WARNING: The following contains spoilers for Star Wars: The Clone Wars Season 7, streaming now on Disney+.
Star Wars: The Clone Wars enjoys putting a spotlight on characters who never really had a chance to shine in the live-action Star Wars films. Such is the case with Mace Windu, a character that was featured prominently in the prequels but never got a chance to stand out. Well, the latest episode of The Clone Wars, "Unfinished Business," fixes that, giving the Jedi Master his shiniest moment yet in the form of a monologue.
The scene comes as a result of an ongoing conflict against the Separatist Army in which the droids seemingly act with precognitive knowledge of the Galactic Republic's tactics. Ultimately it came down to Captain Rex discovering that the Separatists were harvesting knowledge directly from a thought-dead Clone Trooper to use his tactical knowledge against them. The culmination of the arc in the latest episode leads to Mace Windu and Obi-Wan back-to-back as they face down an endless horde of droids.
Leaping down from a starship in the planet's atmosphere, Windu landed with signature Jedi grace in a facility filled with droids. Rather than launching right into battle, Windu gave a true chilling ultimatum to the droids. He warned them that by this point in the Clone Wars he personally dismantled over 100,000 of their kind, and urged them to lay down their weapons and surrender to reprogramming. Obviously, the droids refuse the offer and begin blasting the Republic forces.
It proves a particularly puzzling moment because the Separatist Army is rarely afforded with the assumption of an ability to make decisions or defy their programming by either side. Neither their combatants nor masters seem to care much about giving the droids a chance, and by doing so, Windu makes an unprecedented move toward recognizing the possible personhood of the soldiers he's facing down. To him, they aren't just empty pieces of tech waiting to get scrapped, but enemy combatants he'd prefer to find a peaceful solution with.
That's not to say he backs down from the fight once it starts. Horde after horde of droids fire and Windu and Obi-Wan, and the two Jedi and their Clone allies mow them down with more mechanical precision than the automatons they're fighting. From this point on, the scene is pretty standard for The Clone Wars, as the Jedi never truly feel like they are under a real threat from the endless waves of droids, but the opening monologue may be one of the best lead-ins to a fight the show has ever done.
The monologue serves as a perfect bit of character development for Windu, something that the films never really had a chance to show off. In the Legends continuity, Windu was known for his struggles against the Dark Side of the Force and the temptation it offered him, being renowned for his ability to fight against that temptation without ever truly giving into it. What this new scene adds to the canon iteration of the character is that he is truly at heart a peaceful warrior, but a warrior nonetheless.
It stands in stark contrast to another Legends scene with Windu and the Droid Army, as the previous 2-D animated Clone Wars animated miniseries featured an episode where Windu personally faced down an entire army he dismantled in droves. Whether he shattered the droids apart with his fists, sent back tidal waves of them with the Force, or sliced through countless numbers, the short perfectly captured the violence the Jedi Master is capable of. As cool as it was, though, it still couldn't portray the character in the way the monologue did. Different character beats are great for different reasons, and Windu's latest is one of his greatest.
Streaming on Disney+, the final season of Star Wars: The Clone Wars stars Matt Lanter as Anakin Skywalker, Ashley Eckstein as Ahsoka Tano, Dee Bradley Baker as Captain Rex and the clone troopers, James Arnold Taylor as Obi-Wan Kenobi, Katee Sackhoff as Bo-Katan and Sam Witwer as Maul. A new episode arrives each Friday.