How Solo: A Star Wars Story's most surprising cameo was possible

Familiar faces are to be expected, but this one came as quite a shock for fans

*WARNING: MAJOR SPOILERS FOR SOLO: A STAR WARS STORY*

Lucasfilm has one of cinema's vastest universes in its hands. A complex web of interlocking stories and histories - and that's after you discount the now officially non-canon Expanded Universe.

Fans have now come to expect that each new Star Wars installment will bring back a few familiar faces, if only to make the universe seem a little less endless.

However, Solo: A Star Wars Story, which dials back the years to follow everyone's favourite rogue in his younger years - first meeting Chewbacca and enrolling in a group of galactic smugglers - takes quite a surprising route here. One more warning: SPOILERS AHEAD.

As the film's climax reveals, the much-spoken-of leader of the crime syndicate Crimson Dawn and Dryden Vos (Paul Bettany)'s boss is none other than Darth Maul; the one character from the prequel trilogy that actually seems to have sustained some level of popularity over the years.

Perhaps it's unsurprising then that Lucasfilm would be keen to bring him back in, but there's one issue: Darth Maul notably kicked the bucket in The Phantom Menace, having been sliced in two by Obi-Wan Kenobi and punted into one of those endless abysses people in Star Wars movies are always falling into.

Yet for any fans of the animated TV series Star Wars: The Clone Wars, it's common knowledge Darth Maul miraculously survived this fate, using the Force to grab onto an air vent, and navigating himself into a trash container. He then ended up on the junkyard planet of Lotho Minor, hiding out until he was discovered by his brother Savage Opress.

Maul then founded The Shadow Collective, a criminal alliance which sought to disrupt the Galactic Republic and briefly had the Hutt Cartel (which is name-dropped in Solo) as one of its members.

He also conquered Mandalore, while in constant pursuit of Obi-Wan Kenobi so he could serve up some revenge, with his former master Darth Sidious (later known as Emperor Palpatine) another target for his angst. The Shadow Collective eventually collapsed, while he also lost control over Mandalore.

Fast forward to the time Rebels is set, another Star Wars animated series, which is set between Solo and A New Hope, and Maul has ended up trapped on the planet Malachor, in search of an ancient weapon. What happens between these moments is presumably what further live-action films will explore, now that Qi'ra (Emilia Clarke) has been invited to join Maul by his side.

Ray Park does actually return to reprise his role, with Sam Witwer, who voiced Maul in both The Clone Wars and Rebels, replacing Peter Serafinowicz.

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