Major Darth Maul Rumor Debunked by Obi-Wan Director

Ever since Darth Maul returned to live-action in Solo: A Star Wars Story, rumors have circled about the villain returning for more live-action appearances, though according to Star Wars: Obi-Wan Kenobi director Deborah Chow, it was never part of the plan to bring back the figure. While some fans surely would have looked forward to the return, it was specifically a series of reports that claimed Maul was set to be the antagonist of the series before he was ultimately replaced by Darth Vader, with Chow noting that Maul’s storyline in Star Wars: The Clone Wars and Star Wars Rebels was compelling enough that he didn’t need to be brought back for this series. Star Wars: Obi-Wan Kenobi premieres on Disney+ on May 27th.

“As long as I’ve been involved, we’ve never had Darth Maul in any of it,” Chow revealed to Total Film, per GamesRadar. “Dave [Filoni] did a beautiful job of telling that story already.”

Maul quickly became a fan-favorite character when he debuted in Star Wars: The Phantom Menace, only for that film to seemingly feature the character meeting his demise. Over the course of The Clone Wars and Rebels, Maul was revealed to have survived that encounter, turning away from the life of the Sith and becoming a central component of the criminal underworld, before ultimately meeting his definitive demise at the hands of Obi-Wan.

While we can’t rule out Maul ever making a return to live-action, the timeline of this series seemingly isn’t, and never would have been, the place for it.

“For anybody trying to tell a story in the middle of these two trilogies, there were only certain elements that made sense in where [Obi-Wan] is,” the director expressed. “With a lot of the legacy aspects, the decision to bring Vader into it was not made lightly. We’re 10 years after Revenge of the Sith. Where is Obi-Wan’s starting place? What has been important to him in his life? Anakin and Vader are a huge and very profound part of his life. We ended up feeling that he made sense in telling this story. And Vader casts such a dark shadow in this, that to have Maul as well, it might be a little bit much.”

Star Wars: Obi-Wan Kenobi premieres on Disney+ on May 27th.

Do you wish Maul was in the new series? Let us know in the comments below or contact Patrick Cavanaugh directly on Twitter to talk all things Star Wars and horror!