EddieDean

All I can remember of Laura Dern’s ouvre is her appearance in the third season of Twin Peaks. That said, it’d be great if you could have Admiral Holdo say “Fuck you, Albert.”

Edit: God, what a horrible post to start a new page on.

I enjoy, and think it’s been very productive, to have Hal in this role:

Anyway, my edit-brain having run out, I just skipped ahead now to watch the five-part Geonosis arc, which will form my season two finale.

I’d always thought I’d split it as follows:

• Senate Spy - a mostly standalone Anakin/Padmé adventure which provides the macguffin to kick off the battle
• Landing at Point Rain / Weapons Factory - the second battle itself
• Legacy of Terror / Brain Invaders - the follow-up episodes with the worms, intercut similarly to Smudger’s approach, to preserve the suprises and tension a little longer

I think I probably will keep to that plan and present it as those three episodes, unless LAPR/WF ends up short in which case I’d put Senate Spy on the start. I might still play around with that idea. I don’t think I’d want to merge LAPR/WF with LOT/BI though, because those two each have their arcs go up and down, and they’re tonally different. Just because they’re back to back doesn’t mean they have a natural viewing flow, and I think the break should be preserved.

So, analysis and cuts:

Senate Spy has really good Anakin/Padmé romance and tension. I might trim the slightly slapstick pettiness of Anakin on the flight out, and Padmé being Clovis’ password (because I don’t like the trope). There are just a couple of goofy moments which I’ll trim, but this will have a quick turnaround. As it’ll be a very light touch edit I’ll preserve the episode’s original name.

The Battle of Geonosis duology is fairly jeopardy and emotion light and action heavy, BUT it’s good action with good character work and the battle is one of Star Wars’ best land battles - especially impressive since it’s all prequel elements which were unpopular on first release.

I could trim the bit where the three forces split up and meet again, but they’re kind of fun. Ki-Adi-Mundi in the spooky caves is novel, and Anakin’s prong of the attack shows why having the Jedi lead the military worked so well, and gives some fun Ahsoka stuff. So I think I’ll keep all of that. I might trim Anakin’s ludicrous jump off the wall though.

I will, naturally, trim droid banter throughout. I think I’ll end this episode where the current episode ends, rather than making a cliffhanger out of Ahsoka’s survival or letting it run a little longer into the wrap-up from the next two episodes. But I’ll see how that feels when I come to it.

I think I’ll call this episode simply ‘The Second Battle of Geonosis’, since that’s the selling point and there’s not a punctual character arc to follow here. But I’m open to suggestions.

The Geonosis worms duology is even more fun, and there’s proper jeopardy since we lean into Barriss and Ahsoka getting traumatised (Barriss begs Ahsoka to kill her…) and have both zombie bugs and zombie clones, also hinting forward to Order 66. I think I’ll preserve the line where a zombie-clone ominously says “we’re very good at killing Jedi”, because it’s almost like they’re subconsciously aware of Order 66 and only the worm’s weirdness gives temporary access to that knowledge.

I need to trim droid banter and the reference to the traitor clone (in my anthology episode) being tied to Ventress (since these are now two separate events), and then interleave them neatly, but there’re no real other trims to make.

I’m not sure on what to call this. Emphasising the terror/trauma/worms seems sensible, though I do kind of like keeping the focus on the Geonosians - perhaps ‘The Archduke and the Queen’.

I think this makes a fine finale, again tying together a lot of what came before, hinting forward at a few things, giving everyone their moment in the spotlight, and traumatising Ahsoka enough for her to want to mature her character model.

Assuming nothing unexpected happens, I should be able to get these and the workprint of my anthology episode done by the end of Monday, finishing off season two.

So I got started with my TALES OF THE LOST CLONES anthology episode and made some progress on that before running out of edit-brain for today. Couple of thoughts to share:

TOTLC is going to contain three mini-stories:

• LOST IN SPIRIT - The traitor clone stuff from Hidden Enemy in the Christophsis arc - which works really nicely as a single thing cut out of the original episodes.
• LOST IN MIND - The Gregor plot from Missing in Action in the Droids in the Void arc - with its context heavily simplified into a crash on a droid mining planet.
• LOST IN BODY - The deserter plot from The Deserter.

I’ve put them in that order so that the two plots which actively feature Rex are at either end.

I’ve currently got the opening text as follows, to try to sell that it’s an anthology and not all immediately consecutive, without losing my usual tone of voice:

• The Clone Wars spread instability and chaos across the galaxy.
• The clones are genetically identical, born from a single source and raised toward a single purpose. Obedience is in their blood.
• And yet, in different places and at different times throughout the war, a few clones have found themselves on different paths.
• As CHRISTOPHSIS enjoys its freedom from the Separatists, the Republic bastion there has been ambushed at the cost of many lives.
• Lost on the Separatist mining planet ABAFAR, the tiny Republic Colonel Gascon and his droid infiltration squad need a way home.
• And on the remote planet SALEUCAMI, Clone Commander Rex of the 501st and a small clone squadron have had a crash landing of their own.

For my opening title(s), I then have ‘Tales of the Lost Clones’ in smaller font, lowercase and yellow, followed by the individual story’s title in the usual all-caps teal. I repeat this three times.

Just interested in thoughts on that so far.

RELEASED - s02e04 - THE CORRUPTION OF MANDALORE

Comprising Corruption, the Academy, and a scene from Assassin.
Technically releasing this as a review version because the audio may be a bit dodgy, though on a check it seemed OK.

Notes above, PM for access to the tracker if you don’t already have it.

Feels nice to have completed another episode end-to-end after a long time working on polish.

I’m uploading my Corruption on Mandalore episode now. I’m really pleased with how that came out. I can’t quite tell with my current setup, but the audio might be fucked, so I’m just calling it a review cut for now. All of the actual technical edits are in place though, so it’s final other than that. In review it does sound OK, but let me know if you guys feel it doesn’t work. If I need to fix the audio I can do so, but I’ll save that for next week - I’d rather use this long weekend to spend my focus on working out the tricky bits of (ideally) the next couple of episodes.

Onwards to my clone individuality anthology, TALES OF THE LOST CLONES.

Man, if it wasn’t a waste of good time, I’m really tempted to put together an anti-trailer for TCW:R to show all of the things I’m intending to cut or minimise.

Epic music over droid banter, JarJar antics, Ziro’s flamboyance, many quick shots of Grievous being defeated yet again and going “Grr”, and then as the music swells to indicate real action, have Satine dramatically say “The school has received adequate government funding!”

RogueLeader said:

Damn, this sounds good Eddie. You’ve really put some thought into this. I’ve loved all your episodes so far, but these are the kind of episodes I really love to see come out of your project!

It’s definitely satisfying when it comes together like this. Since I know that the idea was spawned in a writers’ room and THEN made to fit into some multiple of 22-minute episodes (at which point all of the ideas may have been both fleshed out and watered down), I feel like sometimes I’m trying to uncover/imagine what those original ideas were initially, then recompiling them from the component parts in front of me. For this one it was realising that ‘the black market is government corruption’ was the ‘plot’ (or, I suppose, the setting, almost) of this duology, and the ‘character arc’ (really the plot) was Ahsoka demonstrating the patience we’ve recently seen her learn successfully.

I find that often you find the answer when looking at where a plot ends up, and thinking back to front instead of front to back, because it’s in the execution that you find the writer’s intention, not the initial setup. That’s also why I think that making the whole show set up and reinforce the Mauldalore finale is sensible.

Man, this Corruption on Mandalore duology in its original form really failed to convey its plot. It’s clear that the original intention was that the existence of the black market wasn’t the mystery, but instead that the big reveal was supposed to be that the black market was actually entirely unnecessary, artificially forced into existence by Almec so that he could secretly control the flow of cash. But the way it unfolds originally, the first episode focused too much on ‘black market bad’ with the poisoned kids, and then the second episode focused too much on the cadets instead of on what they were investigating.

It also felt awkward to have Satine discover corruption and then decide the best solution was to have a Jedi become a school teacher.

I’ve now intercut these episodes so the plot is as follows:

• Satine knows that Mandalore has a reliance on the black market, and some corruption.
• To invest in the issue of corruption long term, she embeds a Jedi in the academy to help ensure a lasting resistance against corruption on a generational basis. (Implicitly, she does this secretly, because the Mandalorian population at large don’t trust Jedi due to their mutual history.)
• On the same trip, she invites Padmé, who’s popular on Mandalore because of her support for their neutrality, and who may be able to help her politically.
• Ahsoka is uncertain of this responsibility - using the best scene of Ahsoka and Padmé on Padmé’s ship from the Assassin episode (which she also arrives on Mandalore in) - now giving Ahsoka more of an arc throughout, building on their relationship, and tying them together a bit better even though they don’t share other scenes together this episode.
• Ahsoka unintentionally inspires the kids to investigate the black market, which they do offscreen.
• The kids report that the black market may actually be linked to government officials to Satine (Korkie’s aunt, so a sensible move). THIS is the trigger for the plot - that the black market may be linked to government corruption, not that either exists in isolation.
• Satine tells the kids not to investigate (because they’re kids, so a sensible move), but frustrated they decide to call Almec.
• Before they can do that, Satine decides to take action - and she and Padmé go to talk to Almec (another senior official, so a sensible move).
• Almec shows little interest, saying it’s probably Death Watch, which Satine finds a bit nonsensical. (This makes the scene in this context a little funny and Almec more flippant, which I think is fun.) Suspicious, and not knowing who else to trust (sensible, because she now suspects it may go as high as Almec) she decides to take some action herself.
• The kids call Almec, who’s already suspicious that Satine may be closing in because of their previous conversation. He tells the kids to meet him that night, knowing he has to act fast. This justifies his fairly radical actions now - he’s more panicked now than in the original episodes.
• The kids attend the academy, where they tell Ahsoka about what’s going on. This brings her into the story, and now that she’s learned a lot more caution than her season one self, she’s wary, and decides to keep an eye on them.
• Late in the evening, Satine and Padmé (who’s always up for capers like this) go and check out the docks, where they see an easily bribed guy. I’ve changed the dialogue “A customs official” to “A government official” to make it explicit that they’ve just had their suspicions confirmed.
• Again, they go to Almec (still sensible because they don’t completely suspect him, and they have more evidence now, and they’d always prefer to go through official channels). He rebuffs them once more, and they retreat for the night.
• Almec now knows for certain he’s made, so while he moves to arrest the kids that night (as he always intended to since the moment they told him they had evidence), off camera he arranges the arrest of Satine. Padmé is unaware of this and doesn’t follow the rest of the plot (she enjoys a good night’s rest in the ambassador’s suite, presumably).
• Ahsoka, now savvy and patient, saves the kids from arrest by Almec’s corrupt guards. They realise that Almec was corrupt and rush to Satine (as a senior official who can help them, still sensible), only to find her taken.
• Ahsoka puts a plan into motion immediately, giving Almec what he wants (the arrested kids) and impicates Satine (who she knows Almec opposes) in order to gain his trust. This doesn’t work, but only because he’s not very trusting, but it was a perfectly sensible idea. It also gets her close to the prison.
• She moves to plan B, and tries to free Satine herself. She falls into a trap, where Almec freely reveals his own corruption, but she turns the tables and imprisons him, freeing Satine, and implicitly rooting out Almec’s corrupt network.
• As a note: Plan B also includes using the kids as part of the plan. I thought about trimming this, but I think it ties more into the Ahsoka-as-teacher plotline, and contrasts well against her cautioning patience earlier. She trusts these kids to act even in the face of danger, but she just knows that there was an unsuitable time for it (breaking into a government warehouse) and a suitable time for it (to free someone from illegal imprisonment and root out a usurper). It shows she’s a bit more discerning, even when she’s being bold. This also kind of shows that she expected to be drawn into a trap (and use that to get Almec to confess), if you want to interpret it that way.
• Ahsoka - now no longer required because she’s both taught the kids about corruption AND triggered a series of events which has likely made the population of Mandalore more savvy about corruption - is picked up by Anakin.
• But Padmé, in my version, remains, for a while. She has dinner with Satine, where they discuss their happiness at the outcome while still bemoaning the cost of corruption across the galaxy. But true to her earlier word, Satine now invites her to come and see a new hospital (the one where in the original they saw the poisoned kids, but here free of context it’s just A Good Thing) and enjoy peaceful mandalore to raise their spirits. They toast, and we end the episode. Mandalore’s now left in a better place than in the original version, and having Padmé stay there for a while is a nice way to keep it feeling relevant even if we don’t revisit them again soon.

I think this all ties together and flows well now, allowing the plots to interweave whilst keeping all of the character motivations completely sensible, and minimising the awful poisoned drinks plot and the kids we aren’t emotionally invested in. They’re now well-meaning but essentially still a foil for Ahsoka, which emphasises her growth.

I’m really glad I got this to work, because (strategically for the whole show) I needed us to spend more time with Satine, Padmé, Ahsoka and Mandalore.

This episode should be out later today, I still need to finalise it and then upload it.

New Bad Batch trailer has released. I spotted Tarkin, Zygerria, and Saw Gererra, which works just fine, since all of those are still in TCW:R (even after not including the Citadel arc, since Tarkin is in Ahsoka’s Fall). Interestingly, this didn’t show any environments or characters that we haven’t already seen in other trailers, so I think we can safely say that we know what’s going to be covered within the plot of the first (/only?) season.

Hmm. Working on the Corruption on Mandalore arc now, and it’s not very good. There’s no heart to it, just a few moving pieces. It’s important to have more Mandalore about now in the overall plot because it helps anchor the audience on the idea of Mandalore as one of our throughlines, and to show some internal politics is fine - it’s just not a very fun episode.

I realised that I could get the best Ahsoka/Padmé scene from Assassin into this episode if I have them both travel to Mandalore together. And if I could find the right line (Padmé saying something to indicate she happens to have a Jedi available) then I could get a bit more value out of Assassin’s scenes too. But without that, I think the strongest thing is to have the plot be that Ahsoka is going there to SECRETLY help train the academy kids in corruption, and Padmé’s tagged along as an OFFICIAL opportunity to increase diplomatic ties with Mandalore.

So Padmé will wave at the crowd then have a nice friendly chat with Satine, while Ahsoka inspires some kids to investigate the black market. They discover something shady (offscreen, I think) and report it to Satine, who out of wanting them to be safe discourages them. The kids, discouraged but concerned, decide to call Prime Minister Almec (but don’t call him yet). That night, Satine takes Padmé together to investigate, where they discover black market stuff. They report it to Almec, saying “It wasn’t Death Watch, but we have a huge black market”, to which he says “good, it’s not Death Watch, that shuts things down”, to which Satine replies “a black market is still a problem”, bringing them into conflict. The kids later call Almec, saying they’ve learned of the market, and spotting the risk to himself he decides to act, drawing the kids into a trap whilst also leveraging it as evidence with which to convict Satine. We then play out the rest of that plotline, with Ahsoka and the kids rescuing Satine and sending Almec to prison. Anakin comes to pick up Ahsoka in his ship, and Padmé says goodbye to Satine in her own ship.

Doing it this way you’d have to kind of accept that Padmé was essentially unaware of all of the later drama with Ahsoka and the kids and Satine being imprisoned, but it did all happen in the one night so it’s kind of OK.

I think this is probably the strongest feasible version.

Updated - s02e06 - The Return of Maul to v1.1, shifting the scene of Obi-Wan and Yoda detecting Maul in the force to directly after he gets better then goes outside to scream.

And that’s everything polished up! Productive day. Hopefully get my next proper episode (s02e04 - Corruption on Mandalore) out on either Wednesday or Friday,

Updated - s02e03 - Sins of the Father (Boba Fett arc) to v1.1, just fixing the credits.

Can I get a quick opinion guys? A friend recommended that I change the way I present the four cuts (Mando, Quality, Continuity, Complete) in my tracker spreadsheet. Can I get some feedback on whether the original INFO tab is clear enough, or if it isn’t, that the new ‘Info2’ tab is any clearer? I want to make it obvious to people that people who want the Mando cut just need the red episodes, but people who want the Quality cut need red + green, etc.

Updated - s02e02 - Massacre to v1.2, trimming references to Nightsister illusion, and to the defoliator tank (which still appears, but isn’t named)

Updated - s02e01 - Seven Warriors (originally Bounty Hunters) to v1.1, removing the medical station angle (making it just that the Separatists have abandoned the planet), and better hiding the loud fauna noises.

Woop! Thanks so much guys! Artan, I hope you enjoy it!

Woohoo! Thanks buddy! Thanks for all of your support - the community’s feedback and support has been MASSIVELY motivating, I cannot understate that. It’s great knowing that it’s well liked. As I said earlier, the rest that I’ve made are now polished and uploading, and with luck I might get through the rest of season two this week. Onwards!

Updated - s01e10 - A Strike at the Heart (Holocron Crisis) (Part 2) to v1.3, fixing nothing but the credits.

But with that, I can say…

COMPLETELY RELEASED - SEASON ONE

No caveats, no asterisks. I’m sure there will be things I’ll need to fix or improve in future, but as of right now, the whole season is release quality.

Woop woop!

Remaining four episodes are also fully edited, they’re uploading now.

I don’t mind them, and I do like the Nightsister variations on a lot of stuff, but I think unless it serves the plot in a particular way, it’s best avoided.

Updated - s01e09 - A Strike at the Heart (Holocron Crisis) (Part 1) to v1.2, trimming the rabbit droid, adding a line of dialogue for Bane.

Question for you all: In Massacre, at one point Talzin does some witchy magic to reveal a hidden cave, where she hangs out whilst the zombies are resurrected. She uses green magic to make the rocks reveal a passage, then walks through that, then green magic seals the rocks behind her. We know it’s not an illusion and that the rock is actually solid, because later, the droids explode through it. So she’s technically using the magic to make the wall intangible. That’s a new power, and it’s got weird ramifications. Should I remove the scene of her entering the cave that way, just to avoid adding that new layer of the Force which isn’t strictly necessary? She’s already said in dialogue that she’s going to a ‘hidden cave’, so it’s not like her change of position depends on it.

Edit: I’ve convinced myself to get rid of it.

As a note, I’m OK with the way that Talzin uses the wax voodoo doll to remotely harm Count Dooku, since it’s effectively a witchy twist on Vader force choking that guy halfway across the galaxy via phonecall.

Updated - s01e08 - Duchess of Mandalore to v1.1, removing an unwanted camera swing and removing Mas Amedda’s obvious malveolence at the end.

Updated - s01e01 - The New Padawan (Christophsis) to v1.8, now with an unwelcome frame removed, and a single beat extended, when it cuts from Yularen down to the first street battle

Updated - s01e07 - The Blockade of Ryloth to v1.2, fixing, uh, just the credits I think?

Should have all of my existing episodes finished with full polish today, so that I can get on with other episodes this week and hopefully have the second season completed over the upcoming bank holiday weekend!

RaoulJuke2020 said:

Snip

That’s all really wonderful to hear, RaoulJuke, thanks so much for your feedback! That’s exactly why I’m doing this. Your insights as someone who’s not watched the original series (but who knows the rest of Star Wars well) will be really valuable, so please keep them coming! The questions you mentioned (Does the story flow? Does the story feel complete? Does the series have a continuity that wants me to come back and see more? Does it feel amateurish?) are all really important to me so it’s great to see that you’re thinking about it on those terms.

That’s interesting that you liked Cloak, because I think it’s one of the weaker ones! That one I haven’t touched much at all, I don’t think I made any major edits to that, but yeah that quiet scene was quite odd. There’re a few instances in the very early episodes where the music is a bit odd, maybe they only added the music as the last thing they did, and for some episodes perhaps they didn’t have time to properly finish it?

DFR was relatively heavily restructured to make it flow like an episode rather than feel like a series of short scenes, or at least with the intention that it felt like the timings all worked out.

Keep it coming, and I’m glad you’re enjoying it!