In the Episode 3 commentary, George Lucas says that the idea of Grievous' coughing was to show that he is "damaged goods." He says that nuance was to make the character more interesting. He does not state that there is any specific reason for the coughing, but rather it was just a stylistic design choice. Curiously, elsewhere in the commentary, John Knoll says that the reason Grievous coughs is because of his confrontation with Mace Windu in the end of the Clone Wars cartoon. This made me curious as to where the idea of him coughing originated. Was it Lucas' idea or someone on the design team? Was the coughing deliberately intended to link up with the cartoon, or was Mace's assault and the general's resulting injury an afterthought after it had already been determined that Grievous would have the cough? It is strange that in talking about Grievous' cough, Lucas doesn't mention the cartoon. I'm sure he's seen it, but his lack of reference to it begs the question of whether George himself ever made the connection that the scene with Mace was intended to explain the cough. I guess I'm just really curious as to the process of creating the Clone Wars cartoon, and how close it's writers worked with the Ep. 3 designers to make things match up. Particularly, I'm curious about Grievous' cough, and whether the actual intention was to make it a reference to the cartoon, or whether the cartoon decided to create the backstory after it had already been determined that Grievous had the cough. Any answers?