I’m currently putting the finishing touches on the Clones portion of the edit. I checked out several 3-in-1 edits (such as Galaxy Betrayed and Empire Begins) as well as HAL-9000’s and octoroxx’s Clones and Sith edits to get some ideas and inspiration.
Attack of the Clones Edits:
-Flipped after the crawl so that we pan down and not up.
-Kept “we made it” but cut “guess there was nothing to worry about” line.
-Padme runs to Cordy after explosion, but when she gets to her, Cordy is already dead.
-Insert deleted senate scene with Padme
-Cut Mace’s line about Dooku not being behind the assassination attempts because “it’s not in his character” (even when I saw this in the theater I couldn’t believe this was actually written and said and then not edited out in post)
-Cut Obi Wan and Anakin reminiscing in the elevator of a past adventure we never saw (mostly because Anakin’s delivery was just jarring and the convo made no sense).
-Cut Jar Jar receiving Obi Wan and Anakin as they get off the elevator. The cut goes from Anakin sweating to Padme and her posse walking towards the jedi from the balcony (without hearing Jar Jar announce them).
-Cut Padme friend-zoning Anakin as well as Anakin’s cringy “you’re beautiful, for a senator” line. Now Padme says “Ani, you’ve grown” to which he replies “so have you” and then she smiles and they sit down. No reason to be creepy right away.
-Cut a little bit of Obi Wan scolding Anakin in front of Padme.
-Cut the whole thing about using Padme as bait and how Anakin couldn’t watch her because she turned off the cameras.
-Cut Jango talking to Zam beforehand. Jango will be the surprise reveal later. Zam inserts the canister and the drone flies off.
-Anakin talks about dreaming of his mother and then we cut to Padme sleeping as the drone is arriving, cut back to Anakin and Obi Wan talking some more about the dreams and then we see the drone beginning to get ready to fire
-No back and forth about not trusting senators. It just didn’t feel right given them trusting the chancellor but not the senators. Either be weary of all politicians or none of them IMO here.
-Borrowed this from the Galaxy Betrayed edit…the drone fires shots at Padme, not slugs. Anakin comes in and blocks the shots and then Obi Wan jumps out of the window and grabs onto the drone.
-Cleaned up a lot of the drone to Zam chase. Anakin does not lose his lightsaber.
-Anakin and Obi Wan arrive at the club and Obi Wan tells Anakin to stay focused and then they enter without the “death of me” and “you’re like a father” conversation (the father comparison didn’t gel for me because Obi Wan calls him his brother at the end of the Mustafar duel).
-Cleaned up the club scene.
-Borrowed from Empire Begins…after Zam is shot with the dart, her dying words are that the bounty hunter is from Kamino
-At the Jedi temple, Mace doesn’t ask Anakin to talk to the Chancellor. Anakin just goes to see Palpatine on his own volition.
-Initially I cut the “chosen one” stuff, but I kept bits of it only to keep things canon. We hear the conversation between Mace, Obi Wan and Yoda about worrying about Anakin on this assignment and then Mace plays the “he’s the chosen one” card only to help sell how blind they were with Anakin. This might be driven home if I go back and keep Qui Gon’s dying words about training the boy.
-Cut the “we’ve got R2” line. Anakin and Padme are both scared and they carry on. R2 as well as 3P0 are in the background whenever I can’t help it, but the idea is not to include them at all in this. It creates too many questions and errors, so they aren’t part of the story and for the most part, you won’t realize they are around based on how I’m cutting things and cropping. R2 around on Naboo wasn’t anything I have the skills to mask away unfortunately.
-Back on track…as soon as Padme and Anakin takeoff we cut to them talking about attachments and I removed Anakin’s poor attempt at flirting. He says we are encouraged to love and she stares at him and then looks down at her food.
-Obi Wan and Mace are talking about Anakin’s attachment to Padme and he gets ready to leave for Kamino
-Anakin and Padme arrive on Naboo along with deleted scenes talking about her childhood and her sister’s children
-Cutaway to Obi Wan arriving on Kamino (all intact)
-The deleted scenes of Anakin and Padme going to her parents and the conversation afterwards with Padme and her mom and sister are re-inserted
-Cut back to Obi Wan seeing the clone troops (all intact). This is not streamlined with meeting Jango, calling the council and trying to arrest Jango. Here are the cuts made to those scenes:
-Cut back to Obi Wan meeting Jango. I cut the line about Lord Tyranus, but the rest is there.
-Obi Wan calls Mace and Yoda (Mace doesn’t ask if Jango is involved in the assassination attempt because it’s like 100% clear and it was said 2 seconds earlier). After the call, Obi Wan and Jango have their fight on the platform as Jango escapes.
-Anakin and Padme’s picnic is in, but the riding of the creatures and the rolling around the grass is cut. Anakin’s political views are shown, but she thinks he’s kidding ironically. This is now streamlined with them having dinner and the pear cutting scene, followed by the now re-colored to look like early evening boat ride and walking to look at the view as she tells a story of swimming to an island.
-Anakin runs his fingers on Padme’s back as she gazes at him, then we fade out to Anakin’s nightmare. No kiss here.
-Anakin is meditating and we have a flashback to him saying goodbye to his mother and asking her if he’ll ever see her again.
-Anakin tells Padme that he needs to help his mother and she says “I’ll go with you” and then we end scene. Anakin apologizing for having to go is cut.
-Obi Wan follows Jango as they arrive on Geonosis. No asteroid chase.
-Obi Wan lands and finds his way inside the temple area and listens in on Count Dooku’s conversation with the Separatists.
-A later shot of Anakin and Padme’s ship is used in place of them arriving in downton Tatooine. Anakin and Padme arrive at his home and meet Owen and Beru as well as Clieg who fills them in. I cut some of Clieg’s lines because one second he says he wants to go after Shmi and the other he says it’s hopeless she’s alive. No 3P0 here.
-Anakin goes after his mother and we don’t cutaway to Obi Wan. We stay with Anakin until he starts killing Sandpeople.
-Obi Wan goes to send the message to Anakin when we cut back to Anakin arriving with Shmi’s body.
-The “not just the men” scene is cut so that Anakin says they’re animals and he slaughtered them like animals, but he feels bad and Padme consoles him. Cut out whining about Obi Wan and of course the “not just the men” dialogue.
-Clieg does not speak at the funeral. Anakin vows to never fail again and we cut to Anakin and Padme in her ship getting the Obi Wan message.
-Padme says to Anakin “you’re not going to leave him he’s your friend” and he responds with “you heard what Master Windu said” and she says well I’m going. Anakin smiles and the ship takes off. No “he’s like my father” line. No droids either.
-Count Dooku doesn’t act like he doesn’t know Obi Wan and no mention of Qui Gon
-Jar Jar doesn’t speak. Palpatine is awarded full control.
-Padme and Anakin arrive on Geonosis where she wants to handle things diplomatically. No droid factory, no other random creatures.
-Deleted scene inserted of Padme and Dooku hashing it out and him taking them as prisoners.
-Before they are taken to the area, Padme says she’s not afraid of dying and that she loves Anakin. They kiss and that’s that. No other back and forth about their relationship.
-Lots of little cuts to the arena fight to tighten up pacing.
-Clones come in to the rescue
-Dooku and Gunray escape and Obi Wan, Anakin and Padme see him and go after him
-No giant Clones vs Droids battle
-Padme doesn’t fall from the ship
-It’s cut so that when Anakin and Obi Wan arrive and jump off the ship to run after Dooku, Dooku flies out of a different exit and escapes while Padme shoots at him.
-No lightsaber duel between them, which also means that Anakin doesn’t lose his hand.
-Dooku arrives and speaks with Palpatine
-Yoda says begun the Clone Wars have then we see the brief montage of the army shipping out for battle
-Mace asks where Anakin is and Obi Wan says he took Padme back to Naboo where we jump to the wedding scene
-The wedding scene will now end with us jumping back to old Obi Wan with Luke and we go into the whole father’s lightsaber sequence
-Luke will ask how his father died and we will jump into Revenge of the Sith…
Running time of this portion is 77 minutes.