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Hey everyone. I’ve just recently completed my version 1.0 of Superman II, combining arguably the best of the Richard Donner cut and Lester versions. Best of all, this is in full 1080p video from the new Superman Anthology set and in full DTS-HD Master 5.1 Audio.
There were some technical hurdles I had to overcome before completing this edit. Richard Donner’s cut is in VC1 and Lester’s cut is AVC so that right there was a major stumbling block. Luckily I found an excellent re-encode program called Ripbot that allowed me to re-encode all the video to join together seamlessly. Being somewhat of a perfectionist, I encoded all segments at pretty much maximum Blu-Ray bitrate (38 Mbps average video). Now many of you are going to raise your eyebrows at this one, but I used eac3to and tsmuxer exclusively to put together this edit. Unfortunately, I don’t know Vegas and the few times I’ve tried to learn it have taken me way too long to make any real progress. I can’t begin to describe how tedious it is to edit down to the millisecond level without a frame-by-frame point of reference like Vegas offers. If I used the other programs I’d likely still be working on it.
Now, my goal of posting about it is to see if anyone would be interested in teaming up with me to whip my final edit into shape with full Blu-Ray menus, chapter stops, etc. which my current version is just a movie only disk. I’d also welcome suggestions for perhaps other ways of arranging scenes if anyone thinks something works better.
Now with the technical details of how I put this all together out of the way, this is the breakdown of my edit in order of scenes as they appear…
- Before the opening WB logos, the film now begins with the tribute to Christopher Reeve.
- After the WB logos, the DC logo from Donner’s cut appears
- From here it’s Lester’s opening, until the villains get snared in the rings…
- Immediately cutting to Brando’s opening in Superman I, starting with “These indictments that I have brought you today” following until he says “This mindless abberation,” then immediately cutting to the Richard Donner cut for the rest of this scene.
- Donner cut continues until the flashback from near the end of Superman II, after the missiles launch I cut all the Lex Luther/kryptonite footage and went directly to Superman chasing the missile. From here it’s all Donner cut all the way through the beginning of the Niagara falls sequence.
- First honeymoon suite scene using all of Lester’s footage here, vibrating bed and all.
- Luthor’s finding the fortress (Donner cut). A minor trim in this scene to delete the “Fortress of Solitude toilet.” Never cared for it.
- From here, the niagara falls rescue scene (All Lester footage, including the stuff Donner cut out of his version).
- The villains arrive on Earth (Lester cut footage, but using Donner’s approach to ending the scene with the fisherman tossing his coffee).
- Donner cut reveal (Yes, I know the footage doesn’t quite match in a few shots, but I think it works great as a continuation of Lois trying to get Superman to reveal himself. The bear scene, although good, just doesn’t follow that spirit, to me).
- Second half of villains arrival scene, starting with the rattlesnake (Lester cut) Non tries to use his heat vision restored.
- Donner cut arrival of Lois and Superman at the fortress followed by the villains harassing the cops
13)Re-inserted the end of the cop scene from the Lester cut, where Non rips off the siren. Scene now ends with Zod rolling his eyes, not continuing to the goofy shot of Non cradling it. - Superman’s romancing Lois (all Lester cut–getting the flowers and returning with dinner)
- Lester’s Villains Arrival in East Houston (this scene has been cut down a bit, mainly to eliminate all dialogue from THE ANNOYING BOY who sounds like a British girl.) The sherrif arrives and starts to inspect the damaged tire, cutting to the bar confrontation. When Zod lifts the man with the shotgun, there’s no dialogue with the boy pleading. Zod lifts him up, gets bored and drops him faster.
- Superman’s dinner with Lois (all Lester).
- East Houston battle (Lester cut until the military orders Zod to lay down his arms, followed by Donner’s cut. Re-inserted Lester’s line about the nuclear strike being called off and back to Donner’s cut for remainder of scene.
- Superman’s depowering (Donner cut)
- Aftermath of battle (Donner cut). When Zod says “…or else all his cities will end up like this one” it immediately cuts to…
- Villains defacing Mount Rushmore, followed by Clark and Lois in bed, cutting to…
- Fall of Washington Monument
- White House attack… from here it’s all Donner cut until…
- “Care to step outside!”
- Back to Donner cut until Zod asks Luthor what he wants for revealing the fortress location. Luthor says Cuba, immediately cutting to…
- Ursa approaching Lois and grabbing her (Lester cut)
- Donner’s final fortress approach and final battle
- Trim to eliminate Superman destroying the fortress.
- Memory Kiss
- Diner rematch and end credits.
All in all, the edit is about 95 percent of what I wanted to achieve. With the exception of just two minor cuts, the audio appears seamlessly edited. I want to take it further though, so that’s where one of you may come in. I’d ideally like to release this as a beta version and get input, someone to make menus, etc. so this can be one fan’s definitive edition of the film. Wow, I wrote a book here. Anyone interested in seeing this version?
