• "He had one line …" "… was on-screen for 10 minutes …" "… had no character traits whatsoever other than looking weird." These points could be applied equally to Boba Fett in ESB. Darth Maul was in a bad movie, but it doesn't make him a bad character.

• Please,  Its clearly a hammer.

• Actually, has come back three times that I know of in the EU, all of them under the Infinities imprint.  Once as a cyborg, once as a clone, and once as a brain in a jar. The brain in a jar story was largely forgettable. The clone one where he fights Vader was actually pretty cool, and I have no problem accepting it as part of my personal canon. The cyborg one was amusing mostly because -SPOILER ALERT- Obi-Wan mostly distracts Robo-Maul by getting his butt kicked just long enough for Owen to shoot him in the head.

• The problem is that we all seem to be optimists at heart and each time he puts out a new Star Wars we all go "May this will be the one.  Maybe this is the one that will make everything good again" So far all we've got is blinking ewoks

• He didn't?   <Cue Internet search> Great Buddha you're right!  Someone tell me the Star Wars Christmas Special still sucks.  I need  something certain in my life

• YOU GO STAND IN THE CORNER THERE AND THINK ABOUT WHAT YOU SAID!

• In regards to Howard the Duck, it's a Katz/Huyck production. I thought Lucas' involvement was helping them out with money and putting his name on the project to help sell it? A similar thing Francis Ford Coppola did with American Graffiti for them.

• Well, I always figured their ages to be around those of the actors, with Solo in his mid-30's like Ford (he refers to Luke as "kid"), and Luke maybe very early 20's (so a few years younger than actor Hamil). Strangely Leia always seemed atleast 5-10 years older than Luke. Anyway, by that reckoning yes during the Clone Wars Solo would be about 13-15 years old.

• i would have thought the way he developed fett's backstory in the prequel would have killed whatever love people had of the character.

• GL's beard GL's beard does it stir your gay emotion

• 335 and it's not even a "complete" sex toy i mean darth maul. where did sextoy come from? i must still be thinking of GL's beard. obscene - but at least i couldn't find any jar jar binks statues there.

• We nerds have the knowhow and the numbers.  If we wanted we could get Lucas Bashing into the olympics. (If we weren't all busy playing Griffball that is)

• Yeah, they are sold in two packs with the clones Lt. Repaint, Col. Kitbash, and Capt. Exclusive!

• depends on how much older Han is compared to Luke and Leia.  I always thought he was about 5 years older than the Skywalker twins, so Han is alive at the time of the Clone Wars? Yes.  Teenage Han Solo?  I doubt it. Maybe Anakin, Obi Wan, or Ashoka visit Corellia and bump into Ma & Pa Solo....

• Not really that surprising...this Statue has been up at Sideshow for a while. http://www.sideshowtoy.com/?page_id=4489&sku=3000221&affiliate=geneda

• you fools! you do not understand the arcana that is this quantum reality we inhabit. merely by saying so YOU MAKE IT HAPPEN!!!!

• Mark my words, people, MARK MY WORDS! Teenage Hans Solo WILL make an appearance in "Clone Wars" I WARNED YOU!

• You're right! Darth Maul is basically the prequels' Bobba Fett. I personally don't get either of these two's popularity.

• rick, must you be such a privilegist?! it's cock. he puts his cock into their blow job holes.

• He also puts something else in their mouths that I shan't divulge in this gentlemanly affairs. ... His penis. He puts his penis in their mouths.

• you got to admit, though, bashing GL and being morbidly attached to his beard is something that unites almost all nerds. how can it be a bad thing????

• It's "Darth Bruticus". get it straight. XD

• sucking, hehehe

• Well, Duane Benzie will be ecstatic! /"Spaced"/voice actor joke

• Nnnnooooooope. If it's anyone sucking all the fun out of Star Wars, it's Lucas. We're just here to point out his shitty, shitty, shitty, SHITTY judgement calls.

• I think you're confused. We were talking about Maul, not Jar Jar.

• I tend to agree with you, Doc. I never really understood why people liked Maul to begin with. He looked like a pro-wrestling reject. Horns, face paint, and poor dental hygiene do not a convincing alien make.

• "or because his beard makes you feel funny" how did you know? HOW DID YOU KNOW???? :hides in SHAME:

• I think it would be HILARIOUS if they put him on screen, then immediately afterward he is sliced in half and falls down a shaft.

• Gods, you people whine about Star Wars and George Lucas so much, you'd think you had to share an apartment with him. (I know; It's not all of you, but I'm addressing those who do.) Get. Over. It. I enjoy Star Wars. I enjoy The Clone Wars and the EU books (when they don't suck). I enjoy the movies and the games, too. Lots of us do. If all the joy has gone out of Star Wars for you, then my suggestion would be to stop watching, stop caring, and stop obsessing over it. Most of all, I'd suggest you <i>just stop bitching about it</i> every opportunity you get. We get it. You hate George Lucas now because his vision didn't match yours, or he changed something you liked, or because his beard makes you feel funny. You've been whining about this for decades now. <i>Decades</i>. I know this falls on deaf ears (blind eyes?) and I know you'll all still show up for the weekly (daily?) Two Minutes' Hate where Rob (or another geek blogger) posts a picture of George Lucas and you all vent and scream and rage and shout "rape!" until you feel that you've accomplished-- Something?  But really, it's annoying now. I think if anyone's sucking all the joy out of Star Wars, it's you guys.

• if Tartakovsy!Grievous was in RotS, ObiWan would've been a force ghost much sooner

• Ouch!

• in the comics darth maul comes back (atleast the upper torso) with mechanical cyborg legs.... and fights obi-wan in the desert.... Sideshow Collectible made an amazing statue of this.... so if darth maull comes back in his cyborg persona... them it will be amazing...

• This is such a cool idea. George is truly a genius.

• This is great news! What an awesome idea. I hope he goes on an adventure with Jar Jar.

• So you're saying that Disney started cleaning everything up for kids at the dawn of commercial cinema, and that somehow proves I'm wrong for suggesting that incest isn't a kids movie topic?  To me that sounds like proof of my point. I R confused.

• He can now have an extra lightsaber...

• at last we shall reveal our mechanical genitalia to the jedi, at last we shall have revenge

• Now we may get to see Robo-Maul.

• Darth Lucas "I want more strange furry things in the movies" <insert zappy laser sound> Minions "Boring conversation anyway"

• That'd be one I'd want to see.  one version with Tartovsky directing, one with Tarantino (because I can actually spell his name) and one with Lucas (so that he can look at the output and finally know that he's lost the creative spark)

• No, there are orange sellers and such, every spy has to have a cover story.

• yes but that would have required a talent for storytelling. hint - GL didn't exactly write ESB

• Damn you Lucas!  I've argued for years that Maul should have been inside the body of Grevious.  He would have been the prototype Vader, to show audiences that the technology was there. He would have had droid abilities mimicking the power of the force and this would have explained why he seemed to be obsessed with collecting lightsabers his reveal would have been the "I am your father" moment of the prequels http://gyrangymble.blogspot.com/2011/05/reworking-star-wars-with-some-cute.html

• You clearly haven't read any of the original versions of any fairy tales.  Disney made a heck of a lot of changes before they started animating them.

• But I freaking love Howard the Duck!

• Killing Maul off was, suprisingly, the right call, Maul's limited presence is what made the character cool in the first place, he's the Bobba Fett of the Prequel Trilogy. Then again, George Lucas basically invented this shit with Bobba Fett in the first place.

• Darth Maul is popular for the same reason Bobba Fett was/is popular, limited presence plus a cool character design always makes you popular. Though in fairness, it's not just Lucas who did this, lots of idiot take side characters with cool character designs and give them a sickening amount of overexposure, just look at <i>Square Enix</i> with Vincent and Organization XIII, or <i>Fairy Tail</i> with Gerard, or every slasher movie ever. Bringing Maul back is a waste of time, then again, 95% of the Star Wars Expanded Universe is a waste of time, so I'm not surprised in the slightest.

• OK, wait, maybe I'm wrong here, but I thought that Darth Maul did survive, or at least, he did in the expanded universe. I think it may have been in the comics, which are supposed to be cannon, he came back but with a cyborg lower body.  He was basically half Grievous half Maul. Even the Emperor survived his death at the end of Jedi by becoming a ghost and then possessing a clone body. The story of Darth Bane has people coming back from the dead by using the force to posses those still living. This is nothing new in the Star Wars universe.  What's wrong however, is how Lucas is going to be shitting on previously established cannon to do this.  

• Does that mean he can be taken out by rail guns  that Jedi's just happen to possess?

• Which goes to show everyone out there DON'T GIVE LUCAS IDEAS. Remember, we all mocked ROTS's "NOOOOOOOOO!", but Lucas, a man born without a sense of sarcasm, must've thought fans really, really liked that scene...and the result was the blu-ray change to ROTJ.

• so that means he continues to live through his PENIS?

• I hope they make Maul a cyborg from the waist up. I think that would be a refreshing surprise.

• Yeah, the EU makes every background alien either a rebel spy, an Imperial informant, a smuggler, a bounty hunter, an assassin or a mercenary. No one say, works at the Tatooine equivalent of Wal-Mart or sells orange on the street corner.

• They could've kept Dooku as an actual rouge Jedi (i.e. not a Sith) who was more or less in the right about the Republic...thus meaning the Jedi were fighting for the wrong side...might explain why Kenobi and Yoda weren't aiding the rebellion years later, they were fooled once before.

• http://images.wikia.com/starwars/images/8/84/Visionaries_Darth_Maul.jpg

• Good old George just can't let sleeping dogs lie...He has to beat them into the ground.

• Thank you for your screen name, as I think someone on this comment log has a handle that relates to Chewbacca's name, and for a brief moment, I thought, "wait, did someone actually use 'chewy balls' as an alias?"

• Twice, both of which were non-canon.

• You hit something here. When I watched Episodes II and III, I couldn't shake the feeling that it was all an elaborate fan-film, and Ewan McGregor was trying too hard to be Alec Guiness (and in the process, exaggerating all of Alec Guiness's mannerisms). He was more the person with an accent cosplaying Obi-wan than a character in himself. In fact, the only times I ever hear his character praised in the Prequels, it's over how skilled a combatant he was. Who the fuck cares? This is not Dragon Ball Z.

• (Original Samurai Jack style Clone Wars) General Grievous > Darth Maul  any day

• i'm not a believer but i am a fan of conspiracy theories (they're so f'ing juicy!) this makes a lot of sense to me. and i seem to recall an interview with GL about Temple of Doom and how his bitter divorce may have influenced the way Willy was depicted there.

• I'm no conspiracy theorist, but George Lucas has wiped almost every trace of his wife from the Original trilogy. A bitter divorce will do that. In truth, she was the editor on Star Wars.

• Duel of the Fates is the clearest testament to that singular fact.

• what Rob knows about comics can be wrapped up in a ball and used as an insectan condom.

• he let john williams do whatever he wanted pretty much

• Kids today are dumber.  Wow.

• Did George Lucas actually do something right?

• Plus they were all either saved, beat up, killed, or a combo of the three by Han so there's also that.

• Plus, credit where it's due to the actors. If you listen to all the exposition on Obi-Wan, and read his dialogue without any context it seems like "that wizard is just a crazy old man", so to speak. Alec Guiness's performance makes the character. Same goes for Han Solo. In the prequels, it seems like this massive behemoth of a franchise is outweighing any focus on characters. There's no room for the actors to, you know, act. Watching Ewan McGregor doing an impression of Alec Guiness is almost as odd as watching the rest of the cast do an impression of people who aren't in front of a green screen.

• Once again, im amazed at the proverbial geek poster who has no clue that Darth Maul has been resurrected in the comics on numerous occasions....

• No, Maul will be in that last shot of Jedi ghosts, but he will inexplicably look like Toad.

• Then the nerds get upset again... it's a vicious cycle.

• in 3-D

• they were magnificent - and just depressed me even more :(

• The only reaseon Lucas killed him off is so that he can create a new villian/toy that he could sell. Licas is a marketer not a film maker. LUCAS BLOWS!!!

• Like 5 times.  It was like he was channeling everything I'd ever thought about the prequels.

• let me add: not unlike the relationship between TR and its readers

• FACT: the only thing better than a double ended light sabre is a double ended PENIS FACT: the only thing better than a double ended PENIS is a PENIS that ends with a VAGINA these statements are irrefutable!

• I don't know how to take this. sir, I am numbed by your reply and for that you get a like

• applause! have you seen Plinkett's review of the prequel trilogy per chance?

• There's a difference from a movie that kids can enjoy and a movie aimed at kids. Spy Kids is a kids movie because it's aimed at children.  Indiana Jones or Back to the Future or Star Wars are just movies that can be enjoyed by children as well as adults.  Claiming Star Wars is a kids movie is just an excuse to inflict Jar Jar Binks on adults.

• I am amazed.  I read through all these comments and no one seems to realize that Episode One goes theatrical next February, and putting Maul in the current television series airing at the same time is just good marketing.All of Star Wars has always been about marketing. Every little change Lucas makes keeps SW in our minds, so that we'll keep spending money. It's called "Skywalker" ranch for a reason, you know!

• Darth Maul was not exciting and engaging, and was in fact an awful character, he only stands out because of the sheer level of terrible the Phantom Menace itself was. Proof? In the Tim Burton directed Sleepy Hollow, the Headless Horseman was played by the same actor - Ray Parks. (Yes I know Christopher Walken also played the character during flashback). The Headless Horseman had more screen presence, more menace, and more character than Darth Maul and he DIDN'T HAVE A HEAD.

• This amuses me. You know why? First time I saw Phantom Menace, there was no split in half as he fell down the shaft. My understanding is that Lucas added that shortly into the film's release as he kept hearing people say, "Oh, he was an awesome villian. I'm sure he'll be back." And Lucas added the split to say, "Nope. He's dead. No more Maul for you. How about some more Jar Jar?" So now, the man who made a point of making sure we all knew Maul was dead and not coming back... wants to bring him back. Well, I guess they could just duct tape his two halves together. Duct tape fixes everything. It binds the universe together.

• Every time you kill a puppy, George Lucas will just revive it eleven years later.

• No.No.No. After the split, when you join Upper Maul and Lower Maul, they combine to form Darth Devastator.

• My gaming group does this as well when we play <I>WEG's</I> old d6 <I>Star Wars RPG</I>, picking-and-choosing what we like from most of the pre-Prequel EU stuff and ignoring most of the what happened after <I>The Phantom Menace</I> was released. The bad part is that it makes it almost impossible for us to recruit any new players to the group, as most younger <I>Star Wars</I> fans love the Prequels and dismiss the Original Trilogy, the little fuckin' blasphemers...

• Wait, wait, wait...are you saying that the ever-mutating and self-contradicting events that regularly occur in the <I>Star Wars</I> universe are supposed to be recognized as being organized in some kind of officially-sanctioned manner?!? <I>*Head-a-splode*</I>

• I'm confused, so Lucas wants Darth Maul to be brought back? Which fucking part of Darth Maul?! The upper or lower half of his body? Maybe I can get behind this if Darth Maul has so bizarre Sith bullshit powers that allow the upper and middle halves of his body to just become re-animated, so now you've got two action figures for Hasbro to push out, "Upper Maul" and "Lower Maul" combine together to create Darth Maul.

• Did the show already give Darth Maul a "Ed-Hardy-face-design-with-billy-goat-horn-ese" name, or will Lucas get to wow us with another one of his names?  I would suggest "Badas Redgai," but Lucas may just go with something like "Dawfmaw."

• Great, great post.

• I agree. There are probably tribes of indians, deep in the amazon jungle, untouched by western civilization who could write a better sequel trilogy than George Lucas.

• Yeah, they're intended as childrens films. Clearly you didn't grow up with the nightmare that were children's films of the late '60s and '70s. I could provide a list of nightmare inducing childrens movies from the era but I'd rather not dredge up the sickness. Be glad of your ignorance young one.

• I've heard this rumor many times and if it is true I can agree with it, however I've never seen any evidence that the ex-Lucas had any involvement in the films. Yes, it would explain a lot. It would also go a long way to explain constant Lucas meddling with the original films. As of yet I've seen nothing to make me believe she was at all involved, let alone with the edited bits. I also agree that a positive outside influence can be a good thing, however the list of influences I reference are ones admitted to by Lucas in the commentary. As for the pod race I find it is very much like the added Jar-Jar – it breaks up the pacing of the film and eats up screen time producing nothing.

• HAHAHA! Awesome!

• Vindication! http://www.neuroticmonkey.com/home/2011/8/17/darth-maul-is-boba-fett.html

• So wait. The original movies, which involved genocide, incest, torture, people being burned alive, tons of violence, murder by choking, sex slaves, dismemberment, and all that was a kids movie?  A KIDS MOVIE?  The first prequel, which was trying to be a political thriller, was a kids movie?  If it involves scenes of people talking to a senate, trade federation, and political manipulation, it's not a kids movie.  The kids movie excuse is just a way of pretending the suck was intentional and the critics of the films are humorless dicks. But look--- people don't think the prequels sucked because they don't get the plot.  They think it sucked because the dialogue was coarse and rough and irritating and it was everywhere.  The acting was wooden.  The characters were flat and deeply uninteresting even when they were played by actors who we know don't suck.  Lucas was trying to direct a movie driven by political intrigue and the psychology of Anakin Skywalker.  He was simply not up to the task of writing or directing anything more complicated that "we gots to kill that deathstar." That's it.  He just wasn't up to it.  Whether that was because it was beyond his talents or he'd gone soft from getting non-stop praise from everyone he'd ever talked to since 1977 is a interesting question, but it doesn't change the end result.   Sorry.  The prequels were just crap.  Honestly.  I don't know or give two shits about how it fits into the larger canon of novels and comics and cartoons.  That's not the point.  They were, in and of themselves, deeply mediocre movies on every level but the special effects.

• I keep wanting to stop caring about Star Wars, but the original trilogy was a huge part of my childhood, and there's still some great stuff in the Expanded Universe. I'm more hyped about The Old Republic than I've ever been about a video game, and I've been reading the Legacy comics which are just great. The setting has so much potential that I don't want to just give up on it - and I kind of feel that, if he makes me hate Star Wars, George Lucas will have won.

• The main reason that this is a dumb idea is that Darth Maul made such an impression because of the physicality of Ray Park's performance and the ferocity he brought to the dueling sequence, which was something that we hadn't seen in Star Wars at that point.  In animation, any character can do anything, so Darth Maul is just another character that the animators can flip around the screen.  He's not special.

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