After the duel on Mustafar, and with the Bloodwolf story and the Megalith feat, Legends Kenobi is defenitely on par with Dooku. And he kept up with Vader. In fact, during filming, George Lucas was working on the belief that Obi-Wan was stronger than Vader.
I don't know enough about Canon Dooku, or even Canon Kenobi to make a judgement.
I really don't think the whole "three-shotting Maul" thing should be taken as a measure of Kenobi's strength.
I remember Filoni said that it was a homage to old Samurai films where the swordfights were really short. And even in real life, most olympic fencing matches only last about 1 second.
Don't get me wrong, I do think Kenobi was stronger than Maul, but not in the same way as say when Sidious three-shotted Kit Fisto, because the authorial intent behind the two fights were very different.
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Filoni stated in an interview that one of the main reasons he made the fight between Maul and Kenobi so short was to show us that they weren't peers any longer. Kenobi was just THAT far above him.
The actual quote "If you talk to a lot of people who sword fight, they'll tell you people who are very good don't have long fights. So that scene, its a homage to the 7th samurai. I think on one level people would be excited to see a prolonged lightsaber fight. But I just never really saw the confrontation that way because to do that is to say the characters don't have growth."
I don't think the quote indicates Ben is THAT far above him. After all, he says characters (plural), so both of them saw growth. Clearly Ben saw more growth though
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Seems like Filoni's intent was specifically NOT to make it a prolonged battle because that would have suggested that they were still close in power and skill.
But the fact that Kenobi ended it in 3 moves shows you how large the gap between them actually was.
Taking all of Filonis comments what ive gathered is that Filoni made it a short battle, because he knew if he did an extended Vader vs Ahsoka type of fight, then given Maul and Kenobis history that would make out the fight could go either way, and he wanted to make it crystal clear Kenobi > Maul.
That said, he wasnt in any way suggesting it was a Sidious vs Fisto type Gap, hence the Samurai type battle, which will be short by its very nature. So even IF Maul won, it would have been short, BUT Maul would never have won.
Certainly ANH Kenobi >> Maul, but I think the ease in which Kenobi bested him had more to do with their respective mindsets, and less to do with raw power. In terms of personal growth and overall enlightenment with the Force, Kenobi had grown immensely over the years, and he was also protecting something greater than himself(ie. Luke, who he viewed as the true "Chosen One".) Maul, however, had remained spiritually stagnant, and was still the same hate-filled, vengeful person he was during TCW.
Conversely, Sidious easily wrecked Fisto and the other Jedi because he was simply that far above them. It really had nothing to do with mindsets, and everything to do with power/skill.
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Last edited by Galan007 on Jan 27th, 2020 at 03:31 PM
Yeah and Kenobi suckered him into doing that by taking Qui-Gons stance.
Its not like Sidious and Fisto were intently studying each other stance and leg work before making their respective check mate move.
I think Filoni just intended there to Be a Noticeable Gap. To show how far Kenobi had come. Because in TCW their fights were back and forth, so any gap would have been much smaller, hence Maul could still win at that time.
Edit: Also remember Maul was approx on Ahsokas level (hopefully that doesnt change after the final season of TCW), and Kenobi at most on par with Vader. And its not like Vader was blitzing Ahsoka. So there is that.
Last edited by Darth Thor on Jan 27th, 2020 at 05:20 PM