Solo: A Star Wars Story (Alternate Cut)

Hello again!

I wasn’t really expecting to do another edit so soon after the Alien: Romulus one, and I didn’t really think I was actually doing one until I realized I’d spent couple 2-3am nights in a row poking at what I thought was just an idea or two I had. I guess it was inevitable. You hang around OriginalTrilogy, you’re gonna give a Star Wars edit a go (ya lumpy brute!)

Anyway: Solo! Why that one? Well, I think the last 7 years have been okay to it, really! There’s always been sort of rueful charm there, a ramshackle vibe that feels like a dog-eared Del Rey paperback come to life, and almost 10 years later, I feel like it’s actually grown into that more. I liked that it didn’t really take itself or “Star Wars” that seriously! I didn’t mind its tone, or the irreverence with which it treated its “legends,” none of that!

What I minded was what everyone else seemed to mind: The look is a complete mismatch with that tone (all respect to Bradford Young), it took way too long, and it took way too much pleasure in stopping to pull up Wookieepedia pages and explain them way too loudly. Now, this edit doesn’t get rid of all the “And here’s how Han did X!” stuff, because then there’d be no movie; that’s just the cost of admission here, unfortunately. But there can be some balance between letting backstory just be backstory, in the back somewhere - and letting things also be foreshadowing without signaling that through on-the-nose yapping about it as it’s happening!

So that’s the goal of this Alternate Cut - to keep that paperback vibe alive, while minimizing the “lore”-fest it gets bogged down in visually and metaphorically. I’ve tried to do that via some scene and dialog deletions - primarily conversation trims (a few throughout), especially with Han’s would-be “mentor”/enemy Tobias Beckett, and through the excision of Corellia entirely (that’s the big one). There’s also the removal of that one special guest star since it was always kind of a goofy Marvel-esque inclusion that never went anywhere in the first place; and your by-now-standard color-correction. It’s no “The Bold One” or anything, but hopefully it’s providing the show a little more punch. (examples below).

• Runtime is now 1hr, 59min. Burnt-in subs for alien languages, english subs (srt) and chapters included. Dolby Digital 5.1, 1080p.

Please PM me if you’d like to check it out! As always, any suggestions, questions, critiques, comments, whatever you got, I’m all ears 😃 Thanks!

Thanks for that! I did a scene-by-scene correction, but not shot-by-shot. I tried to keep it a little punchy/crunchy still, but I didn’t want to lose any details in the highlights or blow out the upper-registers if I didn’t have to - which ended up being harder than I’d anticipated. Often I’d think “well, that looks pretty solid” - and then I’d check the scopes and the shots on either side of it, and realize I’m clipping the hell out of everything past a certain point: suddenly clouds are just solid white sheets, windows are just blank white squares, etc. For a movie that is generally thought of as being flat and dim, you’d think there’d be a lot of headroom to play with, but nope!

Finding the right balance for the saturation levels was also kind of a weird tiptoe through the dials - and I probably slipped here and there, too, LOL. I’m no Dre, after all. But all in all I think I landed in a place where it looks right for the paperback vibe - not oversaturated, not blown out - but not low-contrast or faded, either. Just the right amount of pulpy & vivid, if maybe a teeeeensy bit inaccurate (or color-cast in a slightly too-strong direction) for a scene or two.

Hey thanks for the questions! And I definitely don’t take any offense or anything at all like that, I’m just happy folks are interested and care to toss some questions my way! Onto the bullet points:

• I kept all of the Lando + L3 stuff. Not just because I don’t mind it (I thought it actually fit pretty solidly with that pulp paperback feel I was trying to preserve as much as I could) but because like 99% of Donald Glover’s best stuff in this movie is rooted there to some degree. I also feel like the Kessel Run doesn’t work as well as it can without L3 at full volume, as it were. She’s how they get out of the colony, and she’s how they complete the run, so it lessens the impact of both those things if I truncate the setup for those payoffs by muting her somewhat. The shower scene never occurred to me as a thing to cut, actually! I just thought it was one last physical comedy button on the preceding “Beast” scene where they’re both messing with each other pretty ruthlessly.

• The origin of his name is completely gone along with anything that happens on Corellia.

• The movie is still “Solo: A Star Wars Story” - down to the logo appearing on the screen. it doesn’t look exactly the same, nor appear in the same place though (again, no Corellia. No crawl, either)

• I did address Han’s “softness” to some degree. There’s a few moments where the original version of a scene plays out in a way that makes him look like a neophyte to crime/smuggling that doesn’t track, and I’ve clipped lines/reactions so it reads less like he needs his hand held, and more like he’s just observing or waiting for an opening. There’s at least one moment that’s been edited quite a bit to make his reaction to a meaningful event less sympathetic.

Hopefully that’s not too much of a deal-killer?

one half of one! It happens pretty quick, too.

edit: I almost forgot I put it up on YouTube for people to stumble across, LOL.

This is how the movie now opens, and where the 1/2 of a deleted scene appears -

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kg6v_jIMAKc

Hey everyone, quick heads up: I updated this to v2 recently while I was putting the finishing touches on the Rogue One: Special Edition. It’s now 23 seconds faster than the last cut! Still looks the same, still sounds the same, still sticking to that dog-eared Del Rey paperback feel.

“Wow,” you might say. “23 seconds. Oh boy.” Yeah, don’t get too excited Princess. I know. You see, what had happened was…

In the late stages of finishing the Rogue One: SE (available now, btw!) I was waiting for some stuff to do some other stuff, and I remembered that there were always 4 or 5 things in Solo that I’d meant to pull out of that edit, that I’d just… spaced on! Maybe if I’d slowed down like I had done on Rogue One, I wouldn’t have forgotten in the first place, LOL. So I just dragged the old “Solo.Alt.Final.Forreal.V5.Ugh.ProRes” into Final Cut while I was waiting and… did 'em!

So, yeah. Twenty-three seconds. I’m not even rounding down, buddy. But you’d be surprised (or maybe not, considering this movie) at how many little callbacks, overexplanations, and on-the-nose moments could be fit into :23 seconds (Spoilers: It’s about five of 'em). I guess to make this v2 post interesting, I should actually note the primary changes the Alternate Cut makes to the movie, which I didn’t when it first released:

PRIMARY CHANGES: Not every microedit or dialog trim has been noted, but the major edits and changes to the film are below (v2 changes in italics.)

• Lucasfilm/A long time ago title card replaced with modified versions of Return of the Jedi’s (taken from TN1’s 4K83 scan, modified by Ooohteedee for his OTD83 project)

• Movie begins with a Star Destroyer dropping out of lightspeed and approaching planet cutting to second half of “Han Solo: Imperial Cadet” deleted scene. Star Destroyer scene by YouTube user Coastlake via their “Blender Test 003”. This opening transitions straight to Mimban, deleting the entirety of Corellia.

• New title card (taken from Theatrical Trailer) dropped between shower gag and Han & Chewie’s post-rescue conversation. “What’s your name anyway?” gag trimmed up

• Gang campfire discussion trimmed for pacing and to improve comedic beats, and ensuing Coaxium heist edited slightly to reduce extra explanation/exposition.

• Han’s punch-interrupted apology to Beckett trimmed for pacing/performance.

• L3’s confrontation with the tranya addict running the droidfight ring trimmed to remove fanservicey callback

• Approach to Kessel Mines, and securing of station for 2nd Coaxium heist edited for pacing/performance/removal of fanservicey wookieepedia flexing.

• Maul appearance and conversation with Q’ira completely deleted.

• Showdown with Beckett edited so Han no longer goes to him after shooting him down.

• Han & Chewie meeting with Enfys lightly edited for performance

• Iris out to credits brought forward in time with music crescendo and hyperspace tunnel.

If you already have the edit, and you’re like “I don’t need a v2 just to make it less than 30 seconds shorter” – Heard chef! Thanks for giving it a shot in the first place! If you have the edit and you’d like the update, just re-download at the link you already got, the file’s been updated (In fact, anyone who has reached out in the last 3-4 days already got v2!)

If you’ve never gotten this edit before but this seems like something you wanna try out, PRIVATE MESSAGE ME A REQUEST, OR EMAIL ME DIRECTLY AT STRAIGHTCUTSNOCHASER AT GMAIL. DO NOT JUST REQUEST A LINK DOWN BELOW Not only is “link plz” not a great way to get noticed, not only will site ownership probably just wipe it out (it’s against the rules here!) but it’s honestly way better odds you’ll get seen and get your request fulfilled faster if you just PM me, anyway. 😃

Any suggestions, comments, critiques, questions - whatever you got, I’m all ears.