AI Star Wars Fan Edit Ideas Megathread — Page 2

Several years ago, I had the idea of repurposing the footage of Rey’s mother (Miramir) as her Jedi master and cutting out the footage of her father (Dathan) entirely for a Rey nobody edit that still connected her to the Skywalker family.

Rey’s backstory would then go on to be somewhat like this:
Rey was a force-sensitive child who was sold by her parents for drinking money (As stated in The Last Jedi). However, that person turned out to be Miramir; Luke’s Jedi apprentice. Over time, Rey learned the ways of the Jedi but they were also targeted by Sith cultists. In order to protect Rey from them; Miramir leaves her on Jakku while she tries to contact the rest of the Jedi but she’s killed before doing so when Rey accidentally blows up her ship with force lightning. The trauma of doing so is heavily repressed by Rey; who vaguely remembers Miramir and mistakes her as the mother who abandoned her on Jakku. It would also be the loss of his first apprentice what made Luke the paranoid man that was tempted to kill his own nephew in order to protect the rest of his friends.

This was mostly feasible with the footage that we had (Though it would need some editing for the force lighning destroying the ship); but the main problem would be the dialogue (Namely; the reveal at the hangar and Luke’s encounter with Rey on Ach-To during Episode IX).

Nowadays, however, creating dialogue with AI voices is feasible for a task like this (Though now the challenge would be making the lips match or writing good dialogue to begin with lol).

ELAYEM said:

Several years ago, I had the idea of repurposing the footage of Rey’s mother (Miramir) as her Jedi master and cutting out the footage of her father (Dathan) entirely for a Rey nobody edit that still connected her to the Skywalker family.

Rey’s backstory would then go on to be somewhat like this:
Rey was a force-sensitive child who was sold by her parents for drinking money (As stated in The Last Jedi). However, that person turned out to be Miramir; Luke’s Jedi apprentice. Over time, Rey learned the ways of the Jedi but they were also targeted by Sith cultists. In order to protect Rey from them; Miramir leaves her on Jakku while she tries to contact the rest of the Jedi but she’s killed before doing so when Rey accidentally blows up her ship with force lightning. The trauma of doing so is heavily repressed by Rey; who vaguely remembers Miramir and mistakes her as the mother who abandoned her on Jakku.

Personally the retcon that bothers me the most from TROS is that the people who left her behind were good people doing a good deed. That does a disservice to Rey’s character. If anything, TROS should reveal that the reason they sold her is because they feared her and her power. This is what allows Leia to step into the motherly role and do what her own mother never could.

I do love the idea that as a result of their purposeful abandonment child Rey blows up their ship and buries that memory deep. The only problem is that in order for a 5 year old to be that powerful untrained, you have to follow it up with an insane reveal that puts her on a comparable level to Anakin Skywalker. This is where I got the idea to have her conception be literally forced upon her mother via Palpatine’s shenanigans (influence the midichlorians to create life), and therefore still allow Palpatine to claim Rey as his family in a twisted sort of way later on.

The problem of course is that this introduces a whole new problem: where does that leave the Chosen One prophecy? That’s a sensitive matter for a lot of Star Wars fans, and Ahch-To doesn’t have enough space to touch on that.

Regardless, I listed out the dialogue sequence I had for this idea in my other thread. It works so well on a character level but messes with the mythology that people have come so attached to that I don’t know if it’s feasible.

EDIT: I’ll put it here too so people don’t have to go digging for it

K: I pushed you in the desert because I needed to see it. I needed you to see it. The memory you buried.
R: You’re lying.
K: You lie to yourself. Your parents were no one. Junk traders who sold the child they feared…
R: Don’t!
K: You remember more than you say. I’ve been inside your head.
R: I don’t want this!
K: Accept the truth. See what you did!
Brief flashback of her parents’ ship being jolted by lightning and shutting down / plummeting with Falcon shutdown SFX
K: You caused their deaths. And became the monster they feared.
R: Stop talking!
K: Rey, you’ll get your friends killed, too…
transition to brief scene of Pryde ordering Finn and Poe to be executed
K: Tell me where you are. You don’t know the whole story. Your mother couldn’t explain your birth. The man you called father came after. You were never their choice. Born of no father… just like Vader.
Anakin igniting his saber on Tuskens, kneeling before Shmi’s grave, behind shot of Anakin + Palps at the opera, igniting saber on younglings, slaughtering Separatists, hooded Sith-eyes Anakin shot intercut rapidly with dark Rey on the throne and finally the mask being lowered on Vader.
R: No!
Vader’s charred mask falls to the ground
K: So that’s where you are. Palpatine wants one of us on his throne.
R: No…
K: I’ll come tell you why.
Later in the hangar
K: Rey, please listen to me. I know why the Emperor sees us both as his heirs.
R: Tell me.
K: He learned to drain a vergence in the Force… and have it take form. First, my grandfather. Then you. Both, marked by Palpatine… Bodies strong enough to host his spirit, born with potential far beyond his own. Now, he wants to test which of us is stronger. But there’s still time to let old things die. Together, we can trap his spirit. And end the Sith.

Some other line changes:
Rey - “I killed my mother… and my father… I’m going to find Palpatine. And destroy him.” (no lipsync required)

Ahch-To Sequence:
Rey - “I killed my parents. Everyone will be safer if I’m gone. I’m never leaving this place. I’m doing what you did.”
Luke - “I was wrong. Failure reveals where you still need to grow. What are you most afraid of?”
Rey: “Myself.”
Luke - "Because Palpatine marked you? Leia sensed how much you’re like Vader.”
Rey: “She never told me. She still trained me!”
Luke - “Because she saw your spirit. Your heart. Rey, some things are stronger than blood. Confronting fear is the destiny of a Jedi. Your destiny. If you don’t face Palpatine, it will mean the end of the Jedi. And the war will be lost.”

Palpatine: “It is your birthright to rule. Here. It is in your blood. Exegol’s blood.”
Palpatine: “The life force of your bond. A dyad in the Force. A power like life itself. Two that are one. And now the power of two restores the one true Emperor.”
The dyad would still be included as a 3rd act reveal because it’s necessary in order to explain why Palpatine couldn’t have just absorbed Kylo’s power in the very first scene of the movie.

Another thing AI could be used for is creating a Force ghost of Anakin who’s actually an older version of Hayden Christensen.

I understand why Lucas replaced Sebastian Shaw with Hayden. He wanted to create a stronger connection between the Prequels and the Original Trilogy. And honestly, I’m all in for it. But including a younger version of Anakin doesn’t make sense from a narrative standpoint. Anakin didn’t die on Mustafar, he died on the Second Death Star, when he turned back to the Light Side and sacrificed himself to save Luke. That’s basically the entire reason Return of the Jedi is called Return of the Jedi to begin with. It’s the return to the Light Side of the fallen Jedi, the return of Anakin. Thus, Anakin’s Force ghost shouldn’t look like his younger self, he should look like his older self.

So I’m all in for having Hayden Christensen in Return of the Jedi, but he should look like a 40-year-old version of Hayden, not a 20-year-old one. AI could fix this by giving us exactly what we need: an older version of Hayden Christensen that we can use instead of the younger version.

I would love to see that Spartacus.

When deepfaking started getting good, I had planned to attempt this using a lot of the Hayden interviews that he did for the Obi-Wan Kenobi show. But A.I. at this point would be so much easier, and less awkward looking.

Jar Jar Bricks said:

K: I pushed you in the desert because I needed to see it. I needed you to see it. The memory you buried.
R: You’re lying.
K: You lie to yourself. Your parents were no one. Junk traders who sold the child they feared…
R: Don’t!
K: You remember more than you say. I’ve been inside your head.
R: I don’t want this!
K: Accept the truth. See what you did!
Brief flashback of her parents’ ship being jolted by lightning and shutting down / plummeting with Falcon shutdown SFX
K: You caused their deaths. And became the monster they feared.
R: Stop talking!
K: Rey, you’ll get your friends killed, too…
transition to brief scene of Pryde ordering Finn and Poe to be executed
K: Tell me where you are. You don’t know the whole story. Your mother couldn’t explain your birth. The man you called father came after. You were never their choice. Born of no father… just like Vader.
Anakin igniting his saber on Tuskens, kneeling before Shmi’s grave, behind shot of Anakin + Palps at the opera, igniting saber on younglings, slaughtering Separatists, hooded Sith-eyes Anakin shot intercut rapidly with dark Rey on the throne and finally the mask being lowered on Vader.
R: No!
Vader’s charred mask falls to the ground
K: So that’s where you are. Palpatine wants one of us on his throne.
R: No…
K: I’ll come tell you why.
Later in the hangar
K: Rey, please listen to me. I know why the Emperor sees us both as his heirs.
R: Tell me.
K: He learned to drain a vergence in the Force… and have it take form. First, my grandfather. Then you. Both, marked by Palpatine… Bodies strong enough to host his spirit, born with potential far beyond his own. Now, he wants to test which of us is stronger. But there’s still time to let old things die. Together, we can trap his spirit. And end the Sith.

Some other line changes:
Rey - “I killed my mother… and my father… I’m going to find Palpatine. And destroy him.” (no lipsync required)

Ahch-To Sequence:
Rey - “I killed my parents. Everyone will be safer if I’m gone. I’m never leaving this place. I’m doing what you did.”
Luke - “I was wrong. Failure reveals where you still need to grow. What are you most afraid of?”
Rey: “Myself.”
Luke - "Because Palpatine marked you? Leia sensed how much you’re like Vader.”
Rey: “She never told me. She still trained me!”
Luke - “Because she saw your spirit. Your heart. Rey, some things are stronger than blood. Confronting fear is the destiny of a Jedi. Your destiny. If you don’t face Palpatine, it will mean the end of the Jedi. And the war will be lost.”

Palpatine: “It is your birthright to rule. Here. It is in your blood. Exegol’s blood.”
Palpatine: “The life force of your bond. A dyad in the Force. A power like life itself. Two that are one. And now the power of two restores the one true Emperor.”
The dyad would still be included as a 3rd act reveal because it’s necessary in order to explain why Palpatine couldn’t have just absorbed Kylo’s power in the very first scene of the movie.

I kind of figured out a way to do this without retconning Anakin himself:

K: I pushed you in the desert because I needed to see it. I needed you to see it. The memory you buried.
R: You’re lying.
K: You lie to yourself. Your parents were no one. Junk traders who sold the child they feared…
R: Don’t!
K: You remember more than you say. I’ve been inside your head.
R: I don’t want this!
K: Accept the truth. See what you did!
Brief flashback of her parents’ ship being jolted by lightning and shutting down / plummeting with Falcon shutdown SFX
K: You caused their deaths. And became the monster they feared.
R: Stop talking!
K: Rey, you’ll get your friends killed, too…
transition to brief scene of Pryde ordering Finn and Poe to be executed
K: Tell me where you are. You don’t know the whole story. Your mother couldn’t explain your birth. The man you called father came after. You were never their choice. Born of no father… just like Vader.
Anakin igniting his saber on Tuskens, kneeling before Shmi’s grave, behind shot of Anakin + Palps at the opera, igniting saber on younglings, slaughtering Separatists, hooded Sith-eyes Anakin shot intercut rapidly with dark Rey on the throne and finally the mask being lowered on Vader.
R: No!
Vader’s charred mask falls to the ground
K: So that’s where you are. Palpatine wants one of us on his throne.
R: No…
K: I’ll come tell you why.
Later in the hangar
K: Rey, please listen to me. I know why the Emperor sees us both as his heirs.
R: Tell me.
K: The Force made my grandfather, and Palpatine learned to do it himself. He drained the vergence on Exegol… and had it take form elsewhere. You… were shaped by Palpatine… A Chosen One, not of the Jedi, but of the Sith. Now, he wants to test which of us is more powerful. But there’s still time to let old things die. Together, we can trap his spirit. And end the Sith.

Some other line changes:
Rey - “I killed my mother… and my father… I’m going to find Palpatine. And destroy him.” (no lipsync required)

Ahch-To Sequence:
Rey - “I killed my parents. Everyone will be safer if I’m gone. I’m never leaving this place. I’m doing what you did.”
Luke - “I was wrong. Failure reveals where you still need to grow. What are you most afraid of?”
Rey: “Myself.”
Luke - "Because Palpatine claims you? Leia had visions of you taking his throne”
Rey: “She never told me. She still trained me!”
Luke - “Because she saw your spirit. Your heart. Rey, some things are stronger than blood. Confronting fear is the destiny of a Jedi. Your destiny. If you don’t face Palpatine, it will mean the end of the Jedi. And the war will be lost.”

Palpatine: “It is your birthright to rule. Here. It is in your blood. Exegol’s blood.”
Palpatine: “The life force of your bond. A dyad in the Force. A power like life itself. Two that are one. And now the power of two restores the one true Emperor.”
The dyad would still be included as a 3rd act reveal because it’s necessary in order to explain why Palpatine couldn’t have just absorbed Kylo’s power in the very first scene of the movie.

Problem is that you miss out on a lot of the parallels between them. The benefit of the first version is that it retroactively explains why Luke does things that are out of character for him in the sequels, why Leia gives up on her training due to her darkness, why Ben emulates Vader, etc. Kylo has less reason to believe that the dark side is inherent to his own nature versus Rey in the second version. More importantly though Leia doesn’t forgive her father implicitly by choosing to train Rey.