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HBO's Game of Thrones - Fan Edit Ideas

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This thread might already exist, but I wanted to start a thread to share ideas for ways of editing Game of Thrones. I know some exist already, like condensing each season into a movie, or making edits to only show one character’s POV. People are welcome to share more of those ideas as well.

I am particularly interested in more general ideas to improve some of the weaker plot elements of the show, like the Dornish plot and the mission to capture a Wight in season 7. I already have some ideas I can share, but I also would love to hear any other ideas people might have to execute these kind of changes or improve the plot in general.

I’m sure this thread will be Season 7 changes heavy, but this thread is open to ideas for changes throughout the entire show. I see a ton of YouTube videos or reddit threads suggesting ways to rewrite the plot, but obviously most of those ideas are not really doable. I know a site like this might encourage more feasible ideas with what we have to work with.

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I’ll get started with two of the most controversial storylines.

Idea to improve Dornish subplot:

Can’t really cut it out, so how can we make it more bearable? Obviously Ellaria is driven by revenge, but it would be nice if it could be made clearer that Ellaria is going to make one of the Sand Snakes the Princess of Dorne. So instead of her actions being just purely revenge it is also a power move, and it won’t seem like a blatant betrayal of Oberyn to destroy his house, since the implication would be that his eldest daughter, Tyene, would be legitimized and made the Princess of Dorne.

Maybe cut their first failed conspiracy plan to kidnap Myrcella. Trim it so the Sand Snakes just seem like Myrcella and Trystane’s bodyguards when Jaime and Bronn try to “rescue” Myrcella. We don’t see them in jail with Bronn, nor any of the conspiracy moments with Ellaria before that.

We know Ellaria is upset, but it isn’t until Myrcella starts dying of poison do we realize what Ellaria has done. It makes both Doran and Ellaria look a lot less stupid. Then when Ellaria kills Doran (maybe hear Doran’s bodyguard getting stabbed multiple times in the background), we then either see a trimmed version of Trystane getting killed, or when Ellaria says Trystane is weak and weak men will never rule Dorne again, we see a quick shot of the boat, and Trystane lying on the ground dead. We could even spread out the intercutting so we see the boat, Trystane at the desk, the Sand Snakes enter, then Trystane dead on the floor.

When Olenna later comes to Dorne, maybe try to have Olenna call Tyene “Princess” off-screen to establish that Ellaria put Oberyn’s daughter on the Dornish throne and technically continuing the Martell line through her.

Idea to improve the Wight mission:

It seems like most people think that it was out of character for Tyrion to suggest such a plan, and it has been one of the most controversial plot elements in the show so far. We can’t remove the plan, so how can we make it work?

Instead of Bran warging into crows and seeing the wight army, he has a “green sight” vision, edited to be a little vague and dreamlike, but he has a vision of Jon getting a wight, showing it to Cersei, and their armies marching together to defeat the white walkers.

He has the maester to send a raven to tell Jon about this vision.

So now, Bran has a vision that this how they can defeat the white walkers instead of Tyrion. Jon knows the odds are stacked against them, so this could be enough to encourage Jon to do it.

You can heavily alter the scene where Tyrion suggests the idea. Possibly use new VO for the characters if it helps make this work.
Not exactly certain how it can be cut, but luckily there is mostly no music in the background, which will make it easier to cut. But they begin talking about the feasibility of the idea more immediately.

The twist is, though, that instead of this being a true vision, but it turns out it is a false vision given to Bran by the Night King. Since the Night King touched Bran, they are connected in a way, which is could make this possible, especially since there has been an implication that the Night King is also a greenseer.

You have to think of it this way, who gains the most from the wight mission? The mission didn’t really seem to unite the Seven Kingdoms. The Night King, on the other hand, got exactly what he needed to get past the wall: a dragon.

I’m also thinking a second vision could be invented that Bran will have after Jon is already Beyond the Wall, that shows that he will be trapped and possibly die. This causes him to send a raven to Dragonstone, to tell Daenerys that she must rescue him.
Alternatively, a short scene could possibly be constructed where Daenerys is looking out toward the ocean, maybe using a shot from the Danny/Tyrion conversation scene, maybe find an ocean insert shot, and play their love motif subtly to show she is thinking about Jon. This way, Dany decides to go on her own.
But, for the Night King trap idea to work, the Night King’s idea sort of necessitates that a dragon comes beyond the wall, which is why the two visions idea might be necessary. This would also explain why it seems that the White Walkers wait until the last minute to try and kill them all. It really seems like a trap, especially if we can decontextualize it.

I still need ideas to make these changes work, so if anyone has some thoughts I would love to hear them. Also feel free to share your own ideas. I think it would be cool if once Season 8 is finished, to eventually make an edit of the series that makes changes like these to help make the improve the series overall.

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Seems like a lot of people aren’t very happy with the new season of Game of Thrones. If you have any ideas for trying to improve the episodes, share them here!

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There seems to be a disconnect with fans who frequent certain online reddit subs (those that do not kneel and have multiple leaks - and memes! So many memes! 😃) - and those fans who don’t frequent those sites…

For me, the quality has dropped off the last couple of seasons - and I think this season could have benefited from having an extra episode or two to focus on character development and decision-making, along with giving more breathing room between and leading up to the more action-orientated episodes.

Yet I don’t think it’s as bad as some make out on those certain reddit sites - the episodes are still an enjoyable watch, absorbing on many levels, and am very much looking forward to the last episode (despite knowing how it will likely end). Yet, there is ‘something’ lacking this season and some choices made are somewhat questionable…
 

Am quite intrigued to see ideas and suggestions for possible improvements…
 

A little patience goes a long way on this old-school Rebel base. If you are having issues finding what you are looking for, these will be of some help…

Welcome to the OriginalTrilogy.com | Introduce yourself in here | Useful info within : About : Help : Site Rules : Fan Project Rules : Announcements
How do I do this?’ on the OriginalTrilogy.com; some info & answers + FAQs - includes info on how to search for projects and threads on the OT•com

A Project Index for Star Wars Preservations (Harmy’s Despecialized & 4K77/80/83 etc) : A Project Index for Star Wars Fan Edits (adywan & Hal 9000 etc)

… and take your time to look around this site before posting - to get a feel for this place. Don’t just lazily make yet another thread asking for projects.

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oojason said:

I think this season could have benefited from having an extra episode or two to focus on character development and decision-making, along with giving more breathing room between and leading up to the more action-orientated episodes.

I couldn’t agree more with this. I think the broad outline of what’s happened since they ran out of book material makes a lot of sense and I can see where Martin was going with it, but the race to the ending caused many characters to do contortions to serve the plot.

If You had shown me episode 5 “The Bells” back while I was watching season 1, I think I would have said: “Oh my God, that’s amazing, I can’t wait to see how they get to this moment.” The answer is, though, “They didn’t.” They didn’t get there, at least not for me.

That’s all to say and agree that I think we need more material. I don’t think they release many deleted scenes for the show, unfortunately, but hopefully the Blu-ray for this season with have something.

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I agree! While I’m okay with the general story beats and I’m still enjoying the experience, I do agree that it feels rushed. Unfortunately all fan editors can do is cut/rearrange content rather than adding more. So I think we have to figure out how we can make what is already there work better.

I personally don’t want to do TV-to-Movie edits like Andreas is doing. What I would like to do or see would just be edits of individual episodes, so if one were to do a rewatch of the series, they could just watch the handful of fan edited episodes in place of the original ones. The idea being that the purpose is to address various controversies or weaker points throughout the show, rather than fundamentally changing the viewing experience. I would like to make a list of possible changes throughout the series so if anyone has any ideas just shout them out.

I kind of want to brainstorm ideas regarding Season 8.

SPOILERS AHEAD.

I think there could be a lot of things done to these episodes, but here are some thoughts I’ve currently been having.

I would like to have Bran do more greenseer things during the Battle of Winterfell. All he does is warg into some crows. I’m not exactly sure what he could do, but having him go into the past or have visions might be feasible ideas from an editing perspective. Maybe we could have him warg into Rhaegal when Jon and the Night King fight on their dragons.

Maybe we could just brighten up the entire episode just a little.

Just cut all the scenes with Bronn so far.

Another small change would be to have Rheagal’s death make more sense. I guy on reddit actually has already made a version of this. https://www.reddit.com/r/freefolk/comments/bnq8to/rhaegal_dies_but_it_makes_slightly_more_sense/

Speaking of Euron, I think you could cut Euron and Jaime’s fight scene in 805, and everything still make sense. Just make it look like Euron died in dragonfire, have Jaime walk up the beach and into the cave, then cut out Cersei mention that he’s bleeding.

I’m also trying to think of ways we could help Dany’s decision to burn the citizens of King’s Landing not feel so sudden. It seems a lot of people feel like it was a total character change, where others feel it was hinted at a lot. I think there a lot of ways you approach this issue.

  1. You could never have the Bells ring, which makes Dany feel like they did not surrender, so she keeps destroying the city.

  2. Cut certain shots to downplay Dany’s actions, or make it seem like she is just burning the Red Keep and the general destruction in the city is from spreading fire and the wildfire throughout the city exploding.

While I think these top options would be easier, I kind of think that Dany needs to go off the deep end, because Dany ignoring the Bells will forever be an infamous moment. Regardless, these are possible options.

  1. Give Dany more reasons to want to punish the citizens of King’s Landing. What if was possible to use some VFX and clever editing to have the citizens of King’s Landing standing along the walls, like Cersei brought them up there as another layer of protection against Dany (like she did by inviting them into the Red Keep) it would also explain why Cersei doesn’t just kill Dany with the ballistae at that moment, since all of King’s Landing was watching and that could be seen as dishonorable maybe. But you could add sound effects of the crowd jeering at Dany, and then cheering when Missandei was executed. It might make it feel like the citizens themselves took part in Missandei’s death, so it would make Dany feel like they need to be taught a lesson.

There are other ideas too, like have Dany hear voices at different times in the last few seasons to imply she really is going Mad (although I think the actual version, if it had more set up, would have more nuance than her just being “crazy”). Then she could hear voices during the Bells moment. Maybe one could cut some of her dialogue from the last two or so seasons to make Dany seem more “bad queen” and less “good queen”, if that makes sense. Personally my favorite idea so far is having the citizens cheer during Missandei’s execution, but obviously that would be one of the hardest ones to actually do.

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For me, it’s probably unfixable, because all the problems the show now has has stem from two decisions D&D made long ago:

  1. Cutting Young Griff from the story (who is supposedly Aegon Targaryen, Dany’s other brother nephew, but who might have been fed lies about this by Varys). Who, in the books, will likely be the one to take King’s Landing from Cersei after her Sept of Baelor stunt and be welcomed by the people. He already has the backing of most of the southern Kingdoms (that have been forgotten by the show), which makes Dorne relevant and gives the Tyrells someone to rally behind, too. Thus, when Dany arrives expecting to be welcomed with open arms, she’s shunned as an invader and usurper by the people while someone who theoretically has a better claim to the throne than her sits on it, making her turn to cruelty make more sense.
  2. Stripping almost all magic from the show. The Starks are all supposed to be wargs (Bran should have been doing some warg-fighting in episode 3), Jon’s resurrection should have had more consequences (foreshadowed by book Beric and Lady Stoneheart), and the big one - Euron Greyjoy is supposed to be a goddamn pirate wizard who used blood magic and has a horn that can bind dragons. Book Euron is way more interesting and will probably be the one to steal Dany’s dragon and bring down the Wall, eliminating all that bullshit from last season.

There are more nitty-gritty issues than this, but these two major things caused ripple effects through all the other characters - Tyrion is now a moron, Varys and Littlefinger ended up purposeless because their endgame plans relied on characters that no longer exist on the show, Dany seemed to decide to burn innocent people for no reason when it should have been anger at them supporting Griff instead of her, Bran just sits there being cryptic, Cersei stood on a balcony for at least a season after she should have been dead already…

I could go on but I’m burnt out.

Basically, I think some editing might be able to salvage what’s there to some degree, but the core problems started with decisions made years ago because the things that were eliminated weren’t massively important yet as of book 5 with little thought as to how they might affect the ending. Now that we see what the bones of the ending are, we can see what purpose those seemingly out-of-nowhere book 4/5 things actually are meant to serve.

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Young Griff/Aegon Targaryen technically would be Rhaegar’s first son, so Dany’s nephew (like Jon is). But there are some theories that Griff is actually a pretender (though he might not even know that).

Basically, he is a Blackfyre and supposedly Varys and Illyrio have groomed him for the throne. So even if he is revealed as not a true Targaryen, the people might not even care because they still love him. But you’re right, Dany’s actions would make a lot more sense if she was dealing with him rather than Cersei. I think the key is making it to where Dany blames the people to feel like punishing them. What you said makes sense, so maybe we can think of an alternative, like that Missandei idea I had.

But you’re right, even if we were to try to fix things, it still won’t be perfect obviously. But you know, GoT has still been a great show, especially the first four seasons with some good moments in the following ones. I guess I would want to try to make some changes that might make the show more bearable for those who have loved the show, but have been disappointed by the last season or two and think it might affect their interest in rewatching the series eventually.

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RogueLeader said:

Young Griff/Aegon Targaryen technically would be Rhaegar’s first son, so Dany’s nephew (like Jon is).

Ah, right, my bad.

But there are some theories that Griff is actually a pretender (though he might not even know that).

Basically, he is a Blackfyre and supposedly Varys and Illyrio have groomed him for the throne. So even if he is revealed as not a true Targaryen, the people might not even care because they still love him.

Exactly - I made a passing mention of that in my post but didn’t go into detail.

But you’re right, Dany’s actions would make a lot more sense if she was dealing with him rather than Cersei. I think the key is making it to where Dany blames the people to feel like punishing them. What you said makes sense, so maybe we can think of an alternative, like that Missandei idea I had.

I’ll have to read your post again, but yeah, that’s a key thing. I think also editing the whole series to downplay some of her more magnanimous qualities and play up her questionable actions would help.

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I would be delighted to take part in this sort of effort. My list of edit ideas has been growing for years. There are definitely some things that need to happen with season 8, and I love that re-cut of Rhaegal’s death. Makes so much more sense. In particular, there’s a lot in-between Dany’s death and the final montage that needs to go. What I’d love to see is a “consistency edit”. For example, things like the Eyrie should look the same in all seasons, rather than undergoing a complete re-design retcon. One of the most jarring changes was Daario, but that would be a major undertaking.

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The Dorne storyline is still the worst in the show. It would be nice if Doran was shown as smarter and Ellaria was more sympathetic. A lot of those scenes can be cut entirely. Would it be doable and make sense that Ellaria might not kill Doran but instead just take over after Areo Hotah dies?

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The Finale was okay for me overall until the Dragonpit scene where they pick a new king. It was a massive tonal shift with too much speechifying from Tyrion and self-aware humor (democracy? Hahaha!).

I bought the episode on iTunes and played with the scene a little bit. I’m curious to see if anyone thinks this is an improvement or not.

https://vimeo.com/338291512
pw: fanedit

Here’s a general list of changes:

  1. trimmed Edmure Tulley’s awkward moment slightly, particularly the weird reaction shots and him accidentally clanging his sword. I kept the rest of the moment in, however, because I think his character would actually do that.

  2. Removed Grey Worm snapping at Tyrion about not speaking. It makes him look silly when Tyrion then speaks for the next ten minutes. As a note, Grey Worm is one of the big writing letdowns of the past few episodes. He went straight villain without any remorse over what happened, and unfortunately this scene didn’t help. Can’t really fix that, unfortunately.

  3. Removed Sam’s suggestion of democracy. It was too on the nose and self-aware. Also, I don’t like the execution when dead silence goes to huge laughter suddenly. It felt unnatural.

  4. Trimmed Tyrion’s speech, specifically removing the idea that stories are what unites people and makes a good king.

  5. Sansa declaring independence is not just a side moment, it’s the climax of the scene where the Stark theme swells. That way it’s as much a triumph for Sansa (who we’re more invested in) as for Bran.

EDIT:
6) Made an update and removed Tyrion saying, “Jon committed his crime here.” Is he really making a claim about jurisdiction?

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This scene still has so much wrong with it. Not due to your editing, mind you. But you’re not starting with choice material. It represents such a tonal shift from the previous scenes and makes little narrative sense. I’d argue for its removal altogether, (along with the small council scene), maybe find some other way to get to the ending montage, or change the ending entirely somehow.

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Totally fair. I’m not sure how you could really remove it entirely, though. There’s just no way the show would have ended without dealing with who is ruling. We can’t really cut to the Starks farewells without understanding that Bran is King and Sansa has declared independence, can we? I agree about the small council scene; it should be trimmed (definitely remove the Song of Ice and Fire) or cut.

After this, I bought “The Long Night” episode and began playing with the color correction, because I think most of the problems people were having could have been easily mitigated with a gamma curve. Here’s my try:
http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/576/picture:0

These shots are all done with the same correction. The episode may require some shot by shot correction, but I think this curve actually works pretty well overall.

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Wow, I’m glad this thread has been brought back to life, I adore this show and the books and it was almost perfect for the first 4 seasons. There’s so much above that I agree with entirely especially the idea of just editing individual moments in episodes. I agree about the detrimental affects the Young Griff cuts and Euron’s character assassination had, but the show is just too damn good to give up on and even the later seasons had some brilliant moments. I have been planning my own fan edit but there are some really tough things to fix from season 5-8 and on first read I agree most of these things look impossible. I’ll split this post into two because it’s long but here are some things that need to be improved imo:

Seasons 1-7 (mainly 5-7)

• Insert some deleted scenes
• Fix Melisandre’s missing necklace in the bath
• Fix the brief appearance of Beric Dondarion before he is sent to kill the Mountain (VFx change the actor’s head)
• The other actor changes are jarring but probably impossible to undo. The first Bloodraven guy maybe could be changed to Max Von Sydow as it is only one scene? I can’t remember how bad the second Mountain actor looked, did he ever remove his helmet?
• The Dorne plot is dreadful, ideally a whole new cast would need to be integrated from a different show entirely for a few (longish) scenes, just to imply that Doran Martell had a plan and was secretly plotting against the Lannisters instead of just being weak and pointless. We need to see more of Dorne and it’s people rather than just seeing the Water Gardens.
• As a minimum we need a better way to explain why Bronn and Jaime arrive in the water gardens at the exact same time as the sand snakes attack.
• Change how Areo Hotah is killed with a tiny knife in the back (can it be shown going into the back of his head?)
• Away from Dorne I hated how Brienne just turns up in time to kill Stannis. There needs to be an effects shot where Brienne is seen watching the end of Stannis’s defeat from the higher ground. She sees Stannis stagger into the woods before going to kill him
• Barristan Selmy doesn’t die like such a punk (Can he kill more Harpies or be sped up a bit Lol)
• Fix the vanishing dogs that attack Sansa/Theon
• The waif stabbing Arya. This was awful, try to cut the shot of the knife going into her belly and being twisted and leave it with the initial slash. Not easy.
• Improve the first Euron sea battle
• Don’t then show Euron’s ship at Casterley Rock unless it can time travel
• Show Bronn running away from Drogon after firing the scorpion at him
• Remove Jaime sinking in his armour after he charges the dragon
• Dany shouldn’t know who Randall Tarly is before questioning him
• Tyrion should be concerned for “missing” Jaime, maybe have him scanning the battlefield
• Davos is sent for a blacksmith and doesn’t revisit Gendry out of good will
• Bran has a better greensight vision where he sees the future (including capturing the wight etc, Viserion falling), which he then sends by raven to Jon and which then leads to the mission north of the wall (I stole this idea from above)
• Cersei has a better reaction to Dany’s impending attack and to Jaime secretly meeting Tyrion (she does a 180 degree switch over two scenes because of her pregnancy)
• Dany chooses to fly north of the wall on her own accord before Gendry runs back to Castle Black
• Improve Uncle Benjen’s death scene, have him take down a few more wights

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Season 8

• Fix the coffee cup and water bottle
• Improve the colour/darkness of Episode 3 (Poppasketti WOW AWESOME WORK!!)
• Improve the Rheagal death scene similar to Reddit above, insert another scene though directly after before Euron seems to time travel back to Kings Landing
• Possibly remove the silly Bronn scene or could dialogue be added so that he still threatens them but he is torn and more jokey with them?
• When Dany offers surrender to Cersei outside of KL, change the VFx so that they are standing much further away from the scorpions and are out of range (or reduce the amount of scorpions)
• Insert footage from the upcoming prequel show when it arrives into The Long Night battle or show white walkers attacking The Last Hearth using footage from Hardhome etc we just need a bit more to show them slaying innocents and to show off the destructive nature of the WW
• Insert something/anything between the Jon/Dany murder scene and the election scene, the cut and change in tone between the two was terrible and jarring. Maybe have a shot of each of the different armies gathering outside the walls
• Remove some of the humour in the election scene as above (I can’t get the video to work but it sounds great)

Now I liked each of the six episodes as standalones (apart from the last half an hour of ep4) but the season needed more episodes/footage and too many plot points felt unearned or unresolved. However I think the show could be improved massively by including a flashback section at the very end of the final episode after Jon has disappeared into the woods. The show needs a Keyser Soze moment to end on and there are loads of Reddit theories that I really like, most are tin foily and would boil down to personal taste but I think the show is crying out for one involving Bran (who’s character was butchered this season).

E.g. Jon disappears into the woods with Tormund and the Wildlings, fade to black then:

• Maybe imply that there is a new Night King, Bran’s eyes could go blue or maybe even show him warging into Drogon or reanimating Dany with blue eyes etc

• My personal take is that GRR Martin will reveal that Bran has been manipulating time and influencing history throughout the whole show. He has basically Littlefingered everyone to become King. He has played each of his enemies off against each other and moved everyone into the right place at the right time so that these events we have seen for 8 seasons played out. I believe there is some minor evidence of this in the show (just wait for the prequel) but lots more in the books. With an extended flashback scene and by using some of the narration from the histories and lore documentaries I think some of his manipulations could be alluded to. I also think you could provide some much needed motivation for the Night King right at the show’s death. You could either imply that Bran has been working towards “breaking the wheel”, for the good of the realm or instead for purely evil purposes. I’m tempted to lean towards the latter because I think it will improve the show if we suddenly discover Bran is the real villain who has tricked us all to become king, although I think Martin will make Bran more of a saviour in his books.

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I really like some of these ideas. (FYI I haven’t seen it personally, but I read somewhere that HBO had already removed the coffee cup from subsequent showings.) Some of these are nearing impossibility though, in my opinion. For example, even the professionals didn’t do a perfect job putting Lena Headey’s head on her body double for the walk of shame, and they had both actresses available in person. But I think you’ve got the right idea for my thoughts on establishing consistency and continuity, at the very least.

Have any of you seen the “Last Watch” documentary? During the table read for season 8, I noticed that those final scenes seem to have not been a part of the original script (as I suspected). After Daenerys’ death, the script reads “(Jon) looks down at what he’s done, terrible, and necessary. End of Game of Thrones.”

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With the footage that we have, how much can the Dorne stoyline be altered? How much is possible to change?

Also, is it possible to show more moments of Dany cracking in seasons 6 and 7? Maybe edit some scenes to make her seem more ruthless so it is not as jaring when she burns King’s Landing. What if she refused to parley with masters in 6x9?

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Glad to see some activity on this thread!

big_gareth said:

I agree about the detrimental affects the Young Griff cuts and Euron’s character assassination had, but the show is just too damn good to give up on and even the later seasons had some brilliant moments. I have been planning my own fan edit but there are some really tough things to fix from season 5-8 and on first read I agree most of these things look impossible.

I think that boils down why I am interested in an edit project like this. The first four seasons of the show is some of the greatest episodes of television history, in my opinion, and I think making changes to help improve the latter half of the series is worth the effort.

I’m sure we will get a lot of people saying that the edits still don’t change certain fundamental flaws of the latter seasons, but I personally believe smart edits can do a lot more for the show than people think.

Poppa, thanks for sharing the first of hopefully many sample edits that can be made here in the future! I definitely think it is an improvement over the original. I think it was a good idea to cut Tyrion’s crap about the stories, since I think it takes away from more of the fact that bran would be a good King since he can see all of history and the mistakes that have been made in the past.

The only editing issue I really noticed was seeing Tyrion in a new position without seeing or hearing him move to that spot. You also lose Bran naming Tyrion his hand, if this version would actually keep that scene. But I like how you built to the climax of Sansa declaring independence. Honestly I kind of think it is weird how they cut to a shot of Yara and the Prince of Dorne’s reactions to Sansa declaring independence, since if any kingdoms were to be independent, it would be the Iron Islands and Dorne (since they are so culturally different). I would also say that specific reaction shot should be cut since, imo, it highlights that weird question of why the North deserves independence and not the other kingdoms?

Personally, I kind of wish there was a way to change the dialogue where they decided all the kingdoms would become more independent, with Bran being a High King that mediates disputes between them. Many “high kings” throughout history were chosen by lesser rulers through election, so it fits within what we see happen. Maybe Sansa’s dialogue could be altered off-screen to suggest this. Though this might be too complicated to get across in an edit. I just really don’t think Yara Greyjoy and Dorne would just be like, “okay, we’ll accept a Stark king and accept that the North will be independent also under Stark leadership.”

Also, I’ve heard that people find it weird that Bran says, “Why do you think I came all this way?” It seems to suggest he knew this would happen, which also kind of implies he knew what Dany was going to do, which makes it feel like he allowed all that to happen in order to become king. Though this could make more since if we were to edit it to give Bran more visions throughout, or maybe make Bran have ulterior motives like others have suggest. A lot to think about. Although I think how much we change really depends on how much you all think we should be allowed to stray from the source material, if we all work together on this, which I think we should!

Also Poppa, I like your color correction for the Long Night. Something like this will definitely be needed for an edit of that episode.

Tsiskwa said:

I would be delighted to take part in this sort of effort. My list of edit ideas has been growing for years. There are definitely some things that need to happen with season 8, and I love that re-cut of Rhaegal’s death. Makes so much more sense. In particular, there’s a lot in-between Dany’s death and the final montage that needs to go. What I’d love to see is a “consistency edit”. For example, things like the Eyrie should look the same in all seasons, rather than undergoing a complete re-design retcon. One of the most jarring changes was Daario, but that would be a major undertaking.

Thanks for chiming in Tsiskwa! Would love to hear more of your ideas!

The “consistency” idea is interesting. I think this can be done to some extent with locations if we just reuse establishing shots, but I also think this should depend on how much needs to be changed, if anything, in those episodes. Like, I don’t think changing an establishing shot in one episode would be worth it if it was the only thing that needed changing in that episode. But if we were editing something else in that episode anyway, then I’d say go for it.

big_gareth also makes a suggestion like this, regarding the recasts, like Daario, Beric, and the Three-Eyed Raven. Something like this could be done for Beric and Daario with a deepfake program (maybe make first Daario’s hair darker too), and maybe we clever editing could replace the first TER with Von Sidow, but honestly with the amount of effort needed I don’t know if it would be really worth it. At least for me this would not be my personal focus, but if it someone else really wanted to do this I would be happy to help and give feedback.

WillS8 said:

The Dorne storyline is still the worst in the show. It would be nice if Doran was shown as smarter and Ellaria was more sympathetic. A lot of those scenes can be cut entirely. Would it be doable and make sense that Ellaria might not kill Doran but instead just take over after Areo Hotah dies?

Sammuel7 said:

With the footage that we have, how much can the Dorne stoyline be altered? How much is possible to change?

Thanks for chiming in Will and Samuel! If you haven’t, you should go back and read my first reply in this thread that briefly touches on my idea to improve the Dorne subplot. Since Doran does not show up as the Prince of Dorne in the finale, I do think we have to keep Doran dying earlier in the show, unless we were somehow able to swap that guy out with Doran, but that would be extremely difficult. I think Ellaria still must take part in a coup backed by the people to put one of Oberyn’s daughters on the throne, but maybe we can make Ellaria seem a lot smarter through editing. Though if someone has an idea to keep Doran around I’m all ears.

Also, is it possible to show more moments of Dany cracking in seasons 6 and 7? Maybe edit some scenes to make her seem more ruthless so it is not as jaring when she burns King’s Landing. What if she refused to parley with masters in 6x9?

I think this is a good question. I think if we decide to edit certain episodes for larger narrative reasons, and those episodes contain moments where we could make Dany appear more ruthless, then it could be something we can consider. But I don’t think it would be worth it if that was the only thing about an episode we were going to change.

I’ve mentioned this already, but I think my favorite idea regarding this would be using VFX to have the citizens of King’s Landing along the walls when Missandei is executed. We could take crowd elements from earlier episode moments, like the King’s Landing riot or Cersei’s walk of shame. So we could see them along the walls, and more importantly, hear them jeering at Dany and then cheering when Missandei is killed. I think to Dany, it would make it feel like the citizens were participants and they also needed to be punished.

Another idea I’ve heard suggested is not to have the bells ring, but the episode is called “The Bells”, so it might be counterintuitive to do that.

I will post again to touch on some of big_gareth’s idea list, and I will add some other ideas I had of my own.

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Some really good discussion and ideas here. I agree as well that you have to be realistic with what can be changed within the realms and limitations of a fanedit.

Game Of Thrones was such an incredible show and deserves to go out on the best note possible, I think a really well done and consistent edit could do a lot of work there. Especially since it is mainly the pacing and some of the writing throwing everything off (acting, visuals, audio all incredible quality)

In terms of S8, i’ve been chipping away at some edits of eps 3 - 6, incorporating a lot of common changes suggested online (Moving when Rhaegal is shot to ep5 for example) as well as a lot of other stuff and small QOL adjustments.

We can’t get 10 episodes or a season of NK and then a season of Kings Landing obviously, but there’s a lot to work with. A really good post I saw made a point that there somewhere between 10 and 13 notable things are happening in each episode in S8, compared to 4 or 5 things in seasons 1-4 and this is a big part of why everything feels so rushed.

I’m experimenting with going for 7 episodes instead of 6, by splitting The Long Night over two episodes. This is a bit of psychological misdirection with the pacing, making it seem like it stretches over two eps instead of being all tied up in one.

To do this i’m currently running with the NK surviving Drogons blast as the dividing point. Alongside roughly 4-5 mins of cuts along the way, this clocks in at a fairly standard 55mins. Next ep picks up from there and also steals the funeral scene from ep 4 as a closer. I really loved that scene and I think it gives a nice bookend to the fight being over, Jons speech closing it out nicely.

I’ll need to flesh that second part out though as it’s only about 31 mins with the funeral scene. It’s also a shame not having Mel walking into the wastes as an ending anymore too as it worked really well, especially with the score. May need to look at this. Going just by the numbers theres ~60mins a piece for 7 episodes if you can cut it right and I have little to no editing experience.

Broadly though, here are things i’ve done with episode 3 so far:

  • Did a default brightness/color correction off the bat, then adjusted shots individually (so shots with fire aren’t blown out for example)

  • Slightly changed intro to episode to show characters preparing in a slightly different order, also worked in audio of Bran describing his dream of Winterfell being flooded to Osha from way back.

  • Removed 4 or 5 times a main character is seemingly covered in the dead/swarmed but then it cuts away.

  • Restructured the intro, whilst keeping the eerie silence theme going. Removed about half of the main cast standing on the frontlines. I find it much more believable that they are fighting through and surviving if they show up in the fray later instead of eating the first charge. Tormund, Beric, Jorah and The Hound are still in there though to still have some guys to follow.

  • Used audio from old seasons and subtitling to make it seem that when the Dothraki break, they are breaking early and off plan because they got too ginned up from getting a fire bonus on their Arakhs and this causes everyone to join in and sweep up Jorah in the midst.

  • Removed almost all shots that show you where the trebuchets are located. Now you still see them fired and their impact, but its not 100% obvious where they are.

  • Trimmed some dialogue here (and in 4 + 5) that felt a bit to on-the-nose.

  • Have sectioned off the scene where Bran wargs into the crows so that it works without it or can be repurposed later on. I will probably use it later because i’d like it if Bran could be helping other people or doing something other than observing.

  • Slightly trimmed Aryas entrance, she still shows up and kills a bunch of wights, but doesn’t pose hollywood style right into shot, also re-scored here to different music.

  • Re-cut scene where NK raises his new dead so that Dany saving Jon here happens continuously instead of cutting away when Jon looks swamped. This makes it looks like she is quick with the save, more believable to me anyway.

I’ve done a lot of 4 and 5 too, but I don’t want to make this post even longer, i’ll see if I can try to post a clip later.

Anyone else got any burning issues with e3 from an editing standpoint they think I should work in?

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Apologies for this delayed response. There hasn’t been much activity on the thread and so I honestly forgot to check. In any case, I certainly think a collective effort, or working together as a team, is a feasible way to approach such a project. A fan-edit of a single film, or even a trilogy, is a daunting task. Sometimes even a single scene. But we are talking about approximately 80 hours of footage, all told. I know we’re not talking about changing much early on, but it’s still a lot, and some of these ideas will be technically challenging to execute well.

I’m a bit torn about changing the story, or straying from the source material. While I’m certainly tempted, I think the safer option is to keep things as is, but try to improve the execution.

Regarding consistency, that is a major motivation for me. We should definitely swap in Von Sidow for the first appearance of the TER, for example. For the astute viewer, these changes simply don’t make sense. (Are we supposed to believe the guy shaved or something?)

As for “The Bells”, I think the issues don’t really lie in the episode itself, but in the lead-up in previous episodes and previous seasons. Sure, making Daenerys come across as more ruthless earlier on is a possibility. But I don’t think we should attempt to telegraph her switch too strongly. The story does an excellent job in the very beginning of hiding both its ultimate protagonist and antagonist, and allowing the viewer to unknowingly cheer for the villain. It’s a theme that has much to say about the nature of good and evil and our perception of such. Her destruction in King’s Landing should remain both shocking and painful to watch. (It just needs to make sense.) So, I say let her hear the bells. That is the moment when she snaps, and I think it is important to maintain. The lead-in for the episode actually did well with the voice-over flashback montage from previous seasons. Perhaps that is an idea that could be incorporated into the main storyline. (Is she hearing voices? Etc.) The books do seem to hint at this, and it could be fun to play around with.

Splitting things into shorter episodes for the final season is also an interesting idea. Thus far, I haven’t yet purchased the previous seasons (been holding out for some crazy boxed set or something cool). So, I’ve only seen the aired episodes. But does anyone know if there are any extras or deleted scenes ripe for finishing and including, etc.?

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So as it stands there is only the standalone eps for season 8 that I can find- no blu ray details yet or deleted scenes.

What I am working with is the episodes themselves and then i’ve split out the 5.1 audio and rebounced as two tracks: one with everything except the dialogue and one that is dialogue only - just makes it a bit easier to do more seamless/convincing transitions especially during action sequences.

I like staying close to the source material as well, there are plenty of crazy things you could attempt, but I kind of want to show the show telling the story it had but more convincingly and powerfully.

You are right with regards to The Bells - it should be harrowing to see Dany go over the line, GOT was always great at having that feeling of dread and inevitability when things go bad for someone in a typically good role. Oberyn is a perfect example: it’s unexpected and horrific but you can kind of feel it moving in slow motion. One of the highlights of Danys turn for me, was following Jon as he realizes, like Ned, the horror of what they are doing. We should be with Jon emotionally at this point.

Wherever you land on the episode critically, I think everyone agrees that it just didn’t feel quite as earned and I feel its more a symptom of having the whole season feel so rushed that something like that, that you really want to digest, is swept up among all the other developments - having some audio clips playing at key points would be a really neat way to weave in a bit more development without being too ham-handed.

There are plenty of scenes where she is speaking to one person or her advisers in the non-action portions, in particular scenes where she is dwelling or thinking. Maybe we hear her remembering people from throughout her life, just the odd quote here and there and then she is snapped out of it when Tyrion or Jon or someone enters to speak to her.

In terms of audio I do also have all the Histories and Lore from all the old blu-rays which are a goldmine for getting audio of the cast, in character - but not doing lines from the show. I have a few really good ones earmarked for later use (Bran talking about the history of warging/greenseeing, Jamie talking about being the Kingslayer etc) which I think, if they can be worked in elegantly, could do some real work in bolstering characters we wanted more time with.

I think your right that it shouldn’t be too telegraphed either, which is why I like moving Rhaegals death to this episode - it serves as a catalyzing event that brings you with her and lends more believability to her ignoring the surrender. She has only minutes ago had one of her children killed and NOW they surrender? Was it for nothing? It sells that impulsive loss of control way better for me. Its a two for one as well as it removed a highly criticized point in ep 4.

I thought it would be a massive chore to move that event and edit all the mentions of it successively, but it only took a couple of nights. Rhaegals death is mentioned about five times after it happens, each case was a throw-away line that took no real effort to remove. Beyond that we don’t get any real reaction from Dany either, so having it happen in The Bells covers us not seeing her grieve.

Right now i’m using a free version of some editing software, so there is a large obnoxious banner over clips I export (i’ll just pay the 40 bucks for the software if I get to a final edit I want to export) but here a couple of clips of some scenes i’ve been working on, the pw is ‘fanedit’ for all of these:

Alt Into to The Long Night: https://vimeo.com/341071202

Euron Ambush Without Dany: https://vimeo.com/341068472

Rhaegals Death In The Bells: https://vimeo.com/341070921

These are still a bit rough but i’ll put some more up tomorrow if I can

Poppasketti, I liked your version of that scene in the last ep too, I still think there could be a few changes but it just tightens up the whole flow of that part really well - that kind of approach could do a lot for all of S8 I think.

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Those are some great ideas about using audio from extras, etc. I personally think if that device is employed though, best to keep it as a sign of Dany’s mental state. It wasn’t something employed stylistically in the show, and so I think it’s overuse could create dissonance. I liked your Long Night intro, but would constructively offer that it is a stylistic change from the overall tone of the series.

Your removal of Daenerys from Euron’s ambush was very well done, and it’s an interesting idea to move Rhaegal’s death to The Bells. I love that it isn’t Euron who gets him. (I seriously could not stand the show version of that character). Also nice to see Daenerys actually be able to do something with her anger afterwards. My main constructive point I’d offer here is that Dragonstone is still visible in the shot of the two dragons flying together. It might be possible to roto it out if you absolutely need that shot.

Looking forward to getting started with some of the ideas being discussed here.

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That’s fair - it’s not used as a device at all really in the earlier seasons, so that can go.

I actually have 2 versions of that scene where you can see dragonstone, the cut is just a bit more jarring when its a few frames further in - but it can be trimmed out.

I’ll mess with them a bit more and put up some new clips later tomorrow.