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Cadavra

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20-Aug-2017
Last activity
11-Jan-2024
Posts
109
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https://teamdaletros.wordpress.com/

Post History

Post
#1418914
Topic
Zack Snyder's Justice League: Redux Ideas thread
Time

I’ll second the point that Lois’s intervention (and character overall) was better in the Whedon Cut (though the Snyder Cut was better overall). Having Batman bring her in as the “big gun” has the added benefit of neatly making sense out of & resolving Future Flash’s “Lois is the key” message from BvS. I really don’t like the way that, even after Superman is revived, Snyder goes out of his way to suggest that a Superman back in his right mind could still be turned evil simply by killing Lois.

Post
#1413622
Topic
STAR WARS: EP V &quot;REVISITED EDITION&quot;<strong>ADYWAN</strong> - <strong>12GB 1080p MP4 VERSION AVAILABLE NOW</strong>
Time

This is fantastic news, thank you!

Since Temura is back on the table, I’d like to toss one small thing out there for your consideration. A secondary reason the Temura change was originally controversial was because a couple of his line readings were a bit phoned in. But he also delivered better readings of a couple of those same lines (“As you wish” and “he’s worth a lot to me”) in the Battlefront and Bounty Hunter video games.

You’ve been working so hard on these that I don’t want this to sound like pushing you into even more work, and the standard Temura audio is more than enough for me personally. The fact that you’re giving the option at all is amazing. But I thought it was worth mentioning just in case you weren’t aware of it and thought it might be worthwhile to swap in those versions of those lines.

Post
#1366676
Topic
What's your take on Emperor Palpatine being brought back for The Rise of Skywalker?
Time

It’s also worth noting that Dark Empire came out long before the prequels introduced the whole Chosen One concept, so whatever narrative or thematic problems there may have been to resurrecting Palpatine, it didn’t contradict any pretense of Anakin’s cosmic purpose or balance of the Force as it pertains to the final fate of the Sith (whether the prequels should have introduced any of those complications by making Anakin a Chosen One in the first place is another rant).

The Rise of Skywalker has no such excuse.

Post
#1365310
Topic
Star Wars Headcanons
Time
  • As Chancellor, Palpatine evaded detection for over a decade despite regular meetings with Jedi Masters not because of some vague, plot-convenient “shroud of the dark side” diminishing all Jedi’s perception, but because he cut himself off from the Force for limited stretches of time, thereby hiding his own dark side signature when in proximity to Jedi. That he would willingly leave himself vulnerable for extended periods is a testament to Palpatine’s well-deserved confidence in his skills of deceit and manipulation. (This may also explain why Palpatine’s face really became deformed in ROTS – it was a reaction to summoning so much Force power so abruptly, when normally he would reopen his Force connection more gradually.)

  • Why was Luke allowed to keep the last name “Skywalker” if he was supposed to be in hiding? Perhaps Anakin’s victory in the Boonta Eve podrace became something of a local legend, and so it became fairly common for human residents of Tatooine to adopt the name, meaning nobody would suspect Luke was actually a Skywalker.

  • The logic of the Mortis arc in ‘The Clone Wars’ falls apart if the Father’s death simply depowers the Son, effectively eliminating the threat he posed. But it can make sense if the Dagger of Mortis transfers the power of its victims to the wielder – if the Son had killed the Father with it, he would have become immeasurably stronger and been able to escape the planet. But when the Father used it on himself, he created a loop that destroyed his power entirely, thereby depowering the Son as well.

  • Darth Vader’s injuries on Mustafar didn’t actually inhibit his Force potential at all (other than maybe stopping him from generating Sith lightning). It’s purely psychological – his immense power is still but a fraction of what Anakin Skywalker would have eventually reached, for no other reason than that Vader sees himself as less than whole. (This one may actually have been confirmed or at least hinted at in official media, but I’m not aware of a specific source offhand.)

Post
#1345401
Topic
Revenge of the Sith (The New Canon Cut) [ON HOLD INDEFINITELY]
Time

Awesome work! One thing doesn’t sit quiiiite right to me personally is Padme so readily agreeing with Anakin’s statement that she’s there to help kill him. So what if Anakin says “you brought him here to-” and Pabme cuts him off with “Because of what you’ve done”? Or just have “You’re with him! You brought him here!” as a complete statement, to which Padme responds.

Post
#1342881
Topic
Star Wars: <strong>The Rise Of Skywalker</strong> Redux Ideas thread
Time

Apologies if this has been brought up before…but has anyone experimented with taking the “Chewie fakeout death” issue completely in the opposite direction, and just have the First Order transport get away clean? (i.e., no Force tug-of-war or lightning at all) They know from the start Chewie’s just been captured, but they can’t do anything about it until Rey senses him over Kijimi.

I suppose that might risk the possibility of having the whole thing feel like an even shallower detour from the heroes’ main mission, but I would argue that a plot thread without the pretense of angst is still preferable to a plot thread of phony angst that’s undone in the next scene. Besides, Rey’s arc would still have more than enough weight if the film went with the revelation that Rey accidentally killed her parents.

Post
#1331892
Topic
Star Wars: <strong>The Rise Of Skywalker</strong> Redux Ideas thread
Time

Regarding the idea of a new saber effect for Rey – if anyone has played the first Force Unleashed, you can get “compressed” (pulsing effect running down the blade) and “unstable” (sort of a wavy, flowing appearance to the blade’s glow) crystals for every lightsaber color, the latter of which might fit well.

Post
#1315836
Topic
Idea: 'STAR WARS: SENATE EDITION' – a Theoretical Plan for Salvaging the Sequel Trilogy
Time

Oh, I’d much rather have Andy Serkis’ awesome Snoke voice and for Luke to hold on until the trilogy’s end. But I just don’t know how possible either of those things would be with the existing footage. Having Luke & Leia help Rey defeat Palpatine is a really cool idea, though.

Regarding “Darth Ren” vs “Kylo Ren” – I do like the Kylo name, it just comes across to me as a random alias without being rooted in some sort of new dark-side faction or tradition that’s actually CONVEYED on-screen (which Snoke and the Knights of Ren seemed like they were going to be until TROS came along). Making him a straight-up Sith Lord is purely an exercise in simplifying what we did get…and for me personally, the ship has sailed on trying to keep ST edits roughly canonical.

Post
#1315250
Topic
Idea: 'STAR WARS: SENATE EDITION' – a Theoretical Plan for Salvaging the Sequel Trilogy
Time

DISCLAIMER: I am not a fan-editor. I have no video or audio editing skills whatsoever, and this edit concept is NOT in any level of production. Still, I wanted to lay out my own understanding of this trilogy’s issues and a theoretical vision for correcting them, just in case any of these ideas inspire or are useful to anyone else.
 

BACKGROUND: I loved both The Force Awakens and The Last Jedi. I had definite concerns and disappointments—chief among them that they skipped over way too much critical backstory and that Resistance vs. First Order was far too similar a conflict to Rebellion vs. Empire—and it soon became clear the Sequel Trilogy wouldn’t be telling the story I really wanted (Luke rebuilding the Jedi Order). But the characters, heart, and fun factor won me over, such that I was more than content to buy into what we got instead and see where it was leading us.

Then The Rise of Skywalker happened, and I came home vastly more disappointed in a Star Wars movie than ever before. I had fun and liked a lot of its individual parts, but its logical shortcuts and storytelling gaps were too much to ignore, and more importantly it seemed to be the point where the lack of a single trilogy-wide plan finally came crashing down on the whole project. It was neither a narratively- nor thematically-cohesive capstone to the Skywalker Saga, nor did it justify the need for a third trilogy in the first place. The fact that TROS ends with the galaxy and the Jedi in pretty much the same state they were in by the end of ROTJ is just…ugh.

However, while I don’t think any form of the ST will ever be my personal definitive version of what “really” happened after the Battle of Endor, I do think there’s a fairly clear path to editing it into something much more cohesive on its own terms, and much more satisfying as an Infinities project—an exercise in answering the hypothetical “what might happen IF Palpatine survived or was resurrected.” The following list is by no means comprehensive—it doesn’t include any of the smaller changes I would like to see in the individual movies, many of which have already been fixed by other edits—but I think it works as a general plan to tie this trilogy together and make it a decent (if not authoritative) companion to the previous trilogies.
 

TRILOGY-WIDE CHANGES:

  • Potentially re-number the trilogy as Episodes X, XI, & XII, just because it skips over damn near a full trilogy’s worth of important developments, and there’s always the possibility that Dave Filoni will do a proper New Republic animated series someday that could be repurposed into VII, VIII, & IX. (Admittedly this change is kind of petty, and I’m not sure whether I would actually go through with it, but I just wanted to toss it out there.)

  • Since we’re stuck with Palpatine being alive again, it’s best to just make peace with that as part of the price of admission, and work him into the entire trilogy. A lot of people have rightfully started talking about moving one of his scenes to TLJ, which is good but thinking too small—I say we establish him as the true leader of the First Order as soon as TFA.

  • To further distinguish the ST’s conflict from the OT’s, rewritten opening crawls would reveal that while Starkiller Base was devastating, destroying the Senate did not completely destroy the New Republic (which wasn’t stupid enough to keep all of its fleet in a single system), nor has the First Order taken over more than a handful of worlds. NR and FO forces are engaged in combat all over the galaxy (offscreen, sadly, unless additional footage sources can be found & used creatively), and the films simply follow the conflict with Leia’s unit because it’s been identified as a unique threat (since it’s searching for Luke & has picked up another potential Jedi in Rey). This also means that when the war is over at the end of the trilogy, the free government the OT heroes fought to build is still standing.

  • Snoke’s character and dialogue would be largely rewritten by dubbing his audio in an alien language, accompanied by new subtitles. Reframe him from the outset as an intermediary for Sidious, a straightforward dark-side disciple who did not train Ren, & whose origins and abilities are not important (it’s easy enough to imagine he played a role similar to the purple-robed advisers we see in ROTJ). His new dialogue would also be a tool for enforcing some of the other changes to the story.

  • The Knights of Ren are never developed in the films themselves, and there’s no point in trying to make the dark-siders into some new or different faction from the Sith in a story where Sidious is still calling the shots. So let’s streamline things by cutting the word “Kylo” from dialogue—which, along with new crawls and new Snoke subtitles, will establish that Ben Solo’s dark-side identity is simply Darth Ren, Sidious’ latest apprentice. When the Knights of Ren appear in IX, they can easily be interpreted as simple mercenaries.

 

EPISODE VII: A SHATTERED BALANCE (I’m not fully happy with this title, but it’s more plot-related and less abstract than “The Force Awakens.” Feel free to suggest alternatives!)

CRAWL (rough draft):

Luke Skywalker has vanished. In his absence, an Imperial remnant calling itself the FIRST ORDER has emerged from the Unknown Regions, having spent decades planning a brutal campaign to retake the galaxy.

Grimly recalling the horrors of the Empire, the New Republic has granted Leia Organa command of a special military unit, code-named THE RESISTANCE, to combat the threat. But hope shines dimly without the galaxy’s only Jedi Master.

Desperate to find her brother, Leia has sent her most daring pilot on a secret mission to the deserts of Jakku, where an old friend has discovered a clue to Luke’s whereabouts…

  • The destruction of Hosnian Prime would be followed by Sidious’ broadcast to the galaxy, establishing his return early in the trilogy and intensifying the intimidation factor—imagine the terror of the capital getting blown up, accompanied by the reveal that someone who’s supposed to be dead was behind it. Also incorporate (modified) TROS dialogue speculating as to how he’s alive, look for more footage to serve as reaction shots from citizens across the galaxy.

REVISED SNOKE SCENE 1 (before Sidious reveal, but lays the groundwork that there’s somebody above Snoke):

  • SNOKE: The droid will soon be delivered to the rebels, enabling them to recover Skywalker. This our Master cannot tolerate.
  • HUX: I take full responsibility for the-
  • SNOKE: Enough! He wants solutions, not excuses.
  • HUX: The weapon. It is ready. I believe the time has come to use it.
  • SNOKE: We agree. Oversee preparations.
  • HUX: Yes.
  • SNOKE: And as for you, Lord Ren…We have learned that the droid we seek is aboard the Millennium Falcon, in the hands of your father, Han Solo.
  • REN: He means nothing to me.
  • SNOKE: You know what the way of the Sith demands next.
  • REN: Yes. By the grace of his training, I will not be seduced.
  • SNOKE: We shall see.

REVISED SNOKE SCENE 2 (after Sidious reveal):

  • SNOKE: The scavenger resisted you?!
  • REN: She is strong with the Force! Untrained, but stronger than she knows.
  • SNOKE: And the droid?
  • HUX: Ren believed it was no longer valuable to us, that the girl was all we needed. As a result, the droid has most likely been returned to the hands of the enemy. They may have the map already.
  • SNOKE: Then Organa’s forces must be finished now, before they get to Skywalker.
  • HUX: We have their location. We tracked their reconnaissance ship to the Ileenium system.
  • SNOKE: Good. Then we will crush them once and for all. Prepare the weapon.
  • REN: I can get the map from the girl.
  • SNOKE: If what you say about this girl is true, bring her before Lord Sidious.

REVISED SNOKE SCENE 3:

  • HUX: The fuel cells have ruptured. The collapse of the planet has begun.
  • SNOKE: Leave the base at once and come to me with Darth Ren. This weapon has already served the Master’s purpose.

 

EPISODE VIII: THE LEGEND OF SKYWALKER (the Skywalker myth/bloodline was a much bigger narrative element of TLJ than of TROS, and I don’t like the idea of titles using any of the key words—“Jedi, Return, Sith, Hope, etc.”—more than once. I like this one.)

CRAWL (rough draft):

The specter of DARTH SIDIOUS has plunged the galaxy into terror. But despite the devastation unleashed by Starkiller Base, New Republic forces have regrouped and engaged the First Order across the galaxy.

General Leia Organa’s brave soldiers press on, struggling to survive until young Rey returns with Jedi Master Luke Skywalker, and together they turn the tide against the resurgent Sith.

Recognizing Skywalker as the greatest threat to his revenge, Sidious has tasked the troubled DARTH REN with finding his uncle and preventing the Jedi Order’s revival…

  • Replace Ren’s introductory scene in Snoke’s throne room with TROS scene of Kylo meeting with Sidious. Edit dialogue to cut antagonism, cut references to Rey’s origin, & suggest that murdering Han was Ben’s Sith sacrifice, through which he proved himself ready to take over command from Snoke.

REVISED THRONE ROOM CONFRONTATION (with Snoke’s display of Force abilities significantly toned down):

  • SNOKE: Well done, Lord Ren. The Master will be pleased. Young Rey, welcome.
    […]
  • SNOKE: Come closer, child. So much strength. Tell us where Skywalker is, and perhaps we can find a use for your talents in our new regime.
  • REY: You underestimate Skywalker…and Ben Solo…and me. It will be your downfall.
  • SNOKE: Oh, so you think you can turn Lord Ren, like his grandfather? Is that why you came? Young fool. It was Lord Sidious who bridged your minds, and I who stoked Ren’s conflicted soul. Our master knew Ren was not strong enough to hide it from you, and you would not be wise enough to resist the bait.
    […]
  • SNOKE: Such spunk. Look here, now. Look at Organa’s transports. The same is happening to Republic vermin across the galaxy. Soon there will be nothing left for Skywalker to save anyway.
  • SNOKE: Oh, still that fiery spit of hope. You have the spirit of a true Jedi! And because of that…you must die. Lord Ren, deliver to this child the destiny of all Jedi.
  • REN: I know what I have to do.
  • REY: Ben.
  • [Ren kills Snoke]

 

EPISODE IX: POWER OF THE FORCE (open to suggestions again, but for now I like the grand, cosmic feel of this one. In any event, the title has to change if for no other reason than that virtually everyone put more thought into what “Rise of Skywalker” might mean than the writers themselves did.)

CRAWL (rough draft):

Darkness rises. Darth Ren, now commanding the First Order’s full military might, hunts his enemies across the galaxy, closer than ever to realizing his grandfather’s monstrous legacy.

Yet light remains. Galvanized by Luke Skywalker’s heroic last stand, New Republic forces continue to resist the First Order’s advances, while Rey devotes herself to learning the ways of the Jedi.

Her training may be too late, however. While conventional warfare rages on, Darth Sidious prepares for an apocalyptic strike against countless worlds, an act of FINAL REVENGE decades in the making…

  • Cut Rey being Palpatine’s granddaughter; tweak dialogue so Palpatine is simply interested in Rey’s Force potential.

  • Eliminate any suggestion that the Final Order/Sith Eternal fleet is a separate entity from the First Order.

  • Rey Destroying Sidious: add visual representation of the Jedi spirits, change color & effect of reflected lightning to imply that Sidious is actually destroyed by some sort of light side energy generated by all the Jedi spirits joining Rey. It’s still vague and kind of silly, but I would argue it’s less silly than simply reflecting his own lightning back at him.

  • Ending: change final scene to make Lars homestead a meeting place for a new class of Jedi students, by filming new footage of a handful of students igniting lightsabers around Rey. Add spirits of Anakin, Obi-Wan, Yoda, Qui-Gon, & Ben beside Luke & Leia (or put the Masters behind Rey), to suggest that she’ll be aided & guided by a “Force Jedi Council” of her own (even with a time skip Daisy Ridley is pretty obviously too young to be the sole headmaster of a New Jedi Order, and Luke needs to be involved in the NJO in some capacity anyway).

  • Why is this meeting taking place at the Lars homestead? Because that’s the footage we’ve got to work with. 😉 Seriously, though, maybe they traveled to Luke’s old home as a Jedi history field trip, maybe this is where a new training temple will be rebuilt, or maybe the backgrounds could be changed so they aren’t on Tatooine after all (the desert ground definitely limits the options, but perhaps having the New Jedi Order start on Jedha would be cool).

  • NOTE: Rey adopting the Skywalker name is actually one of the things I liked (even if the execution here was a little ham-fisted). But it’ll probably have to go for this edit, simply because it wouldn’t fit naturally with this reimagined ending.

Post
#1314078
Topic
Star Wars: <strong>The Rise Of Skywalker</strong> Redux Ideas thread
Time

One of the biggest disappointments of this trilogy for me is that not only does it end with the galaxy in pretty much the same situation it was in after ROTJ, but it punted Luke’s role of rebuilding the Jedi to Rey’s generation – and EVEN THEN, did nothing with it. No fanedit can fully correct that, but I do have an idea for possibly mitigating it somewhat: transform the final scene into a gathering of Rey’s first class of Jedi students:

  • Film new footage of a handful of people igniting lightsabers in the desert (matching & integrating it with the Rey footage would be challenging, but it’s conceivable).

  • Add spirits of more Jedi Masters either beside Luke & Leia or behind Rey, to suggest that she’ll be aided & guided by a “Force Jedi Council” of her own (even with a time skip, Daisy Ridley is pretty obviously too young to start teaching on her own, & it would be nice to keep Luke involved in the New Jedi Order).

  • Cut the “Rey Skywalker” exchange (which I’m personally fine with, but it simply wouldn’t fit with this version).

Post
#1313103
Topic
STAR WARS: Episode 7 &amp; 8 [Trilogy enhancement] - Released
Time

DougieP, cutting Snoke’s Force-sensitivity entirely is brilliant. It would eliminate the need for a payoff in IX, and might even make the “Palpatine’s still REALLY behind it all” reveal more satisfying. Implementing it would be somewhat challenging, but there are some options:

  • If Palpatine’s survival is integrated into the trilogy as a whole, it could be implied that Kylo accepts Snoke’s authority on Palpatine’s orders (similar to Tarkin being pretty much the only Imperial who doesn’t need to fear Vader).

  • A powerless Snoke communicating with Kylo via hologram could be a security measure, so Kylo never knows where he’s located. This would take some significant restructuring of Last Jedi’s throne room confrontation, but it could potentially be made to work by playing up the angle that the first time they’re ever in the same room together, Kylo seizes his opportunity and takes the shot.

Post
#1313091
Topic
Unusual <strong>Sequel Trilogy</strong> Radical Redux Ideas Thread
Time

Don’t know if this has been suggested yet, but how about having Palpatine’s Fortnite broadcast either replace or preface Starkiller Base firing in Force Awakens? Find or create additional footage for a montage of people hearing it across the galaxy, throw in the Resistance guy’s TROS line speculating as to how he’s alive.

Introduce that right away in the trilogy, then (as has already been suggested) move Kylo tracking Palps down to somewhere in Last Jedi, along with whatever other lines can be altered or added to integrate his survival into the trilogy.

Post
#1312485
Topic
Star Wars: <strong>The Rise Of Skywalker</strong> Redux Ideas thread
Time

A couple of minor fixes:

  • It’s weird that Leia dies, but her body waits to disappear until Ben’s body does. Moving that shot to right after her death would be pretty simple.

  • They make a point of saying how nobody answered their distress call from Crait, but then the explanation for how they get the MASSIVE fleet at the end basically boils down to “Lando made a few calls.” Cut the earlier line, and then imply that the closing fleet is simply the payoff for all the recruitment the Resistance has been doing over the past several months (or however long it’s been since TLJ).

Post
#1288077
Topic
The Last Jedi: Legendary (Released)
Time

I recently watched this edit and loved it. It’s damn near perfect for my editing-related gripes with TLJ. I think the ONLY thing still in there that I really didn’t like was Rey’s line “Master Skywalker, we need you to bring the Jedi back because Kylo Ren is strong with the dark side of the Force” at the start of the First Lesson scene. It just strikes me as incredibly stilted (plus repetitive of the “there’s no light left in Kylo Ren” conversation earlier), and the scene would work just fine if it started with Luke’s subsequent question “What do you know about the Force?”