That’s a HUGE relief that you thought this all flowed! That second half took a lot of work from a lot of options and this was my preferred (and shortest) version so if you think this worked as a whole I’m very happy.
At no point did this feel like anything was joined together.
I did trim Ahsoka’s “check me out”, mainly because there’s the full-body scan shot and I don’t like the camera gawking at a teenager and the whole “boys will be boys” thing (probably for the same reason that we both have an issue with Ahsoka assuming that the senator friend was male). But the hint at flirting isn’t vital here, so I think it’s an OK trim. Did the actual cutting feel natural there?
That’s a fair point. It’s only because I found it funny that I noticed it wasn’t there. It was funny to me because she behaves so much like Anakin in non-Jedi situations as well as in fighting, but it’s not the end of the world to remove it, she still gets similar fails in the Ondaron arc. Otherwise there’s no indication there’s anything cut.
You mention liking the episode but forgetting that it spelt out that the corporate seats were corruption, but I’d like to correct you here and let you know that that wasn’t something from the original episode 😉 That’s a scene from the far less enjoyable Senate Murders episode rather than the greater Heroes on Both Sides/Pursuit of Peace duology. That said, while you’re quite right about corporate seats being bought, I do like that they have a senate which includes more than just member nation states. It’s cool that there are some powerful corporate elements, as well as that neutral systems collectively have a seat even though they’re external. It’s a little distopian and a little utopian too.
I’ve not seen Senate Murders for years so I didn’t spot any inserted scenes here. I’m impressed though considering the lower quality of the early episodes.
And yeah, American “Table a motion” versus UK “Table a motion” is an unfortunate complete opposite of meaning. I also thought about removing ‘Caucus’ because it’s very specific to US politics but I didn’t want to break the flow of that scene to achieve that trim.
They even use the correct meaning of the phrase later on (I think it was Mothma) when the put the peace talks on the table or something like that.
My largest recontextualising was when Padmé’s walking alone before she gets jumped. Having watched my episode, why do you think Padmé was walking alone there in that scene? I’d like to see if my intentions carried across! Do you think that scene worked?
I thought it was strange at first but Padmé is always doing reckless things like that so I thought she was doing it to try draw out the people who were attacking her allies.
And of course the ever-important question: Would you prefer to watch this over the original three episodes?
I think I would yes. I don’t think I’ve seen any of your edits that aren’t as good as, or preferable to, the originals yet, though I’ve not watched them all.