I'm agreeing with some of the earlier sentiments and saying that Darth Maul is a flat and meaningless character in an equally flat and meaningless film. A little more characterization, beyond "standing there menacingly" would have been great.

The Consequence:
I like Darth Maul. A drunken group of friends were talking (of course) about Starwars Episode 1-3, and I mentioned that Darth Maul was an exceptional character. Then it was pointed out to me that if everything else in the story was up to par, he wouldn't be considered so great. What do you think?

he was terrible. the emperor builds him up as his great new up-coming pupil, has one or two cool intro scenes when hes searching for anakin and attacks. but he never winds up saying ANYTHING, or contributing to the overall plot. all he does is dance around with a double-blade saber. he couldve been used to shed some light on the early Sith, but he doesnt even demonstrate much power beyond being able to twirl a baton.

he was a useless character, looks pretty but not worth much at all.

OT: your poll doesnt make any sense. you ask two questions and only ask "yes, no, meh". which question are people supposed to be answering? please dont be a numbnuts in the future, thank you.

I liked him, but I don't really know why. He wasn't fleshed out enough in the film, however I remember reading a book written from his perspective ages back. Couldn't tell you if it was any good or not though, I was like five at the time.

Not exceptional, by any means. He's pretty cool, but besides that he's practically non-existent as an actual character (in the film, at any rate).

I forget who said it, but if you have to figure everything out for a specific character by reading or watching something OTHER than the one movie/game he's in, then the writers failed to establish that person as a character and/or to make him a character at all.

Everyone trying to explain who or what he was is missing the point. Darth Maul is the equivalent of those two guys we see firing up the Death Star as it blows up Alderaan. The difference being that "Darth Time Filler", as Confused Matthew calls him, served no purpose other than to further lengthen a movie.

It's like when people try to tell me that Governor Phatt was a supporting villain, like Largo, in Monkey Island 2. It just doesn't hold up.

Darth Maul wasn't a character. He was an ambulatory prop. Exactly the same purpose would have been served by clipping his double-bladed saber to a hatstand with some horns glued on it.

Maul was a well designed soulless piece of iconography. He was distinctive, used a very interesting and memorable weapon, and was generally memorable. But he was, honestly, not much more of a character then the couches they sat on. He had no real character, he was just eye catching.

Holy crap, I just realized that Maul is the Prequels Boba Fett!

I imagine he would've made a good character in the right hands. The right hands are not George Lucas.

EDIT: I vaguely recall reading that he had a backstory, which was told in the novels (correct me if I'm wrong)and that Sideous left him marooned on a barren planet of some sort. Maul seethed with rage and when Sideous returned, they fought. Sideous only barely managed to block Mauls ruthless attacks.

Elmoth:
He has TWO lines in the entire movie.

Haha, but maybe that's what's so good about him.

Susurrus:
I don't understand this at all.

He said next-to-nothing, so he has no character.

The character design was pretty much a: "How can we make a guy look evil?" It wasn't good character design, it was generic. He looked like a devil. Hooray? If his lightsaber had been a trident it couldn't have been any more hamfisted. I get that most of the characters in Star Wars are stereotypes, but Han Solo didn't wear a pirate hat, and keep a spyglass by his side, and a parrot on his shoulder.

Darth Vader - that was good character design. General Grievous was at least interesting.

Not that I don't agree on Darth Maul being a terrible character (though one with a lot of potential. potential Lucas failed to capitalize on.), but just because a character has little or no dialog does NOT mean they have no character.

Take a look at most of Pixar's films, especially Wall-E. Wall-E, the character, had a lot of personality. Yet, his dialog for the entirety of the film was two words. "Wall-E" and "Eve-ah".

Lots of dialog =/= character just as a lack of dialog =/= a lack of character.

That said, Lucas still failed to do anything to make Maul more interesting, save for looking sinister.

Soviet Heavy:
His main weakness was a lack of screen time. If he was introduced earlier, and had more scenes showing him tracking the Jedi and the Queen, he would have been that much more intimidating.

However, if you want more Maul, he's apparently still alive.... somehow. In an upcoming Clone Wars TV arc, Darth Maul's body was attached to spider robot legs, and he is going to fight against the Jedi.

This was my line of thinking. If he had had more screen time (and Lucas hadn't lost his ability to write), he could have made for a classic film villain.

Darth Maul lacked any characterization in the movie except looking like a badass, so to me no he wasn't a good character because he wasn't a character just an obstacle for Obi-Wan to get through. They may give him a character in a book but I am going strictly by the movie.

Remember the kill bugs at the beginning of Episode II? The creepy crawly things that Jango Fett gave to Zam Wessel that gave to that probe droid to kill Padme?

Maul was those. There to do a job, with no real motivation outside of doing that job. Ever. Maul was as much of a character as those bugs were. So, no, he was not a 'good' character or even a 'mediocre' one. He was a battle droid that just happened to have flesh and blood.

Vader was a great character, in that while he was a servant to the Empire, he'd be known to tighten a collar or two to make a point. He was decidedly unimpressed with a battle station that could destroy a motherfucking planet, and we are given glimpses into his past that suggest he was once a better man, but was somehow 'seduced' by the Dark Side. There's some complexity and depth to Vader that goes beyond 'kill everything I see'.

With Maul you get none of that. There's a difference between 'mystique' and 'not telling us a damn thing'. So far as the audience is concerned, Maul is just some goon who does whatever Sidious tells him to without question or hesitation.

He had no character or personality, but was a complete badass. Meh.

Darth Maul was a guy who looked super-evil and killed Obi-Wan's master. Was he a character at all or just a plot device?

I'm not a fan of star wars anyway,so I might have a stilted opinion, but he was barely a character at all. Literally,how many lines of dialogue did he have in the entire movie? One to three? He was more of a "thing" that the protagonists had to get past than an actual villain. At least that four-armed robot in episode 3 had a part to play in the story other than a speed bump and a way to kill off Liam Neeson (although that was a noble cause in and of itself).

He played the part of a sith perfectly, he was evil looking, was himself evil, and was all around pretty badass. He was event he first to use the double-bladed light-saber when t was still cool.

Of all the characters in the new trilogy, I'd say I think Maul was one of the best. The right atmosphere was created around him, he said enough, but also not too much to ruin the air around him and he had a really cool lightsaber (okay that last point may be invalid). He's like the Boba Fett of the new trilogy; doesn't have that much screen time, doesn't say much and is ultimately pretty cool.

Mediocre Character in an above average movie. He is just there to menace the main characters, have a cool fight scene, kill off Qui Gon and that is pretty much it. If a little more of the movie was devoted to fleshing out Darth Maul, or atleast give him a few more scenes, maybe some James Earl Jones style talking moments, he might have done better.

I think he was one of the most superfluous characters in all of Star Wars, well one of the most superfluous named characters anyway. Seriously he had absolutely ZERO influence on the plot whatsoever and pretty much just existed as an excuse for them to have that wicked three way sword fight at the end. You'd think that for all the work that went into his character design and how much he was and is plastered all of the marketing, he'd have had a much larger role to play. Instead you could have completely taken him out of the movie and lost nothing. ...well except the awesome sword fight.

I do not think he is on the screen long enough to know anything more than he is a good fighter and has some cool face paint happening.

...although he did not do much he did nothing bad.

As many others have said he wasn't really a good character, he just had an awesome visual design.

I mean he had absolutly no personality and you never actually get too know anything about him, his only purpose was looking cool and provide an opponent for a ligthsaber battle.

*oops doubble post

Vigormortis:
SNIP

That assumes he was in a film by a guy who could direct, or a guy who could write.

Also, Lucas has never had the ability to write. Watch the original trilogy and actually listen to the dialogue. It's cringe inducing. The only reason Star Wars is loved is because some of the ideas and concepts were brilliant.

I'll never understand this about starwars fans: why do you guys deify all these mostly-silent non-characters?

Hell, you did it with Boba Fett, and Darth Maul has gotten similar treatment.

What character? Disregarding all the Extended/expanded/whatever - universe and comics and going only with the original film he appeared in, then he had only like what - two lines and 15 - 20 minutes of overall screen time? It's like the collective consciousness of the fandom is made up of easily-amused five-year olds who base importance off of "OOH, he haz dubbul-bwaded lightsaybuh! Hees got these SO COOL head horns and faise tatooS!!!1 LETZ MAIK ENTIRE COMX AND BACKSTORY AROUND THIS GUY BECAUSE HE JUST LOOKED SO BADASS1!!"

Same with Boba Fett. In 1970-whatever: "OMG< HE HAZ THE COOL VIZOR ADN JHETPAK! i want cool helmte and jeetpac!1!! Let krait al theis baxtoree and continue the charactor in zuh comix because we thought he looked SO COOL!" [even though he only had like a few lines in the original]

I hate baseless fan worship, and while I tend to not have hate for characters initially for things like this, it grows when they become idolized and regarded 'iconic' for no reason than said fans. It's a strange love/hate I have with SW: I think the universe Lucas created is an interesting place than needs more exploration, but usually does not because everyone working on the IP always tries too hard to shoehorn in popular established characters or everything gets designed around being exactly like said characters just because fanboys don't know how to control themselves.

TLDR; No, he is not a good character in a pretty 'meh' movie.

Darth Maul didn't have a character.
"I'm the evil looking Sith Swordsman, here to act as a stand-in for Darth Vader to fill in the badass villain quota."

That's all there was to his "character", going strictly by the movies. I'm sure he sold a LOT of action figures though!

I love the guy (didn't have too much "character" thou) + the actor (Ray Park) is absolutely fantastic, also plays snake-eys in the G I Joes movie (see any similarities?). And the silent martial artist is something I like. AND he does all the jumping and shit for real (well not the a few stories high ones) and the stunts too.

I think he had the potential to be a really good character. And that potential sets him aside from the rest of the borderline mediocrity in the movie.

SycoMantis91:
I think he had the potential to be a really good character. And that potential sets him aside from the rest of the borderline mediocrity in the movie.

I'd argue that the entire prequel trilogy had tremendous potential, and it turned into nothing more than a gigantic money-grab.

Atmos Duality:

SycoMantis91:
I think he had the potential to be a really good character. And that potential sets him aside from the rest of the borderline mediocrity in the movie.

I'd argue that the entire prequel trilogy had tremendous potential, and it turned into nothing more than a gigantic money-grab.

I completely agree with this. If the same time and effort had been put into character and story development as special affects and sleek looking ships, they could have been classics in their own right. I still like them, but compared to the originals and a lot of other sci-fi films, as well as all the things it could have been, just doesn't measure up.

He did more than Boba Fett ever did.