#102 Season 5 Episode 14

“One vision can have many interpretations.”

Savage and Maul forge an alliance with Death Watch to target a common enemy: Obi-Wan Kenobi.

After his failure at Florrum, Darth Maul awakens in the custody of Death Watch. The scheming Sith Lord senses opportunity, as the outlaw Mandalorian group is just what he needs to begin building a new base of power.

Eminence Commentary, Preview, Bonus clip, clip 2 and starwars.com Episode Guide.

Original Airdate: 19 January 2013

Writer: Chris Collins

Director: Kyle Dunlevy

Concept Art and Trivia

The discovery of the incapacitated Sith brothers, nearly frozen in a drifting starship, was staged as an homage to the opening scenes of Aliens (1986) wherein Ripley is found by a salvage team.

Now that Maul has humanoid artificial legs, he is much shorter than the lumbering Savage Opress, a point made clear when Opress stands and bangs his head on the operating theater’s overhead light on Zanbar.

The mechanical arms that operate on the Sith brothers are repurposed mining equipment previously seen on the moon of Concordia, which Pre Vizsla governed in Season Two’s “The Mandalore Plot.”

Black Sun was originally developed for Shadows of the Empire, a multimedia Expanded Universe Star Wars story released in 1996 as a novel, comics series, video game, and collectibles. The Black Sun symbol comes from that source, as does the look of the Falleen leaders.

The architecture of the Black Sun installation on Mustafar is distinct from previous facilities seen on the lava planet. In fact, the main fortress (illustrated here by Wayne Lo) resembles the shape and lines of the Virago, starship of Prince Xizor in Shadows of the Empire (inset illustration by Doug Chiang).

The Black Sun foot soldier blasters were inspired by a similar weapon used by the robot guards seen in The Black Hole.

All the Huttese dialogue in the episode was translated from English. The phrase “Stuka Crispo,” heard uttered by Jabba the Hutt, means “Death Watch.”

As evidence of their stock and trade, the mouths and fingers of the Pykes are stained by spice. Illustration by Amy Beth Christenson.

A more stunning version of Savage throwing his lightsaber down the length of the table and decapitating the Black Sun leaders exists, but it was edited for broadcast. The complete version will appear on the Blu-ray and DVD release.

The Mandalorian Gauntlet ships in this episode are smaller versions of the larger ones seen in previous seasons. They also feature a new ventral deployment rack that makes excellent use of the jetpack-wearing warriors.