I still fondly remember the levels of hype that the original Star Wars: The Force Unleashed had going for it in the days leading up to its launch. Long before the sequel trilogy proved to be an underwhelming rebirth for Star Wars, Force Unleashed was poised to be the definitive take on the franchise and the years between the prequel and original trilogies.
This would be the tale of how the Rebel Alliance came to be, Vader’s secret apprentice who could literally rip Star Destroyers from the sky and a bridge between sagas. It…didn’t reignite the franchise in the manner that LucasArts hoped for, and once Disney bought the franchise it was pretty much the end for The Force Unleashed.
You’ve got to marvel at the original game though. The gameplay may be dated, but the story, the characters and the sheer magnetism of Sam Witwer as Starkiller made for the best Star Wars story that you could have hoped for at the time. A sequel followed, and while it was a more of the same experience that believed that doubling the lightsaber count on the screen would lead to double the fun, it did end on a heck of a cliffhanger.
After a climatic battle with the Sith Lord who literally stabbed him in the back, Starkiller’s latest clone defeated Darth Vader and had him locked up in the safest brig that the Rebel Alliance could afford. What would have happened next if Star Wars: The Force Unleashed 3 was made? That game would have turned Vader into a fusion of Hannibal Lector and the Black Knight from Monty Python and the Holy Grail. “At the end of The Force Unleashed II he cuts off Vader’s hand and captures him,” Sam Witwer said to IGN during a recent stay at home party.
I’m not comfortable sharing everything we discussed, but the idea was, that was the biggest mistake ever, and that Vader, like he was toying with Luke, the Force Unleashed I and II games were all about Vader toying with Starkiller. And at some point, there would be a confrontation where Starkiller’s fighting Vader, and everything that worked before suddenly isn’t working now. He’s like, ‘I cut off your hand!,’ and Vader says, ‘That wasn’t my hand. I have no hand.’
Starkiller’s fighting and Starkiller says, ‘How are you doing this?’. Vader answers simply with whatever the first line in the original Star Wars script was, which I believe was, ‘I am Lord Darth Vader, Dark Lord of the Sith.’ It was something along those lines, and that ends the conversation. He’s no match for this guy. There’s a little spoiler for an alternate universe.
I’ll be honest, I’m not exactly certain what Witwer is actually saying here, but I’ve got a feeling that Force Unleashed 3 would have been a weird game. It’s not all doom and gloom though! Witwer may have surrendered Starkiller’s lightsabers after The Force Unleashed era was sent into the void with the rest of the Star Wars Expanded Universe after the House of Mouse executed sale order 66, but he got a heck of an upgrade in the years to come.
Giving life to Darth Maul in the Clone Wars and Rebels TV series (Or simply Maul), Witwer gave the character an air of menace that transformed him back into a fan favourite character who could make certain that the Sith hits the fan whenever he popped up.
Last Updated: May 25, 2020
