Dom's (Possibly) Useful TROS Edit (WIP) — Page 3

DominicCobb said:

Here’s the thing about the opening, I get what you’re all saying. My thought is I’d like to see it in action. I can see why cutting out scene jumping would improve the pacing even though it’s reducing the runtime. I’m just not entirely confident that’d for sure be the case without seeing it first.

Of course! Any idea is really only proven valuable and worthy under testing in the first place. All these ideas are good ideas but good ideas can sometimes fail out once put into practice. Hell, that’s kind of the story of this movie, and almost any movie being worked on in this section of the board.

But I really do think the last line of your scroll as written in the OP really lends itself very, very well to the tilt down, nebula, Kylo jumps into frame, and we follow him from there. We’re literally finishing the sentence ended by the preceding ellipses in that case. Hopefully it works in practice, but if not, there’s a lot of very creative problem-solvers here, too.

DominicCobb said:

What’s the line again? Isn’t it like they haven’t reported back yet? Maybe doesn’t make the most sense but arguably it makes going from that scene to the Falcon feel natural (again, I’m pretty sure this is where the scene was originally placed).

Yeah, that’s basically the line. The more I think about it I guess it could still work! It feels a little like we should already know what’s happening re: the Falcon but it makes the next transition make sense.

Yeah I feel like that’s important. In a film like Star Wars you have to be careful in how you transition from storyline to storyline. How the first act of TLJ is structured is a good example to look at. Going from Palpatine to Rey right after Rey is mentioned just makes more sense in terms of flow and keeps things focused on that main conflict to start out. I only worry about how the literal transition will work (in terms of music and visuals).

Here’s hoping it will work! Based on my limited messing around, I think it’s doable.

Hal 9000 said:

I can’t wait to see what you’re able to do with Rey Nobody. I’m sure you’ve already considered this, but perhaps the duel in Kylo’s bedroom could end with, “I know what happened to them. I’ll come tell you.”

I have some notes, I’m waiting to personally get my hands on the scene before I make any definite decisions. But it’s probably fair to say most of the dialogue in that scene will be shifted around.

NeverarGreat said:

I think there is some value in giving Rey these darkside abilities, since Palpatine or not she is struggling with some dark emotions in TROS. The lightning especially feels very right for Rey, and I like it even more if it is unconnected with her heritage because it feels organic to her struggle with Kylo.

That’s how I feel yeah. One potential solution is taking a page from DOTF and making it purple lightning.

The Death Star door never really occurred to me. You could probably think of some explanation. What worries me more is Leia’s line “Never be afraid of who you are” and Rey’s talk with Luke. I’m still not sure if Leia’s line tips too much towards ‘She’s a Palpatine’ or if it’s vague enough to work, and the scene with Luke will have to be cut down drastically of course but I wonder what the effect will be with the remaining lines.

NFBisms said:

give rey hand flamethrowers

I’d like to see a cut where everyone has hand flamethrowers, actually.

Hal 9000 said:

Did the DOTF draft really have her using purple lightning?

Yeah, similar sort of situation where she uses it a fit of rage (though it kills a Knight of Ren, not “Chewie”).

I’d read the “Don’t be afraid of who you are” line as accepting the mix of dark and light we all have or something like that.

That’s my hope, though I’d like to find some way to bring that point home more clearly. Perhaps a Kylo Ren line, but I haven’t found any lines from him that’d work to that point.

I honestly think you could get away with not having her parents involved in the story at all.

I think you would have to cut less than you think. If you never saw the movie before, you probably wouldn’t even notice the difference, pacing-wise. At the very least, you might want to insert dialogue here and there to replace some of the dialogue you remove.

But any explanation that tries to fit her parents into the narrative just feels a little convoluted. I think TROS, and Rey’s story, would honestly benefit from a straight-forward conflict of dealing with the potential darkness within her, the same darkness that exists in everybody. Not just the grandchildren of Sith Lords.

At least I think it would be worth trying to edit it that way first. I genuinely think it would be less of a headache than to try and get the parent narrative to work and not feel complicated. Maybe I’m wrong though!

EDIT: Totally just my opinion though. Maybe it could work.

Well, I already do know some of those things don’t have to be totally excised to work. Also, you came up with that clever way to cut the Rey/Luke conversation without mentioning Palpatine, I wouldn’t be surprised if you end up being the one to figure out how to make some of these other changes work!

But despite all of my saying this, I think Dom has a clear idea how to cut it, and should definitely stick with what he has in mind.

I’m taking a very JJ Abrams approach with it, which is basically do it quickly and don’t ask too many questions. Basically, the path of least resistance - cut out all discussion of Rey’s parents trying to protect her and any flashback that shows them loving her and standing up to Ochi. All we see and know is that Palpatine was looking for Rey, and when Ochi couldn’t find her he killed her parents. Does it make sense? Maybe not. But I don’t think it makes any less sense than what we get in the theatrical.

NeverarGreat said:

‘Palpatine sort of forgot about Rey’

Yeah this is the unfortunate aspect, but it’s right there in the original too.

In my mind I have a solution, but I’m not confident I can accomplish it. Basically Palpatine tried to kill a lot of force sensitive babies. But honestly the available Kylo dialogue is pretty limited.