NeverarGreat

I don’t think that Kylo should tell Rey that Palpatine is lying to her, or giving her visions. I think that can be implied, however, if the visions first appear in some fragmented form when Kylo interacts with the Vader helmet and they share a vision, basically like the theatrical version of that scene.

In the Kylo quarters fight, it could be that Kylo is surprised at the new version of Rey’s past that he has seen, since he didn’t see that in her memories before, but I don’t think he should outright suggest that this is a device of Palpatine. Again, if Rey knows for sure that Palpatine is lying about her past, then she can easily discard it. So that interpretation should remain plausible but unconfirmed for the entire runtime, and the story should be about Rey choosing which story to believe.

For this to be communicated, we would need to alter the D-O scene and maybe give D-O some new lines if we want to be fancy, in order to prevent confirmation of Rey Palpatine. Luke’s line of ‘Because you’re a Palpatine’ doesn’t actually need to change, since it could merely be that he is giving voice to her greatest fear, not confirming it. His next line could be ‘Leia sensed your fear.’

The only other thing that is needed to pull this off is to give Finn a line where he pushes back against Palpatine’s story and tells Rey that she ultimately must choose her destiny, not the Emperor. For this, I think it would be interesting if we used this opportunity to give Finn some closure to his character arc as well. From a practical perspective, Finn would want to get to Rey in order to convey his doubt to her, which means that his mission at the end of the film would be similar to the one in TFA: he is involved in a Resistance attack but has the ulterior motive of wanting only to find Rey. However, he ultimately chooses not to find Rey and instead chooses to sacrifice himself for the Resistance, knowing that this time his sacrifice will not be in vain.

So how do we accomplish all of this? There are a few opportunities for dialogue adjustments that can make this clear:

“It’s Rey. She’s going to Exegol. She’s showing us the way to get there. But she’s alone.”
“Then we go together.”

…

“So how do the ships take off?”
“They use a signal from a navigation tower…like this one.”
“Except they won’t. Air team’s gonna blast the tower, ground team’s gonna find Rey and rescue her.”
“Ground team?”
“I have an idea for that.”
“Once the tower’s down, the fleet will be stuck in atmo. With no shields, and no way out.”

…

“There it is. Poe…I see it. Got a visual on the tower. But it must be jamming Rey’s signal. We need to eliminate that tower before we can find her.”
“Incoming TIES.”
“I see ‘em. I’ve got you, Finn.”
“You ready back there?”
“Never been readier.”

…

“This should do it!”
(Tower goes down)
“There it goes. Now we can find Rey!”
“Nice one, Finn! Nav signal’s down, but not for long.”

…

The final act would be restructured to allow for Pryde’s death and Finn’s rescue before Palpatine is restored to full power:

-Rey arrives on Exegol, meets Palpatine.
-Poe arrives on Exegol, the battle begins.
-Finn lands on the Command Ship.
-Palpatine makes an ultimatum, Rey prepares to strike him down.
-Finn destroys the first beacon.
-Ben arrives on Exegol, battle with the Knights of Ren/Praetorian Guards.
-Civilian Fleet arrives.
-Finn destroys the Command Ship, is rescued by the Falcon.
-Rey and Ben defeat their enemies, confront Palpatine, are drained of Force. Finn reacts from within the Falcon. Palpatine rises and attacks the fleet, Rey calls out to the Jedi.
-Finn responds through the Force, reminds her of her true family.
-Rey’s friends join Finn in helping Rey, who confronts Palpatine for the last time.
-The fleet gains a reprieve, attacks one last time.
-Palpatine is destroyed, Rey dies, Ben returns and restores her.

“Be with me…be with me…be with me.”

Finn: “Rey, your family isn’t in the past…it’s here, now, with us…and within you. Remember us, Rey.”
Poe: “We go together.”
BB-8: (Beeps Amiably)
D-O: “Thank you…very kind.”
Leia: “Never be afraid of who you are.”
Maz: “The light…it’s always been there…”
Chewbacca: (Supportive Chewbacca noises)
Maz: “…it will guide you.”
Ben: “Take my power, Rey. Use it.”
Luke: “Rey, the Force will be with you…”
Leia: “…always.”

Removing the voices of the Jedi that Rey didn’t know in life will emphasize that she has rejected her desire to find belonging in the past, and will choose instead to take Finn’s advice and rely on the strength of her friends for her future. Burying the old lightsabers in the homestead is final confirmation of her new resolve.

Eyepainter said:

NeverarGreat said:

Superweapon VII said:

JadedSkywalker said:

Starcrash. I’ve finally watched a sci fi film that is worse than the Star Wars Holiday Special. One of the worst films i have ever seen, worse than At the Earth’s Core even.

This movie has a cult following, and I just don’t get it. Caroline Munro’s hot. Big whoop. T&A alone can’t elevate a bad movie to so-bad-it’s-good.

Maybe it depends on the crowd, but I remember seeing it at a special screening with a few hundred B-movie fans and thought it was hilarious.

I did some binge-watching on a lot of B-movies and Roger Corman movies last year (Star Crash being one of them), and my experiences are hit-or-miss. It either entertains me or it doesn’t. I’ve watched plenty of b-movies that left me bored despite the rabid fanbase. While other times, I watch one that is universally despised by everyone else, but ends up being an unintentional comedy riot that makes my night.

I guess when it comes to b-movies, it truly is a subjective experience, even more so than with more “artistic” films. When you watch a movie that’s supposed to be good, there is a real effort to make it something more universally applicable to everyone. This is why people take it personally when someone says they hate, say, The Shawshank Redemption. That’s rarely the case with a cheesy b-movie where rookie mistakes are made on a consistent basis. Either those technical blunders are gonna get a laugh out of you, or you’re just gonna notice their existence and be reminded you’re not invested in what’s going on.

Tl;dr: the entertainment level of a b-movie is variable in my world, and if someone doesn’t like Star Crash, I understand why. Not everyone has to laugh at the same things.

True. Nothing wrong with someone disliking a bad movie…it’s almost definitionally the norm!

I’m continuing to tinker with splitting the chess scene. This was the first attempt, a few pages back. That version didn’t reuse any footage between scenes, just took the original and allocated shots between the two new scenes.

Here’s the new version: https://mega.nz/file/fMd1DbSb#TOE1DBzQHkpRwucpALML8Ol0LJ0kgVFG8Q2Ro7-Iwms

I reused both shots of Chewie, but cut the first one down so it would be less noticeable and the second one is used to extend Poe’s and Finn’s lines in the final scene. I think that both of these scenes could stand rather well on their own, at least with a bit more audio work. It would be nice to keep the lines in the first scene with ‘cheating’ changed to ‘stalling’, and maybe make some AI Poe and Finn banter for background as Rey leaves the Falcon.

I think for D-O, I could probably record new lines and distort them enough to fit in.

To hint at D-O’s role in the story, he could have one or two more lines before this in the film. When he’s scooting around on Kijimi, he could say something like ‘Kimiji scan complete.’ before Rey fixes his wheel. Then when he is on Endor hanging out with the horses, he could say ‘Life forms detected…updating Endor…no thank you!’

This gives the droid an ongoing purpose in the story, rather than just being used for a onetime plot dump, and sets up an offscreen interaction between the droid and Rey where she asks it about Jakku.

Concerning the D-O scene, I was almost certainly overthinking it. If the only important thing to establish is that Rey Palpatine is unconfirmed, there isn’t much that needs changing.

The scene could go from this:

“This droid has…thank you, I appreciate that. General?”
“General.”
"This droid has a ton of information about Exegol”
“Wait, coneface?”
“D-O”
“Sorry, D-O”
“He was going to Exegol with Ochi of Bestoon.”
“Why was Ochi going there?”
“To bring a little girl he was supposed to take from Jakku, to the Emperor.”

to this:

“This droid has…thank you, I appreciate that. General?”
“General.”
"This droid has scanned every planet he ever visited.”
“Wait, coneface?”
“D-O”
“Sorry, D-O”
“Rey believes he went to Jakku with Ochi of Bestoon.”
“Why was Ochi going there?”
“To bring a little girl he was supposed to take from Jakku, to the Emperor.”

All of the dialogue changes would happen to words spoken off-screen, or partially off-screen.

This version implies that D-O had a conversation with Rey, probably on their journey to Endor, and she learned that D-O had scans of every planet that he had gone to with Ochi. She probably found out that D-O had been to Jakku at some point, though he may have had scans of thousands of worlds depending on how old he is. Rey took this as confirmation that Palpatine’s story was true, though this scene is mum on whether D-O himself confirmed it.

Because D-O only has scans of the planets and not navigational charts, it actually solves the plot convenience of why he would have detailed readings of Exegol but wouldn’t know how to actually get there.

Finally, this allows Poe’s confusion to make sense, because he, like most people, would have no idea how Jakku might fit into all of this.

StarkillerAG said:

Maybe I’m missing something, but why is Palpatine lying about being Rey’s grandfather necessary in the first place? It’s not like a massive amount of runtime gets cut if you remove all lines where Palpatine mentions this: depending on how you rewrite the hangar reveal, you can even keep some lines that were originally meant to allude to it. Personally, I think it would be much more effective if whatever reveal Rey gets about her past is actually true, rather than just a blatant lie that Rey can overcome by simply finding out it was a lie in the first place.

It’s not necessary to have the ‘Rey clone’ concept be a lie, but I feel like it would be nice if it remained unconfirmed, especially since there are discrepancies between that story and the ones from prior films. In particular, I think the depiction of the ship Rey sees from her past being different between visions is a hint that her Palpatine lineage is an invention of the Emperor. It just feels like that’s something he would do as a way of controlling someone. It also isn’t really necessary that Rey learns that this story was a lie, just that she comes to realize that the family she may have had in the past isn’t important, it’s the metaphorical family that she has now that really matters.

Jar Jar Bricks’s idea of Rey being a clone is one of the most promising alternate reveals I’ve seen proposed so far (especially given you need to cut practically nothing), but I think one of your earlier ideas, where Rey was trained by Palpatine as a child, still has a lot of potential. It makes both Rey and her parents unambiguous “nobodies” (by blood, at least), while still giving Rey a strong connection to Palpatine. If anything, I actually think Rey having spent a significant portion of her early life with Palpatine is a much stronger reason for her to feel drawn to the throne than “evil genetics” or whatever.

Actually, I proposed both of those ideas. I agree that the first one, where Rey spent time with Palpatine, is compelling in a personal way, and it isn’t even incompatible with the Clone Rey concept. Perhaps this could be the default story, that Rey was a female clone of the Emperor who was being groomed by him as his heir before being kidnapped by Sith cultists and taken to Jakku and Luke’s disciples. This presents the strongest version of the ‘destined for evil’ trope that the saga has ever had, far more than Luke’s evil daddy.

However, this story obliterates the point of Rey nobody; many people thought that Rey coming from nothing was a refreshing concept because they could see Rey’s story in themselves; no virgin birth, no famous or powerful lineage. That was the one redeeming characteristic of the character to many people, my girlfriend included. So when TROS revealed that she was just one more nepo baby in this ever more tiny and incestuous universe, it killed any remaining interest for a lot of people. That, above all else, is why I think it’s important that we not kill the idea that Rey could genuinely come from nowhere, and that’s why I’m fighting so hard for a way to keep the Rey clone story as just a story, however cool it is. The point of the film, after all, is that Rey is able to choose the version of her past that she wants, or reject them all…and she does, choosing an ennobling fiction over the prospect of a humble past or an evil one.

I’m not too worried about changing the occasional word spoken on-screen, but it does help if the mouth movements are similar.

Speaking of that, I’ve been thinking a bit more about the small scene of Finn, Poe, and D-O. For an edit where Rey Palpatine is a lie, this dialogue needs to be cut or changed in some way. The first inclination I had was to change the dialogue to establish that Lando’s daughter was the target of Ochi, to somehow lure Luke to the Emperor, but this is sort of unconnected from the rest of the plot and doesn’t make much sense at this point in the story.

So then I thought that there is one other reason why Lando would be involved with Luke chasing Ochi across the galaxy, and that was if it had something to do with Luke’s saber. This would complete the whole ‘story for another time’ moment in TFA while also being relevant to Finn because he was there when that story was originally teased.

“This droid has a ton of information about Exegol”
“Wait, coneface?”
“D-O”
“Sorry, D-O”
“He was going to Bespin with Ochi of Bestoon.”
“Why was Ochi going there?”
“To bring a lightsaber he was supposed to take from Cloud City, to the Emperor.”

Changing ‘Exegol’ to ‘Bespin’ would be fairly simple because his line would only need to be shifted slightly forward to be masked by the previous shot, and ‘lightsaber’ is very similar to ‘little girl’ in terms of syllables and mouth movements. From ‘Cloud City’ onward, this change could be covered by cutting to Poe’s reaction shot.

This change also fixes something weird about the original scene, which was that Poe’s confused reaction of ‘Why was Ochi going there?’ doesn’t make sense because everything they know about Ochi points to him frequenting Exegol. That Ochi was going to Bespin allows Poe’s confused reaction to make sense.

Finally, making this scene about Anakin’s lightsaber ties into the following scene, where Rey attempts to destroy the saber in anger and fear. This connection between scenes could be made even stronger if we extended Luke’s dialogue with a reaction shot of Rey, and perhaps shifting her line up to make all of this work. There is a good candidate of her looking at the burning ship from earlier in the scene, and over this reaction we can have Luke continue his admonition:

(Luke catches the saber)
“Master Skywalker!”
“A Jedi’s weapon deserves more respect. The Emperor sought to destroy it…so what are you doing here?”

Now Luke’s statement doesn’t come out of nowhere, since it bridges the previous scene and explains why the Emperor was after Luke’s saber - he clearly feared it for some reason. Perhaps he foresaw that it would be used in his annihilation, or simply that it featured in his future somehow. But the irony of this is that Luke is tying Rey’s action with that of Palpatine in wanting to destroy the saber, further linking the two. Also interesting is that Palpatine seeking the saber led to intelligence about Exegol falling into the hands of his enemies, resulting in his ruin.

One final bonus of this change is that if we set up that the Emperor now fears Luke’s saber, it becomes less random that this is a weapon used in his destruction.

I think Kylo as a character is more blunt than Yoda, so it makes sense that he would opt for clarity over magniloquence.

Rey’s name in the flashback could be good.

As far as changing Finn’s line in the D-O scene, I think there’s a reaction from D-O that could be used to cover a line change if it was brief.

I’m feeling optimistic about this approach. The Clone Rey angle goes some way to explaining how Palpatine was resurrected, even if Rey’s connection to this is unconfirmed. I think a lot of people may be hung up on thinking that Palpatine is trying to engender some familial emotions with this story, but his bigger plan may simply be to set himself up as an obvious villain for Rey to hate, and in so doing allow him to transfer his spirit into her. It is only too convenient that he offers her a story about her parents that turns them from worthless nobodies into loving parents who only wanted to protect her, who died defending her from the evil undead Emperor. He knows he’s the villain, and all he wants is for her to be conflicted, to act out of confusion and fear rather than peace and purpose. Palpatine recognizes that Rey has always been in a hall of mirrors, trying to find her true family. The biggest change that we could make in this direction would be to show that Rey’s visions of her parents are newly uncovered, arising from her vision during her training. In fact, we could initially put the visions there, perhaps in truncated form, then let them play out in full during Kylo’s quarters scene.

I don’t know if we need specific proof that Palpatine is lying about this story, since one of its benefits is that it is plausible but unfalsifiable. I think someone like Finn should push back against this idea, saying that he doesn’t believe the Emperor’s story, and Rey shouldn’t either.

In explaining the Emperor’s fleet, I think the best place to put it would be when it is established.

“What could you…offer me?”

“Everything. My Empire was not defeated…it was preserved…frozen at my command. And now…awakened. The might of the Final Order will soon be ready. It will be yours…if you do what I ask.”

Then Poe could reiterate:

“He’s been planning his revenge. His followers have been building something for years. Upgrading a fleet of Star Destroyers that vanished after his death. He calls it the Final Order. Each ship has been modified with dreadnought cannons. The Emperor and his fleet have been hiding in the Unknown Regions on a world called Exegol.”

That’s a really evocative way to describe things. I like it!

And yeah, I think as long as we emphasize that this information comes entirely from Palpatine, it shouldn’t contradict the concept of having the Rey Palpatine story be a fabrication. In fact, the more evocative the story is, the better.

I kind of like the idea that in this current conception, Rey Palpatine and Rey Nobody are both plausible interpretations of events. Changing D-O’s information from being about a child from Jakku to being about Lando’s daughter doesn’t negate the possibility that Ochi had first tried to find Rey, merely that there was no information about Rey or Jakku within D-O’s memory. Similarly, changing Luke’s dialogue to suggest that he’s just going off of Leia’s feelings makes him as trustworthy as Obi-wan. Finally, if we gave Finn something to say to Rey in the final confrontation, his statement about family and belonging can be seen as metaphorical, and in fact maybe the point of the story is that it doesn’t matter where Rey comes from, because in the end she is the one who must choose what to believe and she must choose what ‘family’ really means to her. The final scene shows her rejecting the two stories put forth for her past and choosing a third, one that may not be factual but one that holds the most truth for her.

Wow, a lot happened here.

I don’t think I can address everyone’s points here, but in short: If we’re going for a Rey Palpatine version of the film, my go-to is the Rey as a clone concept. I think that is the best version of that story we’re going to get, so it’s well worth pursuing for a Rey Palpatine cut.

However, a Rey Palpatine cut is still kneecapped by the larger issue that this would mean that Rey isn’t nobody in this version, no matter how you slice it. And Rey coming from nothing is an absolutely essential part of what makes Rey interesting in this story.

The only other option I see to edit this movie and retain much of its existing dialogue is to reframe the Rey Palpatine revelation as a lie.

Rey’s Vision

So I’d say that we can keep the Hangar Revelation that Rey is a Palpatine, but with the caveat that this is information which comes directly from Palpatine, and isn’t presented as omniscient knowledge. It could even be that we use the Rey as a clone concept as part of the lie, in order to more clearly paint her parents as the innocent victims of Palpatine’s evil plan. The visions of Rey’s parents as good people who were killed by Ochi could then be reframed as parts of the vision that Rey had during her training, and which she is now recalling with Kylo’s goading. However, these are not memories from her childhood, but images given to her in a vision directly from Palpatine, including the image of her on the Sith throne.

“There was more to your vision, Rey. Remember it!”

This means that Palpatine now has a direct line to Rey, which is strange because she has never met him. However, Snoke was able to bridge Rey and Kylo’s minds without meeting Rey, so this means that Palpatine would be able to get to anyone if they were in contact with one who was under his influence, however briefly. This explains why Ben turned to the Dark Side: he was being trained by Luke, who had confronted Palpatine years earlier. It even gives greater threat to Luke in ROTJ, since he had already confronted Vader who was under Palpatine’s control.

As a bonus, Luke blaming himself for Ben’s turn to the Dark Side becomes completely understandable, as he may view himself as contaminated by his contact with Palpatine, necessitating quarantine on a desolate world. Rey fleeing to Luke after learning that she is contaminated with this mental link is a natural conclusion.

Kylo could explain to Rey that Palpatine is bringing Rey under his control through their mental connection, as Palpatine can already contact Kylo. Perhaps the original version of the Vader mask scene would be used here, since it shows both Rey and Kylo sharing the vision when Kylo touches the mask.

Luke’s Response

If Rey being a Palpatine is a lie, then Luke’s statement to her must change.

“What are you afraid of?”
“Myself.”
“Because you’re a Palpatine. Leia felt your darkness as well.”

This means that Luke doesn’t confirm or deny that Rey is a Palpatine, since he probably wouldn’t know either way. He merely tries to support her.

D-O’s Information

The scene between Finn and Poe could change to explain that D-O has information about Ochi’s mission that contradicts the story of Palpatine:

“This droid has a ton of information about Exegol”
“Wait, coneface?”
“D-O”
“Sorry, D-O”
“He was going to Exegol with Ochi of Bestoon.”
“Why was Ochi going there?”
“To bring a little girl he was supposed to take from Jakku, to the Emperor.”

It could be changed to:

“To bring a little girl he took from Lando Calrissian, to the Emperor.”

D-O’s reaction shot would mask the line change. This could imply that it was Lando’s daughter who was captured by Ochi, perhaps to be used as bait to lure Luke into a confrontation on Exegol. Rey would never have been on their radar.

In the reunion scene, Jannah appears to glance down at something that Lando could be holding in his hand. If there was an insert shot of Lando holding a photo of himself and his daughter, it would put a button on this subplot which was originally meant to be in the film, as well as make it clear what Lando’s intentions are in this scene.

Finn’s Response

Because Finn knows that Ochi is unconnected with the deaths of Rey’s parents due to D-O’s information, he is able to convey this to Rey. When Rey reaches out to the spirits of the Jedi, she is greeted not by the Jedi, but by the voice of Finn, who tells her what she needs to know: that she wasn’t a Palpatine after all.

“Rey, you know the truth. Palpatine isn’t your family…we are. We are all with you…forever.”

This is why Palpatine says that she is nothing after this point, that she is merely a scavenger girl who is no match for the power in him.

Final Confrontation Reorder

-Rey arrives on Exegol, meets Palpatine.
-Poe arrives on Exegol, the battle begins.
-Finn lands on the Command Ship.
-Palpatine makes an ultimatum, Rey prepares to strike him down.
-Finn destroys the first beacon.
-Ben arrives on Exegol, battle with the Knights of Ren/Praetorian Guards.
-Civilian Fleet arrives.
-Finn destroys the Command Ship, is rescued by the Falcon.
-Rey and Ben defeat their enemies, confront Palpatine, are drained of Force, Palpatine rises and attacks the fleet, Rey calls out to the Jedi.
-Finn responds from within the Falcon, tells her about her past.
-Rey’s friends join Finn in helping Rey, who confronts Palpatine for the last time.
-The fleet gains a reprieve, attacks one last time.
-Palpatine is destroyed, Rey dies, Ben returns and restores her.

Rey Palpatine?

Rey’s identity is by far the most tangled web of confusion in the story, so disentangling them starts with determining the overlap between what is possible and what is thematically resonant. The most resonant part of Rey’s identity is that she was a nobody abandoned by her parents. However, this is not sufficient because it merely says what Rey is not: she is not a Palpatine, not a Skywalker, not anyone of any importance. TLJ establishes that her insecurity and grief over her abandonment drives her actions, and her deepest desire is to find a family to call her own.

Therefore, if the story of TROS is to remain relatively intact, the most promising tactic would be to establish that Rey’s Palpatine heritage is a lie created by Palpatine in order to tempt her with the one thing she desires most: belonging. This is easily done. The only object tying Rey to the Sith is that Ochi’s ship appears similar to one that left Jakku with her parents many years ago. However, the solution to this puzzle is staring us in the face: They are simply different ships. This is demonstrably true by comparing TFA’s vision with Rey’s memory in TROS, where the designs of the ships are quite clearly different. Palpatine can latch onto this similarity and tell Kylo Ren the lie that Rey is a Palpatine, and he can convey this to Rey. There is also dialogue between Finn and Poe where they discuss the information in D-O that appears to confirm the Rey Palpatine connection, but that can be deleted.

Rey Nobody

Now that Rey Palpatine is established as a lie, a problem arises. There still needs to be some dark revelation about Rey for her to doubt herself, beyond the Rey Palpatine lie. This is because all Rey needs to do is reject the lie in order to resolve the problem, which isn’t thematically resonant. This was the problem in TLJ as well: if Rey is a nobody, it isn’t particularly devastating. Rather, the film establishes that she is a force of light to rival Kylo’s force of darkness, as described by Snoke, so by rejecting Kylo’s hand she is establishing herself as good in opposition to Kylo’s evil. This can be viewed as a victory, rather than an insurmountable obstacle.

Dark Revelation

Any revelation about Rey must be about Rey herself, rather than her lineage, and must cast her story into doubt. The strongest way to do this is to flip the script and paint her as an underdog in her own story, a force of evil rather than one of light. This is what TROS attempts to do with Rey Palpatine. Yet the issue, among others, is that it is established that Rey is Kylo’s rival in the Force, a counterbalance to an equation of light and dark.

The solution now appears obvious: Kylo Ren must be a force of good. Is there evidence for this? Yes, in fact. He is secretly drawn to the light, and all characters know how conflicted he appears. It takes only a little more exposition to establish that he has secretly been attempting to destroy the Sith for his entire life, ever since he learned of Palpatine during his training with Luke. In order to get close to Snoke, Han had to die. In order to find Palpatine, Snoke had to be destroyed. Ben followed the ways of the Jedi, divesting himself of attachments to all those whom he was afraid to lose and forging a new identity for himself as Kylo Ren, a false identity taken merely to complete what Vader could not and destroy the Sith once and for all.

Rey’s Darkness

Kylo can reveal to Rey the truth, that she was always driven by the Dark Side. Her insecurity and need for a family is founded on selfishness, which is the core of the Dark Side. She wears a mask just as Ben does, but instead of an evil visage she wears a mask of false benevolence. Deep down, she is driven by a desire for a family, and Palpatine’s lie secretly appeals to her because it allows her a belonging that she has never allowed herself to feel with Luke or Leia or her friends.

Rey’s blazing fast rise in power is only possible through the use of the Dark Side, giving her a quick and easy path to a place in the story and the family she has always wanted. She knows, however, that only Palpatine would really accept her, and so Kylo reveals to her in the hangar that though she may not be a Palpatine, she undoubtedly has the spirit of a Sith. This is why she is unable to contact the spirits of the Jedi.

It seems I can’t help but think about this mess of a movie, so instead of cluttering other threads I’ll just put the ideas here for now. 😃

The Final Order:

The Ascendant edit has Poe explain that Emperor has a stockpile of old Star Destroyers leftover from the war, and further says that they have been updated with dreadnought cannons.

I would alter this dialogue to convey that directly after the Emperor’s death, his most loyal captains from across the galaxy charted a course into the unknown regions and eventually regrouped over Exegol, and this is where they have remained all these years. This contingency plan was known to his loyalists as ‘The Final Order’, to be executed in the event of his death. This explains why the Rebels were victorious even when the Imperial Starfleet was undefeated in ROTJ; much of it disappeared into Hyperspace after the Death Star was destroyed. This further explains Finn’s statement that the Death Star was where the last war ended. Even if the battle of Jakku was the official end of hostilities, the war was decided when the Emperor died and much of his starfleet vanished.

The dreadnought cannons addition can be conveyed in the Kijimi destruction scene, which can be altered to indicate that only the primary city was destroyed in the attack.

Maybe, but I’d just delete it altogether.

EddieDean said:

His second major objection was the pacing. It’s a very relentless film, really quite overwhelmingly fast throughout. He really liked how we’d given moments more time to breathe, especially Chewie’s ‘death’, C-3PO’s ‘irreversible’ memory wipe, and Hux’s betrayal. He liked the Mustafar minute. He had nothing negative to say about the mention of ‘lightspeed skipping’ - it didn’t really register as a noteworthy thing to him, which I think is a good sign. (Note: You could maybe drop the dialogue here, or go with something even softer than ‘ramming’ - though didn’t you intend to cut the word ‘ramming’ in for v4? It’s still ‘skipping’ in this version.) But he did dislike how fast that early scene with the Rebels getting the transmission went - “like being on a Star Wars rollercoaster”. There were many other quick cuts and quick scenes too. I wonder if we could improve the pacing any further - my immediate feeling is that more re-establishing shots would go a long way.

This part got me thinking about that early transmission scene and how it could work better, and I thought, why not reincorporate some version of the chess introduction? There were some shots left on the cutting room floor when Ascendant put the scene at the end of the film, so what if we just make that scene into a little Chewie-Poe-Finn subplot?

Here’s a quick mockup of the idea: https://mega.nz/file/WYlgQYTR#KycySILs6E4dRdoSSiQyLNPd4JIIoCDtwBc_8-3U-5A

By muting Finn’s cheating accusation in the first scene, we can just establish that they are losing to Chewie and don’t know why. Either the mouth movements can be edited out or new dialogue could be generated, like ‘He was stalling.’ ‘Definitely’.

In the final scene we get the accusation, and by keeping most of the ‘just kidding’ shot, it keeps the tone jovial instead of antagonistic as we wrap up the film.

That’s probably partly my fault, switching back and forth between these versions so much. Sorry about that.

Here’s an unrelated idea that I’m throwing out before I forget it, concerning Poe and Korri’s subplot. When we see the Captain’s medallion, I imagine the assumption is that Korri stole it somehow and will use it to escape, and this makes it feel like a convenient get-out-of-jail free card for our heroes.

So what if instead of that she has dialogue indicating that the First Order used it to buy off her crew so they could continue harvesting Kijimi’s young unopposed?

“That’s a First Order captain’s medallion. I’ve never seen a real one.”

“That’s how they bought our silence, Poe. Free passage through the blockade, landing privileges, any ship. Want to come with me?”

Now the medallion takes on a darker meaning, and her giving it up isn’t just her giving up a ticket off-world, but rejecting the First Order’s hold over her.

Awesome write-up, Eddie! It’s really great to hear a fresh perspective, and in such detail as well.

I agree with you that something feels off about the pacing of the final confrontation. Were the scenes shifted from the theatrical version? It just felt noticeably weird.

But yeah, the pacing and dialogue really is one of the worst aspects of TROS, it’s something that is almost shocking when I go back and watch sections of Ascendant.

Related to this, I was thinking about the Leia scene after our heroes encounter the sinking fields on Pasanna. The scene offers nothing from a plot perspective and serves only to preserve a bit more of Leia’s leftover TFA footage. Furthermore, I abhor Snap’s rejoinder to Leia’s suggestion. I hate to suggest cutting the scene because that means less Leia, but the scene feels pointless and bad, even by TROS standards, and if the sandworm cave scene were allowed to play out in full it may help to repair a bit of the hyperactive pacing.

Burbin, I agree with most of what you’re saying, and it is definitely a more interesting take to have Rey be a nobody who comes from nowhere. Unfortunately, as Jar Jar said, it just can’t be done without changing a lot of the original film. And that’s fine, there’s a Rey Nobody version sitting alongside the Rey Palpatine version of Ascendant. But as much as I wish it were true, I don’t think that the two versions can be reconciled or that most people would be happy with a version that excises the core of TROS’s plot revelation and supporting structure.

But the nice thing about having two edits of the film is that we don’t have to reconcile these contradictory visions. Heck, I’ve offered suggestions for Rey Palpatine and Rey Nobody edits in this thread on the same day. It’s confusing, and frustrating, and because of this dumb movie everything is going to be a compromised salvage effort from the outset.

I do like your idea about Rey being a nobody who nevertheless is chosen to fulfill the saga’s prophecy. That’s a really strong concept, but not for a Rey Palpatine edit. So all I’m saying is that we need to be clear what vision of the story we’re working with, because from what I can tell is that we’re arguing about what are essentially two different films at this point.

Just a few changes then:

“Rey….wherever you are…You are hard to find.

“You are hard to get rid of.”

“I pushed you in the desert because I needed to see it…I needed you to see it…who you are. Darkness is in your blood. Rey…”

“You’re lying.”

“You were right…your parents were no one. Used as livestock by the Emperor’s cult.”

“Don’t!”

“The woman you called mother…she was merely a host…”

“I don’t want this!”

“…carrying a dark experiment.”

“No!”

“But she loved you nonetheless.”

(Rey sees the vision of her parents and her abandonment.)
“My Love…be brave.”
“You’ll be safe here…I promise.”
“Come back! Nooo!”

“They paid for your protection…in more than one way.”

“Stop talking.”

“Rey…I know what happened to them.”

(Cutaway to heroes capture)

“They sought sanctuary on Jakku, among the friends and disciples of Luke Skywalker. They almost made it. But your parents couldn’t escape their destiny.”

(Rey sees her parents get killed.)

“So that’s where you are.”

“You know why the Emperor wanted you dead. I’ll come tell you.”

…

“Why did the Emperor come for me? Why did he want to kill a child? Tell me.”

“Because his spirit chose another vessel, out of the hundreds his followers had created. Rey…you’re a clone.”

“You were created to sit upon the throne of the Sith, a vessel for the Emperor’s corrupted spirit. But what he couldn’t foresee was our connection in the Force. We can kill him, Rey, destroy the Sith…and bring a new order to the galaxy.”

(Removes his helmet)

“You know what you need to do. You know.”

“I know.”

…

One thing that I think should be different from Ascendant is to keep Palpatine’s line about spirit possession where it is in the theatrical version. In Ascendant Palps uses the spirit transfer threat to prevent Kylo from killing him, but that isn’t strictly needed and it may make more sense if only Rey is intended as a host to his spirit. And because we’re establishing the concept in the hangar scene, it doesn’t come out of nowhere when Palpatine refers to this later on, but it becomes a further wrinkle in how Rey must destroy him.

There is still the issue of how Rey can kill a spirit that won’t stay dead, but maybe she can do it as a Jedi with their help. That’s still a thing that doesn’t sit right with me.

“Rey….wherever you are…You are hard to find.

“You are hard to get rid of.”

“I pushed you in the desert because I needed to see it…I needed you to see it…who you are. Darkness is in your blood. Rey…”

“You’re lying.”

“You were right…your parents were no one. Used as livestock by the Emperor’s cult.”

“Don’t!”

“The woman you called mother…she was merely a host…”

“I don’t want this!”

“…for a dark creation…”

“No!”

“But a creation that they loved.”

(Rey sees the vision of her parents and her abandonment.)
“My Love…be brave.”
“You’ll be safe here…I promise.”
“Come back! Nooo!”

“They paid for your protection…in more than one way.”

“Stop talking.”

“Rey…I know what happened to them.”

(Cutaway to heroes capture)

“They sought sanctuary on Jakku, among the friends and disciples of Luke Skywalker. They almost made it. But your parents couldn’t escape the shadow of the Sith.”

(Rey sees her parents get killed.)

“So that’s where you are.”

“You know why the Emperor wanted you dead. I’ll come tell you.”

…

“Why did the Emperor come for me? Why did he want to kill a child? Tell me.”

“Because his spirit could possess only one body, out of the hundreds his followers had created. Rey…you’re a clone.”

“You were created to sit upon the throne of the Sith, a willing vessel for the Emperor’s spirit. But what he couldn’t foresee was our connection in the Force. We can kill him, Rey, destroy the Sith…and bring a new order to the galaxy.”

(Removes his helmet)

“You know what you need to do. You know.”

“I know.”

“Why did the Emperor come for me? Why did he want to kill a child? Tell me.”

“Because you, like Snoke, were created by the Sith in the image of their fallen Emperor. You…are his clone.”

“Our masters tried to destroy us, fearing what we could become. But the bond between us is something new, something they did not foresee. A Palpatine and a Skywalker together, balanced in darkness and in light.”

“You know what you need to do. You know.”

“I know.”

I guess we’ll need to try and mash these two sentiments into one Frankenstein’s statement. It will take judicious word choice and a lot of editing, but perhaps it can be done.

Indeed! There will always be two versions, Rey Palpatine and Rey Nobody, but now the Palpatine version can stand as a worthy alternative to the admittedly more interesting nobody version, and be perhaps more robust because it uses more of TROS’s plot scaffolding.

Jar Jar Bricks said:

A lot of that is an improvement over what I wrote, but you definitely need to replace “unwanted children” with “dark children”.

I’m also not sure what Kylo’s motivation is in your version. Yeah, he wants to kill Palpatine with her, but then what? That’s why I did a callback to TLJ in my version. He still clearly wants to let old things die, and wants Rey by his side regardless of the recent revelations.

Fair points.

Kylo’s motivation is a bit of a black box for sure. He’s being pulled in a bunch of directions, with his desire to be like Vader and serve the Emperor, his desire to let everything die and do his own thing with the galaxy, and his desire to be with Rey even though she is a Palpatine and will presumably be a continuation of Palpatine’s rule if she accepts Kylo’s offer.

Maybe since she is revealed to be a Palpatine, he considers that their union is something new, and like a political marriage in the Middle Ages, the union of a Skywalker and a Palpatine will bring true peace to the galaxy.

“Why did the Emperor come for me? Why did he want to kill a child? Tell me.”

“Because he saw what you would become. You don’t just have power. You have his power. You’re his clone.”

“For generations, this war has pitted Skywalker against Palpatine. But we are connected, Rey, and we can heal these wounds of war. Let’s destroy the past…let it die, and write a new future for the galaxy.”

“We can kill him, Rey…together.”

(Removes his helmet)

“You know what you need to do. You know.”

“I know.”

“Rey….wherever you are…You are hard to find.

“You are hard to get rid of.”

“I pushed you in the desert because I needed to see it…I needed you to see it…who you are. Darkness is in your blood. Rey…”

“You’re lying.”

“You were right…your parents were no one. Two out of thousands used by the Sith cult.”

“Don’t!”

“The woman you call your mother…she was merely a host…”

“I don’t want this!”

“…for a dark experiment…”

“No!”

“But they grew to love you anyway.”

(Rey sees the vision of her parents and her abandonment.)
“My Love…be brave.”
“You’ll be safe here…I promise.”
“Come back! Nooo!”

“They paid for your protection…in more than one way.”

“Stop talking.”

“Rey…I know what happened to them.”

(Cutaway to heroes capture)

“Your parents had traveled to Jakku, chasing rumors of a hidden village…allies of Luke Skywalker who could keep you safe. But they couldn’t escape the long shadow of the Sith.”

(Rey sees her parents get killed.)

“So that’s where you are.”

“You know why the Emperor wanted you dead. I’ll come tell you.”

…

“Why did the Emperor come for me? Why did he want to kill a child? Tell me.”

“Because he saw what you would become. You don’t just have power. You have his power. You’re his clone.”

“Snoke was a twisted experiment in Palpatine’s quest to conquer death…and so were you. When he was reborn he destroyed his dark children one by one. Now only you remain.”

“We can kill him, Rey…together.”

(Removes his helmet)

“You know what you need to do. You know.”

“I know.”