Ray Park Kept Telling People He Was Returning As Darth Maul, And No One Noticed
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The biggest surprise to come out of Solo: A Star Wars Story was the reveal that Darth Maul was the secret bad guy behind the Crimson Dawn crime organization. While Maul has been back for a while thanks to Star Wars cartoons, this was his first live action appearance since 1998. Ray Park, the actor who physically plays Maul in The Phantom Menace, was brought back for Solo, and while these types of cameos are usually shrouded in secrecy, Park was pretty into teasing it on social media ahead of his ultimate appearance. However, as it turns out, no one really noticed at the time. Check out one post he made teasing his Star Wars appearance.
Ray Park is an actor and martial artist perhaps best known for his role as Darth Maul in Star Wars: The Phantom Menace. Park was able to design his choreography for the role, contributing to what most Star Wars fans consider to be one of the best lightsaber fights in the franchise. Though only had a few lines in the movie, he was dubbed over by Peter Serafinowicz in the film, and later when Maul made his big return in Star Wars: The Clone Wars, Sam Witwer provided the voice. Witwer once again did the voice for Maul in Solo, with Park reprising his role on set.
It had been quite a few years since Ray Park had to get his face painted, so one can imagine he was excited to be playing the character again. He was so excited that if people were paying attention to his social media feed, they probably would have gotten some big hints. One clue was that he shaved his head and Park had posted to his Instagram page writing, "Now... I wonder why I shaved my hair a wee while ago?"
This post came out a little while after Solo when the cat was already out of the bag, but apparently, he had deleted a few previous posts where he had secretly provided hints to his comeback, according to Forbes.
I may have deleted a bunch, but if you go back and check all my Instagram posts, I was secretly telling everyone, but no-one knew.
If Darth Maul ever shows up again, people better pay attention to Ray Park's social media! Still, it's unclear if there is a plan for Maul to appear in a movie again. One would assume that a sequel to Solo would be the best place for Maul to appear, but it's unknown if Disney and Lucasfilm will greenlight such a movie after Solo underperformed at the box office.
It might not have Maul in it, but the next Star Wars film to hit theaters will be Star Wars: Episode IX, which doesn't arrive until December 19, 2019. To learn more about the movie, here's everything we know so far.
