By George & Josh Bate
The first official trailer for the upcoming Star Wars animated series Maul – Shadow Lord has been unveiled, along the show’s release schedule, plot information, its stacked cast and more.
Check out the trailer for Maul – Shadow Lord….
Check out official poster for Maul – Shadow Lord….
Release Schedule
Maul – Shadow Lord will debut on Disney+ on April 6 with a two-episode premiere.
After this, two episodes will release each week, culminating in the finale on May the 4th.
The series will include 10 episodes released over the course of 5 weeks.
Cast Information
Sam Witwer will return as Maul in the new series. An article published by StarWars.com confirms that Sam Witwer prepared for the Tea Ceremony in the trailer by actually attending a tea ceremony in Japan. “There is a moment in the animation where Maul is conducting a Tea Ceremony with Devon and you can see the nuances in Maul’s performance that Sam Witwer learned while he attended an actual tea ceremony in Japan,” Executive Producer and VP of Lucasfilm Animation Athena Portillo says. If you thought you couldn’t love Witwer anymore, just think about this insane dedication to his voice work as Maul. He is a Star Wars fan through and through and understands Maul better than anyone.
“We are having the best time working with Sam Witwer,” says Supervising Director and Executive Producer Brad Rau (who previously served as Supervising Director of The Bad Batch). “He brings so much depth to the character of Maul and with his knowledge of Star Wars, he’s been a really awesome collaborator to keep Maul authentic for us.” Rau continued, “We’re — all of us, including Sam, — surprised at the new facets that we’re finding in Maul on this show, which we’re sure the fans are going to be delighted with.”
Wagner Moura, who was just nominated for an Academy Award for The Secret Agent, will voice Brander Lawson.
Richard Ayoade will voice the droid Two-Boots. Ayoade previously voiced Q9-0 in The Mandalorian.
Gideon Adlon will voice Devon Izara, Maul’s new apprentice in the series. Adlon is known for her roles in Miller’s Girl, The Craft: Legacy, and Sick. She is also the sister of Marty Supreme breakout star Odessa A’zion and daughter of Pamela Adlon (Better Things, Louie). Regarding Devon, a character we suspect will eventually evolve in canon’s version of Darth Talon, executive producer Athena Portillo said, “She’s conflicted between right and wrong, but there’s a level of innocence, too….Devon is a young person who’s living through challenging times and realizes that the future she once thought she was going to have is no longer possible, and so she has to adapt.”
Dennis Haysbert will voice Master Eeko-Dio-Daki, while Star Wars legend Vanessa Marshall returns to voice Rook Kast. Also included in the cast is Chris Diamantopoulos as Looti Vario, Charlie Bushnell as Rylee Lawson, David C. Collins as Spybot, A.J. LoCascio as Marrok, and Steve Blum as Icarus.
Also returning to the fold is Marrok, the Inquisitor introduced in Ahsoka, and the Eleventh Brother, the Inquisitor voiced by Clancy Brown introduced in Tales of the Jedi.
What is the plot of Maul – Shadow Lord?
StarWars.com published an official plot synopsis of Maul – Shadow Lord. Check it out below….
“Maul – Shadow Lord picks up after the events of Star Wars: The Clone Wars, for a pulpy adventure that finds Maul plotting to rebuild his criminal syndicate on a planet untouched by the Empire. There, he crosses paths with a disillusioned young Jedi Padawan who may just be the apprentice he is seeking to aid him in his relentless pursuit for revenge.”
Maul – Shadow Lord will be set “in the period a few short years after Order 66,” confirms the official Star Wars site.
Executive producer Matt Michnovetz elaborated on the plot. The Empire is consolidating the galaxy from the core worlds out, and the Inquisitorius is stronger than ever,” Michnovetz says. “They’re hunting Jedi and other Force users, doing all kinds of nasty work. The galaxy at large is sort of dealing with this slow rise of the Empire and different groups have different understandings of what the Empire is. The same thing goes for the inquisitors. They’re secret mercenaries that show up out of the darkness.”
Supervising Director and Executive Producer Brad Rau hinted that the series will not have one-off episodes like recent animated series. “This show is highly serialized, very connected all the way through,” Rau says.
Matt Michnovetz described the influence of George Lucas on the series, “It’s a super fast-paced series. We wanted to create an action-packed thrill ride, something that had the rush of a roller coaster, so we do a lot of homages to the classic serials of the day, which gave George Lucas the inspiration for Star Wars. And we’ve got the perfect character to drive us through this in Maul.”
The primary setting of the show is the neon-colored city of Janix, which will first appear in the prequel comic Shadow of Maul. “It’s one part Gotham, one part Metropolis and a hundred percent Star Wars with all these different levels and layers,” says Michnovetz. “It’s a city essentially built into a crater on this planet that is untouched by the Empire. It’s got a functioning democracy and law enforcement doing a good job of policing their own community. It’s a rich environment for crime and gangsters, but so far there’s been a very peaceful accord between all of them in the interest of business.”
New Animation Style
Although the animation style of Maul – Shadow Lord bears resemblance to The Clone Wars and The Bad Batch, the series will feature a novel animation style for a Star Wars series.
According to StarWars.com, “The series features stylized animation emblematic of the gritty new cityscape locale of Janix combined with old-school filmmaking methods to capture painterly brushstrokes on glass and other physical elements.”
Executive Producer and Vice President of Lucasfilm Animation Athena Portillo elaborated on the new animation style. “Cinematography Lighting & VFX Director Joel Aron really took it up a notch with going back to the practical ways of capturing brush strokes by painting them on glass, shooting them then strategically placing them in shots,” says Portillo. “He even went back to establishing matte paintings on canvas. There’s always different challenges with every show that we do, but this one in particular raised the bar. We also wanted the animation body mechanics and the facial to be more fluid from our previous work and animation director Keith Kellogg worked closely with CGCG and our internal animation team to upgrade the performances of our main characters.”