Should Darth Maul have died? No. He never should have lived.

Well, I have been daydreaming about Star Wars again (slow Saturday night) and I am sure that this thread is worth a go. We've had plenty of opinions reflecting the dislike of so much filler material in TPM and I'd agree that things would have been more pertinent had we started with Anakin as a teen.

Nevertheless, this thread is not about that.

I'd rather talk about Dooku replacing Maul, period. The more I think about Maul in the movies and the EU, the more I find him boring. He basically brings a double-blade saber to Star Wars, or rather, makes it popular. Dooku is more intriguing on screen, in the EU and more importantly, as a Sith Lord. This is the opinion I have had for some time.

Thus, instead of adding to the already substantial Darth Maul thread, I think I'll take this from a semi-original angle.

Discuss (and don't hold back if you think it is ridiculous).

 

I think you could do this with just about any of the prequel villains besides Jango.


Maul: Could have had an expanded role where he replaces Grievous as the Supreme Commander of the Sep Droid Army. Grievous was designed to be scary and intimidating; so was Maul. Grievous was designed to engage and defeat Jedi; Maul trained to do exactly that for years.

Dooku: Could have been Sidious' secret ally in the Jedi Order. Could also have been more directly Tarkin-esque, and not even have had the Force or previously been a Jedi; having Anakin execute him then would've had even more impact, as Dooku would have been completely helpless to begin with.

Grievous: Could have been designed to be more Force-resistant and dropped straight into TPM duelling Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan.

 

Point taken, and for the record I think that Grievous was a ridiculous concept. I hate him more than Jar Jar.

I think that bringing Dooku into TPM instead of Maul is worthy of discussion because it would give us a solid Sith Apprentice. As it stands we have potential in Maul and potential in Dooku. Nearly everyone goes for keeping Maul, so I am switching it up.

A Sith Apprentice with meaningful dialogue as well as more longevity is intriguing to me.

 

To be honest as cool as Maul looked he was really nothing more then a punk. Mean he was just the guy who stood there and did nothing but fight. I never really saw him as having much in the way of brains.

 

TBH, that's chiefly because Maul's line that make him obviously brainy-like correctly deducing that the Jedi were specifically after him, not just there to protect the Queen when she returned to Naboo-were deleted. They're still in the script, and I'd say it was Lucas' original intent to have him be intelligent.

Not to mention that Sidious doesn't seem to care if his apprentices are stupidly loyal or not. Heck, it's canon from the Dark Lord novel that he wanted Vader to replace him, so there's no particular reason to assume he didn't want the same for Maul when he was still alive.

But yeah-Maul could have been replaced by an expanded role for Dooku, but the same applies in reverse.

 

Also reflected in the EU.

In Shadow Hunter he constantly underestimates his quarry and seems to be simply outsmarted much of the time.

But I want to focus on Dooku instead of Maul.

All ideas welcome.

 

I don't agree personally for the idea of making Dooku be in TPM in place of Maul, simply because I think one of the functions of Maul was to show that not all of the Sith were geriatric male humans. If Dooku were there instead, people would assume that the Sith were primarily a human orginization, because Sith humans would be all you would see.

The reason I think that Maul might come off of as 'filler' to some people, is because his character was not expanded on enough. He looks cool, has a cool lightsaber, but any lines/situations that would have given him depth were cut out or half-filmed, so he ends up shallow.

 

If you want to focus on Dooku and not Maul, your thread title is a bit off...

 

I was going for a mild sarcastic touch

 

Fair enough. You are also going to bring on the thunder of the Maul defenders.

 

I don't think that this would be a great loss considering we have multimedia EU material that can show-off a bit of versatility. My preference would have been to use a character like Ventress in place of General Grievous. None the less, she seems to have a significant part in the new animated Clone Wars project (which I have not bothered to watch yet). But scratch that if you like, because having a human bias might be in the interest of continuity for this Era of Star Wars.

But then, this very point can work for me in other ways too. As I say, and as you recognise, Maul was never expanded enough and for Lucas it was enough to give him the cool factor - the double-Blade and the non-human face.

And yet, it was not Maul that made the double-blade: that idea came straight from the EU.

Would we lose anything before gaining something with Dooku, Qui-Gon's Master and Former Council member*? Maybe, but Lucas could make up for that later. Grievous, Ventress, a talking banana? Meh.

For me, it comes down to this. Dooku, a former ideal Jedi Knight and Master is seduced by Sidious, drawing a longer, stronger parallel between his fall/transformation and Anakin's. The material in Yoda: Dark Rendezvous and LOE give me enough food for thought. Having Dooku and all of his baggage would make for a thrilling encounter between light and dark, whilst adding meat and adequate complexity to the story.


* Yes, I am aware that the time-line would be different!

 

Hmmm...Dooku in place of Maul. I kind of like the idea.

Actually, a human Sith would dovetail nicely with the apparently all-human Empire in contradistinction to the multiracial Rebellion.

Maul was cool, but it was the variety of cool espoused by a 13 year old male. He's tattooed and has a double-bladed lightsaber and...

And...uh...nothing.

 

--Storm Clouds are forming, Strilo...

 

Well I am not a particular Maul defender - but frankly, I wouldn't change a thing about TPM. Maul was colorful, scary (back then - hey I was just a kid), cool with his double blades, a great fight scene with Quiggy and had the awesome chop in half scene with Obi Wan. The problem with brining in Dooku early was you couldn't have that great monstrous presence with a stately estate owning villain, who found it tedious to get a little dust on his shoes. To me, it was very well done and I am glad they mixed it up like they did. So I wouldn't change a thing myself.

 

Dooku was expendable from the get go -- that's why he doesn't appear until 1/2 way through AOTC and is dispatched quickly and rather unceremoniously in the first 1/2 hour of ROTS.

Lucas seems confused about his new Sith order and its 'rule of two.' He erases a true Sith, trained from birth, and introduces us to a Jedi traitor, one who (would you believe it) trained Qui-Gonn Jinn, Obi-Wan's master, and Jinn finds 'The Chosen One,' yada yada . . .

Too many twists and turns here. Any significance Lucas wanted Dooku to have is washed away in a tide of confusing, dead end plot holes. Now Maul . . .

He hates. He hunts. He attacks. He kills. That's what he does.

He's Predator with a red light saber. That's what he is.

Thoughts of Maul makes little kids soil their pants, have nightmares about him, imagine him in dark, dingy basements or lurking behind leafless, half-dead ancient oak trees on cold, windy evenings as the autumn sun sets crosses the horizon. He invades the imagination, causing children (and some adults) to run home to momma in fear for their puny, vulnerable little lives.

Dooku does none of that. He is "gentleman," a Jedi traitor. Big deal. The SWU is chock full of fall guys like the aristocratic (and boooooooring) Dooku.

He's Tarkin with a light saber. He should have met his end on the cutting room floor.

 

To me Dooku works best as a vehicle to reflect Palpatine's duplicitous genius. More as that than as a particularly interesting character in and of himself. After Maul's death and Anakin's appearance, Dooku is only ever a dispensable stop-gap in Palpatine's eyes. He's useful though. Useful in gaining the sway of the kinds of people who are impressed by nobility, aristocracy, connectedness etc. It would've been interesting to me to have both Dooku and Maul on the go at the same time. One the pure Sith one-man destruction unit and the other the political tool, neither knowing exactly what was going on in their master's mind. I don't think substituting Dooku for Maul in TPM would've worked too well. They contribute completely different things to the story.

 

Frankly, i do not really like Dooku. I do believe his concept is very interesting (fallen jedi) but he does not have neither the gravitas nor the look of a sith. I do think he could have worked better as a tarkin-esque non force sensitive being who the sidious and maul use to manipulate the CIS leaders.

I think you need Maul in episode. I pretty much watch TPM just for him. I think he should have been given a bigger role and in Episode II he could have been more powerful using force lightening and such to defeat obi and anakin so anakin defeating him in ROTS has significance.

 

I agree that Maul shouldn't have lived beyond TPM, but I don't agree that Dooku should have completely replaced him.

Maul served his purpose. The Sith Apprentice role in TPM didn't need someone to be overly interesting or having lots of dialogue. He needed to be mysterious, and needed to be Sith. This is the first Sith that the Jedi have seen in a thousand years. A Jedi-turned-Sith/Dark Jedi just wouldn't work so well for that. When I first saw AOTC for the first time, it took me a while to realize that Dooku was set up to be the villain. And I think that the Sith Apprentice's death served for a better climax of the film.

Dooku had the potential to be one of the most interesting characters of the PT. Unfortunately, of course, they failed at this.

I still find the idea of Dooku as the Dark Jedi and Maul as the fighter interesting though. I can't decide whether ot not I think that work better. I just can't see Maul running away or attempting any kind of escape in TPM, though, and again, his death helped the climax, IMO. And an awesome-looking character who was mostly silent the whole time worked fine for one episode, but I'm not sure how well that would work for three. But now I'm getting off-topic.

I agree with this as well, but I think he could have been done right...if he'd looked exactly as he had in the concept art, and never once used a lightsaber. Just being a strategic genius and actually commanding droids. And not featured in Revenge of the Sith. Maybe just a cameo.

 

I think thats the whole point. Anyway, Maul should have been in episode one, but I would have made Dooku a Jedi council memeber and have him defend Qui-Gon argument that the Sith have returned.

 

Are you looking at this with your own sensibilities in mind, or though the eyes of kids that enjoy Star Wars? Either is fine, but in the latter case you would have to remember that many teens and adults hate most of the filler put in there for the kids.

 

I agree that he is the highlight of the TPM, but what does a Sith look like?

Like Palpatine?

I don't think that the looks are important in this case. Some complained that he did not have the yellow tint in the eye, but I have never been bothered by that. His actions speak loud enough.

 

That is an idea I have always liked the sound of. Dooku should have been involved at the start, one way or another. As it stands he is shoved into AOTC and it is up to the EU writers to sort it out.

 

Maul would have needed some more personality if he would showed up in AOTC.

 

Little Ani was best for kids. Maul represented a truly malevolent Jungian archetype, haunting the collective subconscious of every adult in every theater across the world -- Maul was definitely NOT for little kids.

You see, Lucas delivered the perfect Sith . . . outside of OT Vader, that is. Why 'terminate' him after EPI?

Maul could have proved himself Anakin's nemesis at every turn, more capably and threateningly than Dooku ever did.

And imagine Anakin on The Invisible Hand, Palpatine strapped in his chair while Skywalker holds two sabers at Maul's neck, and Palpatine orders Anakin to "kill him." Priceless

Talk about revenge! But then Maul ran the threat of over shadowing the PT star, Vaderkin. He was scripted as the boogie man, he scared kids, so Lucas had Kenobi kill him in an improbable scenario.

No, Maul was not for kids. He was psychologically dark, a visually haunting 'menace,' a cinematic enigma that was never fully explained (except in the EU, which undoubtedly realized the Sith's huge popularity and attempted to capitalize on it after Lucas 'fumbled' the character to them.

 

Having read most opinions on Maul's death I realise that many will share this view.

I'll put it down to a matter of taste. I saw Maul's posturing as unconvincing, or at least I imagine it would be unconvincing to Jedi Knights trained for battle. I do not doubt that they feared the skill, but that is different.

Dooku came across as far more intimidating in that respect.