Unashamedly doing the 'swords' thing to death: I personally don't know about muting the whole thing out, but how about this instead: you've got the word "Surrender" from Ep 2 in the Geonosis Arena -- is there the use of the word "gentlemen" somewhere? I would've thought Christopher Lee must've said that somewhere in LOTR, the PT, or other movies he's made. The line "Surrender, gentlemen," might be a decent replacement...and still nice and overconfident.

Dealing with each version of the duel:

Version A:

(1) You've got the problem of how Obi-Wan winds up underneath the balcony, since Dooku doesn't cause it to fall in this version. A bit of a continuity difficulty, I would've thought.

(2) As Anakin and Obi-Wan enter, the choice of the 'chair shot' followed by the slightly-distressed closeup is nice, but it's a little disorienting to me IMHHO because the establishing long shot of the deck comes after the closeup. That's a reversal of the traditional way of establishing a scene. I think it flows smoother with the establishment of the overall space first like this: Chair shot. Establishing shot. As Anakin and Obi-Wan start moving, put in Palpatine's distressed closeup, since it then looks like he's reacting to the two Jedi's movement at the top of the balcony.

(3) Regarding the problem of the jar between Dooku's ignition and his words: it's because in the wider shot he's not moving but is moving in the closer shot. But this can be fixed: cut a few more frames off the closer shot so he isn't moving as much, and it should run a little smoother.

(4) Hm. That's an alternative way to get around that Obi-Wan Force push problem, but I personally think the shot lingers on Palpatine a bit too long: as an audience member I can see myself asking "Why does 'Twice the pride, double the fall' have some significance for Palpatine?" I also wonder, as an audience member, where Anakin is when Dooku's doing the Force push.

(5) My impression on viewing Dooku's execution is that Anakin was in cahoots with Palpatine -- that they had some sort of agreement that he'd kill Dooku if it came to that. I love the way it's cut, but that's the impression I got from it -- that Anakin was basically just following Palpatine's orders given at some earlier date.

(6) I would've said slightly less delay on the line "You wanted revenge" -- it's (I think) one beat too slow.

(7) The concluding conversation now works extremely well. Great stuff.

Version B:

(1) Similar concerns to 1-4 and 6-7 above.

(2) I think Version A works better for Dooku's execution. Anakin's remorse comes a bit too suddenly for it to be realistic (in my mind), and Version A just seems to flow better.

...Just some thoughts.