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DUELING WITH FATE - The Making of Episode I - A 13-Part Docu-Series (Released!)

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Following on from my Episode III documentary “Falling Into Darkness”, I’ve decided to go back and tackle the first of the prequels in a similar manner. I think I’ve found that there is a lot more material to work with as there are a few TV specials I’ve tried to weave into the mix of DVD featurettes, Webisodes, Blu-Ray breakdowns and other works.

So far, I’ve tried to gather the most amount of material possible, that I’ll list here;

TV SPECIALS
Star Wars - The Magic and the Mystery (1997)
A Long Time Ago - The Story of Star Wars (1999)
From Star Wars to Star Wars - The Story of Industrial Light and Magic (1999)
DVD FEATURETTES
Costume
Design
Fights
Story
VFX
STARWARS.COM WEBISODES
All I Need is an Idea
Assistant Director
Bad Droid Karma
Boys in Paradise
Costume Drama
Home Sweet Home
It’s Like War Now
Movie Music
Prime of the Jedi
This is a Creature Film
Thousands of Things
Three Thousand Anakins
MISC. STARWARS.COM CONTENTS
Casting Director
Depth
Interview Outtakes
Naboo Soldier
One Day to Go
Podracing
Something Out of Nothing
Sound
The Fall
Watto
BLU-RAY COLLECTION INTERVIEWS
Darth Maul Costume
Pre-Senate Address Costume
Queen Amidala Senate Costume
Senate Guard Costume
Full-Sized Battle Droid
Jar Jar Maquette
Naboo Starfighter Model
Republic Cruiser
Sando Aqua Monster
Trade Federation Battleship Model
Anakin’s Podracer Model
Dud Bolt Puppet
Eopie with Anakin Maquette
Queens Royal Starship Model
Sebulba Maquette
Sith Speeder Model
Watto Maquette
BLU-RAY INTERVIEWS
Coruscant Overview
Tatooine Overview
Naboo Overview
Rick McCallum Interview - Filming in Tunisia
Rick McCallum Interview - Podracers
Liam Neeson Interview
George Lucas on Preparing to Write Episode I - 1994
OTHER SOURCES
An Exclusive Interview with George Lucas - Part 3 of 3 - ROTJ VHS (1995)
SW UK Fan Club VHS - Behind the Scenes of Episode I (1999)
The Beginning - Making Episode I (2001)

So far I’ve edited together what I will call the first 3 parts of this documentary. Currently it’s planned as a feature film, but if it gets too long, it could be a doco-series.

Part 1 is covering everything George Lucas that was before even pre-production began. A few interviews from 1994-1997 feature here as Lucas hasn’t even considered directing the film yet. Runtime is 18:30

https://youtu.be/dUOYjy9U-EI

Part 2 covers Pre-Production and a lot of stuff that occurs before production that doesn’t fit into the later works I have planned. There’s the storyboarding, budgeting, creature and prop shops, table reads and another George interview right before shooting starts. Runtime is 21:04

https://youtu.be/TVwGF1guQrA

Part 3 includes talk of casting of the main 4 characters being Qui-Gon, Obi-Wan, Padme and Anakin. There’s talk from the casting director, George and the cast of course. Runtime is 19:29

https://youtu.be/z7RbaOswjm8

I’m not entirely sure how the rest will be structured or how many parts there will be. But hopefully I get to include as much as I can.

Feedback on the editing, or if I’ve missed some Behind the Scenes material, or even a good title suggestion. All are welcome.

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Name it “Unravling the Mysteries of the Menace”.

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Here’s another 2 parts of the doco.

Part 4 is entitled The World of Naboo, as it covers everything from the design and creation of Theed and its technology, the Gungan city, the underwater chase, and some of the final battle. Runtime is 27:41

https://youtu.be/0U0T7_5sTmg

Part 5 is all about everyone’s Gungan, Jar Jar. It’s a bit shorter than the other sections (runtime is 12:41), but I was thinking about combining it with perhaps Watto to make a chapter on digital characters. I’ll have to see how much Watto content there is.

https://youtu.be/isor6zhNh2w

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At this point, it might have to be a mini-series of some sort, as the first 7 parts add up to about 2 hours. I still have Coruscant, lightsaber fights, Maul, editing, etc. left to go. I feel this thing might run up to maybe 3:10 at least, but that’s just an estimation.

Here is Part 7, which is all about Tatooine. Runtime is 23:47. Originally I included Watto and Sebulba in here, but I’ve now moved them back to Part 6, of which is all about digital characters.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NPJC2GEATZU

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Hey Bobson, great idea and great execution as well! I remember the DVD specials back in the day to be very fragmented and scattered all over different and rather exhausting animated menus (the early days of the DVD were like that, I guess). So seeing them all together in one streamlined documentary is a really cool thing. 😃 I started watching the first episode this morning and followed with parts 2, 3 and 4 immediately. There were a few eye opening things, that I didn’t grasp back then - maybe because I was too young, but certainly also because of your rearrangement -, so I’m very happy to have a place now to revisit all these cool documentaries.

Please keep up the good work, since I am eager to watch through all of this! 😃

Just one thing: in your last post you mentioned part 7, but there is no link provided so far. If it’s already done, I would be glad if you could provide a link for that as well!

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This is seriously fantastic, the organization alone will make this a great source to reference back to for anyone curious about the production timeline or specific questions they have about TPM without having to do their own detective work! Just finished part one and it’s exactly the sort of compilation I’ve been looking for, I’ll leave more feedback once I’ve watched more of the series but great stuff so far!

“The ability to destroy a planet is insignificant next to the power of the Force.” - DV

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Ooh… Seeing that this was the last Lucas-led Star Wars film that relied heavily on more traditional filmmaking (i.e. shooting on film, using puppetry/miniatures instead of CGI, etc.), I am definitely looking forward to watching this in full when it is finished!

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I’ve been going back through and updated the VHS footage of the film and the interviews with HD footage. Even the interview footage not avalible elsewhere has now been upscaled to HD with Topaz.

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I’ve also gone back and moved around some footage in the Podracing segement and adding some new footage.

Here’s how it all looks now.

https://youtu.be/JZbX-rKimAI

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Part 8 is about Coruscant (briefly) as it moves onto costuming and touches on what an Assistant Director does on a Star Wars set.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JCwv8PbI_lg

A shorter Part 9 covers the climactic Gungan/Droid battle. There was a lot of work here to merge two different VHS recordings with different framerates and subtitles, as well as upscaling it and editing it together with some other footage from the DVD/Blu-Ray.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TIbHU5BjRsI

Full running time right now is 3hr 27min. Final length I have to assume is around maybe 3:50, maybe more.

It seems light Part 10 will be lightsaber dueling and training, while Part 11 may be editing and deleted scene talk. The final Part 12 I’m thinking will be about wrapping up the film, some final interviews and the release of the film with some early Episode II talk about what it could be.

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Bobson Dugnutt said:

Part 8 is about Coruscant (briefly) as it moves onto costuming and touches on what an Assistant Director does on a Star Wars set.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JCwv8PbI_lg

A shorter Part 9 covers the climactic Gungan/Droid battle. There was a lot of work here to merge two different VHS recordings with different framerates and subtitles, as well as upscaling it and editing it together with some other footage from the DVD/Blu-Ray.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JCwv8PbI_lg

Full running time right now is 3hr 27min. Final length I have to assume is around maybe 3:50, maybe more.

It seems light Part 10 will be lightsaber dueling and training, while Part 11 may be editing and deleted scene talk. The final Part 12 I’m thinking will be about wrapping up the film, some final interviews and the release of the film with some early Episode II talk about what it could be.

the videos are the same…

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Whoops, I’ll fix that link right away.

Here’s Part 10, covering the lightsaber work and fights. Runtime is at 18 minutes. I really wish there was more footage to cover this area especially.

https://youtu.be/mseywnvcv00

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Anyone still keeping tabs on this?

Anywho, here’s the last part of the series, all about the hype and anticipation around the film’s release

https://youtu.be/DInEeMNgcBc

I still plan to collect up some of the unusued clips from here and there and collate them into somewhat of a bonus video, but for now I need to go back through and polish anything. The final total runtime is 4hrs and 39mins. Hopefully this is indepth enough for all you TPM Fans out there.

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Oooh I’m interested in this, I really like BTS stuff, especially for Star Wars. I’d love a link when it’s completed!

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Here’s just a few bits and pieces that I couldn’t fit in anywhere else from the sources I was using. There is still so much more footage out there though through interviews that sadly can’t go through. Hopefully roughly 5 hours is thorugh enough though.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nvG3APtwkvU

Also, does anyone have title suggestions? I was considering Dueling with Fate, or something to that effect. Something reminicent of Falling Into Darkness: The Making of Episode III would be good.

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I’ve just finished uploading the entire docu-series to Youtube, as I’ve now finished the whole project. Also I don’t think I mentioned I settled on “DUELING WITH FATE” as a final title.

Final runtime, is 4hr 58min (including the unused footage epilogue)

I’m happy to render this out as one full file, or in parts and upload it elsewhere if anyone wants it that way.

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This is seriously interesting. I could absolutely go for a five hour BTS.

As an aside though, I misread your title as “A 13-part Dooku series” and was thinking “There’s no way there’s enough content to make a series focused only on Count Dooku.”

The Clone Wars: Refocused | Andor: Movie Omnibus

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I would love a link to the full file, been going back and watching parts these past few days and it really is the most comprehensive collection of behind the scenes and interviews. Goes in depth on almost every fine detail of production. Fantastic work I commend you for all the effort put in I really don’t think there exists a better compilation than this.

“The ability to destroy a planet is insignificant next to the power of the Force.” - DV

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Project resurrected!

After some time away from the whole thing, I’ve come back with fresh eyes and armed with even more footage!

TV SPECIALS
Star Wars - The Magic and the Mystery (1997)
Star Wars - An MTV Special (1997)
From Star Wars to Star Wars - The Story of Industrial Light and Magic (1999)
Omnibus S37E09 - A Long Time Ago - The Story of Star Wars (1999)
Dream Weaver - 60 Minutes Australia (1999)
AMC Cinema Secrets - S01E04 - Epic Battles (2000)
DVD FEATURETTES
Costume
Design
Fights
Story
Visual Effects
OTHER DVD MATERIAL
Introduction to Animatics
Podrace Lap 1 - Animatics
Deleted Scenes Documentary
The Beginning - Making Episode I (2001)
STARWARS.COM WEBISODES
All I Need is an Idea
Assistant Director
Bad Droid Karma
Boys in Paradise
Costume Drama
Home Sweet Home
It’s Like War Now
Movie Music
Prime of the Jedi
This is a Creature Film
Thousands of Things
Three Thousand Anakins
Pickups and Reshoots (Episode III)
OTHER STARWARS.COM MATERIAL
Casting Director
Depth
Interview Outtakes
Naboo Soldier
One Day to Go
Podracing
Something Out of Nothing
Sound
The Fall
Watto
BLU-RAY COLLECTION INTERVIEWS
Darth Maul Costume
Pre-Senate Address Costume
Queen Amidala Senate Costume
Senate Guard Costume
Full-Sized Battle Droid
Jar Jar Maquette
Naboo Starfighter Model
Republic Cruiser
Sando Aqua Monster
Trade Federation Battleship Model
Anakin’s Podracer Model
Dud Bolt Puppet
Eopie with Anakin Maquette
Queens Royal Starship Model
Sebulba Maquette
Sith Speeder Model
Watto Maquette
C-3PO Costume (Episode II)
BLU-RAY INTERVIEWS
Coruscant Overview
Tatooine Overview
Naboo Overview
Rick McCallum Interview - Filming in Tunisia
Rick McCallum Interview - Podracers
Liam Neeson Interview
George Lucas on Preparing to Write Episode I in 1994
Ewan McGregor Interview - Episode II
Blue Screen Acting - Episode II
COMMENTARIES
George Lucas, Rick McCallum, Ben Burtt, Rob Coleman, John Knoll, Dennis Muren, and Scott Squires (2001 DVD)
Cast and Crew - Archival (2011 Blu-Ray)
SW Celebration Panels
Creatures of Episode I with Nick Dudman - Audio Only (Celebration I 1999)
Phantom Menace 20th Anniversary (Celebration Chicago 2019)
Doug Chiang: The Evolution of Star Wars Design - Designing Episode I (Celebration Chicago 2019)
OTHER SOURCES
An Exclusive Interview with George Lucas - Part 3 of 3 - ROTJ VHS (1995)
SW UK Fan Club VHS - Behind the Scenes of Episode I (1999)
John Williams talks The Phantom Menace (1999 Interview)
Filmmaking Has Turned A Corner - Widescreen VHS (1999)
Episode II - The Saga Continues (2000 SW LD/VCD Featurette)
SW77 - Cantina Rough Cut (2011 Deleted Scenes)
TPM - Extended Podrace Wager (2011 Deleted Scenes)
Discoveries From Inside - Models and Miniatures (2015)
Conversations - Doug Chiang Looks Back (2015)
George Lucas on the Digital Revolution (2015)
ESB - Hoth Battle Rough Cut (Making of ESB 2015 eBook)
Every C-3PO Costume Explained By Anthony Daniels (Wired Youtube Video 2020)
Light and Magic - Episode 6 (2022)
Obi-Wan Kenobi - A Jedi’s Return (2022)

The original 13 part series ran at 4:43, and the current runtime is about 6hrs, so there is a lot of new stuff in here. I tried to work a lot of the unused footage from the first run, before working in even more material, and then keep adding more and re-arranging. I’ll watch this before release and try to trim it down a bit and make sure there isn’t too much fluff. It’s running at the same length as the Fellowship of the RIng Appendicies, so we’ll see where we end up.

Last things to work in will be the cast/crew commentary, and then I’ll do a pass at trimming it down and we’ll see how we go from there.

I’m having fun with some on-screen text too which is fun, trying to do a bit of this.

https://vimeo.com/819526776?share=copy

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The biggest edition for this latest round of editing, was adding in a lot of Doug Chiang (Design Director) and his panel from SW Celebration, he now additionally discusses his design process, and dives deeper into things like the Battle Droids and Trade Federation, as well as added material in every other section of the doco.

I reccommend watching on it on its own as well.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uYK1OXlm7Us

There’s a lot more John Williams too, as he talks about the music theory and crafting specific tracks, and how they relate to the OT. I found an interesting pack of interview clips that I assume were taken from some kind of EPK Tape or something. Incredible stuff, he now has his own section dedicated to the score.

There’s further specific discussion of the progression of digital filmmaking, with both the CG Characters, and how George tried to get the industry moving, with this film and leading into AOTC. Episode I was the first film to project digitally, and shot a lot of 2nd unit and additional photography on digital cameras, a first for the industry. Really compelling stuff.

Hopefully that extra 80 minutes is worthwhile enough to go around this monster project again!

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That is some great news, thanks for the update!