I love magic and especially the use of dark magic in media. Well, I appreciate all magical things in plots, but the dark tone of some magic has that sort of horror vibe that I really like. I had very little knowledge of The Nightsisters before they were introduced in Clone Wars, Krista had me watch a section of The Fallen Order video game where they appear, but when Asajj went back Dathomir I was immediately very interested.

While I do not agree with Asajj Ventress’ force alignment, I will say a lot of the Dark Side/Sith folks in Clone Wars are very cool. Asajj finds herself running away from her former Master, Dooku, when he is told to kill her by Palpatine. Injured and trying to escape she makes her way back to the planet of her birth, Dathomir, and seeks out the Nightsisters. While she was not able to be raised as a Nightsister she has no where else to go. Mother Talzin immediately works to heal and prepare her returned daughter for the goal of revenge against the man who has wronged her. This also leads us to meeting the male counterparts of the Nightsisters, one of whom is a brother of the thought to be dead Darth Maul. Savage Opress is changed and forced to become Count Dooku’s new apprentice in order to allow Asajj to destroy the man who has betrayed her. What ultimately happens is that Savage does not complete his mission and winds up searching for his lost brother, who Talzin insists is out there. This all comes together into a reveal of Darth Maul and the beginning of what Solo: A Star Wars Story fans will know as Crimson Dawn.

As a whole the Nightsisters are just a very cool inclusion to the Star Wars universe for me. They wield a dark magic that can alter the fundamental nature of a being, but they can also bring their dead sisters back to life. They are remarkable fighters and appear to exist in a sort of Sith-esque world. They are not force users, but they are able to wield a powerful energy, we even see that Talzin is able to attack Dooku at a distance and almost kill him before she is stopped. The sisterhood that exists on Dathomir is very powerful and they act in full support of Asajj, even though she had not been a part of them for a long time. Her giving up her ability to be a Nightsister in order to protect them as a child is seen as a great sacrifice on their behalf. I would love to do a Nightsister themed cosplay, I also really like red as a color in character costumes.

In association with the Nightsisters we got the reveal that I had been waiting for, Darth Maul. I thought he was really cool when I had initially seen The Phantom Menace, which seems interesting to me now since he has so little screen time in that movie. I had heard he was in Clone Wars and that Sam Witwer was his voice actor, which was another plus for me. He was one of my favorite characters in the American version of Being Human and I hadn’t seen him in much since then. His initial introduction was so creepy, literally was a half him, half spider creature. So so creepy and beyond that he had become very lost in the course of his survival. I mean literally he turned himself into a mechanical spider being, that would not be great for anyone’s mental health. I have appreciated his relationship with Savage, he even wanted to continue his training and his brother is very, very powerful. If certain things had not happened I really think he could have taken out Dooku after time with Maul. I am very curious to see more of Maul, though again he is a very bad person, but he has a very cool stage presence.

I am sure I will have more thoughts about Maul, the Nightsisters, and Asajj as I watch more of Clone Wars and eventually make it into Rebels. If you have your own thoughts on these characters I would love to hear them. We also are very sure our marathon is going to have to push into February because we are taking a bit more time than we thought it would take us to get through the Star Wars television series. We also made some additions to the marathon, which has pushed it out even a little bit more.