Sith Lord Smackdown: Maul Doesn't Know When To Quit

Aww, you gotta be kidding me! Those were the first words that came to my mind when I first flipped through Star Wars Visionaries. SWV was a showcase book for Lucas' ILM dawgs to tell their own Star Wars stories and charge the kids USD$17.95 for the privilege. The first story, "Old Wounds", featured a cyborg Darth Maul on the hunt for Obi-Wan Kenobi. A cyborg Maul. Seriously? No back story was given on how the hell he crawled out of the pit in Theed and managed to get himself a robotic lower body. Like this story here where Maul takes on Vader, the how is really not important. A Darth Maul story is a guaranteed fanwank material.

Cyborg Maul never forgot that he got pwned by a Padawan. A Padawan! Maul may have looked scary and had a cool lighsaber but the fact remains that a trainee Jedi who was already hanging by his fingertips managed to jump over him and cut him in half. So now he wants revenge and he's not gonna let a small detail like a missing lower torso stop him. Now that's determination! Maul follows a trail that leads him to a small moisture farm in Tatooine.

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Whoa, Obi-Wan was hiding under the Tatooine desert sand all this time waiting to ambush Maul? Age has not diminished his bad-assedness. Sith Lord and Jedi Master fight for a couple of pages for old times' sake but it's Uncle Owen who jumps in and finishes it once and for all with a blaster shot to the head. You don't mess with a moisture farmer, pal. These guys take no shit from nobody!


Getting cut in half by a Padawan was bad enough, now he gets bushwhacked by a farmer? Oh, the shame. All the other dead Sith Lords are gonna pick on Maul in Sith Hell for eternity now.

Sith Lord Smackdown: Vader vs. Maul

C'mon! Who is the fan who didn't want to see this duel? You lie, sir, if you raised your hand. It's a fight that only the comics can bring. It's Darth "Iron Lung" Vader vs. Darth "my voice was dubbed by Sean's mate in the movie Sean of the Dead*" Maul.

Star Wars comics mostly suck. A few others blow. They take themselves way too seriously, is the problem. The only ones that are okay are the old Marvel Star Wars comics (which were so bad the dial went around and ended up in 'Good') and the anthology based Star Wars Tales. It was in the latter title that this fight occurred.

The plot: Darth Vader is on the hunt for the rebels who stole the plans to the Death Star. The trail leads him to the volcanic planet of Kalakar VI. While searching for the rebels and the plans, however, Vader discovers that it was all a ruse to lure him onto the planet by a trio of Dark Side fanboys who think Vader shouldn't be the no. 2 guy in the galaxy. They want Maul to take over. They brought him back from the dead so he can kill Vader and once again be Palpatine's apprentice.

With that out of the way, let's see some lightsaber action!

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Maul easily subdues Vader who is after all just a paraplegic in a cool black costume with a cape. Choke an Admiral long distance and he's a tough guy. Put him one on one with a tattooed psycho with thorns on his head and he's crying for his mommy. But Vader has one desperate move up his robotic sleeve, though.

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Hey, didn't Yoshimitsu use the same trick move in Tekken 2? And Vader, we learn, has so much self-loathing that he has no problems stabbing himself in the gut just to win a fight. Issues? The man has plenty.


From Star Wars Tales vol. 3

*Pete Serafinovich who was also in the brilliant sitcom Spaced as Simon Pegg's rival.