I’m not usually one to go in for fan-made films – although I can completely understand and appreciate how much time, effort and love goes into creating them – but I saw this one doing the rounds and thought I’d give it a go. Thankfully, it’s one of the best and most well-produced that I’ve ever seen in my (admittedly limited) experience.

Darth Maul: Apprentice, created by T7Pro, is a 20-minute long production which shows everyone’s favourite Star Wars villain from the Prequel-era back in action, in the days before he met Messrs Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan in The Phantom Menace. Showcasing Maul during his training on an unknown planet, the Star Wars Big Bad is in epic form as he takes down a band of Jedi who have stumbled across his hidden abode.

The special effects and fighting choreography on display in Darth Maul: Apprentice are absolutely incredible for a fan-made production, and it’s such as thrill to see Maul again after he was given such a short outing in Episode I. I’m a big fan of the aesthetic of this film, as it mixes the moodiness of Maul in his dingy Sith training rooms with the lusciousness of the forest and sparseness of the beach towards the end, which really gives it some variety in its set-pieces.

I’d highly recommend you give this a watch if you’re a Star Wars fan, and hopefully it’ll tide us over until we get that Darth Maul video game that we’ve all been hankering for since its cancellation some years ago! The footage that I saw a few months ago during the time of a Reddit conversation with the game’s developers looked absolutely awesome – I’ve included it below – and it’s a shame it never saw the light of day. Hopefully, this isn’t the last of Maul that we see and he’ll pop up again in some of the now-very-limited Star Wars Extended Universe sometime in the near future.