– Photo courtesy of Lucasfilm Ltd. © 2026 Lucasfilm Ltd. All Rights Reserved.
At the rise of the Galactic Empire, Maul rebuilds his criminal empire in the stellar first season of the animated Maul: Shadow Lord, premiering across April and May on Disney+
Note: for review purposes, Disney & LucasFilm have provided the first eight of ten episodes of the first season (the second season renewal was announced over the weekend). I’ll have to wait until May 4th, like the rest of you. And I will be watching as I’m wholly invested based on the first 80%. It’s worth it, so very worth it.
While we’re clearing things up for those who don’t know, and with so much Star Wars out there, I get it: (Darth) Maul lived after his bifurcation from Obi-Wan in The Phantom Menace. In The Clone Wars, he has whole arcs of going mad, getting help from his brother Savage, and setting up criminal enterprises. He appears again in Rebels, set a few years before A New Hope (and in the post-credits of Solo, to the confusion of so many). But what’s between the two?
It’s this hole between Clone Wars and Rebels that gets filled in not long after everything in Episode III went down. It’s a fascinating era for storytelling possibilities. In the wake of the Clone Wars, the destruction of the Jedi and the Separatists, and the Rise of the Empire, the galaxy is in flux. This means so many moving pieces, as the vacuum of power is leading to many to vie for it. The Empire isn’t everywhere, with those systems not yet under direct control, knowing when they get there, it’ll all change.
Photo courtesy of Lucasfilm. © 2026 Lucasfilm Ltd. All Rights Reserved.
That threat looms within Shadow Lord, developed and written by long-time Star Wars animated TV writer Matt Michnovetz, as one of the many forces (Forces?) trying to find their way in the new order. Appearing on planet Janix, Maul (no Darth, he’s not been a Sith Apprentice for a very long time), still voiced with a wonderful growl by Sam Witwer, with a set of Mandalorians and Nightbrothers in tow, starts calling in old favors to other crime lords, starting a destabilization of a tenacious safety. A bureaucratic police officer, voiced Oscar-nominated Wagner Moura, and his droid Two Boots, given a great life in the way only Richard Ayoade can, realizes something is going on and tries to solve it without alerting the Empire to the unrest; while trying to be a single dad to a teenage son (the mom is off planet, working with the Empire which makes it more tenuous as easier to say the wrong word and get under their thumb). Also, a purge-surviving Twilek Padawan, Devon Izara, and her master Eeko-Dio Daki, voiced by Gideon Adlon and Dennis Haybert, lending his gravitas, gets between all of it, looking for safety in a galaxy where she’s the enemy and doesn’t understand why.
Cops and conspiracies, violence and intrigue, underworld versus Empire; it’s a show of dichotomies. It’s a crime show, at the heart, under the Star Wars veneer. Of the law and lawlessness conflicting, combining, and altering themselves. Finding your balance and living with choices, but on a wider scale, involves moving about all the forces. All of it is an incredibly compelling narrative, with full plot lines and arcs, without anything forced, as all the cogs move around. Michnovetz and supervising director Brad Rau keep a strength and understanding and mete it out to the audience with steadiness.
Within his animated appearances, Maul has been a truly fascinating character, building from the mysterious cypher of The Phantom Menace to someone incredibly complex. He has a righteous anger at the galaxy, a strong sense of personal tenets, and loves to pick at a society he (often rightly) sees as broken, one that chewed him up and spit him out, especially if he can work with individuals he can see something different in. In no way is he a Good Guy. He’s not a snerring evil, but maybe misguided and violent. And that’s what makes him a standout character. In Shadow Lord, his working with Padawan Devon is a big strength. What is the nature of the Force? Are surviving Jedi still beholden to the teachings, where said teachings are wrong? Survivor or honor? Additionally, knowing where he ends up via Rebels, there’s a certain something in knowing he never reaches the heights he’s convinced himself he’s deserving of.
Photo courtesy of Lucasfilm. © 2026 Lucasfilm Ltd. All Rights Reserved.
All of these forces move with kinetic energy across the series. It never stops. With around 25 minutes per episode, and each having its own hook and arc, Shadow Lord moves with a delightful efficiency; never rushed nor dragged. To its credit, it never feels repetitive in working through this underworld, keeping the story notions fresh as new wrinkles appear, get ironed out, or maybe even worsened. A bumping score by Kiner Music really keeps it going, with a sound akin to mixing Danny Elfman and Vangelis.
That’s helped along with a wonderful art design. Like many properties these days, it pulls from the Spider-verse style of mixing directly computer-generated art with a hand-painted look. I could look at the beautiful brushstrokes of Maul’s contrasting red and black, a color pairing that sets the palette for the series, visage for hours (or 5 as the length of the show). It’s not overpowering in a “look at what we did,” nor the “eh lets try it, it’s popular.” True care is put into all levels; frames can be portraits. The style really lends itself ot the action and moments. In a wider sense, this is some of the best cityscape looks I’ve seen in this sort of media, utterly gorgeous. It’s beautiful, big, and bustling with that kinetic feeling moving in and around, and Janix. It’s a lively place, also calling Blade Runner with a neon, rain-soaked expanse, nearly all city like Coruscant but stands on its own, not just Coruscant, Jr, rendered wonderfully.
Maul: Shadow Lord is a great show. It’s narratively thrilling, with strong characters by Maul and those around him, and with an impressive visual palette drawing from a mixture of hand-painted (or looking like) and the Clone Wars style. Shadow Lord is a well-designed and executed gangster-noir in the established sci-fi universe (not unlike how Andor is a spy show and The Mandalorian is a western). I can’t wait to finish it out on May 4th and the next season.
Maul: Shadow Lord premieres on Disney+ on April 6th with two episodes, with two episodes released weekly until May 4th.