late.
Once the raid that would later be known as Operation Knightfall was finished, the dead
bodies of the Jedi were dragged outside onto the Temple’s front steps and burned for
all the citizens to see.
Anakin later configured the Temple’s main beacons to call Jedi back before leaving to
Mustafar.
All Jedi that returned were ambushed by Clones, some of which actually dressed in traditional
Jedi robes to further disguise themselves before they attacked.
At this point, essentially every Jedi that once was at the Temple had either died or
escaped.
All but one, Sha Koon.
She had remained hidden in the secret underground tunnels of the Temple, until one day she was
able to directly contact Palpatine.
Hoping to trick the Sith as a means to assassinate them both, Sha Koon played the part of a defeated
Jedi who was eager to learn the ways of the dark side.
She proclaimed that she wanted to become Palpatine’s student, who initially dismissed her as he
already had an apprentice.
She responded with what if she killed him?
To which Palpatine stated that if she were able to do that, then she could become his
new student.
Palpatine then sent his apprentice, who had recovered from his injuries from Mustafar,
to go kill the lone Jedi within the ruined Temple.
Vader did just that, locating her within the underbelly of the Temple.
But before he could confront her, he was ambushed by mutated beasts that she controlled through
the force before springing a trap that unleashed an electric net over him.
While these traps hurt Vader, he was able to power through them both and Sha Koon was
forced to face him in a duel as a result.
Although her agility allowed her to strike Vader once in the back, the Sith Lord’s
raw strength in the force allowed him to rag doll her across the ruins, until he finally
force choked her and impalled her with his lightsaber.
As she died, she experienced a force vision that showed her the future of the Sith being
eventually defeated and the new Jedi Order arising.
Such a vision brought her peace in the mind before she finally succumbed to death.
We want to give a shout out to Dmitry for letting us use his artwork for the video.
Be sure to check out his facebook and deviantart pages, where he does take commissions to create
artwork ranging from Star Wars to various video game franchises.