Warning! This post contains SPOILERS for Star Wars: Mace Windu #4

Summary

• Mace Windu faces off against The Shroud in a high-stakes showdown to secure a valuable hyperspace fuel formula.
• Windu defeats The Shroud with a brutal lightsaber move, rivaling his decapitation of Jango Fett.
• The Shroud survives despite Mace's full intentions to end him, hinting at a possible rematch with Mace Windu in the future.

Mace Windu is still a Jedi Knight when he's tasked with securing a valuable new formula for hyperspace fuel known as coaxium ultra. What follows is a major high-stakes race to ensure the formula doesn't fall into the wrong hands, resulting in an intense face-off with the new Star Wars villain known as The Shroud.

As seen in the culminating Star Wars: Mace Windu #4 by Marc Bernardin and Georges Jeanty, Mace Windu has been doing all he can to protect both the formula and its guardian, a pirate named Azita Cruuz. Having just faced off against an entire squadron of enforcers sent by Jabba the Hutt, Mace Windu then clashes with assassins belonging to the Had'le Path, a cult dedicated to ridding the galaxy of all technology led by a Devaronian named The Shroud, a powerful Force-sensitive who refuses the ways of both the Jedi and the Sith.

Realizing just how significant a threat The Shroud posed to the galaxy, Mace Windu unleashes a brutal attack with his iconic purple lightsaber in the Star Wars canon, fully intending to crush the Devaronian under an entire space freighter. As such, it's a move that certainly rivals when the Jedi Master decapitates the legendary bounty hunter Jango Fett in Attack of the Clones.

Mace Windu Knew How Dangerous The Shroud Was

A Fallen Jedi Seeking Galactic Destruction

Believing that the power of the Force was his to claim, The Shroud believed that the Force itself granted him a vision, one that motivated him to plunge the galaxy back into natural darkness by destroying all technology. This includes this new coaxium ultra formula. He also claims in this final issue of Mace Windu that his power supersedes both the Jedi and the Sith, an it's even teased that he was almost a Jedi himself.

Determining that the Devaronian was mad regardless of how valid claims about having a Force vision were, Mace Windu made the choice that The Shroud was too dangerous and needed to be taken out. This somewhat mirrors Windu's determination in Revenge of the Sith with his belief that Darth Sidious was too dangerous to be left alive. Likewise, his execution of Jango Fett happened in the middle of the Geonosian arena after the bounty hunter had unsuccessfully tried to kill him on Count Dooku's orders.

Mace Windu's Defeat Of The Shroud Was Brutal

Will The Shroud Ever Return?

While Mace Windu fully intended to crush The Shroud under Azita's freighter, the powerful Devaronian did manage to survive, lifting the ship above his head and threatening that the Jedi Knight would never be rid of him. However, Azita herself then blows up her own ship and its samples of the coaxium using Windu's Jedi starfighter, resulting in a major explosion that leads to The Shroud's true defeat by the issue's end.

That being said, the end of the series does tease The Shroud's survival. This suggests that Windu may encounter the rogue Force at some later date in the Star Wars timeline. If that does indeed happen, one can imagine that Mace Windu will likely employ even more brutal tactics than he already has against The Shroud in a possible rematch.

Star Wars: Mace Windu #4 is available now from Marvel Comics.