They sound about the same to me. As far as shots, what if you put the shot of Hux over “-will rise” instead of during the gap inbetween his two sentences? That may
Or swap the reactions. Have Hux flinch at “the new Jedi will rise”, then use his stoic expression for, “So…” Hux flinching at the idea of the Jedi returning rather than Hux flinching at “So…” It made sense when Snoke stood and shouted “GENERAL!”, but his reaction doesn’t go with anything in this version, besides Snoke just standing up.
Yes, swapping the order of those two half-shots of Hux works a bit better, as you describe. It’s now one shot split in half, with the second half played first.
EDIT: OR… just cut the stoic Hux shot. Have it go like this: 1. Snoke CU - “Jedi will rise” 2. Hux flinches. 3. Snoke stands, “So…”. 4. Snoke CU “Our strategy must now change.”
It might make more sense to go from a wide to a CU without cutting to a reaction shot in the sequence of shots. Might be worth trying.
Just mocked this up, and it doesn’t work. Going from Snoke standing straight to a close up on him does not feel right at all, video and audio-wise.
For me what is quite noticable is Snoke’s lips are moving while he’s not saying anything. During Hux “support the resistance” line.
That sounds familiar. I bet it was brought up when we were doing V2 and at that time nothing better could be found. I will look again, though, but I wouldn’t count on it.