Star Wars: Solo movie writer SPEAKS OUT on that HUGE surprise cameo

WARNING SPOILERS FOR SOLO AHEAD

Star Wars: The Last Jedi surprised us with Yoda’s Force ghost and Rogue One brought back Darth Vader, so it shouldn’t be surprising Solo would follow suit.

Paul Bettany’s Dryden Vos may be the villain in the Han Solo prequel, but following his demise the real big bad was revealed.

Having not appeared in a Star Wars movie for almost 20 years, Darth Maul finally returned to the big screen as the crime boss of Crimson Dawn.

And now Solo screenwriter Jonathan Kasdan, who penned the Star Wars spin-off with his father Lawrence – the scribe behind The Empire Strikes Back, Return of the Jedi and The Force Awakens – has spoken out on the Darth Maul cameo.

Speaking with Variety, he said: “That was something I was hoping to lay in very early. 

“We were doing it very subtly. I wanted to build toward the idea that this crime syndicate that they were involved with was much bigger than this Dryden Vos character [played by Paul Bettany]. 

“This scary guy wasn’t even in charge and there was someone much scarier above him, so we were looking at who could be that guy.”

He continued: “Maul had gone into this criminal underworld and this particular period in his life was left vague and grey in the canon,

“That gave us an opening to say, ‘OK, can we use that character, and if so, does he fit really nicely into a world of scary people?’”

Incredibly he wasn’t even named in the script, in order to maintain the secrecy.

Kasdan continued: “It was never specifically named in the script.

“It just said, ‘A character too secret to ever name.’ Everyone did a great job of keeping it secret, and Ray was such a delight.”

HOW DARTH MAUL AND JABBA THE HUTT ARE SET UP FOR SOLO 2

Filmed in January of this year with just a skeleton crew, one crew member opened up about the secret shoot.

They said: “Everyone was told, ‘Keep your mouth shut,’”

“But ultimately word spread through the crew and every f***ing crew member ended up on stage. Everyone was geeked out. 

“When [Ray] Park [who played Maul in The Phantom Menace] walked onto the stage in regalia and the paint, everyone started clapping.”