George Lucas’s ideas for the sequel trilogy were to focus on the reconstruction of the galaxy after the fall of the Empire. Although it’s not exactly the same, I think this lines up well with some ideas other people on this site have floated around, where the main conflict of the Sequel Trilogy is to prevent/contain a war before it becomes a galactic, existential crisis. In GL’s ST we might have seen the New Republic face similar stressors to what brought the collapse of the Old Republic, and prevail, demonstrating that the galaxy has grown and learned over the saga and that our heroes have brought about lasting change.
Here you don’t really need for there to be another BBEG. The story is no longer about a guy that has to be defeated for the galaxy to have peace. Bringing back Palpatine, or having Darth Plagueis or Mon Mothma be the villain of the ST all has the same problem, in different flavors. The ST’s story becomes based on how the heroes didn’t really defeat the bad guy yet, and there’s still a little more to go. This doesn’t work when for 32 years we’ve had a satisfying victory for the heroes. But making the ST about reconstruction in the aftermath of the BBEG getting defeated extends the story past Episode 6 more naturally without undermining it, and shows a clear narrative progression across all 9 movies.
I disagree George having Maul as the big bad and likely the new emperor is just as bad.
I don’t know if Darth Maul is meant to be the “big bad” in George’s ST. Maybe he is, he is a Sith master and a clear primary antagonist for the Jedi. But on the other hand, he’s more associated with the criminal underworld of the galaxy while the primary antagonistic force of the story are Imperial ideological holdovers, ex-Stormtroopers in militias refusing to give up like Ba’athists joining ISIS. Maybe they’re in league with each other, maybe Darth Maul takes control of these guys, or maybe they aren’t working together at all. Who knows, George Lucas never made this trilogy. There’s a bunch of different ways it could have played out.
What I was saying wasn’t that George Lucas’s ST pitch had it all figured out, or that if he or Michael Arndt realized it, it would’ve been the objective, correct direction for the sequel trilogy. So talking about midichlorians or prequel-isms is really beside the point. Bringing the conflict of the story in this direction means that the story doesn’t place as much emphasis on beating a new BBEG at the climax of the saga. All these other ideas: Bringing back Palpatine, Snoke or some other knockoff Palpatine, Darth Plagueis surviving, and Mon Mothma, all make the conflict into how the Rebels didn’t actually win in Episode 6, and now they have to win for real this time in Episode 9.