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Some misconceptions about the master of the twin-bladed lightsaber.
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00:00A member of the Zabrak race, the much-loved Maul first appeared as the devoted follower of the
00:05evil Darth Sidious in The Phantom Menace. After a brief skirmish with Qui-Gon Jinn on Tatooine,
00:10Maul then engages in an epic fight with him and Obi-Wan Kenobi on Naboo. After turning his master
00:14into a she's kebab, Maul is defeated by Obi-Wan when he gets sliced clean in half.
00:19And that's the whole story, or is it? The Star Wars universe is so expansive these days that
00:24it's impossible for a character to be this underdeveloped. How there are some gonk droids
00:29with pages upon pages written about them. So you better believe that there's more to our pal
00:33Maul than you could ever possibly imagine. So with that in mind, I'm Darth Gareth from
00:37What Culture Star Wars and here are 10 things everyone always gets wrong about Darth Maul.
00:42Number 10. Ray Park was the first choice. Although voiced by British actor Peter Serafinowicz,
00:48Maul's physical form in The Phantom Menace was portrayed by Scottish actor and stuntman Ray
00:52Park. Park has also appeared in the Tim Burton Sleepy Hollow movie The G.I. Joe series and has
00:57Toad in 2000's X-Men. But he's best known for his time as the horny Sith. Steady now.
01:02He was a natural fit for the part, which might lead you to assume he was the first choice for
01:07it.
01:07But alas, this is not true. Benicio Del Toro of the usual suspects fame was originally signed on
01:12to play the role. This was a huge get for the prequel trilogy as Del Toro's style was very much
01:17on the rise at the time. Unfortunately, the Puerto Rican was less than thrilled to find out that his
01:22part had been considerably cut in the final version of the script. He ditched the project,
01:26leaving the door open for Park to stride on in. Clearly, Del Toro regretted his decision to some
01:31degree, as he returned to Star Wars in The Last Jedi. Although, he may have regretted that decision
01:36even more. Number 9. He only appears once. Let's get a super obvious one out of the way nice and
01:42early, eh? If you've only seen the mainline Star Wars movies, you'd be forgiven for thinking that
01:46Maul's character was totally wasted. In The Phantom Menace, Darth Maul only gets a paltry six minutes of
01:51screen time. Just to put that in perspective, Anakin's mum Shmi gets over seven minutes and
01:56did she have a double-ended lightsaber? No, she did not. So why did Star Wars not make better use
02:00of
02:00such a uniquely designed, interesting presence? Well, it did, just not in the movies. After meeting
02:05his supposed end at the hands of Obi-Wan, Maul actually survived being cut in half through pure
02:10hatred and dark magic. In the animated Clone Wars series, Maul's brother Savage Opress finds him
02:15and helps him return to full power. Since that episode, Maul has turned up in other animated
02:20series, video games, comic books, and novels. He also made his return to the movies when it was
02:25revealed he was playing a part in the plot of Solo, A Star Wars Story, and that was fun while
02:29it
02:29lasted, wasn't it? Number 8. He's always hated the Jedi. The future Emperor Palpatine was not the best
02:35father figure to our young subject. After snatching him away from his mother, Darth Sidious began moulding his
02:39new follower into a walking weapon. He trained the boy in physical combat, taught him the ways of
02:44the dark side, and helped foster the hatred that would come to define his character. As detailed in
02:50Marvel Comics' Darth Maul issue number 2, Sidious takes Maul on a field trip to the planet Malachor,
02:55the site of an ancient battle between Jedi and Sith. In order to really drive home how bad this fight
03:00went for the Sith, Sidious forced his apprentice to inhale their ashes, giving him visions of the
03:05slaughter from long ago. This moment helped grow Maul's resentment towards the Jedi and kick-started
03:09his ambition to wipe them all out. However, had it not been for Sidious' tampering with the young
03:14boy's mind, then maybe this hostility would have never come about. Perhaps we could be looking at
03:18Darth Maul the baker, the accountant, or the used car salesman. We'll just never know.
03:23Number 7. He was Sidious' first choice.
03:25Time now for a section I'm calling Maul's terrible childhood.
03:28He was born on the planet Dathomir, which is ruled over by a group of force-sensitive witches
03:32called the Nightsisters. This all-female clan used the force to rule over their male counterparts,
03:37the Night Brothers, and became so powerful that the evil Darth Sidious took notice of
03:42them. Game recognizes game. Sidious traveled to Dathomir to have a nice cup of tea with
03:46the Nightsisters' leader, Mother Talzin. An extremely powerful being, Talzin was offered
03:50the opportunity to become Sidious' apprentice. But that all changed when the Sith Lord discovered
03:55Talzin's gifted son. You can see where this is going. Yes, Talzin was Maul's mother and
03:59Sidious sensed great potential in him. He kidnapped the young boy, breaking his promise and setting
04:04in motion the Zabraks' rise to power. So Maul was not handpicked by Sidious, his involvement
04:08with the Sith came about through sheer good luck, or bad luck from a certain point of view.
04:13Number 6. He's only got one backstory.
04:16We've already covered Maul's childhood as the son of Mother Talzin, how he was taken
04:19by Sidious, raised to be a killer, blah blah blah. While this is the character's most commonly
04:23accepted backstory, there is another one out there. In 2012, a Star Wars novel called Darth
04:29Plagueis was released, detailing a different version of how Sidious came into possession of the
04:33young Maul. In this story, Maul's mother is not the all-powerful Talzin, but rather a human named
04:37Kaisina. Kaisina was a night sister who lived in fear of Talzin, terrified that she would force her
04:42sons into slavery. Upon learning of Sidious' visit to Dathomir, Kaisina persuaded him to take her
04:47child and raise him far away. Oh yeah, because that just turned out really great, didn't it?
04:51Maul's conflicting parentage is usually ignored in mainstream conversations about Star Wars,
04:55as the Talzin version is most widely accepted. However, learning that our favorite Zabrak might
05:00actually be a little bit human certainly makes for some interesting reading.
05:045. He was always planned for the prequels
05:06The first six Star Wars movies weren't particularly heavy on female characters, it must be said.
05:11There's Leia, Padme, uh, Mon Mothma, that Jedi librarian from Attack of the Clones,
05:16the weird CGI singer from Jabba's Palace. Is that really it?
05:20This was nearly very different, as the name Maul almost went to a very different character altogether.
05:25George Lucas originally planned for an evil witch to be the antagonist of the Phantom Menace,
05:29but this idea was eventually scrapped. The closest we got to this version being released
05:33was Darth Talon, a female Sith who appeared in several Star Wars comics and the mobile game
05:38Galaxy of Heroes. Although she was a Twi'lek, Talon had red and black skin similar to that of Maul's.
05:43She was also going to be teamed up with the twin Blade wielder as the main baddies in one of
05:47Lucas' original drafts of the sequel trilogy. These plans fell through when Lucasfilm got sold,
05:52which is a bit of a shame, because we might have ended up seeing Darth Maul as a Disney princess.
05:564. He's a weak Force user
05:58We can all agree that the double-ended lightsaber is freaking cool, right? Hell,
06:02I spent many a day swinging my own toy version of it about, and regularly smacking myself on the
06:07back of the head in the process. Good times.
06:09Sure, it would be an absolute nightmare to wield, again, I'd know. Probably isn't that much more
06:13effective than a single-ended one, and was almost certainly designed with the sole intention of
06:17selling toys, which again, it did. But it's neat, and I like it, so there.
06:21Maul's most famous contribution to Star Wars has led many to believe that he is not that strong
06:25with the Force, though. Some feel like he uses his signature weapon to make up for this,
06:29but Maul ain't compensating for nothing. Ever since his apparent demise at the hands of Obi-Wan
06:33Kenobi, Maul began using the Force a lot more. In the Clone Wars, he busted out all the time on
06:38a
06:38variety of opponents, including his attempted killer. In fact, it was his Force sensitivity
06:42that attracted him to Sidious in the first place, so it has always been strong with him.
06:47It's impressive just how competent Maul is at deploying the Great Energy. Maybe if he'd been a bit
06:51more willing to use it in The Phantom Menace, he might still have his original legs.
06:56Number 3. He hated Sidious
06:57If someone kidnapped you at a young age, turned you into an assassin, and then abandoned you in
07:02your hour of need, you probably wouldn't be their biggest fan, would you? After falling out with
07:06his master, Maul swore revenge on Sidious and the Sith in general. He became a sort of rogue element in
07:11the Clone Wars, definitely not pro-Jedi, but also acting as a thorn in the bad guy's side.
07:16Parental figures are complicated, though, and it's always much harder to leave them than it seems.
07:19Maul finds this out first-hand in the Son of Dathomir series of comics.
07:23Our subject teams up with some Mandalorians, although without a baby Yoda in sight, to track
07:28down and capture the two men he views as his replacements, Count Dooku and General Grievous.
07:32After he has them both, he presents them to Sidious and decries their failures. He is also
07:37desperate to show his former master that he is more powerful than his two successors.
07:41This moment adds a fantastic layer to Sidious and Maul's relationship, and only serves to
07:45highlight the tragic circumstances under which the latter lives.
07:482. He didn't interact with original trilogy characters
07:51Although getting sliced up like a burger bun doesn't finish him off, Maul does eventually
07:55die for good. But he doesn't let this teensy inconvenience get him down for long.
08:00In the comic book series Shattered Empire, the former princess Leia takes a trip to her
08:04mother's homeworld of Naboo. Leia, who recently helped secure the downfall of the Empire,
08:08wanders around the old palace until she comes across a familiar-feeling hangar.
08:12This is the site of Maul's duel with Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan. Although Leia wasn't even born yet,
08:17she is still somehow connected to the events of that day. She senses something, a presence,
08:21one that makes her feel a little bit cold. She soon finds out what's going on when a vision
08:25of the ex-Sith appears right in front of her. Well, that's a bit terrifying, isn't it?
08:29Like in the case of most powerful Force users, death is far from the end for Maul. He's able to
08:33use his
08:34great power to tangentially connect to the land of the living, through the process of haunting someone in
08:39an old room. Yep, great use of those phenomenal powers, Maul. Number one, Obi-Wan does kill him,
08:43and he doesn't. It was mentioned just now that Maul did eventually die for realsies,
08:48but how did that happen? Well, that depends on who you ask, really. In Star Wars Rebels,
08:52Maul confronts an older Obi-Wan in the desert on Tatooine. After it becomes clear that his adversary
08:56knows of the existence of Luke Skywalker, Kenobi cuts him down after a short duel. However,
09:01if you go by the Star Wars visionary story Old Wounds, Maul meets his maker under slightly
09:06different circumstances. He still goes to Tatooine to confront Obi-Wan, only this time he does it at
09:11the Lars family farm. After a much longer fight, Maul gets shot in the head by Luke's Uncle Owen.
09:16In both cases, the Jedi show some respect to his fallen foe. In Rebels, he reassures Maul that Luke
09:21is the chosen one, while in the comics, he gives him a proper funeral. How nice. As lovely as this
09:26sounds, it will likely bring little comfort to Maul, as Obi-Wan was involved in his death on three
09:31separate occasions. Come on, Kenobi! What did he ever do to you? Oh yeah, quite a lot, actually.
09:37And that's our list. Know of any other things that everyone always gets wrong about Darth Maul?
09:41Then please do let us know all about them in the comments section right down below,
09:44and do not forget to like, share, and click on that subscribe button while you're at it.
09:48Also, if this kind of thing is your bag, then please head on over to whatculture.com and find
09:51some more incredible articles, just like the one this video you're watching right now is based on.
09:55I have been Gareth from WhatCulture Star Wars. May the Force be with you, as always. I hope to see
10:00you very,
10:00very soon, but in the meantime, be good to yourself. Bye-bye!
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