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The Last Jedi: Legendary (Released) — Page 3

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We have indeed, and thanks!
I think removing Phasma altogether would be preferable to merely removing the fight because, as you say, it just has her appear in 2 out of 3 films pointlessly. Either she goes away completely, or the fight with Finn has to stay.

I can’t recall but I’m pretty sure there are several shots with her that would need work, so I’m not holding out hope we’ll be able to do this effectively. But, conceptually, it’d be my first choice.

And welcome aboard, TiMartyn! Thanks for the kind words and input. I agree with most of these. I can’t promise I’ll be able to begin editing right away, but there’s plenty of collective work and brainstorming to do around here which will help all of us.

My stance on revising fan edits.

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Hal 9000 said:

As I think on it, I anticipate removing Phasma from TLJ altogether. The film is overstuffed, and Phasma already had a plausible “out” in TFA. She was not necessary to the story of TLJ at all, and cutting her material allows for a much easier removal of some problematic Finn, Rose, and BB8 stuff.
It will depend on whether it can be pulled off. I’m pretty sure it would require some visual FX work to remove her from several shots, since she is present for an extended scene as DJ sells out the Resistance and Finn and Rose are prepared for execution.

If it’s doable, this is what I’d prefer, but I am far from certain it would be.

It’s totally doable. If you have a 4k source and release in HD, you can easily cut and crop every shot she’s in except for one. Hux names her once, all you do is cut before that.

I remember the line being, “Well done, Phasma”, it then cuts to Phasma and pans to DJ. It should be doable to cut her frames of that pan, and instead have Hux’s line refer to DJ.

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I feel like once you have a pretty solid list of things you’ll need to edit/add vfx to for TLJ, it might be worth considering if it is worth the work, or if there other changes that might be better served that you could put the same time/resources into. It just seems like a lot of work, and there might be other changes in the film that might be more worth the trouble.

I dunno. If I were to vote on a side, I would say keep the fight. I know there are a lot of weird things about the scene, like why were Phasma and the other troopers across the room, how did they survive and most of the stormtroopers did, when did BB8 learn how to drive an ATST, etc etc, but I feel we were teased with this cool Phasma character and we should at least the one cool fight we got with her, and it isn’t that long honestly.

I would find it preferable to keep her in TLJ, and then roto her out of like two shots in TFA to make her not be the one to turn off the shields, so her arc is less of a mess. Phasma represented something to Finn in TFA, and defeating her as a rebel in TLJ serves his character I think.

My two cents, but it really isn’t a big issue compared to some other moments in the film. Like other vfx I think would be worth considering would be to have the Resistance jumping from system to system rather than go in a straight line, or having the First Order Canon firing as soon as Rose & Finn get out of the way. Just some thoughts though!

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I think that’s part of why Phasma in TLJ contributes to the movie being overstuffed. In real life, Johnson inherited this character and there was a need to include her in some way. She was in the trailer and all that. It so happens that, going by the movies and nothing else, Phasma is back from the dead only to die again real quick.
In a fan edit, trailers and real life studio concerns be damned. Phasma could easily be a TFA-only character, whose sense of meaning with Finn was already resolved by Finn being “in charge” and executing her along with most of the personelle on SKB.

Good point about the 4K version being a source for cropped shots. Hopefully… someone could rip it for those particular shots later on.

I’d love to remove Phasma outright, which I think would help this movie in a vacuum removed from the real world concerns around it, and other editors may want to as well. It’ll depend on whether someone can make it work, or if cropping is enough.

My stance on revising fan edits.

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A nice plan. I like that you’re not making the film completely devoid of humor (too many people apparantly hate fun), while removing the jokes that don’t make sense, like Kylo’s cowl or the BB-ST (how did he get in the cockpit?) How about adding a joke - a porg getting impaled by Luke’s lightsaber when the other one plays with it? 😃

As for Snoke’s death scene, how about keeping his dialogue intact but removing the shot of Luke’s lightsaber being turned?

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I wonder if the Leia scene could be sped up considerably, and made to look like it happened near instantly. Could be even while Kylo looks on, or right after he flies away.

Even more radically, though I’m not sure there’s enough footage. You could slow it down, flashing back and forth between Kylo staring at the explosion, and Leia’s face with her eyes closed. End the back and forth with her eyes opening. Then imediately, jump to 1.5x speed of her superman flight, none of her hand twitching or “unfreezing”. Kylo flying away could be right before she opens her eyes, right before she flies back, or right after (my rationalization is that at this point save her or kill her, he’s going to be broken by it.)

Preferred Saga:
1/2: Hal9000
3: L8wrtr
4/5: Adywan
6-9: Hal9000

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On Phasma’s return, let’s put it this way: The issue is definitely that she does little in TFA, and appears to die, then returns in TLJ to do very little again then appears to die again.

Removing her from TLJ is one way to minimise some of the relative weakness of that plot. Her arc, or rather Finn’s arc, becomes that she’s Finn’s overseer in TFA and ultimately he disposes of her. We don’t see her again.

However, without needing to wait two years between movies (which we can do now that TLJ is out), I think the better arc is as follows:

  • She’s Finn’s overseer in TFA
  • Finn leaves the First Order
  • She doesn’t appear again in TFA - it’s not implied that she died on SKB
  • Finn’s a traitor to the FO but struggles to commit to the Resistance in TLJ
  • She appears in TLJ the way she currently does, reinforcing that Finn is a traitor to the FO in a scene where, through DJ, we learn one of the key issues of not picking a side.
  • Finn kills her for good, shortly before we see him properly commit to the Resistance.

That way, one of the key weaknesses of her character (“die” > return > die) is removed, but she gives Finn the stronger arc and his (one on-screen) killing of her is a part of his journey towards being able to commit to the Resistance. The change this’d require is her removal from the SKB scenes of TFA.

The Clone Wars: Refocused | Andor: Movie Omnibus

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EddieDean said:

On Phasma’s return, let’s put it this way: The issue is definitely that she does little in TFA, and appears to die, then returns in TLJ to do very little again then appears to die again.

Removing her from TLJ is one way to minimise some of the relative weakness of that plot. Her arc, or rather Finn’s arc, becomes that she’s Finn’s overseer in TFA and ultimately he disposes of her. We don’t see her again.

However, without needing to wait two years between movies (which we can do now that TLJ is out), I think the better arc is as follows:

  • She’s Finn’s overseer in TFA
  • Finn leaves the First Order
  • She doesn’t appear again in TFA - it’s not implied that she died on SKB
  • Finn’s a traitor to the FO but struggles to commit to the Resistance in TLJ
  • She appears in TLJ the way she currently does, reinforcing that Finn is a traitor to the FO in a scene where, through DJ, we learn one of the key issues of not picking a side.
  • Finn kills her for good, shortly before we see him properly commit to the Resistance.

That way, one of the key weaknesses of her character (“die” > return > die) is removed, but she gives Finn the stronger arc and his (one on-screen) killing of her is a part of his journey towards being able to commit to the Resistance. The change this’d require is her removal from the SKB scenes of TFA.

Well then we would need a way to edit out her SKB scene while still letting the audience know that the shields were deactivated.

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EddieDean said:

That way, one of the key weaknesses of her character (“die” > return > die) is removed, but she gives Finn the stronger arc and his (one on-screen) killing of her is a part of his journey towards being able to commit to the Resistance. The change this’d require is her removal from the SKB scenes of TFA.

This^
Thanks for describing what I was thinking, Eddie. While I think Hal should do what he wants, this was a part of my thought process for this suggestion as well.

I understand though that the original option may be necessary in order to remove BB-8’s ATST moment. It’s been awhile since I’ve seen the movie, but would it be possible to cut away after Phasma falls to her death, and then we don’t come back to Finn & Rose until we see them crash land on Crait? Do we really need to see them find a ship and leave the Supremecy?

Also, Hal mentioned something about rotoscoping her out of necessary TLJ shots, but if you just remove her from the last act of TFA, you’d only need to cut most of her shots out, maybe take her out of 2~ shots, and make any necessary fixes to the viewscreen.

You could just imply they took out the guards (which you see lying dead at the entrance), Finn walks away from the control panel (implying he already did something to the computer) to ask Han something, then he turns back around and you cut to a shot of just the viewscreen to see that the shields are in fact going down. End of scene.

But that’s just how I have imagined it in my head.

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I would prefer not to dig into TFA for Phasma. I’d either leave every beat of her in TLJ or remove her altogether.

As I think about the potential of the deleted scenes… assuming they are usable and presented nicely, that might be the single biggest aid to the film. I think TLJ would have been a superior film if it were presented as a 3-hour Star Wars film and ask the audience to just accept this, rather than both packed to the brim and cut to the bone. Of course, we’ll have to see how it goes, but I hope to give it a running time as merited, not out of concerns of marketability.

My stance on revising fan edits.

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Hal 9000 said:

I would prefer not to dig into TFA for Phasma. I’d either leave every beat of her in TLJ or remove her altogether.

As I think about the potential of the deleted scenes… assuming they are usable and presented nicely, that might be the single biggest aid to the film. I think TLJ would have been a superior film if it were presented as a 3-hour Star Wars film and ask the audience to just accept this, rather than both packed to the brim and cut to the bone. Of course, we’ll have to see how it goes, but I hope to give it a running time as merited, not out of concerns of marketability.

But still maintain all of Canto Bight. Why not significantly trim that sequence and then just add the deleted scenes relating to the interesting characters/stories. Would probably end up being a similar runtime but be more focused on the more interesting and substantial plot lines.

Return of the Jedi: Remastered

Lord of the Rings: The Darth Rush Definitives

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Hal 9000 said:

I think TLJ would have been a superior film if it were presented as a 3-hour Star Wars film

With an intermission, ent’racte music and maybe an overture as well. 😃

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Hope all is well Hal. I posted this in another thread before but your edit of TLJ is the one I’d be most excited for. Here is the supposed deleted scene list for TLJ that leaked out:

  • Alternate Opening
  • Paige’s Gun Jams
  • Luke Has a Moment
  • Poe: Not Much of a Sewer
  • It’s Kind of Weird That You Recorded That
  • The Caretaker Sizes Up Rey
  • Caretaker Village Sequence
  • The Costumes and Creatures of Canto Bight
  • Extended Fathier Chase
  • Mega Destroyer Incursion – Extended Version
  • Rose Bites the Hand That Taunts Her
  • Phasma Squealed Like a Whoop Hog
  • Rose & Finn Go To Where They Belong
  • Rey & Chewie in the Falcon

JEDIT: Target ad mostly comfirmed these as well as saying “Phasma’s Death” so it is unlikely she will be back for IX if that helps make your decision for her character.

The Skywalker Saga:
I · II · III · IV · V · VI · VII · VIII · IX
This is the way.

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Overall this edit proposition has me very excited as I see much of our ideas about the movie align. Outright TLJ haters be damned. Many great ideas in this thread already.

Here are some points of contention:

Hal 9000 said:
• Only because I’d already be editing the film at this point and not because this is in any way called for, try to have the first scene with Luke appear overcast as TFA was. Whatever filter used to achieve this could be gradually faded out over the course of the sequence.

Anybody else as confused as I am about this? Could somebody elaborate?

• Cut Luke’s joke about Jakku.

I like to think it’s a point of relation between them as Luke wasn’t fond of his own desert planet upbringing, but I’d be curious to see how it affects the tone without it.

• Trim Snoke’s dialogue pre-death which makes an obvious outcome painfully so.

Very weary about this! You wouldn’t believe how many people were confused by this scene. Although, now that I think about it, perhaps what confused them was the dialogue itself. Usually they’ll say “But snoke is reading his mind so how did he not see this coming!? He can clearly see it coming!”. So they’re misinterpreting the scene in that way. Perhaps without the dialogue it will be more concise after all. Then again, I like to think it’s a key part of his hubris of being able to see so much with the force but still be simply tricked.

• Remove BB8 commandeering an AT-ST, and ensuing jog toward an escape shuttle.

This is of vital importance! Might I add that BB8 with a million arms in the first juggernaut action sequence is also preposterous and should be shortened to only a couple arms, then cut straight to sticking his head into the broken panel. If possible. BB8 is silly and overpowered in TLJ in-general; needs to be scaled back.

Miscellaneous points:

Space Leia should under no circumstances be removed.

Changing Holdo’s hair colour? Really? Let’s not appease the insufferable anti-feminists.

I lean towards keeping Phasma but open to seeing how alternatives play out. Phasma as a kind of recurring ‘Boba Fett’-like arbitrary death is honestly amusing to me.

TiMartyn said:
-No awkward, prolonged milking of the sea cow.

I feel like each Star Wars film deserves a couple memes, I’d rather the odd fishing sequence be gone/trimmed. But I suppose part of that was showing Luke’s x-wing in the water, but I’m not entirely sure what the point of that is, other than to suggest he can get off the planet if he wanted, to fool the audience into thinking he had during the showdown with Kylo I guess. I digress…

-Less of making a point out of the wealthy who make money off war.

Nah, one of the best parts of the film. It’s about time a Star Wars film addressed what actually creates war; the economy.

-Less making a point out of animal cruelty.

I feel like HAL’s proposed edits serve this already. As a 100% biased vegan I implore that at-least some remain. 😉

Really Cheesy PT Sig
“No, it’s because I’m so in love with you.” Cue laugh track

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I don’t know if it has been mentioned, but The Last Jedi glosses over Luke realizing Han had been killed. It felt strange to not have a scene where Luke mourns his old friend. There’s a deleted scene which will be released, and seems like exactly the kind of content your edit should include.

I really hope to see it in there.

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Hal 9000 said:

I agree. Just looking forward to seeing what we’re working with.

Hey there! I hate asking this, but is there any way you might be able to sneak in a line of dialogue about Snoke’s background? Maybe Kylo could say it to Rey during a Force Skype? Or Snoke could say it in the throne room as an exclamation. It could be done in a way so as not to lose the momentum of any scenes.

I really am afraid we won’t get Snoke’s background in Episode IX. I would love to see something about him in Episode VIII. Maybe there’s a clear hint he is Plagueis from the Unknown Regions? At least something would do wonders!

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ChainsawAsh said:

Where would the dialogue come from?

That was one of the issues I found, but DigModification explained to me that he could try to find someone to do a voice. I’m not too great at this stuff, but the idea made sense to me.

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I’m not sure if this had been mentioned before, but I would like to see Luke and Yoda’s scene moved directly before Crait. All hope seems lost for the Resistance until Luke realizes what he needs to do to help them. A problem with this could be it going from night to day to sunset very fast with the Luke scenes.

The Skywalker Saga:
I · II · III · IV · V · VI · VII · VIII · IX
This is the way.