Hopefully it will just take a few days to get familiar with Sony's DVD Architect 3.0. The program should allow branching, although I doubt it will be seamless - more likely there will be slight pauses. I'll do what I can to orgranize the footage so that the branching is done during the more quiet and still moments.
As for Ocpmovie's suggestions - I am going to incorporate the deleted scene where Ash recruits Henry the Red. I feel it is a worthy scene that deserves to be in some version of the movie. The video quality in this scene is actually not too terrible, though it certainly has blemishes. I've already spent a day digitally removing a great deal of hairs, spots, markings, and all of the splices in the footage - and it looks a little better but still needs more attention. As far as the audio in this deleted scene - anyone have any ideas on how to make it sound better? I've tried different audio filtering methods and nothing really helps. There probably isn't a whole lot that can be done.
And yes - I am using a method that directly streams all 24p VOB footage into my video editor without loss of quality or recompression of any kind. For the SciFi footage and deleted Arthur scene, I am using IVTC to recreate the original 24 frames per second. Again - it's all progressive. The final version will have the necessary pulldown flags for interlaced players - but the progressive image will be preserved for progressive players.
For those of you asking about it - A preservation of the SciFi cut itself is a fine idea for a project. Except for the tape running out during the S-Mart ending (which should be exactly the same as the theatrical version), I have the entire SciFi cut recorded onto Digital 8. I believe that other than the extra scenes and additional music - the only other main difference with this cut is that the final battle sequence is edited in a different manner from both the theatrical and director's cut (though I'd have to check to be sure). Sometime after my main project is done I'll also release the unmodified, full-screen SciFi version separately if no one else gets around to it. I'll need to recheck the tape to ensure there won't be any problems.
I think that about covers it - looks like I'm going to have a little more to do with Army of Darkness than originally planned. It shouldn't force that much of a delay though. However, I do have finals coming up - and that gets top priority unfortunately.