So I skimmed through the version with the Boba Fett subplot. The plot itself is absolutely genius; from a writing perspective every new scene of Boba is great, especially the point him and Han’s final confrontation happens and having him be killed by the AT-ST controlled by Chewie. That should’ve been in the actual movie (though that would present problems for The Mandalorian). I also love the graphics for the views from inside the helmet (like when he’s watching Vader and Luke leave Endor). The only problem is the visual execution. It’s not so much the fan-film footage itself, which is good, but it’s implementation. It should’ve been color corrected to match the rest of the movie. The only part where it didn’t look off was when Boba watches Vader leave with Luke on Endor. There’s also the problem that there aren’t voice lines for Boba for most of the movie. There is one scene (when he asks a dead storm trooper where Han is) and the dude who voiced him did a good job, though I’m guessing that they weren’t able to get the person who voiced him in that to do the rest, as the line probably came from the fan-film they got the footage from. But the rest of his scenes just have text with what he’s supposed to say. The lines themselves are good. However, it is a workprint so I will give that a pass. It’s just a shame that it was cut and never polished, since I was thinking about possibly trying to put the subplot into my own ROTJ edit in the future. I won’t hold it against this edit though.
I’m really glad I got two copies of the edit, as in the Boba version the entire movie is sped up slightly. This is very noticeable because every voice is in a higher pitch. There were also some other things that were very well improved in the newer workprint, like the scene with Vader communicating with Luke after they leave Tatooine; in the Boba version, the footage of Vader is very squished to avoid seeing General Veers. However, the most recent version convincingly cuts Veers out without the footage of Vader being scrunched.
I will definitely applaud the editor here for the effort. Even if it doesn’t always look the best, it was really ambitious, creative, the idea was brilliant, and it looks like they did the best they could with what they had. I’m also very grateful to stretch for being able to provide both versions of the edit. You’re awesome.