Released - s02e09 - TERROR OF GEONOSIS

Comprising Legacy of Terror and Brain Invaders.

Details on the last page, link in the spreadsheet, PM for access.

And with that I can say-

Complete: SEASON TWO

(Well, except for those couple of transitions in my clones anthology, and I think one episode with a very minor bugfix pending, but shhh, I’ll fix them soon.)

Woop woop woop! Trumpets, etc.

Now I’m going to force myself to take a little break because it’s been all-out for a couple of months. Only a little one though!

Released - s02e08 - Assault on Geonosis

Comprising Landing at Point Rain and Weapons Factory.

Details on the last page, link in the spreadsheet, PM for access.

The final episode of this three-part arc and the season is rendering now, should be up in three hours max.

I nearly just rendered an episode with incomplete titles by mistake.

It would have read:

"The Clone Wars spread instability and chaos across the galaxy.
Mando Mando Mando.
Mando Mando Mando.

Mando Mando Mando.
Mando Mando Mando.
Mando Mando."

I’ve no doubt that’s exactly what Dave Filoni’s template document for scripts for episodes of the Mandalorian looks like, but it’s not going to suffice for you guys.

I think I’d like to stick with Return of Maul as the priority, because I really want the show to be bold about the fact that “MAUL IS COMING BACK, deal with it”, because it’s useful to rip the plaster (‘band-aid’) off early and let people come to terms with it earlier.

So I’m more inclined to rename the Geonosis episode, and I think for the sake of uniformity for that now-trilogy I’ll stick with the ‘X of/on Geonosis’ format. I suppose it’s clear that we are returning to it, so Assault works fairly well because it implies some urgency after Padmé’s discovery. That would also help preemptively let people know that Padmé’s episode is not likely to be action heavy, so would help manage expectations there.

Maybe Assault on Geonosis?

Hm! I can’t have The Return of Maul, then two episodes later, Return to Geonosis. Help!

Darth_Zounds said:

As you all know, I also prefer to consider AOTC as Episode 1, with my own rearrangement of episodes from “The Clone Wars” forming an in-between-quel, which I titled ‘Labyrinth of Evil.’

Which episodes did you choose for your inbetweenquel? What do you think best bridges AOTC/ROTS?

That’s worth thinking about. The reason I left those transitions unfinished is because I find it’s a different mental discipline to fix the music - it comes less naturally to me - so I have to change mental gears for it. In this case, I’m cutting at the point where the music would otherwise drop into the bombasic Bah-BAHH of the original credits, which I want to avoid. So I need to find alternate music to fade out to instead, which takes a fair amount of time.

Regarding the intro texts, the first one is the only one that actually matters - we need to know the Republic guys got ambushed and we’ve ‘returned’ to Christophsis. But the other two give all of their context within the episode. So I don’t mind so much people forgetting them - and they are certainly very heavy - but I don’t want the audience feeling overwhelmed or disoriented. I might have to do something different here, so if others’ could give more feedback on this too that’d be helpful.

If I do change the timing of the intertitles, I’ll need to find alternative music for them too, which’ll take a little while.

Released - s02e07 - Shadow of Geonosis

A renamed (and lightly edited) Senate Spy. Fully complete.

Details over the last few posts, link in the tracker spreadsheet, PM for access.

NeverarGreat said:

I’ll see what I can add back into the Poe interrogation scene in terms of audio.

In terms of progress on Act 3, the major thing is of course the Hosnian Destruction. I decided to use the entire music track this time in order to fit all of the important characters reacting to the destruction, including Rey, Finn, and Kylo:

https://vimeo.com/533003587

Password: fanedit

There are of course audio issues to sort out. The actual destruction scene had to be practically silent due to moving the music around, though I kind of like it.

It may be possible to remove the Resistance officers from around Leia in that final shot, but would that be worth the effort?

I haven’t followed the context for this change but I didn’t see any problem with the Leia shot. To me it fit perfectly, I don’t know why the resistance officers were problematic.

Watching this reminded me of a personal annoyance that just gets me every time, and since I first saw it I now can’t unsee it. In the room where Kylo kills Han, the balcony/entrance that Rey and Finn stand at has a railing, and on that railing are lights. The lights have a red light on the left and right of the fixture. But really annoyingly, the lights just look clipped on to the railing, and one is offset. I don’t know why, but that’s always taken me out of the scene, even though it’s not even really that egregious, possibly not even an error.

NeverarGreat said:

Oh, I had another idea for the Reconnaissance briefing, which I think Hal would be interested in as well:

https://vimeo.com/533027544

Password: fanedit

I managed to put a reference in there to the Senate and link it to the Hosnian system, which solves the issue in Restructured of never actually knowing what planet was destroyed. It also arguably does a better job of conveying this information than the theatrical version, since we are given the info before the planet is blown up and not twenty minutes after.

I did have to sacrifice Snap’s line about contacting the Republic, but I think it’s a fair price since that line wasn’t working too well anyway.

There’s also the oddity that Leia says ‘the Senate is their next target’, but it can easily be interpreted that she’s referring to the escalating series of First Order attacks throughout the film.

This is really, really good. A huge value add.

Workprint Released - s02e05 - Tales of the Lost Clones

Review version only because there’re two unfinished transitions (out of the first two episodes), and because it’s a complex edit and I’d like to see how this one works for you guys. Feedback on this one would be very helpful, please.

Details over the last few posts, link in the tracker spreadsheet, PM for access.

Yeah, I’m generally going for simple.

Since the original version of TCW was such an anthology show, and of such inconsistent quality, you never knew what a given episode was going to be about (from a HUGE range), nor whether or not the elements in those episodes were going to be incredible or awful. So as much as I can, I want my show to be a show you can trust. Because when you expect to be frustrated, you’ll be anxious and hesitant and it’ll shape your perception of what you’re consuming.

That’s why getting all of the presentation elements right was important to me - because I want this show to be bold and confident and aware of its strengths, because that will help shape the users’ mindset and make their enjoyment higher because they’ll be wired to expect enjoyment. And an element of that is using the titles and the opening text to really direct the audience to where the quality is, or to enhance the point of a given episode: “THIS is the element to be focusing on today”, and highlighting the key theme or most valuable element from that episode. Even though it’s a small thing, it’s still something that could be useful, and I’ll take those few percent.

For example: Senate Spy is not a strong episode. It certainly doesn’t deliver on the “spy” angle. A valid objection to it is that it’s got prequel B-tier villains and it’s basically the story of Padmé being pimped out by the Jedi council to a smug, rich creep, to which Anakin acts petty and controlling. Not good. But if we call it ‘…Geonosis’ in a Geonosis trilogy, then people will (1) expect that it’s act one/setup and not expect huge things, (2) anticipate the return of a familiar element which is clearly about to be explored further, (3) get curious about the Geonosis angle, pay more attention to Poggle when he appears, get more value out of the secret meeting, care more about the poisoning, treat Clovis as a bit more important than a one-off foil, etc etc.

It’s subtle, but it’s not got a zero value. And doing little things like this can make the show feel more consistent in tone, consistent in quality, and ultimately a little more trustworthy.

In fact I might have just convinced myself to rename the couple of ones I left as they were.

And that’s me done with the body (not the finalisation yet) of the third and final part of my Tales of the Lost Clones anthology, the Cut Lawquane stuff from the Deserter, running at 13:50 without credits etc.

I made no changes to this whatsoever, other than chopping it out of its original episode and putting it together with smooth transitions. It now makes no reference to Obi-Wan or Grievous at all. In fact, all three episodes in this anthology are deliberately like that - no context, no establishing shots. We start within the stories already, because they are slices of a bigger picture, and larger context is not only irrelevant, it’s actively against our intent.

This does now mean that I have two episodes back to back which both have a holochess scene, which might be a bit on the nose for people, but they’re both good scenes so worth riding out any such REMEMBER THAT TIME IN THAT MOVIE WITH THAT THING discomfort I reckon.

The full Tales of the Lost Clones episode will run to just about 45 minutes all told. Three episodes for the price of two.

I’m going to render this now as a workprint just because it’s technically complex, and I want to get a sense from you guys for how it feels before I finalise it. Feedback encouraged as ever, but particularly so in the case of this one.

Very pleased to have got this far this weekend. This means I can get some priority real life stuff done tomorrow and have plenty of time to finalise and release Geonosis and Tales of the Lost Clones ASAP - hopefully all tomorrow, but not long after if not.

Ed Slushie said:

Hi, can I get a link?

PM sent.

I’ve just finished the Gregor part of my Tales of the Lost Clones anthology, coming in at 15:30 of actual content.

I strongly disliked the whole Droids in the Void arc, so wasn’t going to include it in any form until a community member (I forget whom, sorry) recommended plucking out this part of it, which then got rolled into my idea of a lost clones anthology (which itself came about because there’re three half-episodes focusing on clones, which needed a home).

This part is now obviously refocused into being Gregor’s story, not Colonel Gascon’s, so I’ve trimmed everything that doesn’t serve the story of Gregor. I’ve made Colonel Gascon far less abrasive and arrogant (he’s now, possibly, a legitimately competent Colonel who’s simply crashed and exhausted), I’ve made his pit droid more straightforward and helpful and less antagonistic, I’ve minimised the other droids, and I’ve trimmed the usual bants and goofiness, especially during the closing combat scene. It was fun to trim that action scene while keeping the action flow - let me know if you can spot any of the seams!

I think this part is now good enough that it’ll work when sandwitched between two better episodes, and probably a first-time viewer would be OK with it, but for people who hated the original arc I think this’ll just give unwelcome flashbacks.

Either way, it’s alright like this, and it helps with the secondary message of the TOTLC anthology which is “focus on Rex, he’s the main clone in The Clone Wars TV show”. Plus, there’s that extra Gregor payoff once we hit season two of Rebels.

In case it’s not clear to anyone, I don’t intend to include any of the rest of the Droids in the Void anthology in any capacity.

Knight of Kalee said:

Hi there! I haven’t been able to give so much feedback as I used to because university has been a dick to me this semester, but I wanted to comment on at least some parts of this latest array of updates.

Always lovely to have you with us, Kalee. Focus on your studies and I’ll keep churning out episodes for you! Good luck with university.

• So great to see we have almost 2 complete seasons! This is going to be an interesting viewing experience.

I know! It’s kind of crazy to be 42% complete after only four months since this project’s inception. These will ultimately become my own archival versions, but I’m hoping that one day someone’ll say that about my edit as we do about others’.

• If I had any time I would have suggested you to have the plotlines of the last 2 Geonosis episodes happen concurrently, so great to hear you’ve done exactly that! 😄

Full credit to Smudger for the concept of course! I’m very pleased with how that episode worked out. Let me know if you enjoy it.

Is the scene of Anakin forcing Poggle to cooperate included right?

Oh yeah. Punches that bug right in the face.

• The three-parter Geonosis titles you suggestes sound pretty great, they wouldn’t feel out of place if this were the original episodes.

Glad you think so! In a way they kind of evoke the Malevolence trilogy, which for my series I condensed down into one episode just called “Malevolence”, so it was nice to kind of do the same thing in reverse with Geonosis. That’s why I used ‘Shadow of’, though I could equally have used ‘Rise of’. But naturally Geonosis doesn’t get destroyed, so I couldn’t end up with ‘Destroy Geonosis’, as nice an homage as that would have been.

And now the Hidden Enemy parts of Tales of the Lost Clones are finished. One down, two to go. This one’s a cool little story, at just 12 minutes, with only a few trims and transitions and audio changes, but I think it works a lot better when it isn’t put up front in the series like it was in the original chronology. We shouldn’t have a traitor clone right after meeting them. Anyway, cool little tale, which hits a bit stronger when you’re not constantly cutting away. And it’s the right story to start our clone anthology off with, I think, because this one is simply a clone objecting to not being a free man - a fair objection that the audience should think about. Originally this was the B-plot for the story about Ventress infiltrating Christophsis, but now that it’s devoid of that context, I’ve cut the references to being paid off (by “her”) so that it’s purely resistance to Jedi rule. It’ll start Rex off on his own journey exploring orders and his position as a clone.

Click here for detail on part 2 of the anthology episode

(As a random thought, I know it might be a bit odd that I give you this commentary before releasing the episode, but this way I’m able to braindump it when it’s fresh, so the commentary is more complete. I like to give you guys as much commentary as possible in case it triggers any valuable thoughts for you guys which might turn into fruitful discussion. Doing it in advance increases the chances that you’ll pick up on something I should attend to before I’ve released the episode.)

A thought on naming. For the third Geonosis episode, as much as I love RogueLeader’s suggestion of TERROR OF THE BRAIN INVADERS!, I think I want to keep from giving away the reveal, instead leaning into the terror aspect. And while my now-trilogy of episodes can be watched standalone (as opposed to being part one, two, three of the same story), I think I’d like to name them in some way that links them. Naturally, that link is Geonosis, so perhaps my three should be:

• Shadow of Geonosis
• Return to Geonosis
• Terror of Geonosis

That tells the viewer that they’re linked but without requiring viewing as one three-part arc. It also makes Senate Spy more interesting - tying it into Geonosis early rather than letting that reveal come late in the episode, which could be more compelling for a viewer not sold on the episode premise (as I originally wasn’t). For Terror, it puts you in the right mindset without giving the game away, and following Return that’d tell you that you were getting something tonally different.

As always, interested in thoughts.

Aaand that’s the main cut of my Worms of Geonosis episode put together. It’ll be about 36:30 plus credits. Like the previous couple, I still need to finalise it with credits etc before upload, but I want to spend my edit-brain on the meat of the episodes this long weekend, and polish after.

For this episode, I heavily borrowed from Smudger’s excellent interleaving of Legacy of Terror and Brain Invaders, and I used his ideas for audio changes in a couple of places. I still cut it myself from the original sources though, because it forces me to think each element through afresh rather than being lazy. I have some light differences from Smudger’s first half - we don’t need to see Poggle flee, I reckon, and it’s OK if we see the worm-clone carrying eggs early (because we don’t know yet that they contain worms) - but I’ve restructured the second half further.

With mine, we now continue to intercut between the episodes for longer, breaking up the long scene of Anakin and Obi-Wan in the Queen’s throne room with a couple more shots of Ahsoka and Luminara struggling against the zombie clones. This way, we keep them in mind more as we learn of the terror of the parasites, and we put them into more jeopardy sooner. I also did a little more to make the Legacy of Terror finale more ominous, using music and a transition to change “let’s hope the secret [of the worms] is buried with them” from being a hopeful episode ending to an ironic emphasis that Ahsoka is in serious danger - which is followed up immediately by the reveal that Barriss has been zombiefied, and attacks her.

I also removed the “coming in too fast” subplot, because it’s not interesting. We don’t care about the clone medical station so there’s no jeopardy there, and what’re they going to do? Bump into it? It’s not very exciting. It’s cool that Ahsoka wants to prevent the spread of the worms, but that intention enough is valuable for her character - we’re not invested in the outcome beyond Ahsoka caring about it. Instead, we keep the focus on the drama inside the medical ship as Ahsoka defends against Barriss, cutting away only to the odd shot of Kit Fisto responding to their arrival in the system. Once Ahsoka has saved Barriss, the plot is ready to conclude.

Interestingly, once I’ve completed this (and thus my second season), my edits will have covered all of the main arcs covered by Smudger’s five TCW TV-to-movie edits. I’ve always really admired Smudger’s work and for a long time had eagerly anticipated his future plans for TCW, so it’s cool to feel like I’ll have reached parity with his original work and be able to take The Clone Wars forward from that point onwards - albeit in a different format to the one that he chose.

By chance, all of my episodes up to the end of my season two add up in time to almost exactly the same length as Smudger’s five movies - about eleven hours total - which feels like a neat match.

Right, they’re not finalised yet, but I’ve made good progress with Senate Spy and the the Second Battle of Geonosis.

Senate Spy just featured the trims I mentioned beforehand, nothing too radical. I also removed the scene where Padmé gets gawked at by Rush - he’s still really into her, he’s just less slimy. In that same scene I also cut Poggle poisoning Padmé directly, because it’s weird that she’s poisoned by a drink, then eats a whole meal, and only then feels bad. This way, we get the discussion about poisoning, they enjoy a meal, and then Padmé feels ill - implicitly, something was in her food rather than her drink, and the subterfuge was more subtle than HEY DRINK THIS DRINK PLEASE.

Geonosis I trimmed more than expected. I do prefer the flow of the first half if we don’t spend time on Anakin’s and Ki-Adi-Mundi’s prongs of the attack. Now the focus is more on the fact that the plan went wrong and that Kenobi’s wounded. We get a good sense of the threat to Kenobi’s position, only lightly touching on Anakin rushing forward and lucking into Ki-Adi-Mundi. Ki-Adi-Mundi even says ‘sorry, we got diverted and out of comms range’ as we see him emerge from a flaming hole of Geonosians, so I think that’s sufficient explanation. I’ve also trimmed some dialogue to make Yularen more aware of this and more immediately supportive - thinking quickly, he prepares a bombing fleet ready to support Obi-Wan on Anakin’s signal. Naturally I trimmed a lot of droid bants.

I’ve removed a little more of the sense of the first part having a normal episode’s ending, so the transition is more smooth. I’ve also made Ahsoka and Barris’ deaths more ambiguous - Luminara doesn’t say “I know they’re alive”, so now Anakin’s hunt is more of an act of hope. I also reordered some scenes to leave the mystery of their survival lingering for longer. I trimmed their dialogue a bit to make Barris appear more fatalistic. This way, plus the following episode, gives her a sense of being not quite right - pushed too hard by the Jedi - which will pay off a while later in Ahsoka’s Fall.

As I say, I’ve not finalised these yet, but I want to get through the cuts as much as possible for the last four of this season this weekend, so any remaining polish remains an easy task.

CaptainFaraday said:

Okay, I’ve got another one:

There once was a Jedi named Rey
Who needed help finding 'er way
Give yourself to the Sith
And the whispers we give
Will say where it is right away

For real, though, I’m provisionally of the opinion that it would work fine as long as the visuals support it - tracking in on Rey during “darkened heart,” for example, that kind of filmic language. But the proof (or disproof) of that would be in the end result. I’ll record something and let people play around with it if they want to, and we’ll know pretty quickly if it’s going to be tenable or not.

At the same time, we could try and collectively come up with something that retains a poetic/ancient tone to it but conveys the information in a literal way - the writing style of The Epic of Gilgamesh could work as inspiration, for example, as it includes a lot of verses like that.

someBODY once told me
that you just gotta hold me
but I am not a knife made for cutting

at the second deathstar’s grave
where the land meets crashing waves
I will point to a further macguffin

Valid, but I’m already very tight on space…

Ah yeah that’s a tricky one.

I’m trying to convey the following concepts:

• The political academy (which teaches kids politics) is for youths - it is a youth political academy
• The youth political academy has some particularly high-achieving students - the youth political academy’s “brightest”
• These are the people Ahsoka is secretly teaching - the “brightest” students at the political academy for youths.

So perhaps I should present it as:

“…for Ahsoka to secretly teach the top students at the political academy for youths.”

Hmmmm. Now that I’m working on it, I might trim the Anakin/Ahsoka and Ki-Adi-Mundi prongs of the attack on Point Rain. It’s a long battle, we know there’s no jeopardy, and you can overdo battle scenes. I want to preserve the initial assault, the failed landings, and the race to get to Obi-Wan’s position, but I might tighten this whole situation up.

Thoughts?

Ooft, I’ve just realised that with my current structure, all of my season finales relate to the loss of Ahsoka and the topic of letting people go.

1. Cad Bane arc - Anakin says “I can’t lose you, Ahsoka.”
2. Geonosis arc - Anakin and Ahsoka clash with Luminara and Barriss about being ready to lose someone.
3. Onderon arc - Ahsoka learns to let go of Lux (another good reason to focus on him in a single season).
4. Ahsoka’s Fall - well, you know.
5. Siege of Mandalore - well, you know.

It rhymes.