When the greedy corporate titans and the disenfranchised systems of the galaxy pooled their resources together to leave the aging Galactic Republic behind, they became the Confederacy of Independent Systems. Their military assets formed a droid army of seemingly limitless size -- a weapon that needed a military mastermind to be wielded effectively.
From within the ranks of the Confederacy came General Grievous, a brilliant strategist unhindered by compassion or scruples. His lightning strikes and effective campaigns caused his reputation to grow in the eyes of a frightened Republic. To many, he eclipsed the threat posed by Count Dooku, the charismatic leader of the Confederacy's political battlefields -- Grievous was the face of the enemy.
A twisted melding of flesh and metal, General Grievous' body is a deadly weapon forged by the cutting edge developers of the Confederacy. Grievous' living matter was encased within his precision-engineered artificial body; inside the hardened carapace beat the heart of a remorseless killer. A pressurized gut-sack held his vital organs, while his skull-like mask contained his living eyes and brain. Making the horrific amalgam more unpleasant was a persistent wet, hacking cough coming from his ravaged lungs.
Grievous hunted Jedi for sport and kept his victims' lightsabers as trophies of his conquests within his cloak. His unorthodox fighting form and mechanical enhancements gave him an edge in close-quarter combat. Each of his six-fingered arms could split in two, resulting in an array of four limbs, each armed with a lightsaber. Grievous could spin these arms in a whirling storm of deadly lacerating light that few could withstand. Only against opponents he deemed worthy did he enter into combat. Grievous often preferred to let his electrostaff-wielding bodyguard droids do the fighting.
In the final stages of the Clone Wars, Grievous orchestrated a daring strike against the heart of the Republic. His flagship led a fleet of massive warships to Coruscant, where an immense battle raged in the upper atmospheres of the capital world. The supreme commander of the droid army had managed to kidnap the leader of the Republic, Chancellor Palpatine. Fleeing with his valuable hostage, Grievous was determined to be victor, and hoped to add the lightsabers of the most famous Jedi warriors -- Anakin Skywalker and Obi-Wan Kenobi -- to his grisly collection.
Skywalker and Kenobi infiltrated Grievous' Trade Federation cruiser flagship, and were successful in liberating the captive Chancellor and killing Count Dooku. Yet the Republic fugitives were soon trapped by Grievous' droid forces, and marched before the general. In the bridge of the cruiser, the Jedi fought back, engaging Grievous' bodyguard droids. This bought Grievous time to flee the doomed flagship by throwing an electrostaff at the viewport window, shattering the pane and escaping into space. Grievous clawed along the hull of his falling flagship to make for the escape pod bay.
Grievous fled Coruscant to rejoin the Separatist Council on their secret stronghold of Utapau. There, he received a transmission from Darth Sidious, the Sith mastermind behind the Clone Wars. Sidious ordered Grievous to move the council to Mustafar, and not to fret about the loss of Dooku -- Sidious expected a new Sith apprentice to emerge, one younger and far more powerful than Darth Tyranus.
Ordering the council to Mustafar, Grievous stayed behind on Utapau. A Republic task force led by General Obi-Wan Kenobi voyaged to the sinkhole-riddled world to bring Grievous to justice. Kenobi confronted Grievous and the two engaged in a lightsaber duel. Grievous had received training in the Jedi arts from Count Dooku -- and unleashed a withering assault on Kenobi with four lightsaber blades. Kenobi held his own, shearing off some of Grievous' extraneous limbs, and brutally shoving the droid general with a Force push. Disarmed, Grievous skittered away to his waiting escape vehicle.
The cyborg fugitive fired up his ground-tearing wheel bike, fleeing down the twisting avenues of Utapau's sinkhole city. Kenobi gave chase, riding atop a fearless lizard steed named Boga. The Jedi was able to keep pace with Grievous, leaping onto his vehicle and wrestling control of the difficult-to-pilot contraption away from the general. The wheel bike spun out, dropping into the sinkhole abyss.
Its two occupants tumbled to a stop on Grievous' secret landing platform, the one that contained his personal starfighter. The tenacious Kenobi still fought with Grievous, even though he had his lost lightsaber in the pursuit. The fight degraded to bare knuckles and brutal kicks, and the metallic servo-powered Grievous had the clear advantage. He tossed Kenobi aside, throwing him off the platform. The Jedi caught the lip of the platform and with a free hand, dragged Grievous' discarded blaster pistol to him with the Force.
As Grievous closed to deliver a deathblow, Kenobi opened fire with the blaster. The shots tore into Grievous' open carapace. The blasts cracked the pressurized organ jar, igniting the preservative fluids. Grievous' vital organs exploded in an oily blaze, shooting jets of fire from his helmet's eyeholes.
Grievous' artificial body collapsed on the platform, no longer driven by life, hatred or the compulsion to destroy.
Lightsaber Abilities
Grievous hunted Jedi for sport and kept his victims' lightsabers as trophies of his superiority within his cloak. Taught all the lightsaber combat forms by Dooku, he developed a personalized unorthodox fighting form, involving lightning-fast attacks designed to overwhelm his enemies. His mechanical enhancements gave him an edge in close-quarter combat, enabling him to hold his own against several Jedi all at once, although after his encounter with Mace Windu his abilities would downplay, perhaps due to loss of confidence or damage to his cybernetic systems.
Each of his six-fingered arms could split in two. Consequently, Grievous use an array of four limbs, each armed with a lightsaber. Grievous could also spin these arms in a whirling storm of deadly lacerating light that few could withstand. Grievous was also able to spin his torso and his wrists in a 360 degree motion at extremely fast speeds continuously, effectively becoming a walking lightsaber buzzsaw. In addition to this, he also has repulsor lifts built into his legs and his feet can double as hands, allowing him to wield six lightsabers all at once.
Generally, he entered into combat only against opponents he deemed worthy while he usually preferred to let his electrostaff-wielding bodyguard droids do most of the fighting, although he would sometimes fight involuntarily if the situation demanded it.
Grievous' Transformation
Grievous had suffered near-fatal injuries, rendering the body that had survived many battles useless, or so he was told. Planted evidence pointed to a Republic plot. In truth, Grievous once again proved his resilience, and additional injuries had to be added after the crash to make his body as broken as was claimed. San Hill repeated his proposal, including a promise to replace Grievous's broken body. Desiring vengeance against the Galactic Republic and the Huk, he agreed on the condition that his mind would not be tampered with. This was a half-hearted promise at best, as the lies Dooku told Grievous had already destroyed his hold on reality.
Dooku provided blood from the frozen body of Jedi Master Sifo-Dyas as a means of keeping Grievous's body alive during his transit to Geonosis, where Poggle the Lesser and his Geonosian scientists implanted his brain and eyes into a duranium alloy body reminiscent of a Krath war droid, complete with LX-44 robotic legs. His vital organs were housed in a synthskin gutsack impervious to vacuum. The Geonosians would also alter his brain, both to trim away disturbing memories (while enhancing his rage centers) and to enhance his equilibrium, allowing him to better employ his newfound agility. Internal implants were also placed in his eyes to sharpen his vision and to protect them from the vacuum of space. While the midi-chlorian-rich blood of Sifo-Dyas may have played a critical role in maintaining Sheelal's life, the Kaleesh saw it as a personal failure that the transfusion did not also give him a degree of sensitivity to the Force. To San Hill and his allies, however, the experiment was a phenomenal success. Qymaen jai Sheelal had become General Grievous in form as well as spirit. The same droids and techniques used to rebuild Grievous would later be used to transform Anakin Skywalker into Darth Vader.
The cyborg project was funded by San Hill to create a military leader that could counter Count Dooku's growing political influence in the Separatist movement, although he presented the finished General Grievous as a twisted gift to Dooku. Though taken aback by his appearance, Dooku was pleased and bestowed upon Grievous the title "Supreme Commander of the Droid Armies", and planned to use him in his efforts to conquer the Republic. He presented him with his first lightsaber, the weapon of Sifo-Dyas.
Grievous was disgusted by his new droid body and took Dooku's appointment as Supreme Commander of the Droid Armies as an insult. He slaughtered the MagnaGuards in defiance, exclaiming that he was not like them, not a droid. He further rebelled by still displaying some of his Kaleesh heritage by adorning himself and his MagnaGuards with masks and cloaks in styles closely resembling those found amongst his people. Grievous, however, would soon come to highly respect both Dooku and Sidious, considering them the Confederacy's only "necessary" political leadership.
Grievous was first let loose in the Geonosian catacombs during the Battle of Geonosis where he safeguarded the Separatist leaders from Jedi and clone trooper companies; he left none alive to tell of his existence. Dooku, impressed with the general's performance at Geonosis, trained Grievous in the art of lightsaber combat, which Grievous took to at a rapid pace.
Learning all the seven classic forms of Jedi arts—including the rarely seen Makashi and Juyo—Grievous quickly surpassed all the other apprentices of Dooku in terms of individual combat. Despite his obvious prowess, and the time and resources expended to creating him, Dooku still viewed him as second to the Chiss general Sev'rance Tann. It was only after Tann's death one month after Geonosis that Grievous truly began to come into his own.
Grievous's first public appearance against the Republic was at the Battle of Hypori, where he defeated a team of seven Jedi Knights, including Council members Ki-Adi-Mundi and Shaak Ti, and obliberated an entire Republic task force. These two, along with Aayla Secura and K'Kruhk, were the only survivors of the battle, as a rescue team comprised of ARC Captain Fordo and several other Advanced Recon Commandos, sent to Hypori by Obi-Wan Kenobi, arrived before Grievous could kill them. Had the clones not arrived, the remaining Jedi would have likely been killed.
Six months after the Battle of Geonosis, Count Dooku tested the General by pitting him against Asajj Ventress and Durge onboard the Count's Trenchant space station. Grievous successfully humiliated both Separatist commanders, thus showing Count Dooku he was worthy of the position of Supreme Commander of the Droid Armies. Soon the entire Republic would tremble before Grievous's brutality and strategic prowess, and his skill at killing Jedi Knights would have the HoloNet News networks dubbing him "The Knight Slayer".
Grievous strikes down ARC troopers at Hypori.Months later, Grievous put into motion Operation Durge's Lance, a major Separatist campaign whose goal was the complete conquest of the Core Worlds. Hundreds of planets along the Corellian Trade Spine fell before his forces, including the major world of Duro, whose surrender Grievous personally supervised by forcing a public surrender from Hoolidan Keggle in a Galaxy-wide HoloNet transmission. Grievous was also responsible for the bombing of the heavily populated and urbanized planet Humbarine, one of the founding members of the Galactic Republic, during an hour-long orbital bombardment by the Separatist starfleet under his flagship, Invisible Hand, which resulted in the fragementation of the planet's crust and presumably the death of most of its populance. He also released the Loedorvian Brain Plague into the Weemell Sector, which destroyed Republic armies and nearly all Humans there. Due to these acts of wanton destruction, Grievous soon became an avatar of terror in the eyes of the citizens of the Republic, as he won battle after battle.
For three years, he led the CIS to victories on Banvhar Station, Nadiem, Togoria, Vandos, and Belderone.
In 20 BBY, Grievous baited the Republic forces to Vandos by kidnapping Ambassador Quiyyen. Jedi Knights T'chooka D'oon and Jmmaar were killed in the assault, though the Republic was successful in securing Quiyyen. This led to T'chooka's Padawan, Flynn Kybo, gathering a group of other Jedi, including B'dard Tone and Codi Ty, to take revenge on Grievous, something the Jedi Council hardly approved of. They eventually tracked him down to the moon Belsus in the Anoat system and attacked. While Codi rescued a group of younglings Grievous had captured, B'dard and Flynn dueled with Grievous himself; both of them were killed. Seven months later, on Boz Pity, Grievous easily killed Soon Baytes. With a lot more effort, he then killed Jedi Council member Adi Gallia.
During the Second Battle of Xagobah, Grievous dueled young Boba Fett and nearly killed him. Fett only survived because he faked his own death. The General hastily retreated the planet with Wat Tambor before the Republic's clone troopers burst through the citadel.
Towards the end of the war, he led his flagship, Invisible Hand, and the rest of the Confederacy starfleet in an all out assault on the Republic capital, Coruscant, using secret hyperspace routes given to him by Darth Sidious. During the battle, Grievous ordered diversonary tactics, such as sending suicide squadrons of Vulture droids to cause chaos in the city. While a massive battle raged in space and planetside between Confederate and Republic forces, Grievous led an assault on 500 Republica with intelligence provided by Darth Sidious. In pursuit of Palpatine, he dueled Mace Windu atop a speeding mag-lev train, the duel ending with Grievous being pushed off the train. However, he was saved by a hijacked LAAT/i. He then reached the hardened bunker of the Supreme Chancellor, with six of his MagnaGuards in tow, and accessed it using codes provided by Darth Sidious. He then cut a bloody path of destruction through the Chancellor's personal bunker, killing four of Palpatine's Jedi protectors (including Roron Corobb and Foul Moudama) and numerous clones before kidnapping the Chancellor.
As he fled, Jedi Master Mace Windu Force crushed the plates covering Grievous's internal organ sac, injuring his lungs and aggravating the General's already irritating wheezing and coughing problems; a result of his organic form not taking well to his cyborg implants. Though it could probably have been fixed, this crippling blow injured Grievous for the rest of his life—which would not be long.
Anakin Skywalker and Obi-Wan Kenobi, fresh from victory on Tythe, got wind of what had happened and set off to rescue Palpatine. The Jedi boarded Invisible Hand after fighting their way through the massive battle and killed Darth Tyranus and escaped with the Supreme Chancellor, but the rescue mission was an elaborate trap. The two Jedi were soon entrapped in a energy shield, and then surrounded by droids who brought them before Grievous in Invisible Hand's bridge.
While Grievous gloated, the Jedi managed to uncuff themselves while R2-D2 provided a distraction, and defeated Grievous's IG-100 MagnaGuards. The general then shattered the front window of the cruiser, in order to escape the deterioting ship and kill the two Jedi. Obi-Wan, Anakin, and the Chancellor managed to stay in the ship, but Grievous was sucked into space. Since he was almost completely mechanical, the general could survive in space.
General Grievous squares off against Obi-Wan Kenobi on Utapau in what will be his final match.He used a grappling hook installed in his arm latch onto the hull of the ship and fled in one of the escape pods, which was later picked up by a Lucrehulk-class battleship. Realizing that his objective was failed, the General and his fleet retreated. The general then managed to board his Sheathipede-class shuttle and head for the recently secured planet Utapau in the Outer Rim Territories, where the Separatist Council was hiding.
With Count Dooku's death, Grievous was now the Separatist Head of State. Under the direct order of Dooku's master, Darth Sidious, he relocated the council to the planet Mustafar while he stayed on Utapau, waiting for the arrival of Obi-Wan Kenobi, having been warned by Sidious. Though Nute Gunray and the other council members doubted Grievous's ability to lead, they followed his orders, leaving just before Obi-Wan Kenobi's arrival.
Obi-Wan Kenobi examines Grievous's charred corpse.General Kenobi eventually caught up with Grievous on Utapau with a fleet of Venator-class Star Destroyers in orbit. Still slightly weak and jarred from his encounter with Windu, he immediately revealed his four arms—something he usually kept a secret—in an all-out assault. During the duel, Grievous began to grow frustrated with his inability to penetrate Kenobi's Form III defense, and his offense began to grow sloppy. Kenobi took advantage of this and altered the angle of his parries to cut Grievous's wrists instead of blocking his blades. Grievous lost two of his hands to Kenobi before Clone Commander Cody and his clone troopers ambushed the droid army on Utapau. Fighting broke out all over Pau City between droid and clone forces.
Grievous fled on his wheel bike, presumably not wishing to continue with the battle, pursued by Obi-Wan on a varactyl named Boga. After a prolonged chase and running duel, Kenobi caught up with Grievous on his private landing dock, hidden in a small, nearby sinkhole. As they fought hand-to-hand, Grievous showed that he was obviously the superior fighter, making excellent use of his mechanical body. After striking him a few times, Grievous tossed Kenobi off the platform, but the Jedi managed to catch hold of the edge. Grievous, deprived of most of his arsenal, snatched his electrostaff and headed for Obi-Wan. However, during the fight, Kenobi had pulled one of Grievous's chest plates off, revealing the synth-skin gutsack holding Grievous's remaining organs. Using the Force, Kenobi called Grievous's blaster to his outstretched hand. He fired five shots into the general's gutsack just as the Grievous was about to finish him off with an electrostaff. Grievous's flammable organic components burst into flames, charring him from the inside out.
His mechanical corpse lay on the Utapaun landing platform, never again to hold any organic material or life. General Grievous, amongst the greatest foes of the Jedi Order, was dead.
