The Clone Wars - S7E10: The Phantom Apprentice

THE CLONE WARS - DISNEY +

From the outset of The Phantom Apprentice, it is made immediately clear through an eerie lack of opening music that this is going to get dark – and dark it does get. Following the narration and music-less titles, the episode picks up immediately where the last one left off. Ahsoka is in the tunnels of Mandalore, facing off against Darth Maul.

Maul and his motivations are the driving force of this episode, which focuses on Ahsoka, Rex and Bo-Katan attempting first to figure out why Maul wanted to bring the Jedi to Mandalore and then capture the shadowy apprentice. The Clones, meanwhile, continue to wage war against Maul’s Mandalorian minions, who prove more of a nuisance than a genuine threat.

The real threat is, of course, Maul, who is supplied plenty of imposing dialogue by the script and given terrifying life by voice actor Sam Witwer, who has also brought his villainous talents to the past couple of seasons of Supergirl in role full of complexity. It is unfortunate, then that Maul, while complex, is not a distinct type of villain to the Star Wars universe.

Maul wants to bring balance to the force, but that inevitably requires a whole lot of killing to do. Maul often repeats a line about sensing that the end is nigh and he knows that Anakin Skywalker will be responsible for bringing about this end. What Maul proposes is to band together with Ahsoka to take down Darth Sidious once and for all. The scene in which this is composed is way too reminiscent of a scene from The Last Jedi, where Kylon Ren asks the same thing of Rey and extends his hand in the exact same motion that Maul performs. The scenes, and the motivations under them, are far too similar to be overlooked.

Fortunately, the strong suit of the episode is the gripping action, and once again not the complexity of the main villain. The lightsaber fight between Ahsoka and Maul that serves as the climax tries to one-up the lightsaber battle from The Phantom Menace by making the bridge on which the characters are fighting even narrower. The jury is still out on which fight is more spectacular, but it is clear that an animated sequence can still give a live-action one a run for its money. 

Ahsoka and Maul’s moves are truly showstopping. They twirl and jump and dodge and parry – sometimes in mid-air – and the battle is ended with a swift but stunning use of the force. It is a blessing to be living in an age where animation is sophisticated enough to allow for action set-pieces of this magnitude. The fight feels real in a way no previous duel in The Clone Wars has. 

The episode ends as it started: with no theme song, perpetuating the feeling of dread that has been crawling up the viewer’s spine since the beginning. Everyone knows what is to come, now it is just a matter of time before it all comes crashing down.