Review: Star Wars – Maul: Shadow Lord “Chapter 1: The Dark Revenge; Chapter 2: Sinister Schemes”

Gonna make you a Maul-ffer you can’t refuse.
OVERVIEW (SPOILERS)

Years after escaping the end of the Clone Wars, Maul, the one time Sith Apprentice, works to bolster his forces in the underworld of the new Empire and plot his revenge against those who betrayed him. He ends up capturing Devon Izara, a padawan on the run with her master, while himself being pursued by Brander Lawson, part of the local law enforcement trying desperately to keep the Empire out of their business.

OUR TAKE

We’re back to another Star Wars animated series and once again we’re looking at YET ANOTHER story set between Revenge of the Sith and A New Hope. Just like The Bad Batch, which concluded a couple years ago and chronologically takes place just before this, Maul: Shadow Lord picks up a plot thread from the final season of The Clone Wars animated series, in this case being how Maul formerly known as Darth lived on. But if you watched Star Wars Rebels nearly a decade ago, you know none of this works out all that well for him. That said, Star Wars’ recent prequel shows have surprised me before, namely Andor, which I almost completely wrote off when I heard the premise, but then turned out to be one of the most beloved installments of the franchise overall. On the other hand, what helped Andor to make a good quick impression was its distinctly different tone right out of the gate that went on to explore the conflict of the Rebels against the Empire in a pretty fresh way…which I am not really getting from these first two episodes of Shadow Lord. If anything, I’m getting vibes similar to The Book of Boba Fett, where the show seems to hope that the reputation and clout of a fan favorite character will try to hold up what turns out to be a rather anemic story.

I’ve already gone on at length in my Bad Batch reviews about how sick I am of shows set in this specific era of the Star Wars timeline, but the fact is that this show is here now, so all I can do is review it based on what it IS, not what I would like it to be. And as for what it is, well, it’s fine, just not something that feels all that distinct. We’ve seen plenty of the dark underbelly of the Republic and now the early Empire, and if I had a punch card for every plot in these shows that involved a runaway padawan displaced by Order 66, I’d be one away from a free sub. The one kinda new aspect is Brander Lawson, who is representative of someone trying to keep his planet out of the Empire’s control as long as possible, which is already a tragically doomed battle. And as for Maul, the title character, well, I don’t really know what to expect from him or what I want to see out of him now that he’s leading his own show. I suppose I would like to finally see some of his backstory, how he met Sidious and trained under him and how that shaped his worldview and survival instincts to this day, but I’m not terribly sure we’ll get that. Perhaps we’ll see some implications about them as he tries to train Devon to be his own apprentice, but I kinda doubt it.

Much like with the newer Star TREK shows (which are now about to come to halt, but I digress), I try to look at the newer Star WARS shows based on the necessity of the story they’re trying to tell. The Mandalorian was there to show how the galaxy was slowly rebuilding after the fall of the Empire from the perspective of someone not involved in the greater battles. The Obi-Wan Kenobi series felt like a tribute to the Prequel Era while giving two of its stars a chance to return to their characters with more meat. I mentioned Andor already, but The Acolyte and Skeleton Crew, for all their faults, tried to do different things outside of the franchise’s comfort zone. And then there’s The Bad Batch, Tales, Ahsoka, and now Maul: Shadow Lord, which all just feel like Dave Filoni, the new co-head of Lucasfilm, just wants to keep playing with his toys a bit longer. I sincerely hope that, in the coming four weeks of this first season, he proves me wrong on that.