Clearly due to the sample audio from the 2003 Clone Wars microseries that I included in the final edit, the original upload of Anakin Skywalker versus General Grievous has been blocked. Fortunately, I still have the project file saved in my editing software, which made re-editing exceptionally easy. Furthermore, I decided to take this opportunity to re-record the voiceover, as the original audio was taken while I was dealing with some microphone troubles. However, I will be following the original script, as my opinion on this match-up has not changed.
As I stated in the original, my overall analysis will be based purely upon pre-2008 Legends continuity material, specifically omitting the 2008 Clone Wars animated series. In essense, the numerous and arbitrary retcons of TCW took what was previously one of the most tightly plotted and internally consistent timeframes within the Expanded Universe, where every event and storyline was given an exact date down to the week, and reduced it to a muddled sliding scale continuity defined by simplistic and contrived plotlines centered around a childish moral.
Where the original Clone Wars microseries kept its portrayal of Anakin Skywalker consistent with the films while also going a long way towards salvaging that version of the character, TCW reduced Anakin to a bland heroic charicature, with only the most token lipservice paid to his emerging Dark Side tendancies, and he was otherwise almost completely sidelined in favor of Ahsoka Tano. As for General Grievous, his portrayal remains consistent with the films in the worst possible way, continuing his downward spiral into ineffectual slapstick villainy. Even the episodes where he is meant to be taken seriously reduce him to fleeing for his life or play his dismemberments for laughs.
But more than anything else, my intention with this match-up is to cater to my generation of Star Wars fans, the children of the nineties who grew up with the Prequel Trilogy. This is Anakin Skywalker and General Grievous as they were for someone stepping into the cinema in 2005 after just having finished watching the Clone Wars microseries.
My analysis of Anakin Skywalker and General Grievous will be drawn from their appearances in the Star Wars prequel trilogy, including the novelizations, comics, and visual dictionaries, the Clone Wars microseries and its tie-in digest comics, the 2002 Clone Wars video game, the Star Wars: Republic comic series, the General Grievous comic miniseries, the Visionaries anthology, and the New Essential Guides to Chronology, Alien Species, Droids, Weapons and Technology, and The Force, among many others.
Anakin Skywalker and General Grievous, accomplished warriors and murderous butchers, with hands drenched in blood.
If these two titans of the Clone Wars ever met on the battlefield, who would win?
References & Citations:
The New Essential Guide to Characters - Anakin Skywalker/Darth Vader, Pg 155 - [09:04]
The New Essential Guide to Droids - General Grievous, Pg 196 - [16:57]
The Dark Side Sourcebook - Chapter Five: Dark Side Traditions - Darth Vader, Dark Lord of the Sith, Pg 91 - [19:41]
Lightsabers: A Guide to Weapons of the Force - Anakin Skywalker and Luke Skywalker, Pg 48 - [29:04]
Fightsaber: Jedi Lightsaber Combat (article) - [30:21], [30:31], [33:19]
The Complete Visual Dictionary - [11:19], [14:04], [29:24], [29:49], [35:52]
Attack of the Clones (novelization) - Chapter 8 - [21:28]
Jedi Trial - Chapter 9 - [11:46], [33:50]
Labyrinth of Evil - [13:35], [13:39], [27:17], [34:20], [39:03], [39:19], [39:40], [40:13], [41:16], [43:14], [43:36], [47:01]
Revenge of the Sith (novelization) - [09:52], [10:14], [16:12], [20:14], [20:52], [21:14], [21:46], [30:53], [31:41], [36:04], [36:15], [37:55], [38:15], [38:40], [40:47]
Dark Lord: The Rise of Darth Vader - Part IV: Kashyyyk - Chapter 43 - [17:23]
Star Wars Tech (documentary) - Rob Coleman, animation director, "Episodes I, II, III" - [13:06]
Clone Wars Chapter 22 - [42:01]
Catalogue of Darth Vader's amputations - [11:55]