Star Wars reveals Darth Maul's childhood past with Palpatine

Star Wars: Maul - Shadow Lord (Star Wars: Maul - Shadow Lord) continues to fill in important gaps in the story of Darth Maul, one of the franchise's most iconic characters.

Shadowlord is set at the beginning of the Imperial Era, as Maul secretly tried to rebuild a criminal empire in the shadow of Imperial rule. Unfortunately for Maul, the Empire learns of his machinations on the planet Janix before his grand plan can be realized.

In episodes 7 and 8 of the animated series, Maul finds himself in a critical situation when he and his gang are ambushed by the Empire. Maul has to fight two Inquisitors (Marrok and Raven) and almost dies in the duel. Once in the caves, Maul finds himself disoriented, and all his old traumas and fears resurface in the form of visions of his past.

Maul's origin story as a Sith is heartbreaking

The first vision is of the moment when Maul, as a child, was taken by Darth Sidious to train as his apprentice. Maul willingly submitted to Sidious, not believing he had a choice. His brother, Savage Opress, begged him not to go, accusing the Sith Lord of somehow brainwashing Maul.

The second vision shows a young Maul training with Sidious. "Training" here is a softer term to describe the torture that Palpatine inflicts on an apprentice with Force Lightning whenever he performs poorly.

The visions continue with a montage of scenes showing Maul's pain and suffering during Palpatine's training. He is defeated by Obi-Wan Kenobi and left for dead by his master inThe Phantom Menace. After this time, Sidious comes for him and kills his brother on Mandalore.

'Shadowlord' reveals how Palpatine changed his approach to training his apprentices

The animated series doesn't just reveal part of Maul's story that fans have been asking about for nearly 30 years.It also shows how Palpatine started out as a "teacher" before refining his approach.

Palpatine took a different approach to both Count Dooku and Anakin Skywalker: instead of using coercion and pain to bend the students to his will, he used a long game of cunning and flattery. He appealed to their disillusionment with the Jedi Order and their misguided sense of heroism, justice, and the desire to save loved ones.

Unlike Maul, who almost immediately realized that this decision doomed him, Dooku and Anakin realized their mistakes only after they crossed the point of no return. Anakin killed Dooku, contributed to the death of Jedi Master Mace Windu, and carried out the massacre of the Jedi Temple in order to become Darth Vader. Dooku killed his friend, Jedi Master Yaddle, after she discovered his secret meeting with Sidious.

Palpatine became increasingly better and more effective as a true Sith Lord: one whose manipulative and corrupting abilities exceeded any Force lightning he could fire from his fingers. By the time Ben Solo became his target, Sidious was literally using removed bodies (Snoke) to hide his true identity. He became the highest Sith Lord, ruling the Empire from the shadows as Maul could only dream of.