Entry 9: 5/12/24 - The Unrestrained Coolness and the Related Tragedy of Darth MotherFucking Maul
Darth Maul is so fucking cool. This much is obvious. For a while - and I mean a while - it was the only thing he had going. He rocked up, had like two generic vaguely sinister lines, and then Ray Parks pulled down his hood, ignited his twin-bladed lightsaber of ultimate badassery and treated us to a dazzling display of acrobatics and a combat style he more-or-less had to invent himself. Given how the majority of lightsaber fights in prior movies are just guys wacking deconstructed cameras at each other (no joke), the improved choreography in Phantom Menace (a movie that doesn’t offer a whole lot more than some boring political talk and more than a few racial caricatures) would have been enough, so it’s absolutely above the call of duty that they brought in a concept as mad and as well-done as the double-sided lightsaber (yes I know its called the saber-staff - shut up).
Then he impales a racist, has a one on one with Ewan Mcgregor so intense that the filmmakers had to slow it down in post, before being promptly cut in half.
I mean damn. What an entrance. What an exit. Maul was cool. His weapon was cool. His design was cool. His fucking music is a contender for the best in Star Wars.
Fun fact, his horns were originally going to be feathers, but they got misinterpreted when the prosthetics guys got the concept art. Also, also, Ray Parks forgot he had an earring in when he showed up on set. George Lucas said he quite liked the addition and so it was decided they’d keep it in.
Point is, I love Darth Maul, and if he’d stayed dead there I’d have been perfectly happy with what we got. It was short, sweet, uncomplicated and sometimes that’s all you need. Phantom Menace needed a lot more, of course, but man did they get Maul right. Could he have benefited from more personality? Sure, but it goes without saying that he kicks ass in every bit of the just under fifteen minutes he’s on screen for that movie, and he is ninety percent of the reason that I watch it.
But then comes along Sam Witwer.
God damn do I love Sam Witwer. As an unabashed, lifelong fan of Star Wars (even though sometimes the fandom makes me want to pull my own eyes out) it is so nice to have him behind the scenes. For Solo, during Maul’s reveal as the movie-long veiled threat of Crimson Dawn (a shitty revelation that ultimately did nothing to improve an otherwise unnecessary movie), the film-makers made a point of wanting Ray Parks (yes they got him back, the legendary stunt and choreography dude himself, to sit in a chair) to stand (showing off his new cg robot legs to catch up any mooks who hadn’t seen Clone Wars) and ignite his double-sided lightsaber, at which point Sam Witwer gingerly raised his hand and delicately informed them that he couldn’t do that on account it being cut in half in Phantom Menace.
It’s just nice to know that there’s someone on the sets of those movies that cares about the same kind of shit as I do - even though it doesn’t really matter. I mean he remade his double-sided lightsaber anyway for season seven of Clone Wars.
So the Witwer Maul is a slight recharacterisation of Maul as we know him from episode one. Or rather, to put it another way, the Witwer Maul is a characterisation of Maul as we don’t know him from episode one. I mean what’s there to know? Step one start the music, step two kick-ass.
But the Witwer Maul has a lot more meat to his bones. First of all he’s got a wider vocabulary than I think we give him credit for, and he’s a lot more contemplative and soft spoken, though prone to not uncommon growling outbursts. You get the sense that he is a man who, having been separated from his Master, from all prior forms of authority and, crucially, direction, is finally stepping - with his new robotic chicken legs - into his own independence. And not just that, but command, for he has an apprentice - a brother - the rather stupidly named Savage Opress.
There’s a kind of elegance to the way he carries himself, a sort of austere regality, as if the knowledge that he was once Palpatine’s chosen apprentice, privy to all his grand schemes, has rubbed off on him. He seems under no delusion that it was going to be anyone other than him who would be the heir apparent to the Sith.
And this is what I really wanted to talk about. Maul is so fucking cool, just on a basic ass level. Foundation coolsville is he - population Maul.
And what’s funny about this is that he’s, well, one of the most pathetic characters in Star Wars.
I genuinely think Darth Maul, amazingly, has become one of the best written characters in Star Wars. It’s not even something that’s focused on too much, and I think because of this he's able to be so nuanced a character. This is frankly incredible coming from a character who, upon intial inspection, may come across a tad one note; literally all of his lines, barring a choice few, are some variation on “your destruction is near… my evil plan… Ezra, don’t leave me, I’m so lonely.”
That last one’s reading between the lines a little but you get the point.
But I think, when you first meet him in Clone Wars, when he’s a big metal spider, a mad raving lunatic, that is Maul at his purist. I think that animalistic depiction of Maul, chattering and wallowing in a junk world, stays at the core of the Witwer Maul the entire time. And of course he’s brought back to something resembling sanity, but all he can do is rave endlessly about Kenobi and his hatred and his revenge. These things occupy his every thought, and no matter what he does in service of these motivators, he’s never satisfied. He exacts his vengeance against Kenobi by killing Satine before his eyes, and even then, after years of being hunted by the empire, the only thing he can bring himself to do is hunt down that same Jedi that slew him all those years ago and attempt once again to destroy him.
Ultimately, his downfall.
Maul reads to me as a character that is trapped, and maybe he doesn’t fully realise he is until about Rebels, but even then he’s still a helpless slave to his actions. There’s this really poignant moment when he is beaten by Ben Kenobi in a spaghetti western style duel over the Dunes of Tatooine, where he lies dying in his nemesis’ arms and proclaims that Luke will avenge them.
Them.
It’s almost an admission that Maul knows his actions had no great meaning to them, that it was nothing but baseless slaughter in the name of a primal rage, but that he felt helpless to do anything else because hating was all that he knew. It was all he could understand - Sidious had seen to that. Hatred was quite literally his fuel, it got him through every tribulation and he knew that as long as he could hold onto it, hold onto his mindless thirst for vengeance against someone or other, he could survive through any level of setback, brutality or degradation, be it the lost of his destiny, his legs, his brother.
Maul is a heinously awful person, but in that awfulness there is a victimhood that shaped him to what he became - a pathetic, vile monster, demanding in every way except words to be put down. And when he is, he accepts it without hesitation, without resentment, without anger. He finally lets it go, assured that the one thing he desired most, righteous vengeance for the wrongs committed to him by the person that truly manufactured them, will come to fruition.
Yeah I’ve watched Darth Porg’s “Maul - Hatred” video before, why do you ask?
