Star Wars: Darth Maul Animated Series Rumored For Development

Hot on the trails of the new Book of Boba Fett trailers comes rumor that a new Star Wars animated series is in development, which will focus on the character of Darth Maul (or simply “Maul” as he’s now known). The rumor is that the Maul animated series will also serve as a sort of prequel to Solo: A Star Wars Story, helping to fill in one of the last big gaps in Maul’s character arc: how he came to run the criminal organization before the events of Solo: A Star Wars Story!

The ending of Solo (Spoilers) revealed Maul to be the dark power behind Crimson Dawn, the clandestine criminal syndicate run by Dryden Voss (Paul Bettany). Voss died in a duel with Han Solo (Alden Ehrenreich) and his childhood love, Qi’ra (Emilia Clarke), but Qi’ra in turn double-crossed Han, in order to take command of Crimson Dawn herself. One of the final scenes of the movie revealed that Maul would be Qi’ra’s new boss, as the former Sith Lord had formed his nefarious crime syndicate by the time the Empire took control of the galaxy. 

As stated, Maul’s appearance in Solo was a fun cameo for fans of Star Wars movies – but it was also confusing to those who had followed Star Wars in other media like the books, comics and animated series Clone Wars and Rebels. After he seemingly died in The Phantom Menace, Clone Wars revealed that Maul in fact survived as a crazed cyborg, and was brought back to sanity (and full bodily functions) by the dark magic of his home planet, Dathomir. Maul (and for a time his brother, Savage Opress) ruled the planet Mandalore and its warrior clans, as leader of the Shadow Collective, an alliance of Star Wars’ most insidious crime syndicates (Pyke Syndicate, Black Sun, Hutt Clan). Maul was briefly deposed from his criminal throne when Darth Sidious finally came to cow his former apprentice, but he eventually took control of Mandalore again. 

At the end of the Clone Wars, Maul was finally defeated on Mandalore by Ahsoka Tano and Bo-Katan Kryze’s squadron of Mandalorian freedom fighters. However, Maul managed to escape Order 66, and went underground as the Empire rose and took hold of the galaxy – it’s at that point that his story gets a little… muddled. We know Maul forms a criminal empire under Crimson Dawn, but how that happened, and how long he ruled it, is a story Star Wars hasn’t yet told. 

In other words: it’s the perfect subject matter for a Darth Maul animated series. 

This Darth Maul series would also be a nice, controlled, limited event, that also further helps expand the Solo side of the franchise. We know from Star Wars Rebels that at some point when Luke Skywalker is a young boy Maul ends up searching for Sith artifacts of power, which ends up stranding him on a remote planet for years – before he is ultimately killed in a final duel with Obi-Wan Kenobi. 

Furthermore, this Maul animated series would also help further the story of Crimson Dawn – a group that the makers of Star Wars are clearly investing in right now. Qi’ra and Crimson Dawn were revealed to have started a new era of Crimson Dawn after Maul – one that resurfaces just before Return of the Jedi. The “War of the Bounty Hunters” event that re-introduced Crimson Dawn in Star Wars comics this summer will get two comic book sequel events (“Crimson Reign” and “The Hidden Empire”); there are also early clues Crimson Dawn will be in The Book in Boba Fett. A Maul animated series could be key in helping really ground the group’s mythos in Star Wars canon. 

Star Wars: The Book of Boba Fett will stream on Disney+ on December 29th. 

Source: Cinelinx