10 Movie Sequels That Brought Characters Back In The Worst Way Possible

by Josh Brown

1. Darth Maul - Solo: A Star Wars Story

Star Wars Darth Maul
Lucasfilm

Solo: A Stars Wars story was a pretty unremarkable movie in the grand scheme of things. Sure it was fun, but the plot itself was pretty much guessed entirely before fans even saw the film, with every narrative beat identified a mile off. The one exception to that, however, was the appearance of Darth Maul.

Turning out to be the big boss to both Paul Bettany's Dryden Vos and Emilia Clarke's Qi'ra, Maul reappeared for the first time in the series since his execution in The Phantom Menace. With a new set of robo-legs, the villain has left his Sith moniker behind and become a criminal, but outside of a brief hologram appearance, that's pretty much all Solo establishes about the returning character.

Maul being alive is emblematic of the very worst kind of sequel-baiting, a piece of fan service that doesn't at all work in the context of this specific narrative. Even worse it teased a follow up that probably won't happen, and even if it did, would require plenty of mental gymnastics to actually make sense.

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Josh has over 11 years of experience as a published writer, having worked nine of those years as a full-time content producer at WhatCulture. In that period he has created hundreds of articles, videos and podcast episodes for multiple WhatCulture channels, specialising in gaming, horror and film & TV. He now primarily works as a senior content producer and presenter on WhatCulture Gaming where he co-hosts the WhatCulture Gaming Podcast, a top 3 UK most listened to gaming podcast that he co-created in 2018. Over the years he has reviewed several high-profile gaming releases, covered industry events with on-site reporting, opined on breaking news, and even kicked off his interviewing career by chatting to childhood hero, Tommy Wiseau.