Star Wars: The Rise Of Skywalker Redux Ideas thread — Page 21

RogueLeader said:

I have a very clear idea for how to handle a Ben Lives alternate ending, which will be the first thing I work on once the film comes out on Blu-ray, but I kind of want to wait and see how much I can do on my own before I share it.

But speaking of Ben Lives, I’m still kind of debating on how to handle Ben bringing Rey back to life. It makes sense that if Ben resurrects Rey, that he will die since he gave her his life Force. So just cutting him dying might feel like it goes against what the movie established about the power.

So should we just have Ben save Rey and not die, regardless of the questions it might raise, or introduce some “divine intervention”?

Either divine intervention or just have Rey not fully die in the first place. Perhaps she gets hurt or just faints and he wakes/heals her before it’s clear that she’s dead. I like the idea of involving Leia though.

To me, including Anakin has nothing to do with that silly prophecy.

Since I ve never been a fan of those fanedits that make invasive changes to the official Canon, Id like to see an edit that would included those cosmetic changes:
-firstable, remove the damn kiss. Its So bad, So awkward, So out of place.
-remove the fleet’s capacity of destroying planets. Seriously, its gettin ridiculous.
-I d put the scene with Leias body dissapearing After Rey strikes down Kylo. Or, maybe After Hans vision.
-Maybe Id remove the twins’ghosts from the ending. It just looks weird.
-and, if possible, insert as much of deleted material as possible.

Im also not a big fan of the Title. Maybe someone could change it into “The Last Command”, as a nod to the TT. Especially that for a lot of fans, this books was like a “True” ep IX.

Just spoke with my sister and brother-in-law about the film, and they both felt the kiss felt out of left field. It’s so funny to me because I really felt the romantic vibes in TLJ.

For people who want to cut the kiss, that’s fine. But I definitely think if you want to keep the kiss, their feelings for each other need to be set up more. Either the Oracle mentions it or you change Kylo’s mask dialogue. Maybe both. Man, this movie…

Agreed, I wanted to see a kiss and more in the film too. I just wish they talked to their feelings more than, “I will find you and turn you to the dark side.” and “Your Palpatine’s granddaughter.”

For some reason I picture their first scene going like,

Kylo: …your hair is different.

Rey: Same hair…

Honestly, the ST has done multiple solid romances after both previous trilogies couldn’t even get one without it being creepy.

But back on topic, I think the problem with the kiss is that while the subtext is there in TLJ, it’s just that: subtext. I didn’t catch onto it on first viewing and even after the Reylos converted me, I still wasn’t sure if those vibes were intentional or not. The elevator scene definitely has them in spades.

So point is, you’d need to make their feelings a little more explicit.

thebluefrog said:

Darth Lucas said:

I wonder if it would be possible (or even a good idea) to change the twist into that Rey was a clone made by Palpatine to give his soul a new body. Might be able to be accomplished by adding a few Rey bodies in the tanks with the Snoke bodies.

Keeps the same energy as her being his granddaughter without having the question of who the hell did Palpatine hook up with. Also keeps continuity that her parents were “nobody”.

Rey being a clone would’ve been a far, far better plot point than her just being “a Palpatine.” It was really a stretch how they had to make Rey’s parents still be “nobody” yet still explain the granfather link.

In fact, having the Dark Side vision Rey actually be real and be a clone would’ve been far more interesting, too. Probably too hard to do with current VFX editing, though.

I finally got around to seeing TROS yesterday (I had been sort of dreading it), and I’m surprised there’s been so little discussion of Clone Rey on here. This was a popular fan theory before TROS was released. Though not a perfect storyline, it’s certainly logically and thematically more coherent than Rey Palpatine. More to the point, I think it was obviously the storyline that had been originally planned for the sequel trilogy. That weird opening scene with Palpatine talking to Kylo in front of a vat full of Snokes? It’s totally out of place and the Emperor’s cloning experiments aren’t followed up in the rest of the film. But to me it’s pretty clear that in the original version of this scene, Palpatine tells Kylo, “I created Snoke, and I created Rey too.” Rey originates as a Palpatine clone or a Luke-Palpatine clone hybrid (or whatever) in order to serve as a powerful vessel for the Emperor’s resurrection. The Emperor’s laboratory scene was actually supposed to be the moment for the big reveal.

So what happened? Disney execs felt that the Clone Rey backstory was too dark. It wasn’t Disney. So key scenes were re-written at the last minute to make Rey into Palpatine’s granddaughter. The result is not great. You can almost hear Adam Driver apologizing to the audience when he says “You are a Palpatine.”

If I’m right that Clone Rey was the original storyline, I don’t think it would be too hard to restore it, though it would take some new dialogue. The laboratory scene could be taken from the original and cut into the scene (as a flashback) where Kylo Ren tells Rey that she’s actually a Palpatine (Kylo’s lines would have to be changed, of course – fortunately he’s wearing his mask).

The ending would also improve markedly with this, and as per the discussion above, it keeps the idea that Rey’s parents were “nobody” while giving her powers and attraction to the dark side a clearer basis. I think a fanedit based around this idea should be seriously considered – and I for one am dead certain that Clone Rey was the original plotline anyway.

Had an image of a pretty cool visual in my head for an alternate moment for the ending scene.

I have mentioned before that instead of having Rey bury the old lightsabers, we could see her build her new one rather than pull it out of nowhere. Even though Rey goes to Lars Homestead, I wish the ending of the film focused more on how this is the beginning of Rey’s new life. This last scene feels less about her and more about the old characters strangely enough to me.

So imagine we get this sequence of saber parts floating around and coming together. During the construction, I had this image of the first sun rising over the horizon in the background, and we see the crystal floating right at the heart of the sun as the parts of the saber close in around it, making it appear as if the lightsaber is capturing the light of the sun.

I think there is a lot of great symbolism here for a few reasons. Many were speculating on the significance of Rey having a yellow lightsaber, but I think this would make it clearer. Throughout the saga the sun has represented hope, and the lightsaber capturing the light of the sun, as well as the blade being the color of a sun, illustrates the lightsaber as a symbol of hope. Plus, Rey’s name conjures the image of a “ray” of sunlight, so this would help represent this lightsaber as a reflection of her identity. This is her lightsaber, and no one else’s.

Obviously this would require new footage, but luckily I think it all could be done through CGI. One would have to model lightsaber parts and animate them, but it might be rather straightforward for someone who is familiar with animation. If it could be done I think it would be a beautiful sequence.

So what happened? Disney execs felt that the Clone Rey backstory was too dark.

I’m sorry, what? That doesn’t make any sense on any level.

I really can’t see Disney/Lucasfilm making their first female protagonist in a Star Wars film (and the Luke Skywalker for this generation) a clone. The optics for that would be really regressive.

That would just be on the level of “father’s brother’s nephew’s cousin’s former roommate”.

What if everybody’s a clone? What if you’re all clones? WHAT IF IM A CLONE?!

Trevorrow’s Duel of the Fates version of episode IX had some pretty cool imagery. I think it would be a cool connection if we had the First Order meeting take place on a Star Destroyer floating above Coruscant, reminiscent to this piece of concept art from his script. It could just be a regular Star Destroyer, though, like the Finalizer. All you would really need to do is create a single establishing shot, and maybe a planet approach shot.

I can try playing around with that!

And also one of the ‘galaxy defeating the First Order’ shots could be moved here, to get that prequel representation

That would be great!! And I had a similar thought about the finale montage.

I had this idea of reusing the Endor shots, but have the Ewoks watch the Falcon flying overhead to establish Kef-Bir as Endor, because why make the gravesite of the Death Star II a different planet? And it would imply that the natives Jannah and the other Stormtroopers refused to kill were the Ewoks. Maybe the First Order were wanting to get revenge on the creatures that helped topple the Empire.

I just think it is too complicated. Her being a clone of Palpatine or Luke makes little sense. By definition a clone is a copy of a person. So Rey would need to be a copy of someone that looks like her.

Sure, you could say she has Luke’s DNA or Palpatine’s DNA, but at that point is she really a clone? I definitely think even if you could make a good argument for that, it would be just too confusing for the audience.

Maybe Kylo could say, “Palpatine made you.” to imply she is some kind of genetic Force experiment, like an anti-Chosen One. And maybe there could be failed clone experiments of Rey in those tubes. But it still raises the question of who the original Rey was.

@snooker, this is kind of a thought for the future, but I had an idea about the final scene of the film that is similar to something you have done before.

I felt it was a shame that Rey’s look didn’t really change much in the film. Her changing her outfit or putting her hair down to me was symbolic of her no longer wanting to find her parents (or her parents to find), and that should have a new style to represent her trying to forge her own identity. I’m guessing they had to go with a look similar to TFA because of her scenes with Leia. While it would be difficult to change her outfit through the whole film, it would be interesting if at the end of the film she has a somewhat different look.

I think it would be cool to make her clothes half black/half white, just like you did with Obi-Wan’s in that test you did awhile back. It could also be symbolic of her acknowledging both the light and the darkness in her.

While changing her hair would be much more difficult and probably outside of your or my skills, maybe just erasing two of her buns and leaving one bun that is a little bigger might be doable for someone to do eventually. Especially since it is one scene and not the entire movie.

Not to be dismissive, but I don’t love the clone idea for the sheer fact that nobody in the movie ever talks about clones. It feels like such an arbitrary change to me to then have an entire movie after the reveal that thematically and through character dialogue completely ignores the idea of cloning or Rey being a clone. It would just feel way too incomplete and way too much like a fanedit for my tastes.

Say what you will about Rey Palpatine, but atleast there is material there to work with.