Acbagel

Minor Mandalorian Season 3 spoilers below!

Well, my friends, we have the complete picture. I think it will be a long while before we get any new Mandalorian content from Disney. That last episode very much felt like a closing chapter. I am curious as to if Mando S4 will ever see the light of day. Perhaps it may come out in 2025 without Filoni’s direct involvement (which seems to have been how the majority of S3 was produced), or even be pushed way back behind Filoni’s movie. Whatever happens with the future of these characters, it’s going to be at least two years before we get anything new here. It definitely cemented my suspicion that I can only make one film out of this whole season.

I had initially planned to use Pershing & Kane’s content as a B plot throughout the whole film, eventually leading to Gideon’s return, but wow that content did not connect to anything whatsoever. I thought this last episode would bring at least a hint of a payoff to the 45 minutes we spent with them out of nowhere, but it rendered it a total waste of time. That’s all getting cut in my edit now.

I have a general storyboarded order of how I want things to play out and it’s a realistic runtime. But I have a TON of VFX to do… I’ll be parterning with at least 3 other editors (Dazman, Movies Remastered, & ildiem) to collab on some scenes we all have interest in making. Next week I’ll share some of my storyboarding ideas for Book 6, so if you have any suggestions in the meantime, please do share.

End of spoilers.

Book 3 update:

I was planning on having this film ready to go on Friday, but upon review… I really need to create a hair darkening mask and track it on Gideon’s Shadow Council scene. The white-grey is just too noticable, even with as many lighting tricks as I can pull off. I need to manually mask him having black hair. I can get it done, it’ll just add a couple days of additional work. Aside from that, I’m going through one final bug fix review and swapping some scenes around, but we’re probably 85% complete at this point. I’m going to shoot for a Monday release of this, and then the turnaround on Book 4 should be much faster as well. Might even get both out next week as I already have Book 4 ~40% updated while I was waiting on some bug review reports on Book 3. Excited to share my new ideas and hear your thoughts as well. Please feel free to share spoilers here starting tomorrow, and let me know if you think anything across all 6 of my books need changing considering the entirety of the character arcs we were provided with.

So many wonderful ideas in here, that’s a lot to unpack! Much of this could turn out very well if the right context can be presented. I especially love the change to include BoBF final battle as part of an episode. Looking forward to seeing how this turns out.

I’m starting to do some VFX removing Grogu from many scenes as well, so DM me if you want to collab on anything and split up the work.

Wow, that finale was shockingly lackluster, and my expectations were not high at all going in.

I am extremely tired of the trope where the captured protagonist gets casually escorted down a hallway by two careless guards and escapes in 20 seconds. Seriously, Gideon? That does not at all seem like a strategic move he would’ve made as how he has been portrayed as so cautious and forwar thinking. Why did he even send Din away in the first place? Apparently he was going to interrogate him, so he valued something Din knew to such a degree that he didn’t want to kill him on the spot. But then to barely send an escort for knowledge that was so valuable that he wouldn’t kill Din in the midst of battle… I’m just not buying that plot convenience.

Then Din almost immediately escapes by wrecking the two miserable armed guards… Then doesn’t pick up their blasters and is whining in the very next scene that he is unarmed?? What? In the words of Qui-Gon, “Are you brainless?”

What happened to all the TIE fighters and Bombers? So they tear the cruiser to shreds in orbit and then just abandon the battle? These ships don’t have hyperdrives, so where did they all go…? Why did they not completely demolish the Mandalorian drop ships or attempt to shoot down all the Mandos jetpacking down? They by FAR outnumbered the Mando fleet and had incredible air superiority.

How did the Darksaber break? It’s made of pure beskar, Din had marveled about it being the most impressive beskar-created weapon he’d ever seen, yet it shatters from a slight squeeze from Gideon’s augmented suit? Yes, I understand that new Phase of Darktrooper armor provided extreme strength enhancements and could likely snap a bone in half, but snap beskar in half…? No. Din’s beskar spear survived an orbital bombardment that blew a starship to scraps and the spear didn’t even have a dent or a scuff. Yet Gideon can casually crush it in his palm? Plus, Bo’s hand was still gripping the saber when he does this move, and she treats it like a bruise or maybe a small broken bone when even if he could generate the strength to crush beskar, her hand should be turned into pulp.

I could go on about the pacing, terrible slew of fast wipe transitions, incomplete VFX etc, but we can all see this episode and season just didn’t get the TLC it deserved. This is a real shame and I am feeling pretty dejected about the state of Star Wars right now. I do have faith in the Ahsoka show, but if that doesn’t generate hype we are headed for some dark times my friends.

Darth Sadifous said:

I finished Book Two and really loved your depiction of Boba Fett. He is calculating and cunning; actually the bounty hunter I always envisioned. It is amazing what some editing can do to really tweak the depiction of a character. I also was generally surprised how well some scenes were reorganized and repurposed to fit your new narrative. Some of the scenes I thought especially worked well was the Sorgan village scenes and what you cut within those I was not sad to see go as it was one of my least liked episodes of season one.

It was a interesting take on cutting out the Fennec and Toro exchange, I am not 100% sure how I feel about its exclusion. I also see you glossed over Fennec being taken to a modder for life saving treatment. I guess we are to assume she has already been augmented before Boba finds her left for dead in the desert. My only very minor grip is I thought some of the early jumps from Sorgan to Tatooine were a bit jarring at times. Overall, great job; I am looking forward to V3 of Book 3 soon and seeing how you shape Boba’s potrayal in “modern day” as that is what I have had the largest issue with in the orginal Book of Boba Fett.

Thanks for the feedback! Glad you enjoyed my take on a Legends inspired Boba. Modern day Boba will come in Books 4 & 5, and I believe you’ll like him just as much! I’m still making great progress on Book 3, definitely will have it ready this week. And the production time on Book 4 will be much quicker since there isn’t a huge story order change like the first 3. I’m actually updating Books 4-6 right now as well while I have a couple more pairs of eyes doing bug reviews on 3, so all of the coming films are making good progress. I just started reorganizing Book 5 in light of Season 3, and then started storyboarding my Season 3 focused Book 6. Can’t wait for this last episode tomorrow so I can finally have the complete picture of what I can do!

Sent to Malgus and gurgle!

Sent!

Darth Sadifous said:

I just finished the first chapter and my favorite part by far to that edit is the new flashback insertion throughout from the pram in the trash to the final standoff between the Mandolorian forces and the bounty hunter guild on Nevarro!The contrast between Din’s introduction to Mandalorian culture and Grogu’s was perfection. The edit seemed seamless upon first viewing and I cannot wait to watch the revised episode II now. Keep up the great work and may the force be with you…always!

Thanks! So glad to hear all that. Looking forward to seeing what you thought of Book 2!

Just wondering, Moff Giedon’s appearance is slightly different in the latest episode of The Mandalorian with him no longer having a moutache. I know it is minor, but are you going to be able to do some digital trickery to account for his change from season one and two to season three if you plan to insert it into Book 3?

I do indeed utilize “digital trickery”!

So the two main differences in Gideon’s Season 2–>3 appearances are:

1. The lack of a mustache
2. Some greying in the hair

My solution:

1. Digitally remove his mustache in all my other Book 3 scenes.
2. Alter the lighting of the Shadow Council scene to keep his hair looking darker.

Yes, Gideon will again have a mustache in Book 4. But as these films take place across weeks-months, I see no problem in Gideon growing facial hair occasionally. It’s a pretty thin and stubbly mustache anyways that could easily be grown in a few days by many men. It was only jarring seeing it in the same movie, but across movies, I don’t think is an issue. And we could even theorize he only shaves to look professional for his Shadow Council meetings anyways.

EddieDean said:

Definitely out of scope for this - I’ve got a lot of respect for the TCW voices and wouldn’t want to recast them even to their original live action equivalents!

It really freaked me out when I heard Lanter’s voice on the Celebration panel and I instinctively related it more to Anakin than Hayden’s voice. Love both men and their performances, it just comes down to time spent hearing each voice, and there’s so much more screen time with TCW Anakin. It has actually evolved to a point where that feels more natural to me now.

Book 3 Update! I have a working draft completed and am beginning the full watch through --> bug fix phase.

RogueLeader said:

Has this most recent episode given you confidence in being able to put together a decent edit for this season?

This episode was exactly what I expected it to be. Getting back on track, but unable to solve the larger issues of the season as a whole in and of itself. I was initially planning on making 2 films out of Season 3 (before it started…), but now I believe it’ll just be the one. And yes, I do have confidence in what I will be able to transform it into. If you have seen my old BoBF edit (Book 5), I believe this will be similar to that edit where I have to MASSIVELY restructure a huge number of scenes in order to tell a new narrative. I am looking forward to getting into this season’s content and starting to work through the maze of scenes soon.

Daiyus said:

I watched Book 1 and Book 2 last night. Oh. My. Word! These are phenomenal. Absolutely fantastic work, and does exactly what I was hoping for; to blend BoBF & Mando perfectly.

I love the restructuring to the first part of Mando’s story, the arc between retrieving Grogu, handing him off and then rescuing him after the prison break works so well! The flashback work is inspired and perfectly reflects the parallels in their histories. The only cut that felt a little awkward to me was Kuill collecting IG-11. It’s a very short sequence that felt a bit out of left-field when I was refocused on Din after the prison break. Chronologically it makes sense where it is now, but thematically maybe it should follow on from the farewell on Arvala before cutting away to Din on Nevarro? Or maybe something of a post-credits thing? I’m honestly not sure exactly where I’d put it, but I just wanted to be honest with you on that one.

Thanks for the review. So glad you enjoyed the new presentation. I’d love to use something else for the IG-11 scene, but there are barely any “travel” scenes in the season that work to bridge a passage of time. Do you think it would feel less awkward for it to be a jump-to-hyperspace immediately followed by a jump-out-of-hyperspace? I typically hate to do that as it feels like a teleport instead of a journey, but I also hate awkward/distracting alternative scene placements.

While Book 1 is practically perfection, Book 2 is even better in my opinion. I wasn’t sure how I’d feel about so much of Sorgan being cut, but it’s absolutely spot on! The two series are beautifully blended together and the feeling that they’re ships in the night is great. Boba’s characterisation is much closer to what you’d expect from the character, brilliant stuff. I’ll be honest, I did miss the rite-of-passage making the gaffi stick, but completely understand why it’s been cut to maintain the characterisation and pacing; the lizard trip was a bit strange in the original material, and it’s hard to see a way to keep the rite and keep it all thematically sound.

Wow! That’s awesome to hear. Book 2 was very difficult to make! EddieDean and I reviewed at least 3 full drafts with different scenes and story orders before settling on this final cut, so that’s amazing to see that it worked out for you. Getting all those events paced out to work narratively was like figuring out a 1,000 piece puzzle haha. I agree, missing out of the gaffi stick carving was my hardest cut to make as well. I wrestled with that one quite a bit, but ultimately it didn’t fit the pacing and this film needed something left on the cutting board for the greater good. Sometimes that happens and if this were a DVD it would definitely be in the “Deleted Scenes” section!

I’m really stoked to see what comes in Book 3 and beyond. I’ve enjoyed Mando Season 3 overall so far, but I was also concerned about how some of the content would fit into a cut like this. Watching the new episode last night has definitely grounded it all a bit for me, and I’m really interested to see how you blend the new content. Overall this has definitely become my definitive way to watch this content on repeat, and it’ll only be new season releases that I watch through D+.

That’s quite the compliment, thank you very much. As I said above, once you watch my coming Book 5, I hope it’ll give some hope for what I may be able to do with Season 3 content. I’m excited to get the last episode soon and start experimenting in the lab.

PsyGemini said:

So I finally sat down to watch the remaining of Book 1. I specially love how the action scenes flow so much better. Mando was such a badass by the end of it. The fight with the droids at the prison was so damn cool!

Thanks so much! I put an absurd amount of time into touching up the action sequences haha. Frame by frame by frame. Every fight. I think it makes a huge difference though.

Those are my only nitpicks:

1 - I really liked having the prison episode here, but maybe trim down even a little bit more the secondary characters? Maybe the chit chat at their introduction, or they walking the corridors? idk, felt like we spend too much time with such expendable characters.

If the film dragged on, I would probably agree with you here, but it’s under 2 hours before the credits so I don’t feel it’s necessary to chop the length any more. We’re going to spend a good 45 minutes with those characters (and one comes back later in the series) so I don’t feel bad about some talking segments here. Plus, it gives us a look into the daily life of a bounty hunter. Din has probably taken dozens of jobs like this and it’s a cool look into his life.

2 - 1:42:28 that cut was VERY abrupt. Maybe a classic wipe transition would help a lot?
However, IMHO, how about moving that scene to just after mando leaves arvala-7? 'Cause we haven’t been with Kuiil for pretty much an hour, so it’s really weird and confusing when he just randomly pops in for a 40 second scene that doesn’t even pay off (in this Book 1, of course) after that.

Yes, a spiral wipe would probably work well here, and I addressed the IG scene above if you have any further feedback.

3 - Din giving Grogu the little ball thing was perfect for the closing moment, however… just the next scene and it’s back at the top of the lever, which kinda completely ruins the moment lmao.

Well that scene takes place in hyperspace, and the next scene where the ball is re-attached takes place once landed on Sorgan. That is many hours-days seperated. Din usually puts the ball back on each time Grogu gets it for a while.

Anyways, onward to watching Book 2, and anxious to getting Book 3! As always, outstanding work! Wish I could be that good of an editor…

Awesome, hope you enjoy the sequel! Book 3 is coming very soon. You can definitely learn, I’m nothing special 😉 YouTube videos can teach you as much as any degree if you are self-motivated.

Darth Niederlander said:

Sorry for being late here,
but can i please have the links to the books ?!

Kind regards,
Little Darth Niederlander

Of course, sent!

Thanks for the support and feedback everyone. So many messages between here and in DMs that are much appreciated.

jedi_bendu said:

timdiggerm said:

I have to say, having someone say the words “Heir to the Empire” is a little on the nose

It’s definitely not as cool as her next line, “I can sense a dark force rising, we have to stop Thrawn before he can issue the last command.”

My favorite was right after that when she enters the World Between Worlds and said, “Perhaps by looking at these specters of the past, we can receive a vision of the future.”

Sent! Hope you enjoy.

Minor spoilers from today’s episode below:

The Shadow Council scene is actually perfect for a spot in Book 3. As soon as I saw it I knew that was a missing piece that I needed in my current film. I’ll trim/edit some dialogue accordingly, but showing Gideon’s presence in the larger Imperial Remnant is perfect for continuing to build him up as a fleshed out villain in Season 2. Additionally, starting to tease Thrawn earlier is way better than the initial name drop from Ahsoka out of nowhere. I’m ~40% through updating Book 3 and starting to plug things into my change log now.

I hope it’s more than nods and references to the Legends Dawn of the Jedi. It should be an adaptation of that storyline. I’m not saying you need a 1:1 translation of every page, but I would love to see Disney try a faithful adaptation of a Legends storyline for once. Bring it into Disney canon and modernize the presentation for sure, but don’t completely rewrite things and then toss in a few minor easter eggs to the comics and novels. Let us see the Rakata and the Force Hounds as the villains, show the Tho Yor and all the old lore that made the era so rich.

I’m actually pretty interested to see how they handle the Tython v Ahch-To dilemma now. Obviously the comics take place on Tython, which is now in Disney canon from the Mandalorian as an ancient Jedi world, but the Dawn of the Jedi symbol was also on Ach-To, which is halfway across the galaxy. My hope is that they still use Tython for the Je’daii, and then perhaps at the conclusion of the film the Jedi Order can be formed on Ahch-To. Would love to see Ossus included in the storyline too.

Finally, Taika Waititi’s Star Wars film (which is supposedly set 100+ years after Episode 9) was given one promo image at that first Disney Expo it was announced at. And it was a picture of the Tho Yor. So I do believe Disney has had at least some plan in the background to tie in the Dawn of the Jedi content to future events.

fmalover said:

Like I posted earlier, I can’t get excited about this movie because throughout the ST Rey overcomes any and every challenge life throws at her without breaking a sweat. She’s skilled at pretty much everything when we first meet her. One mind probe from Kylo Ren was all it took for her to unlock her full Force potential. Never held a lightsaber before? No problem, she immediately defeats Kylo Ren who had at least ten years of lightsaber training.

Based on all that she should have problem creating a new Jedi Order because she’s Rey, Master of all trades.

This is my biggest concern for the coming movie too. Like… She already defeated Palpatine quite easily. He was the biggest threat we ever had in the saga, so what can now possibly challenge Rey after 15 more years of training?

Honest question. How does anyone go toe-to-toe with her and create any sort of believable threat? Unless it’s Abeloth or a full blown Yuzhan Vong invasion (which would be terrible plots for a singular movie), I just don’t see any threat that can stand against her previously displayed power. Power which she also built up in ~1 year after learning that the force was even real. From feeling “something wake up” inside her to defeating Palpatine in his “all the Sith” form in under a year is just… I’ll say it, impossible.

No one else in Star Wars lore has even come close to that type of power growth. She is absolutely in a league of her own in all of Star Wars lore, Legends and Canon, and to me, it’s just not interesting at all because it feels forced and fake. Anakin took over ~15 years of training with the most talented force users in the galaxy and fighting in a galaxy-wide war and didn’t even come close to the level of power Rey did. He was still very defeatable and had major character flaws. I guess they also went forward with the “Rey is another Chosen One” storyline but even so, she developed 20-30 times faster than the most powerful Jedi ever. It’s frustrating and extremely boring to me. It still hasn’t set in because it doesn’t feel real. It goes against everything I ever learned about the force in my 20+ years of Star Wars fandom.

Hope everyone is enjoying the latest film!

Book 3 is currently in production and I’ve got a brand new Act 1 in a rough cut that is pretty awesome. From the Carnita Arena to Maldo Kreis (the ice planet) without Frog Lady at all to Nevarro, this first Act is action packed! Act 2 is going to be on Tatooine, and Act 3 mostly on Trask.

The main themes so far have been:

Book 1 - Tha Mandalorian: Din’s tension between bounty hunting, the Mandalorian creed, and morality regarding Grogu.
Book 2 - The Reckoning: Din’s coming to terms with his choices as he is now the hunted instead of the hunter, and the parallel journey that Boba goes on in coming to terms with his new identity in a post-empire galaxy.
Book 3 - The Tribes: Din, Boba, and Bo-Katan all search for their purpose in relation to their Mandalorian history.

Looking forward to sharing more throughout the week!

Thanks for all the ideas, everyone! I will be starting my Season 1 rewatch as soon as I finish up on Way of Mandalore and then get to editing this project soon. Probably looking at an early-mid summer release for me. I haven’t even started watching Season 2 yet… But it’s my top priority after Mandalorian.

I did see the Bad Batch Season 3 trailer and it looks promising. Darker, more focused, and I’m glad to see they’re wrapping it all up in a timely manner. I believe we will see Omega in live action at some point as well, so this content will become “essential” for the future of Star Wars shows as well. I’ll be working closely with The Clone Wars legend EddieDean throughout the entirety of production here, and coordinating scenes with his Refocused project to make sure you all can have a smooth and consistent watch through of both shows.

It seems like the most important elements of this show will indeed be the overall Republic–>Empire transition, as well as the character development of Omega rather than the actual Bad Batch themselves, so I’ll be keeping those themes in mind throughout my film creation.

Thanks for the kind works Evansj! I am very pleased with how much more cinematic these films are feeling with the newest version. Speaking of which…

The Way of Mandalore v3 update

Book 2: The Reckoning out now.

• Added new Mandalorian Disney “Star Wars” intro

• There are too many Act 1 story order changes to write in-depth about, so here is the overall new scene order:

Boba escapes Sarlacc --> Fighting monster
Day in Sorgan life + Din entering his room for the first time
Train attacks Tuskens
Continued Din spending time on Sorgan
Boba goes to capture bikes
Din meets Cara
Tuskens attack Train
Bounty Hunter finds Grogu
Boba gifted robes and acceptance
End of Act 1 (~48 minutes): Din flies to Tatooine

• (As I have repurposed the initial Sorgan “restaurant scene” to be used later in the film, I have edited it accordingly, removing all of the references that make it seem like they just landed.)

• Boba does not wake up when the Jawas loot his armor. Now he has an actual reason to search the Sarlacc pit.

• Removed a TON of crappy-looking fast transition wipes.

• Reordered scenes with Tusken dog growling so that Boba now intimidates it and fixed a bad Disney transition cut.

• Quickened the search for black melons so that the monster attacks the Rodian sooner.

• Removed all mentions of the raiders on Sorgan. This planet remains a peaceful refuge until the bounty hunter arrives to haunt Din.

• Reordered shots of the train approaching the Tusken camp for better visual consistency and urgency in its approach.

• Created new back and forth between Din and Cara in their first meeting that no longer requires her joining to defeat the raiders.

• Din now asks the waitress about Cara Dune in a more demanding manner by peppering her with a few questions upfront.

• Cut a Tusken looking at the reflective mirror signal and then panning over to wait to see the train through the binos. What is the point of the mirror if he can just see the train first anyways…?

• During the train attack, cut some scenes of tuskens climbing up the sides after Boba’s speeder gets shot. It now appears to be actually damaged instead of still being able to go full speed for a minute while also burning to a crisp.

• Cut a few shots of combat on top of the train. Just a few were repetitive and poorly choreographed.

• Cut some sequences of the many armed pilot droid going ham on 10,000 levers. We get it, he can make the train go zoom.

• Cut a few sequences of the Tusken Chief combat to keep the focus on Boba.

• Sped up the timing of when a Tusken gets blasted by the tram engine.

• Made it so the train pilot droid actually does commit suicide. This matches Boba’s confused face.

• Cut the “tell” scene that a bounty hunter is at the village. Come on, preserve the mood, and surprise us for once!

• Re-edited the scene where Din talks to the village woman about his future. Without the viewer’s knowledge of the bounty hunter, we are still in “peaceful mode” and perhaps believe that there is a home here for Din and Grogu. The woman does now indeed appear to persuade Din to take his helmet off and stay, but they are interrupted by the bounty hunter which brings him back to reality.

• Re-ordered the scenes of the bounty hunter’s scope to actually make sense now.

• As Din and Grogu leave Sorgan, I have repurposed the Greef calls Din offer to be placed here. This keeps the main plot, Din’s conflict with the Empire, at the forefront of the story while also having another bounty hunter surprise them at the last minute right when they are about to jump to Nevarro. Now the consequences of Din’s actions continually haunt him. The damage from the dogfight grounds the team on Tatooine.

• Removed the hilariously bad death scene of the bounty hunter.

• Removed the head Pyke stirring his tea. Transition works much better to see Boba close a door and then Din open one.

• Removed the Tusken encounter with Din in the desert.

• Re-edited the whole dewback scene. It now plays out quicker and Din only gets shot once. Reduced some of the infantile questions from rookie hunter throughout.

• Cut Boba feeding his Bantha and some of the Rookie pretending to shoot Din while sleeping.

• After Fennec shoots Din (again), I cut the scenes of her taking forever to aim at his unmoving body. The Rookie is now on her almost immediately after that first shot to prevent her double tap.

• Cut all of Fennec and Rookie’s hand-to-hand combat, as well as his incessant moaning for the next minute. She is captured by Rookie and Din peacefully goes over to handcuff her.

• Cut all of Fennec and Rookie’s morning dialogue and her getting shot. We will stay inside the perspective of Din in these events now. It’s enough to know Din returned from securing the dewback and now Fennec is (seemingly) dead. The drawn-out side-character conversation is quite a distraction in this movie format.

• Regraded the scene of Din acquiring the Dewback and going back to the hangar from day-to-night. Disney messed up SO badly on the time of day throughout this and Book of Boba. The chronology was wrecked so this is the best solution.

• Now that we don’t have to see Rookie go through that whole Fennec dialogue, it actually appears that he had some agency in all of these events. He already knew Din had betrayed the guild from the get-go and had been playing dumb to take advantage of Din. This is a proper villain arc and a fun reveal at the end. He still dies though.

• Re-edited the whole hangar dialogue and action scenes to fit into this new theory.

• After Din and Grogu fly away to Sorgan, we see Boba collect Fennec and heals her himself. The extent of her previous injury is never shown or discussed, and we are perfectly fine to believe Boba provided the medical care needed to save her life.

• Inserted the scenes of Boba and Fennec scouting and then acquiring the Slave 1 in an acbagel edited combat sequence to break up Din’s bouncing all over the galaxy to pick up Cara and then Kuiil and then back to Nevarro. The original episode does that all back to back and we desperately need some pacing.

• Cut the “Let’s go over the plan again” talk at the nevarro campfire. I have never in my life seen a show lay out the entire plan so many times. They do this every other episode and it NEVER adds anything at all. It just spoils the next 20 minutes every time.

• Cut the two bodyguards super obviously sneaking up on Din and Cara, legit 20 seconds after Din tells her to keep eyes on them. Greef kills them more suddenly now.

• Re-edited ANOTHER “I have a plan” scene before they just do the whole plan… Preserved some revelations here instead of immediately doing an exposition dump.

• Gideon arrives and ambushes the crew in one extended sequence. It plays out SO much more terrifying without the whole trying to call Kuiil plot here.

• Moved the whole scout bikes kill Kuiil to one uninterrupted scene later after the crew is in more of a standstill period during the EWEB setup.

• In line with the above change, I have completely reworked Moff Gideon’s plan. I never understood his strategy in the original as it was not at all in line with his characterization to attempt a peaceful resolution with Din, especially considering he kills a handful of his soldiers both on screen and off. In my edit, Gideon does not know that the Grogu box is a ploy, so his attempt at a peaceful resolution is due to his not wanting the child to be incidentally harmed. This is why he makes his “until sundown” offer, but when Din attempts to contact Kuiil falsely believing he got away, Kuiil never hears the message at all as it is intercepted leading to Grogu’s capture. The scouts attempt to bring the asset back into town and stop at the checkpoint to confirm.

• As the scouts stop at the checkpoint, they receive orders from the comm man to “double-check” on the asset because Gideon is already exercising violence against his own men. As they promptly do so, they are very quickly set upon by IG-11 (I hate to cut most of the Scout trooper scene as I enjoy that type of Tarantino-esque dialogue, but it does not fit at all in the pacing of the situation or the storytelling logic). This prevents Gideon from ever learning that the child was acquired, so his motivation for allowing the peaceful resolution offer to continue is still sensible.
  IG comes flying into town making a mess, and I have reordered some reaction shots of the stormtroopers and our protagonists to actually make sense according to the explosion sounds instead of the wonky order in the original episode.

• Touched up some shot timing with the Flametrooper.

• Trimmed off some of Din getting healed by IG-11 for better pacing.

• Cut Din not knowing his way through the tunnels because he “normally enters through the bazaar.” What?? I think that a secret Mandalorian covert would require all of its members to memorize every single inch of those tunnels. This lack of knowledge didn’t even lead anywhere as they almost immediately stumble upon the Mandalorian forge anyways, further demonstrating that Din is a complete moron because he has visited that exact location countless times IN THE SHOW. Now I have presented this segment as if Din is intentionally walking the tunnels looking for where the Mandalorians are instead of aimlessly wandering around being lost.

• Cut a bunch of repetitive lines out of the Armorer scene and removed IG-11 killing the whole stormtrooper scout party off-screen. That took away the tension of the imminent danger. Now it will appear like the troopers we just saw enter are the ones who end up finding the Armorer.

• Removed one additional line of Din trying to persuade IG not to explode himself.

• Removed the stormtroopers lowering their weapons and staring at IG for so long after he reveals the bomb. He now delivers the payload more quickly.

• Removed the “magic hand thing” joke by reorganizing shots of Gideon’s TIE. I also found a bug from the original show in which Din puts his jetpack on, but then in the next wide shot, he is in the background still holding it in his hands. That is now fixed as I reordered the scenes in which he does put the pack on.

• Sped up the timing of Gideon’s TIE getting destroyed.

• Since I am now using Nevarro as a conclusion, I can restore the entirety of the Greef/Din/Cara conversation after the battle.

• The film now ends back with Boba and Fennec talking about the future.

• Adjusted Credits concept art to coincide with new story order.

And that’s only about half of the actual changelog…There’s just too much to even continue writing about. There’s a hundred other minor changes I could dump in here, but you all get the point! This film is uploading now so post here if you’d like to watch and I’ll contact you.

I’m heading out for a few days for Easter weekend, but I’ve already got a new Book 3 Act 1 drafted and I will continue production on that starting Monday.

yoshif8tures said:

Unfortunately your hopes will likely be dashed as this season is goi g nowhere fast. Aside from the ending there was absolutely no plot development at all, and even the ending itself was absurd. 🤦‍♂️

Yeah… It is looking pretty bleak. I am becoming increasingly worried about what I can do with S3 content at this point. I don’t even know how to storyboard options yet. The other seasons all had good mid-season endpoints where the narrative shifts and it was clear on how to end a film. There is absolutely nothing in S3 that looks like a definitive moment to do that with. I still think I’ll be able to combine BoBF content into some of S3. But there’s nothing to make a full film from in S3 yet to follow it up. I really need the next two episodes to be laser focused perfection. I suppose the main theme of Season 3 is like “The quest to retake Mandalore”, but I don’t even understand that… Retake it from what? It’s a wasteland with no one there. Just go land and start building.

Book 2 is still progressing! I am putting a ton of time into it every day, it’s just taking a long time to sift through it all. This changelog is going to be massive. It will look radically different than the previous iteration. I think I’m on pace to have it out this evening, so keep an eye out for the follow up post here later on with the changelog and release info.

I’m going to get on board this Phantom Menace train eventually, I have some stuff I worked on in the past for it. Definitely agree with a lot here. I was planning on dubbing over all of the Neimoidians to help present them as more villainous and assertive. I pulled all the audio voice lines out of the Star Wars: The Old Republic video game which fully voiced the alien Neimoidian language in the studio. It sounds more authentic than some of the other “foreign language” dubs I’ve seen used on them, and it fits into the Legends lore as a bonus! I have over 600 lines with all sorts of varying emotions to sort through in order to build their new dialogue.

Today’s episode has me feeling pretty dejected. That was honestly a terrible experience. This can’t even be considered “filler”, it’s just completely wasted time and money. There was no more time to blow this season if it was going to turn into anything worthwhile. You had 3 episodes (~2 hours of content) to build a compelling narrative out of all the tiny teasers they’ve been throwing out, but they completely blew it with this one. There’s simply no way this season can be good now. Yes, we might get 1-2 entertaining episodes (except we STILL have to waste time on the “rebuilding IG-11” plot) but this has been as disappointing as Book of Boba for me.

I don’t mean to sound so dreary, but my honest reaction is that this sapped almost all of my excitement for the future of the Mandalorian. It took over 2 years to write and produce this? How? With such a long break I’m expecting absolute top tier content and Season 3 has utterly failed to deliver on that.

It’s not even that each of the scenes in this episode were outright terrible and this might have worked in a 15+ episode season, but this is inexcusable in an 8 episode storyline. “Filler” episodes need to provide further characterization and continue to build tension in some way by causing the viewer to become further invested in a particular character. For example, we could have had a filler episode here where we learn more about the Armorer and why she suddenly was okay with Bo taking the helmet off. But no, we go on a side quest to a side quest that only further reinforces the “Din hates droids” personality which doesn’t even make sense after his time with IG. It’s directionless and pointless. 3/10 episode in a 5/10 season.

Great news! Your v1 was absolutely revolutionary in terms of structure and changes for TPM. An update is certainly needed to bring it to a full “release” stage, but that first draft showed some real potential so I am glad to see it back in the works.

Sent!

Book 2 is making great progress, but it is an absolute monster of an update. It’s taking a little bit longer to cook. I was hoping to release today, but it’ll be another 1-2 days before I can have it ready.

I have high hopes for the S3 episode tomorrow, I think we will finally get some clarity on which direction the story is going. Though I don’t believe it’ll provide an indication of an ending. I think it’ll start showing some tension between the Mandalorians and Empire though which should start to lead to a way to reverse engineer my films.

Hey, just checking in on this project to see if it’s still in development.

EddieDean said:

I guess the major question Mando will impose on this edit is “Where in Mando S3 do we get content that feels it could conclude a film?” Because you backtrack from there to the content that needs to be included, and that’ll inform any final decisions regarding the structure of the end of the Mando S2/BoBF content.

Great point Eddie. There’s nothing in S3 so far that even looks remotely like an ending. But the way I’ve been to completely reorder episodes in these first few films, I’m still holding out hope that I’ll be able to do something drastic with the coming 3 episodes.

RogueLeader said:

Just got caught up on Mandalorian and had some general thoughts about tackling season 3.

This may not be necessary for what you might be thinking about right now, but I think there are some tools that could be useful in really transforming season 3 content to fit whatever mold you might have in mind.

Thanks for the input Rogue, I’ll definitely revisit this once I get to S3 material.

Peonthegrate said:

If this ever does happen, my year will be made! It’s probably the one thing holding me back from making the Mando S1 and S2 movies you made into full on replacements of the original. Certainly won’t expect it though.

Some of the scenes in my films are getting upgraded to 4k in v3, but not all. It’s an absolutely brutal task tracing 2+ hours of content frame by frame to match it up exactly to where I made my cuts. At the very least, I know Books 5-7 will all be in 4k, it’s just my older content that I started in 2020 that is lacking in the pristine visual shine.

vranir said:

Same here. It’s a common issue with all the D+ exclusive content though. A lot of the recordings aren’t perfect quality, and it’s especially noticeable in dark scenes like that firelight scene with Boba and Fennic.

Yes, some of it is unavoidable. There is certainly some really bad banding in BoBF in the night content. But the other part in my first couple films is just from a number of contributing factors when I first started this project a few years back.

Book 2 update: I watched the first draft, made some changes, and have to send it out for another bug review first. There are some massive story changes in here so it was a beast to tackle. I’m aiming for a Monday release. In addition, I have begun storyboard work on my new Book 3. You’ll have a brief Ice World experience that you’ve never seen anywhere else!

I finally got a chance to watch your Andor 1 last night. Wow! What a difference the narrative pacing makes. Removing all the Syril scenes through Ferrix makes it feel like Cassian is actually the main character. I was getting major spy film vibes throughout the whole film rather than the slow unfocused drip of the show’s original pacing. This is a format that is FAR more rewatchable than the D+ one. Here’s my official review:

Audio/Video Quality: This edit was required to be streamed through Google Drive, so they typical degradation from that process is to be expected, but it presented as a typical 1080p film without any major quality issues. I was not once distracted due to a lack of quality in the A/V department. Maybe I’m getting spoiled by modernity, but ever since getting a 4k monitor and working with 4k footage, 1080p has started to look blurry to me haha. So since Andor does exist in 4k and that would be peak quality, I will rate this category of the edit a 9/10.

Visual Editing: Throughout the entirety of the film I spent many moments going, “Did MR remove a scene here or not?” And that’s a good thing! The majority of new transitions were completely smooth and unnoticeable, making me have to go back to the changelog to see if there was in fact a scene in between. The addition of subtitles to the Kenari flashbacks was incredible, though I did notice a typo which distracted from the moment. There were maybe 3-5 transitions where I could tell that a change had been made due to some visual jarring (the biggest offender IMO was right before the title card), but overall the large majority of the film was top tier visual editing. I score this category a 9/10 as well.

Audio Editing: Similar to the above, 90% of the film had perfect audio editing. The only hiccups I noticed were tied into some of the same transitions as the video ones above, but there were a few more where the video was great but some distracting audio carried over between cuts. Nothing too distracting again, but I probably noticed 6-7 instances of this. This area scores an 8.5/10.

Narrative: Now the meat of any fan edit, especially a TV to Movie format. The general story pacing was nearly perfect. It actually felt like a different source material due to the new overarching story. Whereas D+ Andor sometimes felt like watching a real life simulator where sad boy eats breakfast with mommy, this one actually felt like a real, mature Star Wars meets Spy Thriller genre. The slow drip of the revelation of this growing Rebel Alliance was my favorite part. Cassian’s character development was incredibly focused and felt very cinema-esque. Removing some of the lengthy Ferrix segments of side characters was a great choice, and all three of those side characters were done to perfection, especially the bit with hiding who is the rat. Even down to the nitty gritty of Bix’s boyfriend losing her in the alley faster makes scenes play out so much better and I LOVE that attention to detail. Cutting out Syril’s whole pursuit of Cassian on his end did wonders for the first half of the film. Seeing his response to the disaster on Ferrix was a perfect introduction to him as a character, but with all the focused headshots looking at the aftermath it seemed like he was going to be further development of him as an antagonist, but that never happened as he disappeared from the rest of the film which was odd as I was waiting for another appearance. Mon Mothma’s initial scene hit HARD this time around, and it felt like an impactful cameo that made perfect sense in this film. Though, I did feel that her character arc did not end up going anywhere afterwards and she didn’t have any conclusion, so I personally think just that one scene would have been all that was needed. Luthen comes across as one of the most interesting characters in the show and my only wish here was that 1 or 2 more scenes were left in with him as he played too small of a role for how much he seemed to affect Cassian. The heist crew was edited to perfection, each side character was given their one moment in the sun to make an impact on Cassian and they never once dragged on or were given too much spotlight. Absolutely phenomenal treatment of the rebel crew. Finally, I think that the film could’ve benefitted from another 20-30 minutes of runtime as it did end quite abruptly for me. Concluding without the actual heist occurring was a tough one for me. In a way, it was poetic, but after so much build up and planning you naturally expect a payoff. Starting the next film with the heist seems to me like I will lose so much of the investment in the characters that I had been building for the last 2 hours, so I’m not yet sure how to feel about that until I watch the sequel. I think that cutting out ~5 minutes of the initial flashback and adding the heist plot would be perfect and still keep the film under 3 hours, especially considering cutting some of the later Mon Mothma scenes. Overall, I greatly preferred this format for rewatchablitily and cannot imagine sitting through breakfast with mommy again, so this is a marked improvement in that sense. I will score the narrative a 8/10, though I will say I generally prefer slow, long form story telling so a near 3 hour runtime would not intimidate me in the least, which is what I think this film needed.

Enjoyment: With everything said above, this film was a thrill. It was so unique in its storytelling, themes, and pacing. This was a true Star Wars spy thriller. The D+ version was a one of a kind experience, but this edit is also one as well. Baking down all of the crazy number of original scenes into a 2.25 hour runtime is no easy task. I enjoyed the film from start to finish, and would rank it an 8.5/10 experience.

Final rating average: 8.6/10

Thanks for making this, I don’t think I ever would’ve rewatched the D+ show start to finish again, but this… this I could go back to.

PsyGemini said:

I’m in the middle of Book 1 (just about to start the prison episode), and I have to say you truly did an outstanding job, man. I really love smudger9’s work, but IMHO he has to cut a little bit too much in order to fit the whole thing in a single-shot narrative.

I specially love how you managed to make the action flow better, taking out the childish out of place humor and, of course, Mando leaving Grogu, then going to the prison job, and then returning was a stroke of genius, it just works so well!

Thanks for the kind words, Psy! So glad you enjoyed the film, looking forward to sharing Book 2 with you very soon.

Some minor nitpicks:

1. 39:05 ; Mando says “I THINK it’s a child”. Oh, you think, dude? Could this be changed to a less dumb “it’s a child” or something?

Haha well how I understood that was he was saying “child” as in a sentient being and not an animal. Din would have never seen that species before so it’s him trying to process what a strange creature he has stumbled upon and how that is his bounty. I don’t personally have a problem with his line there.

2. 42:24 ; There remains a weird jawa chant (“egg! egg!”) from the removed bit.

I didn’t intend to 100% remove them saying “Egg!” Yes, it’s weird, but jawas are weird. Look at how they eat it later. Weird.

Also, I’m kinda split on the new color grading, half of the time it works really well, but the other half it makes everything a little too artificially warm, bright and redish. But oh well, guess this is up to personal taste. I do however will say that:

3. The opening cantina scene looks WAAAAY too bright, the color skin of the bearded guy looks so red it’s almost he became a different species.

That’s because… He’s uh… a Zeltron 😉

4. The black scenes/details are a little low quality video-wise? Very blurred, like we lost some details.I don’t know how to explain, I’m really not into video editing jargons, but maybe it was the black crushing in the processing?

Yes, I joke above, but I am aware of both the color grading being somewhat intense in a few scenes as well as some black crushing going on here and there. At some point in the future I might come across a spare 30 hours to go frame by frame and plug in glorious 4k source footage to fix all these scenes… But that is not today! Maybe a v4 with Mando S4, but I have a great deal to do on this v3 update storywise.

Anyways, will finish watching ep1 today, can’t wait for the next one!! Thanks for this gem!!

It’s my pleasure, I’ll write a brief update on the next film below.

EddieDean said:

Just had a look at the changelog and this second one is shaping up excellently too. I love this structure- Din fails to find a home with the wetlanders as Boba loses his with the Tuskens, then they crossover. Din’s story features Cara and the threat of constant pursuit throughout and becomes a true sequel to the previous one with the return of Greef and Nevarro.

Yes! Thanks for your input on how to get some more consistent themes presented throughout the films. I have just completed my first draft of Book 2: The Reckoning, and will be watching it tonight for a first bug review. The changelog should be mostly updated aside from anything I want to change after tonight. Hoping for another Friday/Saturday release!

Also, I have many thoughts on how to take Mando S3 content, but I might as well save it for when I actually get to building those films. Feel free to share thoughts and speculate solutions in the meantime though!

Thanks for all the kind words, glad you folks are enjoying this one! I had a ton of fun watching it too. I’m excited to continue developing this saga.

I’m hard at work working on Book 2: The Reckoning. I am just finishing up the big picture storyboarding on the scene order, so now it’s down to the nitty gritty of the new changes. Again, you can track the live progress here: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1TIVp5tQY9WxxnOe8iRXvG5t4P6vTi1ZCbb8CnxwB_9Q/edit?usp=sharing

Hope to have this out and ready by the weekend! Enjoy Mando day tomorrow, MTFBWY.

Sent!

honestabe said:

I would like a link to Book 1 when you have the opportunity.

I am also just speculating, but the content of Books 6 and 7 are to be determined based upon the current season, correct?

Yes, I’ve begun initial storyboarding on paper but haven’t taken anything to the editing table yet. 4 more episodes to go before I can get a full vision of what I can do.

I do also note some of the current season will be incorporated into Book 5 unless I misread your prior posts.

That’s the plan as of now! Definitely will be using the beginning of Season 3 alongside the Mandalorian content in Book of Boba Fett to create an entirely new timeline of events. This will make the absence between Din and Grogu appear much, much longer.