Disney/Lucasfilm
Warning: This post contains spoilers for "Solo: A Star Wars Story."
- "Solo: A Star Wars Story" has a secret cameo of a "Star Wars" character we didn't think we'd see again: Darth Maul, last seen in 1999's "The Phantom Menace."
- But there were other candidates for who the cameo would be, and it wasn't official until after director Ron Howard was hired and pushed hard for Maul.
- "I thought when I came in, I assumed they knew who it was and they were just keeping it under wraps," Howard said in an interview with Slashfilm. "And they didn't. But Maul was listed as one of the candidates. And I lobbied hard for that."
A "Star Wars" character we didn't think we'd see again on the big screen returns in a top-secret cameo in "Solo: A Star Wars Story," but the character wasn't finalized until after director Ron Howard replaced original directors Phil Lord and Chris Miller.
In the movie, after Paul Bettany's Dryden Vos is killed, it's revealed that Darth Maul is the true boss of a crime organization called Crimson Dawn. Maul was last seen in "The Phantom Menace" in 1999 as a Sith Lord who gets sliced in half by Obi-Wan Kenobi. For those not familiar with the expanded "Star Wars" universe, Maul was considered deceased. But in the cartoon series, "Star Wars: The Clone Wars," he is resurrected with robotic limbs.
In an interview with Slashfilm, Howard said the cameo was written "in a generic way" and with "a lot of uncertainty" in the script, which only labeled the cameo as "Boss." Howard said there were other candidates for who the crime boss would be, and he pushed hard for it to be Maul.
"I thought when I came in, I assumed they knew who it was and they were just keeping it under wraps," he told Slashfilm. "And they didn't. But Maul was listed as one of the candidates. And I lobbied hard for that. I thought that made a lot of sense to me. I found that character to be really effective."
Howard said that he was convinced by his 31-year-old son Reed's reaction, who is a "dedicated 'Star Wars' fan" and thought the idea was "incredibly cool."
"And so for that generation, I thought, well that was gonna be a pretty interesting idea," Howard continued. "And doing a little more research and understanding sort of how the character had worked elsewhere, I thought it was good."
Howard said that they shot the Maul scene twice because the first time "wasn't quite Maul enough yet."
"Added the lightsaber," he said. "And intensified it. And definitely took a big jump."
More on 'Solo: A Star Wars Story':
- 'Solo' is the latest 'Star Wars' movie to bomb in China, and Disney has a big problem on its hands
- Disney's CEO immediately greenlit 'Solo' after the writer described the origin of Han's last name
- 'Solo' director Ron Howard responds to the movie's disappointing box office performance
- 'Solo' bombs at the box office, only taking in $83 million over the weekend