Clone Wars Season 5 Trailer Speculation: Darth Maul & Savage Opress Arc

Sith, Bounty Hunters, Jedi, oh my!

We have already taken a look at two of the three story arcs previewed in the Disney Star Wars Weekends Season Five Trailer.  Now lets dive into the Sith.

We all know that Savage is the less chatty of the the duo, so it is fitting that all three lines we get in the trailer from the pair are spoken by Darth Maul.  In the order that they appear in the trailer, Maul says:

"We are brothers, true Lords of the Sith." 

"I serve no one." 

"Our combined strength will be rewarded when Kenobi, that Sith pretender Dooku, and all our enemies will fall."

We have a number of distinct scenes involving the brothers in the trailer, no doubt they are greatly out of order.

Scene 1: Opress and Maul descending landing ramp on a planet with smoke billowing in the background.  Next we see the pair involved in a battle either inside a ship or inside a building where Maul force chokes and throws a Twi'lek.

Scene 2: Maul speaking line #3 followed by a lightsaber duel of Maul and Obi-Wan on what looks like the Lion King's Pride rock on an unknown planet with smoke (presumably from a ship/speeder crash) in the background.

Scene 3: Dooku at his mansion on Serenno, Opress slashing his lightsaber in the dark, then Maul and Opress dueling some unknown Jedi on the same planet where Maul and Obi-Wan dueled in earlier clip.

Scene 4: Followed by shots of Sugi and Dengar blasters firing and Maul and Opress deflecting blaster bolts.

Scene 5: Next we have a scene of Anakin on the back of a speeder on a snow covered planet protecting two dark haired humans from Embo, who is snowboarding using his hat.  This scene is the one that may not be part of the overall Maul/Opress arc, the reason I include it is that Embo is in both clips and while I wouldn't be against it, I would be a bit surprised if Embo features prominently in two separate story arcs.  The other reason I include it is that it is an odd clip that doesn't seem to be connected to either the Mandalorian arc or the Ahsoka/Lux/Onderon arc.

Scene 6: Obi-Wan wielding two blue lightsabers, followed by a quick cut of Maul toying with a fallen enemy using lightsaber slashes against the floor around what looks like Sugi. Why do I get the feeling that the unnamed Jedi dueling Savage Opress above loses that battle and Obi-Wan ends up with his/her lightsaber? I certainly hope Sugi survives.

Scene 7: We then see Embo engaged in hand to hand combat with Savage Opress until Opress caches him with a force punch to the helmet that sends him across the room.

Scene 8: Opress igniting his double-bladed lightsaber as a trio of aliens are at a table, one of them begins to rise and Opress throws his saber at the central alien.  Maul's face is superimposed between the appearance of Opess igniting the saber and throwing it. Over at the Star Wars Report, I had a post speculating on the direction Darth Maul's story arc would take in Season Five of The Clone Wars.  This speculation was based on the description for a Scholastic book, "Darth Maul: Shadow Conspiracy" written by Jason Fry.  The description of that book states:

"For the first time ever, Scholastic is publishing Star Wars Clone Wars... based off the hit Cartoon Network TV show, viewed by over 2.4 million every week! 

Our story will follow the highly anticipated return of Darth Maul--the infamous villain of Episode I: The Phantom Menace--whose popularity rivals that of Boba Fett. When Darth Maul reunites with his brother, Savage Opress, can even Obi-Wan Kenobi stop him before he rallies the criminal underworld to his cause?" ~ Edelweiss Link

Based on the fact that we are dealing with the criminal underworld and the fact that the three characters clothing is vaguely similar to Prince Xizor's robes, I have been speculating that these are the new heads of Black Sun that replaced Alexi Garyn whom Darth Maul hunted and executed on Darth Sidious' orders in the Dark Horse Comic Darth Maul #3 and #4. I would also note that the pattern on the wall is vaguely similar to  the Black Sun logo inverted.

It would make sense that if Maul is trying to gain control over the criminal underworld that he would go after the biggest criminal organization, i.e. Black Sun.

What do we make of all this?

Maul and Opress certainly know how to pick their enemies.  Both the Jedi and the "other" Sith, Dooku and Palpatine will be gunning for them in Season Five.  For the Jedi the motive is obvious, they need to stop these two monsters.  For Dooku and Palpatine, the motivation is to remove these destabilizing forces from the chess board. The Chancellor and the leader of the Separatists are playing a very delicate game with the Clone Wars and the fact that their is this now alternate branch on the Banite Sith tree poses a risk to that balance and a threat to the Grand Plan.

I believe that Dooku, who we have seen deal with the bounty hunters directly in Season Four will be hiring the bounty hunters based on Palpatine's orders to hunt down Maul and Opress. At the same time we have Obi-Wan hunting after the pair. My best guess is that both Obi-Wan's Jedi shuttle and the bounty hunters led by Sugi are in pursuit of Maul/Opress' turtle-ship, all three ships are damaged and crash land on a planet or one ship is damaged and believed destroyed and the other two ships arrive in close proximity to each other.

Could this planet be one of Black Suns Outer Rim hideouts?  It would seem to make sense if Opress/Maul where intercepted on their way to decapitate Black Sun's leadership.  Perhaps what we see happen is that in a multi-part battle first the unknown Jedi is killed and Obi-Wan is injured.  Maul and Opress head towards their targets, while the bounty hunters continue pursuit and engage them.  This is it ends up with Sugi vs. Maul and Embo vs. Opress.  Opress incapacitates and possibly kills Embo, while Maul is about to kill Sugi when Obi-Wan shows up with his two lightsabers.  Obi-Wan engages Maul in battle and forces him out of the hideout onto the rock outcropping in an epic duel.  Meanwhile Opress continues to his targets and is successful in eliminating them.  Opress then commandeers a vehicle and hovers over the outcropping as Maul leaps into the vehicle and the escape, leaving Obi-Wan looking up impotently.

I am still not sure how the Anakin-Embo scene fits in or even if it does.  It is also possible that the Obi-Wan vs. Maul and bounty hunters vs. Maul/Opress are from separate episodes or arcs, but I think my theory works overall.

What do you think?