Back in April during Star Wars Celebration Japan, the exciting news was announced that a new animated series based on the post-Clone Wars, pre-Star Wars Rebels adventures of Darth Maul was in the works for Disney+.
The synopsis for Star Wars: Maul - Shadow Lord that was released at the time reads: "After the Clone Wars, Maul plots to rebuild his criminal syndicate on a planet untouched by the Empire. In a new series set after the events of the final season of The Clone Wars, Maul rises again to lead the underworld factions."
Now, voice actor Sam Witwer has shared some more details, and it sounds like Maul won't be depicted as a complete villain in the show.
"It's about bad guys vs worse guys," the BSG alum said during a recent appearance on Katee Sackhoff's podcast. "This isn’t going to be a show where you find out Maul is a real teddy bear, man … We’re not doing that. But is he as bad as Sidious or Vader? Actually no. From the Sith perspective, this guy has flaws ... [there's] humanity that seeps in at various points because of things that have happened to him.
"Maul will question whether creating the Empire was a good idea," he went on. "[Maul’s] like, ‘Is that what [Sidious] had in mind? This is a little scary. Maul comes from a time of swords, sorcery, magic and knights, and now all of that color of the universe is being sucked out of this mechanized Empire. And Maul’s like, ‘Is this right? Is this the universe we were trying to build?’”
Exploring Maul's humanity (to some extent, at least) is an interesting approach, and it makes sense not to have your main protagonist be irredeemably evil.
Maul was introduced as the future Emperor Palpatine's apprentice in The Phantom Menace, and was (or seemed to be) pretty definitively killed off by Obi-Wan Kenobi towards the end of the movie. The character's popularity led to him being brought back with metal legs for The Clone Wars animated series, but he would later meet his actual end at the lightsaber of his old nemesis, Obi-Wan, in Star Wars Rebels.
The character made a return to live-action (once again played by Ray Park and voiced by Witwer) in Solo: A Star Wars Story as the leader of the Crimson Dawn cartel, but the movie underperformed at the box office, evidently putting the brakes on a continuation of Maul's story in this particular timeline.