"Star Wars: The Mole — Lord of Shadows": what is the series about, when will it be released

The release of the second season of the animated series "Star Wars: The Mole — Lord of Shadows" was confirmed on April 2 — four days before the first episode will appear on streaming. Who created the show, what it's about and why the industry is already betting on its continuation — in the Izvestia article.

When will the first season be released and will there be a second

A few days before the premiere, series creator and executive producer Dave Filoni confirmed that Lucasfilm Animation is already working on the second season of "Mole — Lord of Shadows." The premiere of the first season will take place on Monday, April 6, and two episodes will be released.

According to Collider, the demand for a sequel was so high that Lucasfilm decided to extend it even before the release of the first episode. Athena producer Yvette Portillo clarified that a number of other studio projects are likely to go into production earlier than the second season of "Lord of Shadows." Specific dates for the continuation have not yet been announced.

The first two episodes of the first season — "Dark Revenge" and "Sinister Intentions" — will be released on April 6. Next, the platform will release two episodes weekly: April 13 — "Whisper of the Unknown" and "Pride and Revenge", April 20 — "Inquisition" and "Night of the Hunt", April 27 — "Call to the Abyss" and "Creeping Fear". The final two episodes will air on May 4— Star Wars Day, an unofficial celebration for fans of the franchise celebrated annually around the world. The title of the last episode of the season has not yet been revealed.

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The plot: "The Godfather" in a galaxy far, far away

The action takes place about a year after the end of the Clone Wars: the former Sith lord Maul rebuilds his crime syndicate on the planet Janix — during the heyday of the Galactic Empire. Meeting the disappointed padawan Devon Izara, Maul sees him as a potential student for his personal war of revenge.

"It's like in The Godfather, a criminal family that the viewer suddenly begins to identify with," Portillo shared.

Script writer Matt Michnowiec said that the team aimed to create a spectacle both for those who encounter the Star Wars universe for the first time and for long-time fans of the franchise.

According to Sam Witwer, who voices Maul, the series does not require any prior knowledge of either the character or the universe as a whole — the viewer will understand what is happening even without watching the previous films of the franchise.

"You can't watch any Star Wars movies and still figure out what's going on. The show is absolutely accessible," Witwer said.

Who is Mol

Filoni said that the idea of Maul's return goes back to his conversations with film producer George Lucas. According to the director, Lucas insisted on bringing back the character in the Clone Wars, although Filoni himself initially doubted the credibility of this decision, given that the Pier was cut in half. Nevertheless, Lucas was confident that his co-author would find a way to base it on a plot.

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The plot is based on the bestseller "Pentagram" about the abnormal heat in Norway and maniac cops.

Maul's fate in the Star Wars canon has already been sealed: in the Star Wars Rebels series, it was shown that he dies at the hands of Obi-Wan Kenobi on Tatooine. This opens up the question of what kind of story "Lord of Shadows" will tell within this time frame.

There is an active discussion in the fan community that Devon Izara may turn out to be the canonical version of the character from the expanded universe — Darth Talon, a student of Maul, whom Lucas once conceived as one of the main villains of his own version of the sequel trilogy, writes CBR.

Creators and cast

Director Brad Rao called "Lord of Shadows" one of the best projects in the history of Lucasfilm Animation. According to him, the narrative, characters, visual style, episode titles and music have formed a single whole — a result that the team is truly proud of.

The style is close to the "Clone Wars", but noticeably more expressive: the artists deliberately moved away from digital tools in favor of physical techniques — in particular, they applied brush strokes to glass and photographed them for insertion into animation, and painted background landscapes on real canvases. This approach reflects the nature of the Mall and the atmosphere of the planet Janix, where the action takes place.

Witwer, who returns to the role of Maul after the Clone Wars, was involved in the project a year before the official announcement and participated in the development of the image much more deeply than in previous works: he discussed the character's character, reviewed scripts and gave feedback on early animation. Gideon Adlon voiced Padawan Devon Izara, Wagner Moura, an Oscar nominee and Golden Globe winner, played detective Brander Lawson, and Richard Ayoade played the Two Boots droid. The cast also includes Dennis Haysbert, Chris Diamantopoulos, Vanessa Marshall, who once again plays the role of Ruk Cast from the Clone Wars, and Steve Blam.

On March 24, Medialogia presented on its website a Russian series rating consisting of the 100 most popular projects of the past year. The South Korean thriller "The Squid Game" took the first place with 42,861 points, the second place was taken by the American science fiction series "Stranger Things" (26,572 points), and the third place was taken by the Russian detective "Sled" (20,361 points).

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