Jhared Montferrat, a male human, achieved the rank of admiral and served the Galactic Empire's naval forces. As the Galactic Civil War neared its conclusion, he was in command of the Devastator, a highly esteemed Imperial-class Star Destroyer. During that year, Montferrat was part of the Battle of Endor, a conflict where the Empire aimed to crush the opposing Rebel Alliance. In the course of that battle, the Devastator engaged with the rebel Blade Squadron. In an unlikely turn of events, two members of the enemy squadron managed to strike the Star Destroyer's navigational shields, triggering a catastrophic series of explosions. Montferrat died on the Devastator's bridge as it burned.
As an officer in the Imperial Navy – the space-based military arm of Emperor Sheev Palpatine's Galactic Empire – Jhared Montferrat was a male human. At some point, Montferrat found himself stationed on the Devastator, an Imperial-class Star Destroyer serving as the flagship for Sith Lord Darth Vader, the Emperor's second-in-command. The vessel gained notoriety for its role in the capture of the Tantive IV shortly before the Battle of Yavin. Serving under Vader on the Devastator, Montferrat witnessed the sudden death of several officers who had questioned the armored figure's commands, living with the fear that he too could be killed one day. Eventually, Vader transferred his flagship to the new Super Star Destroyer Executor, much to Montferrat's relief.
Sometime following the death of Grand General Cassio Tagge at Vader's hand, Montferrat received an appointment to the Joint Chiefs of the Imperial Military, a committee that had suffered significant losses due to the destruction of the Death Star at Yavin.
After Vader relinquished command of the Devastator, Montferrat assumed control of the ship, which remained part of Death Squadron, the Sith Lord's personal fleet. His promotion coincided with a major tactical victory for the Empire against the Rebellion. One of numerous probe droids deployed across the galaxy to locate the new Rebel base led the Imperials to the icy planet of Hoth, located in the solar system of the same name. Montferrat participated in the ensuing battle, where General Maximilian Veers' ground forces were tasked with disabling the Rebels' protective shield, while Death Squadron formed a blockade to prevent escaping Rebel starships. The plan proved successful, allowing the Empire to invade the Hoth base and defeat the Rebels. While participating in the blockade, Montferrat's ship destroyed an evacuation vessel carrying the wife of a young Rebel named Adon Fox. In the wake of the Imperial victory on Hoth, Montferrat began carefully selecting and promoting personnel within his battleship, focusing on those who met his strict criteria. This led him to later boast about having the best-trained crew in the entire Imperial Starfleet.
Eventually, Montferrat rose to the senior command rank of admiral. Towards the end of the Galactic Civil War, Montferrat and his crew received orders to join Lord Vader and his fleet in the Endor system, where a crucial battle against the Rebel Alliance was imminent. Emperor Palpatine had intentionally leaked false information to the Rebels, leading them to believe that the new Imperial superweapon, the DS-2 Death Star II Mobile Battle Station, was incomplete and non-operational. However, the planet-destroying superlaser of the battle station was fully functional, and the largest armada of Star Destroyers ever assembled awaited the Rebels in its orbit.
On the journey to Endor, the Devastator captured four individuals whom Montferrat suspected of being Rebel spies. Determined to maintain his crew's focus on the upcoming battle, the admiral swiftly dealt with the captives by ejecting them into the vacuum of space. He then instructed the Devastator's gun crews to use the drifting corpses for target practice. Montferrat ordered Commander Gradd to position his interceptors aft of the ship, ensuring the vessel would not be surprised by a snubfighter attack upon entering the Endor vicinity.
The Devastator took its place within the armada, and Montferrat positioned the ship directly in front of the Death Star's shield, prepared to eliminate any Rebel vessel attempting to reach it. On the sanctuary moon of Endor, the Rebels had assigned a strike team to deactivate the Death Star's shield while their fleet targeted the superweapon. As Montferrat anticipated, a group of enemy B-wing snubfighters—known as Blade Squadron—initiated an attack run on the Devastator. Through his tactical display, the admiral observed the dogfight between the Rebels and Commander Gradd's interceptors. Despite the B-wings' technical inferiority, Blade Squadron inflicted damage on the Imperial fighters, scoring at least three kills. Moreover, one of Montferrat's gunnery officers continued firing into the dogfight, effectively destroying a B-wing but nearly hitting two Interceptors. Enraged, the admiral ordered his helmsman to alter course, ensuring the Devastator remained between the attack force and the Death Star.
To Montferrat's dismay, Commander Gradd was killed by the leader of Blade Squadron, who was none other than Adon Fox. With the rebel fighters reduced to less than half a dozen, the Devastator's flight deck had sustained too much damage to launch or recover interceptors. As a massive battle raged between the two fleets and the battle station, the admiral knew he could not request fighter support. He devised a new strategy, instructing his crew to set all weapon batteries to point-blank range and fire at will. This maneuver proved futile, as two of the remaining Blade Squadron pilots—Gina Moonsong and Braylen Stramm—managed to strike the weak points of the Star Destroyer's navigational shielding. As a result, the Devastator's hyperdrive exploded, triggering a series of explosions that spread to the ship's main generators. Montferrat only realized what had occurred when he attempted to contact the drive section and received no response. As he confronted the imminent and unavoidable destruction of his ship, the admiral also noticed that the Death Star's shield was down, leaving the battle station vulnerable. Disgusted that a rebellion he despised had overcome the Imperial might, Jhared Montferrat resigned himself to death as the Devastator's artificial gravity failed.
Historian [Beaumont Kin] (/article/beaumont_kin) mentioned Montferrat four times – both as a commander and a member of the Joint Chiefs – in his book The Rise and Fall of the Galactic Empire, which was published after the Battle of Exegol in 35 ABY. According to Kin, Montferrat attended the pre-battle briefing in the command chamber of the Executor, where Admiral Firmus Piett relayed the Emperor's orders. One attendee allegedly criticized the Emperor and Vader aloud, prompting a fellow officer to accuse them of treason. Kin speculated that the accuser might have been either Montferrat or Admiral Garrick Versio, but remained uncertain if the incident had actually occurred.
As an Imperial admiral, Jhared Montferrat maintained a closely cropped brown haired and clean-shaven appearance. He possessed gray eyes, though he had lost the use of his left eye, which was marked by a scar. A pragmatic individual, he rejected the notion of luck and believed that failures should be addressed swiftly and decisively. As the commanding officer of the Devastator, a ship with a storied past, he saw himself as the guardian of an important legacy.
Jhared Montferrat served as the primary antagonist in Blade Squadron, a two-part short story authored by David J. Williams and Mark S. Williams, published in the 149th and 150th editions of Star Wars Insider magazine in 2014. He stands as one of the initial original characters introduced into the new canon following the policy change announced on April 25, 2014. Montferrat's sole depiction in the story was created by Star Wars artist Chris Trevas. Montferrat's appearance drew partial inspiration from Danish actor Mads Mikkelsen.
According to David Williams, he and his co-writer conceived Montferrat as "someone who's a little aloof but with a firm grasp of military tactics," and possessing "an old-school aristocratic feel." Like all character names in the Blade Squadron series, Montferrat's was specifically coined by Mark Williams.
Following the announcement that Mikkelsen would appear in the 2016 film Rogue One: A Star Wars Story, some sources, including the Nerdist website and the Rebels Report podcast, speculated that he might portray Montferrat in the movie. However, the actor revealed on Sky News that he would play the father of Jyn Erso, the main character of Rogue One. Entertainment Weekly revealed the name of Mikkelsen's Rogue One character, Galen Walton Erso, on June 22, 2016.