The Star Wars Prequel Trilogy: Special Editions. New fan edits with a different approach

Hello, all. You may know me for my Star Wars prequel trilogy fan edits: “Faster, More Intense”, “Sanded Down”, and “Another Happy Sanding”. I made the first two of these edits in 2017, and I think it’s fair to say, almost a decade later, that I’ve grown as an editor and my sensibilities have changed somewhat. While I did go back and make some minor updates, these fan edits are still largely reflective of where my Star Wars fandom and editing philosophy was almost ten years ago.

At the same time, there has been a massive shift in popular opinion about the Star Wars prequel trilogy. These films, which were once almost universally derided, have become fond memories for a whole new generation of fans. While the Star Wars prequel trilogy has been fan edited to death, I do think there is actually an under-served population who enjoys these films while recognizing some of their flaws, and may be looking for lighter fan edits that address some of the issues while still keeping the eccentricities and flavor that make them distinct cultural artifacts.

While I haven’t done a complete 180 on my opinions about these films, I’ve decided that I want to re-approach them with a fresh set of eyes. Hence, the name “Special Editions” as a tribute to George Lucas’s penchant to revisit his films. My current favorite fan edits are Hal9000’s "maximalist’ editions, so I will be taking some cues from those, but unlike my previous edits, I will be working from the original Blu-Rays as a base, and recreating most “borrowed” ideas from scratch (although I may borrow an effects shot or a snippet of lossless audio where appropriate).

I will also be upscaling the Blu-Ray footage to 4K and adding subtle filmic effects like grain, halation, and grading changes via DaVinci Resolve. For Attack of the Clones, I will be using the chroma information from the HDTV broadcast to restore colors that are closer to the theatrical release. The audio will be presented in lossless FLAC 5.1 along with an AC3 track for compatibility.

Unlike Hal’s edits, trying to smooth over retcons or bridge more cleanly with the original trilogy will not be a goal of these edits. With the Clone Wars, Tales of the Jedi, and other beloved material building off the prequel films, I prefer to treat them as a distinct era of Star Wars.

I will be starting with Attack of the Clones because it’s my least favorite of the three films, and the one that I think needs the most consideration. One goal I have is to try to make some of the scenes work that many editors tend to excise completely. Here is a test clip showcasing a work-in-progress version of the garage scene, where Anakin confesses the slaughter of the Tuskens to Padme. My goal was to remove the on-the-nose dialogue and other elements that strain credulity. I want Anakin to seem intense and slightly frightening, but not so much so that we can’t believe Padme would choose to stay with him. Let me know what you think:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PRy_S5Bwvec

Very nice! I’m so glad somebody is tackling these movies with this approach. That scene does flow a lot better now without the “whining”. And he definitely didn’t need to dig himself a hole in front of Padme by talking about the women and children. Having him just say that he killed “all of them” is enough to read into for the audience’s sake.

What are your thoughts on including the Kenobi flashback early in the movie in a similar way to Spence’s edit of AOTC? This does feel very “special edition” coded in that it sticks out a little bit like the Jabba scene in ANH lol.

Jar Jar Bricks said:

Very nice! I’m so glad somebody is tackling these movies with this approach. That scene does flow a lot better now without the “whining”. And he definitely didn’t need to dig himself a hole in front of Padme by talking about the women and children. Having him just say that he killed “all of them” is enough to read into for the audience’s sake.

What are your thoughts on including the Kenobi flashback early in the movie in a similar way to Spence’s edit of AOTC? This does feel very “special edition” coded in that it sticks out a little bit like the Jabba scene in ANH lol.

I will definitely consider it. I do like that scene in the context of AOTC. It’s just a matter if I can get it to visually match well enough for me to be happy with it. Notably, I haven’t seen any versions that attempt to de-age Obi-Wan, which I think would be somewhat necessary to get the scene to fit seamlessly.

Skybatman said:

Nice clip, is more natural, if im gonna leave a suggestion it would be that remove the mention of sifo-dyas from the clone plot, it’s really convoluted and incorent.

Thanks for the suggestion. I don’t plan to do this, since one of the goals of this edit is to mesh cleanly with other on-screen canon, and the Sifo-Dyas thread is picked up in The Clone Wars.

This is exactly what I am after and I’m happy you’re doing it

Caleb Gamman’s AoC edit is probably my favourite one precisely because it is conservative with what it cuts

This version de-ages Obi-Wan and also Ani’s voice:

https://youtu.be/PvVvNiDTR_A?si=3v2DyJOFeAiHoiy9

I don’t know much about the creator though.

Jar Jar Bricks said:

This version de-ages Obi-Wan and also Ani’s voice:

https://youtu.be/PvVvNiDTR_A?si=3v2DyJOFeAiHoiy9

I don’t know much about the creator though.

That actually looks pretty good. I will think about it. The creator seems to be all-in on AI generated video, which I don’t love, but this de-aging effect is pretty subtle compared to some of the other stuff on her channel, and seems in line with something an official release might do.

I noticed that a couple of Anakin’s words got cut out. I know the method that she used to de age his voice, but the problem was isolating his lines cleanly. I could do it myself if we figured out how to do that. She probably wasn’t fully able to isolate them which is why a couple of the lines dip in and out of clarity.

Honestly my biggest concern with the scene is the lighting and color grading. I don’t know that I would be able to get it to closely match the look of AOTC. I saw Spence’s edit and he tries but it still doesn’t look quite right. I’m not going to promise that this scene makes it in, but if you want to do any further work on it, I’d be interested to see it.

Can you update the cgi in the prequels?

So, speaking as someone who is fond of the PT and their quirks and would like to preserve as much of them as possible, the only one of the films I would like a fanedit of would indeed be AotC; my only issues with it are the editing and heavy exposition, that diminish the impact of the scenes that are there, or make plot points harder to follow. I think it’s a good story, told well in the novelization especially, but the intent of many scenes gets kinda smothered by the film’s editing.
So for example, I appreciate Caleb Gamman’s edit of AotC for its approach regarding the pacing, and reframing certain bits of dialogue (the way he did Anakin and Obi-Wan’s dialogue right before Padme’s assassination attempt was great and subtle, for example). But, his edit loses me once it starts cutting stuff, as I think it leans too far into his personal tastes (disliking the humor, cutting the romance scenes’ dialogue, altering the action scenes in any way, etc). I’d rather preserve George’s creative decisions as much as possible, warts and all, just have it be presented in a less jumbled manner.

In your edit above, I honestly think trimming Anakin’s dialogue here is unnecessary. Gamman’s edit did a similar cutting of this dialogue, and it was pretty well done technically; but out of all the scenes in the film, I think this is the one where Anakin’s fully allowed to be quote-on-quote “whiny”. He’s having an emotional breakdown and beating himself up from his own overbearing guilt, that’s the point - and Padme has only ever been told how the Tuskens were vicious brutal monsters prior to this, so I never felt that this would’ve been “relationship ruining”. She knows he just lost his mother under incredibly cruel circumstances, so while she’s shocked, she’s still trying to support him through his grief.

Personally, the only thing I’d change about how Anakin and Padme’s relationship is presented by the film would simply be adding back the “meeting Padme’s family” deleted scene, and maybe reordering the picnic scene to happen before the “first kiss- but no, we shouldn’t” scene, to give the latter a bit more buildup. Maybe trimming a little bit of Anakin’s complaining to her about Obi-Wan; not entirely, but make it less overbearing.
I highly recommend giving the AotC novelization a read if you haven’t already, and I’d also recommend giving the YT video “The Romance of the Prequels is Good, Actually” (by 66 seconds) a watch, as it does a great job highlighting the intent behind many of the scenes. I don’t necessarily agree that they’re all executed perfectly, but I think they all have purpose behind them, which I’d prefer not get entirely cut.
(For example, there’s this one scene which the video also points out, where Anakin says something awkward and then bites his lip in regret - which is great, but my problem is that it barely registers, because the scene’s almost immediately fading to Obi-Wan anyway. Obviously I don’t expect a fanedit to suddenly be able to add extra seconds to that shot lol, but I’d rather it be kept in the film instead of the interaction being cut entirely, you know? That’s the philosophy I’d like to see a fanedit tackle the film with).

I know you haven’t talked about ROTS yet, but if you could do something like the following (or just ask this author for permission) to the Palpatine fight it would be excellent and not something we’ve seen on the forum before:

https://youtu.be/YC8VRvDNw1k?t=120&is=y5fUd79hhHoTYxhd

DWN-016 said:

So, speaking as someone who is fond of the PT and their quirks and would like to preserve as much of them as possible, the only one of the films I would like a fanedit of would indeed be AotC; my only issues with it are the editing and heavy exposition, that diminish the impact of the scenes that are there, or make plot points harder to follow. I think it’s a good story, told well in the novelization especially, but the intent of many scenes gets kinda smothered by the film’s editing.
So for example, I appreciate Caleb Gamman’s edit of AotC for its approach regarding the pacing, and reframing certain bits of dialogue (the way he did Anakin and Obi-Wan’s dialogue right before Padme’s assassination attempt was great and subtle, for example). But, his edit loses me once it starts cutting stuff, as I think it leans too far into his personal tastes (disliking the humor, cutting the romance scenes’ dialogue, altering the action scenes in any way, etc). I’d rather preserve George’s creative decisions as much as possible, warts and all, just have it be presented in a less jumbled manner.

In your edit above, I honestly think trimming Anakin’s dialogue here is unnecessary. Gamman’s edit did a similar cutting of this dialogue, and it was pretty well done technically; but out of all the scenes in the film, I think this is the one where Anakin’s fully allowed to be quote-on-quote “whiny”. He’s having an emotional breakdown and beating himself up from his own overbearing guilt, that’s the point - and Padme has only ever been told how the Tuskens were vicious brutal monsters prior to this, so I never felt that this would’ve been “relationship ruining”. She knows he just lost his mother under incredibly cruel circumstances, so while she’s shocked, she’s still trying to support him through his grief.

Personally, the only thing I’d change about how Anakin and Padme’s relationship is presented by the film would simply be adding back the “meeting Padme’s family” deleted scene, and maybe reordering the picnic scene to happen before the “first kiss- but no, we shouldn’t” scene, to give the latter a bit more buildup. Maybe trimming a little bit of Anakin’s complaining to her about Obi-Wan; not entirely, but make it less overbearing.
I highly recommend giving the AotC novelization a read if you haven’t already, and I’d also recommend giving the YT video “The Romance of the Prequels is Good, Actually” (by 66 seconds) a watch, as it does a great job highlighting the intent behind many of the scenes. I don’t necessarily agree that they’re all executed perfectly, but I think they all have purpose behind them, which I’d prefer not get entirely cut.
(For example, there’s this one scene which the video also points out, where Anakin says something awkward and then bites his lip in regret - which is great, but my problem is that it barely registers, because the scene’s almost immediately fading to Obi-Wan anyway. Obviously I don’t expect a fanedit to suddenly be able to add extra seconds to that shot lol, but I’d rather it be kept in the film instead of the interaction being cut entirely, you know? That’s the philosophy I’d like to see a fanedit tackle the film with).

Thank you for the feedback. Not sure I’ll be able to get to the novelization but I’ll definitely check out the video you mentioned.

I’ll keep playing with the Tusken confession scene but I think we just fundamentally disagree. Padme has always been characterized in other media as someone who fights for the rights of the downtrodden and sees the humanity in everyone. There’s even a deleted scene from this movie where she volunteers with alien children. I just don’t believe she would react that way to Anakin admitting to killing children, even if the Tuskens are stigmatized as a savage/monstrous race.

Jar Jar Bricks said:

I know you haven’t talked about ROTS yet, but if you could do something like the following (or just ask this author for permission) to the Palpatine fight it would be excellent and not something we’ve seen on the forum before:

https://youtu.be/YC8VRvDNw1k?t=120&is=y5fUd79hhHoTYxhd

Wow, yeah that definitely has a lot more energy. I was originally going to take the Hal9000 tact of just removing the flips but this might work just as well. I’ll see what I can incorporate when I get to ROTS. Still working on AOTC at the moment.

Something I could use feedback on is whether to incorporate the deleted scene of Padme addressing the senate about the creation of an army. I think it’s a good scene and gives some additional characterization to Padme as a powerful leader, but it doesn’t really tell us anything that isn’t already in the opening crawl. Also, the JarJar VFX are a little wonky, even in the version edited down by Hal. If I did use it, I’d probably put it in the same spot as Hal.

Skybatman said:

i have a similar suggestion, but a different video:
https://youtu.be/b9Luv10fW70?si=pjvKoh6Yj7raEuVR
also about the padme addressing the senate, yes u should put in the movie

I’ve never seen this one. This was awesome. The first cut back to Anakin getting in his ship works so well

I’ve never seen that before, either. I think how he intercuts Anakin travelling works a lot better but the fight itself still feels a bit slow.

He’s got another video on there that’s pretty interesting where Yoda shows up to Palpatine’s office at the same time that he ends the call with Anakin/Vader. I wonder if he planned to have the fight between Yoda and Palps end sooner than it does during the fight between Anakin and Obi-Wan.

Alternatively, one could cut it so that Palpy is getting ready to strike, cut the awful flying spinning whateverthehellthatis effect and cut to Anakin landing, from there cut back to the battle and it’s just Mace vs. Palpy.

The FX are so bad it seems to me a fair trade, haven’t looped back to the music cues, might have an issue there.

regularjoe said:

Alternatively, one could cut it so that Palpy is getting ready to strike, cut the awful flying spinning whateverthehellthatis effect and cut to Anakin landing, from there cut back to the battle and it’s just Mace vs. Palpy.

The FX are so bad it seems to me a fair trade, haven’t looped back to the music cues, might have an issue there.

I think it’s important to see the other Jedi die on screen, unless you remove them from the scene entirely, which I think is a little bit beyond what this edit is attempting to do.

Here is a second test clip for Attack of the Clones, showing the placement of the deleted scene with Padme’s family. I’m experimenting with also using the accompanying scene in Padme’s bedroom, which I don’t think I’ve really seen used in any other fan edit, but I’m still 50/50 on it. I’ve made some adjustments to the scene iin an attempt to draw a parallel between Anakin and the children Padme attempted to rescue. Let me know if you think it works, or if you think there might be a way to improve it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0429F2G8StU

I wonder if the audio / brief visual flash in that moment could actually be the scene between Anakin and Padme en route to Coruscant. Since in both cases it was Padme caring for somebody younger than her.

“Are you all right?”

“It’s very cold…”

Jar Jar Bricks said:

I wonder if the audio / brief visual flash in that moment could actually be the scene between Anakin and Padme en route to Coruscant. Since in both cases it was Padme caring for somebody younger than her.

“Are you all right?”

“It’s very cold…”

Oh, good call.

That’s also an option. The pro to what I suggested is that it’s definitely more relevant to the Padme/Anakin dynamic in particular since she did the same thing with him that she did for these alien children. But the con is that it might be confusing to hear Padme’s voice with an echoey effect if she’s standing right there next to him.

To me it feels a bit too overt having the flashback in the same scene, especially because Star Wars typically doesn’t do stuff like that to make its connections. I almost wish the edit could establish viewing Anakin through that lens earlier so that when this scene shows up the similarity could click into place for the audience without forcing it.

The only way I can think of to do that would be if the deleted scene from the refugee ship where Anakin has a nightmare about Shmi and Padme wakes him up could be reinstated before they arrive on planet for this sequence. That scene includes Anakin’s dialogue: “I left Tatooine so long ago that my memory of her is fading. And I don’t want to lose it.” which I think does a great job of pointing the audience’s view of Anakin in that sort of pseudo-orphaned-rescue direction and makes him more sympathetic. It also would remind the audience of the Shmi nightmare plot point rather than just establishing it once with the conversation with Obi-Wan at the beginning and then waiting all the way until it shows up again right before they head to Tatooine. Perhaps the orphaned-rescue point could be further driven home if we could see into his nightmare before he wakes up on the ship (like we do in Revenge of the Sith) and there you could put flashbacks to his goodbye to his mom (“I don’t want things to change” as Skybatman thinks is best) and his interaction with Padme on the way to Coruscant (“It’s very cold” as Jar Jar Bricks thinks is best) all coming to a climax with Shmi screaming for Anakin to help her as he wakes up.

All of that being said, trying to use that deleted scene would be a nightmare. Trying to fit it into the pacing would be difficult. It would probably also create tonal whiplash where we go from the sombre nightmare into happy again with arriving on Naboo and meeting the family back into sombre with the bedroom scene. And then there’s the fact that there is some obvious unfinished VFX in that scene that would either need to be fixed or adjusted in some way to make it less apparent. I thought maybe this wasn’t even worth suggesting because of these issues, but perhaps contributing this to the discussion could stir up some other more achievable ideas that create a similar result?