Firstly, that initial transition. I agree that ideally you’d open on the Jedi going underwater, but this being Star Wars, we really should begin in space. We could follow the ambassador’s ship (now just anyone’s ship) into the Trade Federation ship, but then we should really have some scene on the ship itself, perhaps implying that the two Neimoidians have just arrived to oversee the situation. The invasion trigger shouldn’t happen until after the Gungan negotiations, but there is one scene of the two Neimoidians walking (away from the monitor) which might be usable with a zoomed shot and some alternate lines.
Secondly, context. Whatever the first scene with the Jedi is, it needs to carry some of the exposition we’d otherwise cut, setting them up as negotiators and mystics. I’ve had a bit of a play with this on top of Peter Pan’s ideas but haven’t finalised my thoughts yet, and you can’t do too much voice work without it becoming “fan-edity”. And while we don’t need the underwater fish stuff, some of the dialogue on the bongo can be a bit useful in emphasising what the Force is (“The force will guide us”, “maxi big the force.”)
Maybe use the original opening shot with the ambassadors ship going past the blockade and use the „I have a bad feeling about this“ scene, but replace the lines about the negotiations with the Federation with some remark about them already filling their supplies with war machinery. Ideally I‘d like to characterize the Federation as vultures that observe the situation from above, waiting for their turn to cannibalize upon the situation, but I can’t think of a good line that works in this context.
It’d also be nice to have them account for the failiure of the negotiations - probably using the line “Well you were right about one thing master; the negotiations were short.” But again you’re wrestling with voice lines there.
Maybe we could add the bongo speeding away from otoh gunga? Shouldn’t be too hard to find a shot of Obi-Wan talking in the bongo that fits his mouth movement closely enough for an edit.