We’ve seen many variations of Darth Maul throughout Star Wars canon. From the brute force of his anger in The Phantom Menace to his wild fury at being betrayed and abandoned in The Clone Wars to his quiet malice in Rebels, a character that was once thought of as very one-dimensional has been expanded on a great deal. That expansion of depth is going to continue in February with a five-issue miniseries from Cullen Bunn and “The Force Awakens” adaptation artist Luke Ross, as announced exclusively over at USA Today.
The miniseries will be set prior to Maul’s appearance in The Phantom Menace and while it seems doubtful that it will explore his actual origins as that was covered in The Clone Wars and “Son Of Dathomir”, it will explore his tutelage under Darth Sidious. This is a time when the Sith were firmly in hiding and, from the sounds of it, Maul is taking out his frustrations against not being allowed to confront the Jedi by carving his way through the Galactic Underworld.
This is a pretty interesting premise and this time in Maul’s life has been covered pretty extensively in Legends material, but seeing a canon work dive into Maul’s apprenticeship with Sidious after what we learned about Maul in The Clone Wars is fascinating. Maul has fast become one of my favourite Star Wars characters thanks to his appearances in The Clone Wars and Rebels building an actual character with more depth than simply having some cool tattoos and a double-bladed lightsaber.
Hopefully this signals an attempt at Marvel to further branch out their Star Wars series past the confines of the Original Trilogy. I can’t wait for this one.
