❤️ ❤️ ❤️
That’s so wonderful to hear (especially since that episode was one of the toughest to make), thank you so much for your kind words! I hope you keep enjoying it as you go, please keep any feedback coming (good and bad!)
Oh, that is a good one. It’s at the easier end of VFX too to just show a couple of escape pods launch.
Just got a peek. My first thoughts are that the first few scenes are really dull and boring. This is one of the biggest problems I have with the political stuff for Episode I, in general, and the absence of action amplified that problem.
However, the intro started to pick up once Jar Jar arrived (Never thought I’d say that in a sentence so, congratulations), and the rest of the intro is a general improvement over the last one. I’m not sure how I feel about Amidala thanking R2 and Jar Jar’s first conversation with Padme, but that might be bias on my part. Otherwise, this one is on the right track.
I think the big challenge is gonna be how to handle the political aspects without dulling the senses. We do need to have something that gives us an understanding of the conflict, so it’s not like we can just remove it all. But at the same time, I think getting down to the planet sooner would be ideal. I’m not sure how to acheive that balance, so I’m curious to hear what others might say before I attempt anything.
Useful feedback, thanks! Ultimately, the intro of this movie being boring is one of its biggest issues, and I think likely one of the big turn-offs for 1999 moviegoers after so long anticpiating the excitement of a new Star Wars. That’s what I think all of these attempts at the intro are fundamentally trying to fix.
I see where you’re coming from regarding the opening politics. I had hoped/felt like at least opening with immediate destruction of the ambassador’s ship might give us enough high energy to carry us through the following couple of scenes - at least here they feature tension rising as the invasion swiftly materialises. I’d be interested to know from others here what combination of scenes from the first act would make the most compelling opening to the movie. If you start on armies landing that’s pretty fun, but then you’d have to have the Jedi meeting Jar Jar before almost anything else, which puts a lot of expositional pressure on their meeting, plus the need to have it conclude with a sense of momentum.
I’ve got to agree with vranir’s Dooku point. I think the most ideal edit of TPM would have Dooku instructing the Separatists. Though I don’t know how this could be feasible.
It’d be interesting for sure, and probably stronger for it, but you’re wrestling against far more challenging practical concerns with that particular idea. That said, Christopher Lee has starred in over twelve billion films, so decent AI voice and face models are more reasonable than for some other actors in the series. Best of luck to anyone who fancies picking that idea off the shelf!
I like it, especially the thread about the ambassadors and some of the new JarJar lines, but the following still stand out to me as (unavoidable?) issues:
- The number of quick scenes make it feel a bit choppy.
I’ve not shortened any scenes here, at least by much, so that’s an interesting one. I wonder what gives it that feeling?
- How did the Jedi get to the planet? Why are they in the woods?
For reasons! I don’t know, to be honest, because this was more about seeing whether or not the scenes flowed in this order without the Jedi on the Neimoidian ship. (Logic should be present, but it’s secondary to the energy and interest flow of the movie itself, or at least wasn’t the first goal of this test sequence.) I’m open to suggestions for how to justify it. I don’t think we need to explain how they got there necessarily - there’s no explicit reason why they shouldn’t be, and we don’t need to explain everything. But why they’re in the woods? I don’t know. I dropped the word “secretly” into the crawl to imply they’re heading in secretly for whatever reason (maybe they fear that there’re already Trade Federation agents in the city?) You could pretty much stick anything in the crawl so long as it’s not too convoluted, supplemented with Jar Jar lines if possible.
This leads a little into how to handle the Jar Jar angle. I’ve got a lot of alternate voice lines to play with, but it’d be nice to think about our options. With this introduction, the invasion is NOT already in play, nor is Padmé already captured. Plus, they definitely appear to stumble upon Jar Jar by chance, and their dialogue is less flexible than his so it probably needs to remain a chance meeting. I’ve always liked the idea of changing Jar Jar into already being a representative (as he becomes by his next appearance), but perhaps that’s one coincidence too far, and the better motivation for him sticking around is just ‘Jar Jar likes Queen Amidala’.
In that case, having Jar Jar audibly identify the Jedi early is good, and then having him say “I’m going to help the Queen” before Qui-Gon replies “That won’t be necessary” would fit nicely for both characters, with them accepting him temporarily when he explains he can guide them into the city later (“City? Can you take us there?”) That, plus Jar Jar’s help in Naboo in finding the Queen, is probably the best path to explain why he sticks around that isn’t a radical change.
- Do we have to tip our hand w Sideous so early? I’d ideally like to see Dooku instructing them, setting up the overall Separatist threat, then reveal that he’s secretly taking orders from elsewhere in Ep2.
In terms of adding Dooku, we’re walking into more radical territory here. If someone had workable Dooku footage that’d certainly be worth consideration, though it’s certainly beyond my abilities.
We don’t need Sidious necessarily, though, and you could trim him out easily enough, though you would lose some context in so doing. Personally though, I like Sidious early, because the Neimoidians aren’t particularly threatening on their own, and it’s interesting to imply that there’re darker politics at play during this crumbling Republic. As much as I’ve presented a fairly significant change with this intro edit, I think a fairly conservative approach is quite sensible. The more I watch TPM, the more I understand the decisions made during the process - I’ve come to believe it’s mainly just the editing that’s not very exciting, rather than the collective bag of ideas.
What is lost in my edit of the intro (above) is scenes of the Jedi being diplomatic- both with their intentions with the Neimoidians and their interactions with Boss Nass.
I suppose that raises the question of how important seeing them in that role is, balanced against the value gain of (IMO) a better paced and flowing opening to the saga.
Their main goal is still protection of the Queen, arguably the most political of their onscreen actions, and they still demonstrate a key role as defenders of the Republic. We do see them interact diplomatically during other scenes in this movie (with Watto, on Coruscant, and with Boss Nass later), plus in future movies, so I don’t think too much is lost by trimming it as I have.
Compare again to ANH, where the Jedi aren’t explained until we meet Obi-Wan, and we don’t develop his force abilities until the mind trick later.
We also lose a little of their force sense by dropping the “something elsewhere, elusive” conversation, but again, that’s demonstrated elsewhere, through Qui-Gon’s dialogue when they rescue the Queen (“there’s someone else behind this”) and I’ve nudged it a little more by mentioning the Jedi Order’s foresight in my crawl.
But still. All for discussion.
OK, my new edit of the intro is available now. 16 minutes long, but the main changes are the first ~8 min.
IMPORTANT MESSAGE ABOUT JAR JAR’S VOICE AT THE END OF THIS POST.
PLEASE READ BEFORE WATCHING.
So, this edit isn’t quite complete, but that’s as much as I could get done today, and it’s decent enough to share for feedback.
While it might sound like a fairly radical edit of the intro, this still contains the vast majority of context from the original. We don’t have the Jedi on the Neimoidian ship, but we preserve most of the context that’s relevant to the plot, and what’s mostly lost is their action scenes (but we still get three Jedi action scenes in this intro). We also don’t have Otoh Gungah, which is mainly used to justify Jar Jar’s involvement, which isn’t required with alternate voice lines.
My feeling is that this flows very logically and naturally. Specifically, taking the criticism of my first attempt to heart, I first sought out the scenes which best flowed together, then ordered them to best control the flow of information for the viewer. I think it’s now a lot clearer, and emphasises many core plotlines - Neimoidian boldness, Sidious’ influence, Amidala’s role, and the goals of the Jedi. And the tension and viewer excitement is held for longer, so the energy levels are good.
But also, on pacing, it feels a lot more like the OT - specifically A New Hope. If we compare the two, Queen Amidala is our Death Star plans, which makes Naboo (not the Neimoidian ship) our Tantive IV which must be escaped in order to start the plot properly. The Jedi must get the Queen to Coruscant = the good guys must get the Death Star Plans to the Rebellion. ANH spends the first ten minutes on the Tantive IV (with an exciting pursuit-and-capture, clarifying the core conflict, worldbuilding, and kicking off the main plot). It then spends six minutes with the droids on Tattooine for lighter jeopardy and worldbuilding, then introduces Luke at minute 16. Now, this introduction spends the first eleven minutes on Naboo (with an exciting invasion-and-chase, clarifying the core conflict, worldbuilding, and kicking the main plot). It then spends five minutes in space for lighter jeopardy and worldbuilding, then introduces Anakin at minute 16. IT LIKES’S POEMRY. IT’S RHYTHM.
Also, while you don’t want to rush through the film at all, and you want to keep it to a decent length, trimming the opening like this also achieves two things: It gets Darth Maul in play earlier, so he can hang over the plot for longer; and it helps identify the main character - Anakin. The rest are supporting cast, with enough character that we understand and care about them, but after this intro the main bulk of the film from here is really Anakin’s story, with his actions driving the plot.
Oh, and I also intend to borrow a few other nice touches from Hal’s version for this intro - removing the droid’s weird scream as it’s force pushed, and the weird ‘does not compute’ dialogue.
IMPORTANTLY-
I haven’t finished the Jar Jar voicework yet. When you watch, please bear in mind the following: Jar Jar’s motivation (whether he’s already a representative or just a regular Gungan) is that he thinks Queen Amidala is a great leader and he wants to do what he can to protect her. There’s lots of lines in TCW that support that, that I’ll work to include soon. (He’s not necessarily a competent protector and he’s still goofy, but his heart’s in the right place and importantly HE HAS A MOTIVATION NOW.)
In place of the voicework I’ll do soon, I’ve just put in some of my existing Jar Jar alternate voice lines for now, which don’t always fit the context (he knows the Queen’s captured before she gets captured, for example), but hopefully they should serve to remind y’all that different things are being said at those moments, without it being too jarring. Importantly, one thing I’ll add is Jar Jar immediately identifying Qui-Gon as a Jedi, to help the audience make the same connection back to the crawl.
Anyway, have a look, BUT REMEMBER THE JAR JAR STUFF ISN’T FINISHED
If only there were some save button I could have clicked, to somehow preserve my progress!
Either way, I’m not restarting from nothing, it’ll be reproducible, it’s just work. I’ll get there!
I feel good about this edit, I’m excited to share it.
…and I’ve lost all this morning’s work, its backup, and the post I’d written about it.
CRY
Very exciting to hear there’re some blender wizards around!
I’ve just spent some time working on a new edit for the opening of the movie based on both of the ideas shared above. It’s not quite finished but I should get it done tomorrow - I need to work on some alternative Jar Jar lines to give context.
In this version, the Jedi are already on the planet, and are NOT the ambassadors. The Neimoidians immediately destroy the docked ambassador ship, which actually serves to recontextualise all of the surrounding discussion, show their boldness in the face of Republic complacency, and emphasise Sidious’ coercive influence. We will also skip over Otoh Gunga completely, with Jar Jar a more active participant who decides to guide them into the city.
That all sounds fairly radical, but I preserved a lot of the original scenes, albeit with new contexts, and found that it flows really nicely without feeling like it’s jumping all over the place like my previous attempt. It builds tension well, it still gives a lot of context, and it really emphasises the invasion angle. And while it is radical, I don’t propose making many other changes to the rest of the movie - this is mainly to (1) get it off with a bang and keep the energy high through the intro, (2) streamline the politics without removing them entirely, and (3) make Jar Jar a more active participant.
The new crawl that sets this up is as follows:
The GALACTIC REPUBLIC is failing.
Under a weak chancellor, complacency
spreads in the Senate, opposed by
Queen Amidala of Naboo, a vocal
champion against corruption.
Encouraged by a shadowy benefactor,
the greedy TRADE FEDERATION have
massed a fleet around her planet
in an attempt to silence her, prompting
the chancellor to send a team of
ambassadors to negotiate.
Foreseeing an invasion, the Jedi Order,
mystical defenders of the Republic,
have secretly dispatched Jedi Knight
Qui-Gon Jinn and his apprentice to
the swamps outside the capital, seeking
to protect the Queen…
I could trim a little from that - perhaps the references to the Senate, Sidious, or the Trade Federation’s goals - but it covers the main beats. I’m hoping that ‘secretly dispatched’ justifies dropping the Jedi in the swamps nearby well enough…
That said, I do have a couple more ideas I might try, for cutting the Jedi on the Neimoidian ship and allowing the movie to have better momentum at the beginning:
The first idea: If we’re trimming the Neimoidian ship, and a valid criticism of my original attempt was that we flick between too many locations, then perhaps we don’t need to see the Jedi on their ship at all - perhaps they begin on the planet. That way, the first time we see them they’re in action. There’s also a natural flow into that content, as it could be preceded by the army arriving in the swamp, which could itself be preceded by the Neimoidian/Sidious dialogue about the invasion. The opening crawl could simply help place them already on mission.
The second idea: This one’s a little more radical, but we could preserve some of the Neimoidian ship drama and existing plot, and build tension, if the ambassadors sent to the Neimoidians are different characters the Jedi. If the Jedi begin on the planet, getting flushed out by Trade Federation forces, then we still have the footage of a Republic ship arriving on the Neimoidian ship, and being destroyed. Plus we might be able to tie that in with Queen Amidala’s accusative phonecall.
Scene ordering might be:
- Opening crawl
- Neimoidians and Sidious discuss their hopes for the invasion
- Second set of shots of Trade Federation forces landing (this set nicely transitions from the sky to the ground)
- Jedi fleeing tanks, discover Jar Jar (a bit of new Jar Jar dialogue here might help give some key exposition)
- Jar Jar agrees to take the Jedi to Theed
- Set of shots showing Trade Federation forces travelling overground to Theed, Padmé laments at the window
Going with the second idea as well, you could put the scenes of the ambassador-but-not-Jedi ship arriving, then getting immediately destroyed, right after the crawl, which feels like it should flow OK. And Padmé’s smack talk could either come around that time - near Sidious calling her naive - or after her lament later on.
I guess between the two, I’ll pick the first one, since I feel lazy, and it’s an easier feat than the other one. Just a couple simple cuts with some crossfades if need be. The second one requires a lot of work, and I’m worried that you’d need someone who knows Blender all too well in order to pull it off.
I’m feeling exhausted due to my day job. But when I get my energy back, I’d be happy to work on the first option and upload the result like I did last time! What do you think?
Sorry if that sounded like I was asking you to do that Eyepainter, it wasn’t my intent to assume you’d take on the responsibility! I assumed I’d pick it up myself (and use the Jar Jar voice thing while I’m at it), but please do give it a crack if you’re up for it. Or we’ll both give it a crack and compare notes!
I’m definitely more of a Hayden guy, just for the continuity with his most familiar face. Though I’m certainly open to aging it. And I think Vader has eyebrows in Rebels, though I’d reserve judgment on that one until the Kenobi show airs.
You’d have to change the Neimodians holo transmission after the invasion force landed. It doesn’t make sense for them to search their ship for the Jedi, if they landed on Naboo directly.
Yeah, you’d skip that shot.
However now that I saw this, I had an idea. What if we show the Jedi pass the blockade? I’m imagining something like this:
-Crawl
-Sidious hologram
-Obi and Qui-Gon are briefed by pseudo 3PO
-Gunray contacts the Jedi’s ship, they’re asked to land onboard
-Wide Shot of the Jedi’s ship approaching the droid control ship, add in a tiny escape pod flying away
-we follow the pod and see the droid invasion fleet lowering to the surface
-from here on we’re back on track with the original plotThis would bridge the Jedi and the invasion plot and mirror the opening of ANH nicely.
All we would need is a model of an escape pod.
This is a nice idea too. I’d love to get some VFX help on things like this but it’s a big ask every time. I’m picking up Blender right now but I’m at the beginner tutorials stage, so far I’ve made a half decent donut.
Looking forward to seeing it!
My feeling from my own rough demo was that removing the Jedi on the control ship might not be possible after all, though the pacing through the intro might still be improvable.
So I’m really excited to have someone else take a crack at this just in case!
Here’s my version of the intro! I’ve done what I could to polish up certain things, but those things that I can’t do are still incomplete. Hope it’s an improvement!
https://drive.google.com/file/d/118OZlN1IP2C3MvN-dsCAQd7AwEWqltwy/view?usp=sharing
Oh man it’s a treat to see my crawl for real! Though I think Hal’s right, and it is too heavy. Good to see though!
On the actual content, I think your original criticism still stands, and it cuts too quickly between too many locations, so there’s no room to breathe, and the pacing is a bit frantic. Having tested this idea, and tending to prefer conservative changes, I suspect that just a light tightening of the original opening might be most appropriate.
That said, I do have a couple more ideas I might try, for cutting the Jedi on the Neimoidian ship and allowing the movie to have better momentum at the beginning:
The first idea: If we’re trimming the Neimoidian ship, and a valid criticism of my original attempt was that we flick between too many locations, then perhaps we don’t need to see the Jedi on their ship at all - perhaps they begin on the planet. That way, the first time we see them they’re in action. There’s also a natural flow into that content, as it could be preceded by the army arriving in the swamp, which could itself be preceded by the Neimoidian/Sidious dialogue about the invasion. The opening crawl could simply help place them already on mission.
The second idea: This one’s a little more radical, but we could preserve some of the Neimoidian ship drama and existing plot, and build tension, if the ambassadors sent to the Neimoidians are different characters the Jedi. If the Jedi begin on the planet, getting flushed out by Trade Federation forces, then we still have the footage of a Republic ship arriving on the Neimoidian ship, and being destroyed. Plus we might be able to tie that in with Queen Amidala’s accusative phonecall.
Scene ordering might be:
Going with the second idea as well, you could put the scenes of the ambassador-but-not-Jedi ship arriving, then getting immediately destroyed, right after the crawl, which feels like it should flow OK. And Padmé’s smack talk could either come around that time - near Sidious calling her naive - or after her lament later on.
Looking forward to seeing it!
My feeling from my own rough demo was that removing the Jedi on the control ship might not be possible after all, though the pacing through the intro might still be improvable.
So I’m really excited to have someone else take a crack at this just in case!
I think that’s a great idea! You’re still covering it at roughly the same time in the movie, but it definitely fits that scene. You’d lose Anakin’s reaction from the movie though, what’re the surrounding lines in the animated segment?
That’s better across the board.
I went to the Skywalker homestead back in 2009 when on holiday in Tunisia, and your grade is much more accurate to how it actually was. The walls are white paint, not off-white. Picture.
Yeah, you’re right. It just doesn’t flow at all. Oh well! Perhaps keeping the original opening is necessary for the flow.
Here’s a very ROUGH example of that idea that I threw together very quickly, to see how you guys think that version works if it played out that way.
That issue’s a bit of a pain. I find that running the audio track through audacity once or twice, sometimes via other filetypes, often does the trick.
Can’t do that, because I’d like a ‘planetary celebration’ with Shaw, and don’t want another version or two to track and worry about when it’s a change I have no interest in. Again, all the resources are there to make that tweak for whomever would like to.
I wonder if it’s worth someone creating (and pinning?) a little video tutorial on how to make small personal tweaks to scenes. Because you’re quite right, these kinds of things are super easy, but most people probably don’t think that. And it would take the pressure off editors to create multiple versions, letting them release alternate versions of single scenes, AND upskilling the consumer community while we were at it.
I did this myself a while back, integrating shamook’s Luke into my last episode of Mando season one.
That idea is neat, but I think it would feel out of place considering the setup. The ‘bait’ aspect of the Death Star and the Rebel’s attack plan both hinge on the Death Star being hidden and isolated from the rest of the galaxy and the Imperial fleet. If the Death Star were to be constructed around Coruscant (or moved there at some point in its construction), there would be no way to keep that a secret and so the Death Star would fail to be enticing as a target to the Rebels since they would expect a trap.
Yeah, and this must be why they chose to change its location to far from the core worlds.
I don’t really see how it would conflict with the prequels.
It’d only conflict with the prequels insofar as it would be nice to see the moon in orbit of Coruscant more in that case.
Yeah, also all good points. I guess these’re all less important if you’re positioning the prequels as just the ‘flashback’ showing Anakin’s fall, but for a proper focus on the wider saga, TPM is pretty key.
Totally unrelated, I’ve just been thinking a little more about the opening of TPM, in the scenario where we don’t have the Jedi board the Neimoidian ship. I know some think we need those scenes, so I was wondering if there was an approach where you could have the best of both worlds, and that led me to thinking about intercutting between the early Neimoidian scenes and the scenes of the Jedi on the planet. Perhaps something like this:
(There’s also perhaps a place earlier on for Padmé’s insulting phonecall with the Neimoidians.)
Now, the Neimoidians have sent a whole military force to hunt down the Jedi, emphasising their threat to the invasion, and the first time we see the Jedi in action, we see how they handle the droids mainly through evasion, but also some good Jedi skill. We still get all of the important context of the Neimoidians and Sidious’ relationship, and the Jedi’s relationship and context, but we get more quickly to action whilst preserving each side’s threat/reaction to each other. We also get the invasion in earlier, which helps move the plot along and helps make ‘save the Queen’ our core macguffin instead of starting with negotiation.
Qui-Gon. The juxtaposition of the way he is (compassionate, caring, unafraid to take risks) vs. the way the Jedi council is (scared, traditionalist, forbidding connection) is important to see. It sets up that the way the Jedi Order functions doesn’t work and should change. Obi-Wan being pulled between the Order and the way Qui-Gon operated is what leads to his middle-ground approach to training Anakin, which leaves him vulnerable to Palpatine.
The Republic. We need to see it the way we see it in TPM. It’s huge, thriving, bright, happy. We need to see it that way to realize how corrupted it becomes, and see the tragedy of its downfall into becoming the Empire.
I personally agree with both, though it would have been nice if both of those core messages were a bit more explicit in the script. Good points though.
I do think TPM deserves its place in the saga, I’m just curious what others think here.