Maul: Shadow Lord breaks Star Wars record with astonishing Rotten Tomatoes score

The latest animated addition to the Star Wars universe has gone down incredibly well with critics and fans alike, securing a record high rating on Rotten Tomatoes.

Star Wars: Maul - Shadow Lord has officially premiered on Disney+, with a 100% score on the Rotten Tomatoes Tomatometer (from 25 reviews). While the Popcornmeter score (from audiences) is a little lower, it's still an incredibly impressive 96%.

Incredibly, it's the first time that a Star Wars release has reached the 100% critic score. It's followed in the rankings by two other highly-acclaimed animated series, Star Wars Rebels (98%) and Star Wars Visions (98%), with live-action series Andor (96%) coming afterwards.

It even puts the series ahead of A New Hope (94%) and The Empire Strikes Back (93%), the most highly-rated of the Star Wars movies.

Of course, these ratings must be taken with a pinch of salt - particularly as they are subject to change as more reviews come in, however, it's still an incredibly impressive premiere for the new series, which was created by Lucasfilm's big boss, Dave Filoni.

Sam Witwer reprises his role as Maul (after voicing him in The Clone Wars), with the show seeing the character rebuilding his criminal syndicate and searching for a new apprentice on the planet Janix.

Gideon Adlon voices Devon Izara, a Jedi on the run from Order 66, while Wagner Moura plays police detective Brander Lawson and Richard Ayoade lends his voice to Two-Boots, Lawson's police droid partner.

Witwer recently opened up about the version of Maul we meet when beginning Shadow Lord, telling Buzzfeed: "This is a changed Maul.

"This is a guy who is questioning everything about his life, even so far as to re-evaluate his stance on what the Jedi were. He looks at them now and thinks, 'Pretty remarkable institution. Extraordinary, in fact. They are not my equal — but they could have made a difference if they had the determination and the guts to do what must be done.'

"That last part — that's his master's thinking, even if Maul does not realise it. Sidious made such an impression on him. Maul cannot help but use the tools that Sidious gave him."

Maul - Shadow Lord is streaming now on Disney+. You can sign up to Disney Plus from £5.99 a month now.

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