Anakin Starkiller

CW always fell between the two, not quite fully fitting with either.

I think the Force healing works thematically, it’s just on a lore/continuity level that it fails. For that reason, I think it could work if we make it so that only dyads can heal each other. Pretty much all you need to do is cut Rey healing the snake and have Palpatine or somebody clarify that this is a property of Force dyads.

And I absolutely agree with StarkillerAG on Rey’s parents. Rey Palpatine doesn’t work, we all agree on that, but Rey’s parents ditching her to protect her does. The thing is, Rey’s parents being drunkards works far better.

I suggest we have someone mention that First Order troops have been sent to Exegol. That way, we’d solve the “where did this army come from?” conundrum. As for where the Star Destroyers came from, we could have them say they were stashed there during the imperial days, explaining their imperial design.

Gothamknight said:

hk47awesome said:
I do think they missed an opportunity at showcasing a new dynamic. . . . I would have much preferred the new dynamic of the New Republic battling a small faction known as the First Order that still believes in the ideals of the Empire. . . . Technically, in canon, it’s been thirty some odd years but TFA is literally the first film after ROTJ, in the main saga, and so the fact that we go from “we did it!” to “welp, it was nice while it lasted” just like that is disappointing.

And:

LordPlagueis said:
The lack of political context irked me at first. Eventually, I realized the relationship between the Republic and the Resistance is at least roughly analogous to the relationship between the French Resistance and Free France in World War II.

You guys are circling the central point of the framing that I wish had been done with these sequels: an analogy with the rise of Hitler and the Nazis between WW1 and WW2.

• The Allies punish Germany too harshly / the New Republic bullies the Imperial remnant
• German resentment soars, and a young, bitter corporal named Adolf blames Jews and communists / Imperial resentment soars, and a young “Hitler” blames uncontrolled, unaccountable Force-users for supposed incompetence and the failure of their “sorcerer’s ways” to carry the Empire to victory
• Hitler rises to power by tapping German resentment and desperation; outlines a plan for a fascist, antisemitic state and brand new war machine / The Imperial “Hitler” outlines a plan to destroy Force-users, rebuild the Imperial war machine, and get vengeance on the New Republic
• The Allies didn’t take Hitler seriously until it was too late to prevent a new war / The New Republic doesn’t initially take the Imperial resurgence seriously

I mean, good grief and bantha poodu, the parallels that could be drawn throughout a sequel trilogy!!!

I’m also considering a new TFA-TLJ amalgamated crawl that actually sketches these parallels, with the opening scene on Jakku being all about an Imperial hunt for Force-users.

Getting a serious Legend of Korra vibe here. It’s an interesting idea. However, it’s not really compatible with having Force users running the place.

Just put Lone Prayer over every single fight.

I think adding a green glow coming from beneath the surface of Exegol through cracks would give it a nice memorable aesthetic, while also letting us see what’s going a lot more clearly. It’d just take basic color correction and more thorough edits to long shots.

So because that plot twist wasn’t well executed, I’m likely gonna ditch it altogether.

Why did I read that as “I’m likely gonna ditch the alligator.”

Seems to me the fact that it’s the ending of the Skywalker saga is the very reason not to introduce “using the Dark Side for good.” I’d be okay with that concept in and of itself; it was explored in the New Jedi Order storyline - but there it was developed over the course of several novels. I can’t see that working within a single film.

That was a typo. I meant it’s not the moment. Lemme fix that post.

Either you provide a believable explanation as to why she’s so powerful, or else the fact that she’s so powerful (sans training) is absurd.

She could just be from an undiscovered or unidentified powerful lineage. The Force works in mysterious ways. Besides, in the context of the films, she never felt OP to me.

Idk… It might seem too convenient if it’s the same character.

Oof.

Really though, I was trying to motivate him to follow a project through to the end.

Mod Edit: ^ Your trying to ‘motivate’ someone in an edit that is ‘not for me’ comes across as both abrupt and snark. I strongly suggest you don’t choose to ‘motivate’ in this manner any further.
 

Your edits (besides this one; I guess it’s not for me) always sound so interesting. It’s just a shame you never finish any of them.

I’d be highly against that. This is the ending. It’s the moment to introduce the idea of using the Dark Side for good. Killing Palpatine is the moment the good guys win, so you don’t want to have moral ambiguity there.

The Horror said:

I suggest putting a clone of Luke in a tank on Exogol. That would imply the Luke we saw in TLJ was actually a deranged clone - maybe Luuke from the Thrawn Trilogy survived and tried to train some Jedi.

Something to suggest Palpatine is a deranged clone would be nice as well.

For a bonus: maybe the Star Destroyer fleet was created by a Star Forge from KOTOR. Put in a shot of the Star Forge or a reference to it into the film and it could provide some explanation for that nonsense.

Um…excuse me, wtf?

Why? What are you trying to accomplish?

I don’t suppose there’s any way we could integrate RLM’s Ewok death cult idea? I really wish we’d gotten it. I’m picture a barely living corpse covered in cybernetic implants (preferably with spider legs) being worshipped by mangey, cannibalistic Ewoks, who have been nursing him back to health with the flesh of their enemies. Integrating all that is impossible, but maybe we could have Exegol as some part of Endor, related to the Death Star wreckage (canonically two different moons, but whatever)? There’d be some close ups revealing the Sith cultists to be mangey Ewoks? I know it probably wouldn’t work, but it’s just a thought.

On a different note, I was thinking of perhaps having the cultists visibly chanting. I know it’s implicit they’re chanting in the film, but I’m talking close-ups where their mouths move to the music. Bonus points if they sing Duel of the Fates.

I agree that Jakku should have been Tatooine, and I would love this change, if it could be done. Realisticy though, the only thing you could do would be add “Tatooine” text at the bottom of the screen. It’s impossible, because, like NeverarGreat said, you would have to cut every time someone mentions Jakku: In TFA: Rey, Kylo, Hux, Poe, Finn, Han, In TLJ: Rey and Luke. It wouldn’t work if no one actually says “Tatooine”.

Well I appreciate you listing out the names of the characters who say “Jakku”. Kylo Ren says it with his mask on, IIRC, so it would be trivial to dub. The others would take more work, though. Do we have any instances of them saying “Tatooine” in the EU?

Dwelling on those won’t help you enjoy the film. Take the film for what it is, not you wish it was, and work your way from there.

Yeah. This piece in particular always intrigued me the most.

That’s my stance too. Either fully commit to making a new planet, or just cut the crap and make it Tatooine. I disagree about Coruscant or Corellia working, though. It needed to be a backwater planet.

In terms of making it a truly different planet, you could add unique plantlife or other structures in the background or recolor the sky using EbSynth. A green sky would be interesting. Especially against purple sand. However, I feel like the sand would be an absolute nightmare to recolor. At most, you could maybe tweak the color balance slightly, but that’s it.

But the more I think about it, the more I want a planet with a purple landscape against a green sky… Well the other ST planets are just as generic, so I could give that treatment to one of them. Preferably one that’s only in a scene or two so it’s not too much work.

Oh and I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: make Ilum (Starkiller Base) a snowy volcano. It’s an idea that appeared in concept art and would help resolve the issue of the fissure that splits Rey and Kylo once you remove the “destroy the superweapon” part of the film. Just add lava flowing to some of the wide shots and voila!

I’d like to see a cut where the 9 year old says “I move for a vote of no confidence in Chancellor Valorum.”

On a different note, I think we should establish right from the start that Palpatine and Sidious are the same person. I know you may be thinking it’s obvious given they’re played by the same actor, but I think for kids who don’t know that it’s worth specifying. Unfortunately, we don’t have a shot of Sidious turning off a holgram to the Trade Federation, removing his hood and emerging from a dark room into a familiar room on Coruscant as Palpatine, but maybe we can work something out.

I feel like this edit ought to have a title more like your other two for a nice match set.

I know this might be controversial but I think Jakku ought to be Tatooine for poetry reasons. It just feels strange having all three protagonists start on a desert planet and two of them are the same but then the third one isn’t?

Yeah but he doesn’t feel present for much of the film.

Really not a fan of the new color grading. I like things saturated.

He’s practically unnoticeable, though. I think it would’ve need to have battle droids as part of the hidden fleet instead of the suspiciously modern sith troopers.

Idk… Finn and Rose’s relationship in TLJ felt very organic to me. The question is did Finn reciprocate her feelings.

On a different note, what if we included battle droids? It would serve as a nice bookend.

Is their any way we could expand Rose’s role in TRoS? At least give her and Finn another kiss during the celebration?

Idk… I much preferred CW’s focus on movie characters than Rebels’s focus on bland-as-bread Ezra.