Solo’s Prequel Trilogy Cameo Explained
This one is going to be divisive.
This article contains spoilers for Solo: A Star Wars Story.
Solo: A Star Wars Story is now hitting theatres, mostly serving as a thoroughly good time at the cinema and adding a couple more layers to Han's character.
The film isn't anywhere near as subversive as The Last Jedi, instead content to offer up some more fan service rather than go for the big surprises, although there are a couple of interesting twists and turns to the plot.
One of the biggest comes close to the end, when we're finally introduced to the boss above Paul Bettany's Dryden Vos, and it turns out to be none other than Maul.
The Prequel Trilogy fan-favourite and former Sith Lord appears in hologram form to Emilia Clarke's Qi'ra, essentially saying she'll be working more closely with him now that Vos is dead and instructing her to join him on Dothmir. He's once again played by Ray Park, with Sam Witwer returning to voice the character.
Of course, to general audiences this may be something of a big shock, given the last time Maul - then with the Darth moniker - appeared on the big screen was The Phantom Menace, where he was given an untimely death courtesy of Obi-Wan Kenobi.
However, the animated series The Clone Wars, realising the untapped potential of the character, revealed that he had actually survived the fall, and he restarted his quest for power.
That led to him forming the Shadow Collective, a criminal alliance that seeks to take down the Confederacy and the Galactic Republic as part of Maul's ultimate goal to get revenge on both Darth Sidious and Obi-Wan Kenobi. He was captured by Sidious, but managed to successfully escape, and seemingly reclaim his position of power within the criminal world.
The character would later play a similar role in Star Wars Rebels, once again intent on defeating Sidious and his apprentice, Darth Vader, to wipe out the Sith because they had the power he craved. There he met Jedi Kanan and his padawan Ezra, even attempting to corrupt the latter. It's a move that ultimately fails, and leads to Maul heading to Tatooine for a final showdown with his old rival Obi-Wan, hoping to find a renewed sense of hope and purpose.
A lightsaber duel leads to Maul dying at Obi-Wan's hand yet again, seemingly for good this time, but the character does find peace in the knowledge that there is a new hope on the desert planet for defeating the Sith.
Solo takes place before Rebels, meaning Maul hasn't undergone this journey yet and is instead once again heading up the Shadow Collective (now apparently operating under the name Crimson Dawn, which at one point included Jabba the Hutt, who it just so happens Han and Chewie are off to work for.
Maul is back on the big screen, and there's clear setup for future appearances for the character here, either in Solo 2 or potentially the Kenobi movie. That itself raises a couple of problems though.
There's no real connection between Han and Maul, so it's hard to imagine the pair ever meeting, and yet Qi'ra would only really work in a Solo sequel. An appearance in Kenobi makes more sense to the character, however, there's no way to do that unless they simply recreate or redo what happened in Rebels, which is possible but would be a massive shame - not to mention an insult to fans of the show - because of how good it was.
As for other stories, there are a few years between this and Maul's reappearance in Rebels, but it doesn't give them too much time to play with and tell a worthwhile story. Solo makes it clear that we'll be seeing Maul again, but how exactly is anyone's guess right now.
What did you think of Maul's cameo? Let us know down in the comments.