This weeks Your Nerd Side Show:
There are plenty of unending debates that happen around the Star Wars franchise. For instance, who is the actual Chosen One: Anakin, Luke or Rey? Then there's the question of who shot first: Han or Greedo? Another intriguing debate is whether Darth Sidious intentionally lost his fight with Master Windu in Revenge of the Sith. Because if he didn't, it would truly speak to Windu's generational skills with a blade, probably making him the best Jedi duelist of all time.
There will probably never be a definitive answer to whether Windu won, (and the fight should have been even better). But even if he lost, Master Windu was still one of the best duelists of all time. He fought the evil Sidious one-on-one with no hesitation and no fear, and he fought until Anakin betrayed him. However, there was one opponent that Master Windu absolutely refused to fight -- and that was the Legends version of General Grievous. Here's why.
Why Legends Grievous Was So Deadly
In Legends, General Grievous was a thing of horrors. He made his debut in Genndy Tartakovsky Star Wars: Clone Wars, and he immediately made an impact. The cybernetic monstrosity took on multiple Jedi Masters, and they were outmatched by his speed and brutality with a lightsaber. Master Windu experienced that brutality firsthand when he fought Grievous during the Battle of Coruscant. Here's a selection of their fight from James Luceno's Labyrinth of Evil novel:
"His sole setting was attack. Successful at analyzing Mace's lightsaber style, those same computers also suggested that Grievous alter his stance and posture, along with the angle of parries, reposts and thrusts. The result wasn't Mace's Vaapad, but it was close enough. And Mace wasn't interested in prolonging the contest longer than necessary."
hat quote explains the real reason why Grievous was such a formidable opponent. Because of his cybernetic brain, he could immediately recognize and mimic an opponent's fighting style. So, the higher quality opponent that Grievous faced, the more deadly he would be, and nothing could ever catch him off guard. Even Master Windu's renowned Vaapad style didn't phase the Legends version of Grievous.
Why Master Windu Refused To Duel Grievous a Second Time
Grievous being able to recognize and mimic a fighting style was bad enough, but his cybernetic brain didn't stop there. Once he cataloged a fighting style, he was able to recycle that form against another opponent. For example, Grievous had seen a small portion of Master Windu's Vaapad, which meant that he would be able to use a version of Vaapad against future opponents. That's one reason why Master Windu didn't want to duel Grievous again. For the sake of his fellow Jedi, he didn’t want to further educate Grievous' cybernetic brain on the sequences of Vaapad.
Before Obi-Wan went to fight Grievous on Utapau, Windu actually warned him that Grievous could adopt the Vaapad (or any other) style. Ultimately, Obi-Wan prevailed against Grievous because of his proficiency in Soresu, which was a defensive form of lightsaber combat. Eventually, Grievous' attack-only mentality got the better of him, and Obi-Wan ended his reign of terror.
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