Episodes 1 and 2 are nearly complete. (For those keeping count, that’ll be 1,2,5,6,7,8 out of 8 all done.)
Here’s an edit from my episode 2, ‘An Unexpected Journey’, which I’m particularly proud of: Bilbo getting captured by the trolls.
I believe the trolls scene should stay in my series, because it shows Bilbo’s first attempt at burglary, and while his attempt fails, he demonstrates some good smarts, and it begins to endear him to the group. It’s also in the book, and it’s referenced in the Lord of the Rings movies.
However, it’s full of snot jokes, and slapstick, which to me feels like unwelcome bad humour.
If you keep the trolls scene you do need to have Bilbo get caught with a sneeze, since that’s the moment that moves the plot forward and he’s also covered in snot later. So we have to accept that element.
However I’ve been able to cut the whole scene down to under half the time, without any of the other snot or slapstick, with Bilbo’s journey making visual sense, with the background audio making a full conversation, and with the audio matching with the video where lipsync or SFX are needed (except one visual sneeze which doesn’t have a sound effect, because to be honest the sound was egregious, and I’m happy to not draw attention to the visual).
I also flipped one shot from the original film, where Bilbo sneaks right-to-left, when the rest of his actions in that part are left-to-right.