Seen the film for the second time. Really digging it and feel there’s a lot of fanedit potential. Like or hate TFA, the problems cited against it are so inherent to the film that they can’t really be removed with a fanedit.
Rogue One, on the other hand, just has some bad scenes that can be removed, so it’s ripe for us. 😃
My suggestions-
- Don’t start in space, no need since crawl was axed. Possibly also remove “A long time ago…”
- Cut opening for cringy child acting and blue milk throwaway shot.
- Put scene of Jyn waking up in the present day to before the logo, clearly indicating the transition in time. This possibly reframes the opening scene as a dream, as it appeared to be in the trailer.
- Replace oddly cheap-looking logo with nicer trailer logo.
- After logo, first scene should now focus on Cassian killing informant.
- Move first scene of Bodhi on Jedha to after Jyn and Cassian leave Yavin, in order to avoid excessive planet hopping. Follow it up directly with scene of Saw interrogating him. This means the audience never has to “leave Jedha” immediately after getting there the first time.
- Reinstate “I Rebel”? Or at very least make ending of briefing scene less awkward. An alternative would be to have the final exchange be “Is that clear?”; “Yes, sir,” also from teaser.
- Cut Cantina Fellows on Jedha.
- Cut Psychic Alien monster; no real pay-off in the long-run
- Trim Tarkin stuff throughout; camera lingers too long and performance is somewhat weak.
- Cut first Vader scene at Bast Castle in its entirety because of poor performance vocally and physically. Better to save Vader for final scene at end.
- Take out some of “odds” jokes, which grow excessive.
- Cut 3PO and R2D2.
- Radical, weird alternate ending idea I had! 😄 (not actually sure how well this would work):
But… instead of ending on a CGI Leia, have the Star Destroyer chase the Tantive, as per the opening shot of SW77, then cut to the deleted scene of Luke watching from the surface of Tatooine. Iris out on a close-up of Luke’s face, as he puts down the binoculars. This would require restoring the deleted scene to an acceptable level of quality, though it could be nice to bring back the “Luke’s theme” musical cue from SW77.
In any case, I feel ending on Luke would do a more clear job of concluding the film’s theme of hope- personifying it, as he is literally “A New Hope” instead of having another character simply say the word. Also, looking at bigger picture placement within the saga, it’s a nice changing of the guard from Vader, shown in close-up, to Luke, who would end the film in close-up. There’d also be an added bit of symmetry with Force Awakens, both ending on Luke.
Of course, we may have a bunch of deleted scenes to work with, as well! Though, my suspicion is that the reshot 3rd act is radically superior to the original.
Freak’n love this, especially the end, and i think it is totally possible to pull off. there was a user on here that was working on restoring all of the deleted scenes starting with the Luke scene.