Saw this a few days ago & found it to be a very admirable attempt to remove Palpatine from the equation. While I’m not sure how it’ll hold up on repeated viewings, I find it pretty novel that Rey’s storyline is separate from the Resistance storyline at the end if only for making Finn’s heroism stand out more. With that said, there were a few bugs I had with the edit:
-There’s a lot of spacing within the crawl that feels off
-Not starting the movie with Mustafar exacerbates the breakneck pacing of the theatrical cut.
-I can still hear Palpatine lauging at one point where we’re on Exegol
-The quick fades to white between the movie & the fanfilm feels weird to see in a Star Wars movie. Have you experimented with just cutting from one scene to another. There’s also noticeable music cuts between the fan film & the movie
-When Rey says “I’m starting to think it’s impossible,” I hear a noticeable audio cut, as well as a sudden shift in music around that time
-Intersting note to hear Kylo & Vader telling Rey to join them
-I hear Poe saying the “S” sound of “Somehow, Palpatine has returned”
-Could you cut Maz saying “if we want to stop him…” in the scene where the Resistance learns of the Star Destroyers? I know she’s referring to Kylo, but Kylo’s name hasn’t been mentioned in that scene.
-Rey telling Poe “You were right before.” That dialogue was deleted, so this makes no sense.
-Music cuts when the Falcon leaves the planet, as well as when Kylo force slams that one general in his meeting room. I know it was to cut the mention of Palpatine, but it sticks out.
-Not sure how to feel about the Knights of Ren being here. You probably can’t remove them completely, but at least keeping them silent reduces their presence. Maybe even remove mention of them being the Knights of Ren?
-Not sure why the scene of Hux talking with Pryde about their capture (Chewie), when you could just cut that scene out and not lose anything
-The cuts trimming Poe’s "everything would’ve been for nothing’ speech sticks out.
-I hate Zori’s line about splattering Poe’s brains on the snow. I’m not someone who rags about “this doesn’t feel like Star Wars,” but apart from that, muting the line allows the film to breath more. Her pointing a gun at Poe is enough.
-On one hand, I like removing mention of Poe being a spice runner, but now the scene fills too quiet without Finn going “get your spice” for such a long camera shot
-Poe & Zori’s talk on the balcony just ends suddenly
-Thanks for trimming down the mind trick of the two Stormtroopers
-Hux saying “we don’t have much time” is cut away from too quickly
-Weird audio mixing for Kylo when he tells Rey “You SENT down THE ship.” I’m also not sure why he tells her his mother was Vader’s daughter if there’s no Palpatine for genetics to play a role in this cut.
-Kylo sensing his mom & Leia dying feels random. It should go from Rey leaving with the Falcon -> Leia lying down & “dying” -> Kylo sensing her “death.” You can get around the potential plot hole of that sequencing (“Kylo knows his mom’s dead but not Rey?”) by holding off on the shot of people gathered around at her deathbed until Finn & Poe get back. Also, weird soundmixing when Leia goes “fInD pOe…”
-When Poe asks Finn if he knows who Rey is, cutting Finn’s response just feels awkward.
-Awkward soundmixing strikes again, this time from Poe. “Finn, we GOTta GOooo…it’s leia…”
-Surprised you didn’t overdub a sad R2 noise upon learning 3PO lost his memory.
-Thanks for keeping the horse on the Star Destroyer.
-Audiomixing again. “You wanted to prove to my mother that your a Jedi but SHE’s gone…”
-Cutting off Duel of the Fates, even temporarily, feels wrong? The fight in full should play out more
-Love cutting Luke saying his line about a Jedi’s weapon, but the cut itself is jarring.
-Hate Luke saying he stayed on Jakku because he was afraid
-“If you don’t, it’ll mean the end of the Jedi” sounds really garbly
-It’s weird for Poe & Finn to look at each other, walk off…and then come back to hug each other 10 seconds later.
-I don’t like the cut to black between the tri hugging & Kylo in the ocean, it feels out of place. But I do like how Leia’s body disappears after he throws his lightsaber away.
-I still see a residual orange glow around Rey’s purple lightsaber
-Thanks for cutting out the old woman, but the music is cut off.
-I like the idea of ending with everyone in the Falcon, but no one seems happy to see each other or looking off towards the future. It’s obvious this isn’t the final shot of the film. Maybe put it before they fly off into the binary sunset?
Still though, this edit has great bones to it. Looking forward to V2!