ImperialFighter

Fang Zei said:

Bob Iger said there will not be a Disney logo at the front of the movie.

I hope it’s just the Lucasfilm logo with no sound and nothing else.

Everything else will undoubtedly be the same, though. There’s no good reason it wouldn’t be.

Glad to hear about the lack of a Disney logo. 😃

And I also like the notion of complete silence with only the Lucasfilm logo and usual ‘a long time ago…’ wording, until the main theme finally blasts out.

Myself and my youngest son are booked for the comfy seats in our local multiplex on the afternoon of 17th Dec. 😃

We’ve chosen a 2d showing as our first viewing, and will see it again a couple of days later with the rest of the family, before Christmas - again in 2d.

At some point during it’s run, some of us are intending to go back and see it in 3D also.

(I had hoped to see it on the biggest screen here for my first viewing, but it’s going to be used exclusively for 3D screenings only, so I’ll have to wait to see it on that - still, our other screens are plenty big too!)

By the way, it’s a nice touch to have a ‘countdown clock’ attached to the site now, and the anticipation is rising. I’ve managed to avoid the last couple of trailers (especially the latest Chinese one, which I believe showed off quite a bit), and was able to dodge a lot of spoiler-ish articles so far. Unfortunately, I was doing some recent Christmas shopping in a local toystore, and inadvertantly spotted something at their ‘Star Wars’ display, which I was trying to avoid - I won’t say what it was, but it was certainly something I hadn’t expected, and I wish I’d seen it for the first time in the movie itself… Never mind, I know very little about it all so far, compared to when ‘The Phantom Menace’ came out.

Also, I wonder how the intro. to this movie is going to play out? - no 20th Century Fox logo (or fanfare either, I guess) this time around. The new Lucasfilm logo is ‘black’ now (I preferred the previous ‘rainbow/golden’ version, personally)…but will we get an additional Disney logo of any kind mixed in?..or a Bad Robot one? And will it even have the standard yellow ‘STAR WARS’ main title, chapter heading, and scroll over a starfield?..or will it be altered somehow? Will J.J. have the main title coming towards us, instead of receding away?..who knows?..but I look forward to hearing the first bars of John Williams’ familiar score boom out on the big screen once again, and can’t wait to hear what he’s come up with for this latest instalment.

Finally…in this age of pre-booking, it’s kinda heart-warming to know this tradition is alive and well - and I take my hat off to these dedicated guys and gals. Don’t let them down J.J. !! - www.nytimes.com/2015/12/09/movies/star-wars-the-force-awakens-fans-are-already-lining-up.html

Wonderful work on the painting and weathering of the miniatures shown - it’s like seeing a group of old friends all together again. Great stuff. 😃

Wishing you a very enjoyable Christmas break adywan, as you’ve put in some fabulous work on ‘ESB:Revisited’ again this past year. It’s nice to know that all your time-consuming efforts are going to be wowing everyone before too long now.

If ‘The Force Awakens’ turns out to be a satisfying follow-up to the original trilogy, the anticipation for ‘ESB:R’ afterwards will be all the more sweeter I reckon.

(and for the benefit of those in the U.K. - just to give you a heads-up that Channel 5 has some ‘Star Wars’-related programs tomorrow night at 9pm onwards…so set your recorders if you’ve got plans to go out)

EDIT: Both of the hour-long documentaries last night were a nice primer for the upcoming movie - ‘Star Wars: The Definitive History’ covered the whole saga so far (including the SE’s), and featured the likes of Gary Kurtz along the way, while ‘How Star Wars Changed The World’ featured some very dedicated fans from around the world with their great-looking projects and collections. Both docs are on again tonight on Channel 5 starting at 10.25pm, if you missed them. (or alternatively, on Channel 5 + 24 starting at 9pm tonight instead)

imperialscum said:

Bottom line is, you sum all the annoying things in TPM and you are still way below the annoyance level of Anakin in AOTC. And it is not Hayden’s performance that should take the main blame. He basically just acted perfectly in accordance with the annoying character that was conceived/written.

Yes, apart from some bizarre expressions/and ‘emoting’ that we got from Hayden in quite a few shots, there’s no doubt that’s it really down to George that we ended up with such a generally unappealing characterisation. The ‘earlier backstory’ for one of cinema’s best creations should have been a ‘golden’ role for anyone to land…but unfortunately for Hayden (and Jake Lloyd before him), far too much of Anakin’s scripted dialogue is laughably bad unfortunately…especially when it came to the various ‘romantic’ interludes between him and Padme in ‘AOTC’!

I don’t doubt that the character is unfixable for you, no matter how anyone re-edits him…but as I previously said, I spent the time to see if I could come up with things that would improve the numerous issues with the prequels that bugged me personally.

Anyway, one of the biggest things which I despaired about was George’s mishandling of Anakin and Padme’s ‘relationship’ build-up…so I’ll describe what I’ve decided to amend for my own eventual version -

Firstly, I’ve settled on a shortened, re-edited version of the short chat about Padme between Anakin and Obi-wan, when they are in the elevator on the way to see her.

…and I’m also including a shortened, re-edited version of the initial meeting between Anakin and Padme, as we’ll as a shortened re-edited version of Padme’s ‘security arrangements’ discussion between Anakin and Obi-wan in front of Padme.

…and that is followed later by a shortened, re-edited version of the discussion between Aanakin and Padme concerning Obi-wan’s attitude to Anakin, as Padme packs ready to leave Coruscant.

…and I’m also including a shortened, re-edited version of Anakin and Padme’s chat as they are about to embark on a transport to Naboo with Artoo.

…and I’m also including a shortened, re-edited version of the chat that they have aboard the transport to Naboo…

…and I’m also including a shortened, re-edited version of their visit to Padme’s family home.

…and I’m also including a shortened, re-edited version of their ‘gondola’ trip to the Naboo retreat, where they walk in a courtyard, and end up having their awkward kiss - but they do not kiss at this point in my version, and won’t until they face their impending ‘arena’ doom towards the end of the movie. So by the time we see it now, the moment between them seems as if it been ‘earned’ a little more.

…and I’m also including a shortened, re-edited version of the ‘Naboo picnic’ scene - which does not involve Anakin’s critter-riding antics, nor rolling about in the field with Padme afterwards.

NOTE - I also initially spent a fair bit of time working out a shortened, re-edited version of their ‘floating pear’ dinner table scene for myself…as well as working out a very shortened, re-edited version of their excruciating ‘fireside discussion’ scene…and in addition to those, I also spent time on coming up with a very shortened, re-edited version of their scene together in the ‘Lars homestead garage’ that I could live with - each of which drastically improved things for me over the existing versions. However…I’ve finally realised that I can do without seeing any of that particular footage and dialogue ever again…and decided that even my cut-down versions were just plain unnecessary in the scheme of things, and just slowed/dragged down the pace of the movie too much - even though I liked the nicely recreated ‘Lars garage’ setting.

Therefore, ALL 3 of those scenes are totally GONE from my ideal ‘AOTC’ version now…and I find that Hayden’s role immediately becomes more bearable, while the movie’s momentum is given a boost too. (and in the case of the ‘fireside’ scene, it’s total removal also helps with my intention to completely do away with all references by anyone to the ‘Jedi code’ of ‘personal relationships’ being frowned upon - I don’t happen to like this aspect that George came up with, as it really gives a po-faced tone to being a Jedi…and puts both Anakin and Padme in poor light for pursuing their relationship together - I’d prefer to see their ‘romance’ play out in a far less deceitful way, so that it all seems a bit more ‘tragic’ when things go wrong eventually…so I’m really hoping that this Jedi ‘rule’ isn’t mentioned in the upcoming sequel trilogy!)

…so that’s the majority of things I’m changing to keep their ‘build-up’ more subtle…and along with one or two other slight re-edits where Anakin and Padme interact together, I’m also including a shortened, re-edited version of their ‘arena’ entrance, to remove some of the clunkier dialogue before their (first) kiss.

(and of course, there’s an extensive amount of their scenes together in ‘ROTS’ that I’ve ended up altering too…seeing as my issues didn’t end with ‘AOTC’! But that’s for another day…) 😃

imperialscum said:

If you somehow cut out Jar Jar, there are very few annoying things left. On the other hand, AOTC is in fact unfixable. There is a clear main character and he is super annoying (much more than Jar Jar in TPM). I cannot see how anyone could even remotely relate to Anakin in AOTC.

There’s quite a lot of annoying things left in ‘TPM’ I’d say, even if an edit were to remove ‘Jar Jar’ completely. An extremely young ‘Darth Vader’-to-be in the shape of ‘Li’l Ani’ as just one example, and it’s a major one I reckon. But while I’ll always think George ended up casting far too young for that role…I’ve found that by cutting a lot of superfluous dialogue/shots that he’s in, it really helps to minimise the problem for me, and it helps to bring the maturer voices around him to the fore instead.

By making ‘Li’l Ani’ say much less throughout various scenes, his character improves quite a bit for me now. And this applies to ‘Jar Jar’s’ childish-sounding voice/unnecessay dialogue too, as well as to the majority of ‘older’ Anakin’s creepy/shouty dialogue throughout the other two prequels. Far less poorly-delivered, eye-rolling dialogue by Hayden makes a huge difference to how he comes across in ‘AOTC’ and ‘ROTS’, compared with the existing versions. And this has helped to make his performance/character a lot more effective for me now, also…even though he’s not the ideal casting I’d have preferred for the backstory of ‘Darth Vader’.

(by the way, keeping the references to the ‘Jedi rule’ forbidding ‘personal relationships’ kinda makes Padme at fault too, seeing as she lets herself get fully involved with Anakin. But a heap of cutting still makes them a more appealing couple, regardless. On the other hand, if that ‘rule’ isn’t specifically referenced in the upcoming sequels, then it’s also possible to recut things slightly so that no mention of this ‘rule’ pops up in ‘AOTC’, to eliminate their deception in this matter)

StarChewyWar, just to let you know that I’m extremely pleased with the various alterations I’ve got in mind for my future ‘TPM’ edit now. However, a ‘3-In-One’ cut might also be interesting for me to attempt sometime using some of my intended prequel changes. But on the other hand, I happen to like too much of the imagery/music in ‘TPM’ to discard the majority of it for a single edit. And I’ll be able to go along with the likes of ‘li’l Ani’s’ and 'Jar Jar’s involvement a lot better in future, seeing as scrapping a heap of their dialogue greatly improves their performances!

(by the way, no-one needs to quote the whole of my lengthy previous post again)

Just wanted to add a couple of my own thoughts on this, in the run-up to the next instalment -

I’m aware that there are a few who believe that ignoring the ‘TPM’ movie altogether improves the ‘prequels’ substantially, since you start with an ‘older Anakin’ storyline with ‘AOTC’ at least.

But I don’t think it makes any difference in the scheme of things, due to the fact that each prequel is as dreadfully bad as the other two, in my opinion…thanks to their overall poorly-conceived plotlines, dire dialogue, crass childishness, and awful acting in places. Oh, and don’t forget the numerous examples of disappointingly-poor, over-the-top effects work in certain areas too! It’s just one awkward moment from start to finish throughout the trilogy, and you don’t have to wait long for one to come along.

Whereas I can still feel a strong attachment to nearly every single moment of the original (theatrical) trilogy over the years…any re-watch of the prequels just makes me cringe, dammit! And the years haven’t improved them in any way for me, unfortunately.

However…despite all that, there remains some highly-memorable imagery and music throughout the prequels…so I was inspired by certain fan edits to see if it was at all possible to come up with any kind of potential ‘cut list’ which could improve the many moments that bothered me personally.

Although I highly doubted there would be, I was pleasantly surprised to find that there are indeed ways to re-edit them into something which I would be happy to re-watch with my family someday. In fact, nearly every dodgy scene and moment which annoyed me, had a possible alteration/or removal I preferred, it turned out! (and TMBTM’s radical style of editing was a big encouragement for me not to be precious about any particular footage, and to consider trying to re-structure/or remove it in a major way in certain instances, if I preferred it that way)

It’s been a very time-consuming challenge, but I’ve now got a lengthy ‘cut-list’ for each prequel which gives me a version of the saga which conveys George’s intended ‘tragic downfall of Anakin’ storyline in way that’s a lot less ridiculous than his (or Frinks!) version…where Anakin and Padme both come across a lot more appealing to me now, with a far more slow-burning ‘relationship’ than what the existing versions portray - thanks to drastically removing a lot of their woeful dialogue throughout each movie, as well as completely removing a couple of their more odious scenes altogether! In the case of their interactions together, less is a whole lot more, I reckon.

But on top of finding a way to rejig their ‘romance’ into something that doesn’t make me throw up, there were a few other crucial sequences that I wasn’t sure if I could re-structure in a way that would absolutely satisfy me - namely ‘Palpatine’s fight with Windu’/his ‘transformation’ into the Emperor’ during it/and ‘Anakin becoming his apprentice’ just afterwards…as well as the whole ‘ROTS’ ending concerning ‘Anakin’s fate’ & ‘Padme’s childbirth/death’ and sequence of events afterwards which round off the prequel trilogy. Well, I’m especially pleased with what I’ve come up with for all of those, and it’s made the whole time I spent on looking at these damned prequels worthwhile.

Palpatine’s ‘transformation’ and his subsequent dialogue with Anakin was one of the most problematic things I played around with throughout the whole trilogy, as it’s as ludicrous as Vader’s ‘yelling’ scene I reckon…and it took me ages to come up with a way to make some of the existing footage work in a way that restores the Emperor’s gravitas somewhat, despite the dodgy make-up. The way that the Emperor and Vader were portrayed during those moments in ‘ROTS’ were amongst the worst disappointments in the prequels for me…so these ended up being some of the alterations which I’m most happy with. (and I hope to be able to show clips of what I’ve come up with at some point in the coming months, one way or another, when time allows)

While I’m not expecting any mentions of ‘midiclorians’(!) to be featured in the upcoming movie…I’m curious to see if it will end up mentioning ‘the chosen one’ notion or not, as well as whether there’s going to be any reference to the Jedi not being allowed to have ‘personal relationships’, or whether the ‘rule of two/master and apprentice’ concept is referred to either…as there’s ways to remove them all seamlessly from the prequels, if I choose to go down that route.

Anyway, future discussions on the prequels are bound to run and run for a long time to come, seeing as the franchise is being thrust into the limelight again over the coming years. So I’ll leave you all with these recent links on the subject to contemplate on, as some of the accompanying comments underneath are always interesting to read -

TPM - io9.com/star-wars-the-phantom-menace-doesnt-really-get-what-it-1742188503

AOTC - io9.com/attack-of-the-clones-is-a-star-wars-wish-fulfillment-ch-1743553858

ROTS - io9.com/sure-revenge-of-the-sith-is-the-best-star-wars-prequel-1744646183

Like others here, I’ll be treating myself to a re-watch of the saga in some manner before ‘The Force Awakens’ opens. And I’m still finding it hard to get my head around the fact that in less than a month now, we’ll be getting to see a Star Wars movie which is a ‘continuation’ of the events seen in ‘Return Of The Jedi’…complete with the original main cast members, and all-new John Williams score! I mean, it just seems like the other day that I was completely shocked to hear that George had actually ‘sold off’ his creation to Disney…and now the first movie is just around the corner.

After being used to many years of high praise by so many fans around the world thanks to his much-loved trilogy, the negative backlash generated by his eventual prequel and ‘special edition’ efforts must have been uncomfortable for him. Although I owned the theatrical trilogy on laserdisc, I remember looking forward to the announcement of when it would finally hit the successful new dvd format at the time…but while loads of other lesser movies were appearing with reverential quality treatments, the Star Wars trilogy remained stubbornly unavailable on the format for years and years. That was the first of a series of dubious miss-steps, and instead, George eventually came up with his dissapointing prequel trilogy and awkwardly-tinkered-with OT versions. And the belated, sub-par GOUT releases were yet another reason why he lost a lot of the high regard he was previously held in by some fans of the OT.

And now in his latest comments, he’s remarked that Disney and co. ended up ditching his own conceived story ideas in favour of ‘something for the fans’…and describes his take on the saga as being a ‘soap opera of family problems’. Well, I don’t know what J.J. and his writers have come up with, but if they’ve come up with something that ends up keeping the majority of fans happy, then I’m certainly all for that.

I’m hopeful that this latest entry will be a successful ‘continuation’ of the adventures of Luke, Han, Leia, Chewie, and the Droids…and that it will simply have the same sense of ‘fun’ that the original trilogy provided overall. I’d have rathered that George had come up with some sequels involving the original cast himself back in 1999…but hopefully, J.J.'s instalment will be the start of a great new trilogy.

Anyway, here’s the saga order I’ll be watching in the run-up to the latest movie -

STAR WARS Despecialized (the blockade runner/stardestroyer opening chase will always kick off the saga for me)
STAR WARS Revisited
EMPIRE STRIKES BACK Despecialized
EMPIRE STRIKES BACK Revisited ‘workprint’
RETURN OF THE JEDI Despecialized

(no prequels whatsoever, and that’s mainly due to the fact that I’ve already spent a lot of time working out many, many cuts/re-arrangements on each one that I hope to re-edit for myself next year into a trilogy I can bear to re-watch)

Here’s the link to the vid now, although the end is cut off where they all then appeared on stage in front of the ‘Children In Need’ audience to reveal the fact that the show had already generated over £15 million pounds at that point in the night - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kgnsswvpz6k

Bingowings said:

FrankT said:

Holy hell! Barbara Windsor as Chewbacca!? I never thought I’d see that!

Well never did I mean… w’uh ?

Not sure if you caught it or not Bingo, but for those that didn’t, she was part of a short ‘Star Wars’ skit on the BBC’s annual ‘Children In Need’ fundraiser earlier tonight. Warwick Davis, C3PO, R2D2, BB-8 and the new Stormtroopers were all involved. It will be up on Youtube before long, no doubt.

Good to know that ‘bookmarks’ and ‘draft posts’ functionality will return at some point Jay, as they were two of the most vital benefits to me around here, I found.

I didn’t get a chance to comment in the ‘bugs report’ topic before it got locked after 6 pages, due to having trouble with re-registering, so just wanted to say it’s good to be back, before this thread is locked down too.

Sad story time - I knew this server migration was imminent, as it had long been flagged up by Jay…but I kept having one family drama, work crisis, etc. getting in the way of me finding some time to try and capture all my hundreds(!) of various saved ‘bookmarks’ which I’d stored for various reasons to refer back to. And also my many saved ‘drafts’ that I was still currently finalising for various topics.

So anyway…I finally got a chance to sit down to spend a while doing this…when the site suddenly went ‘offline’ at that particular moment!!.. I’m gutted. Aaargh!

So I’ve lost the lot, and can just console myself that at least my PMs are still viewable after the migration.

Then on top of this, I didn’t realise that the reason that I wasn’t getting sent a ‘reset password’ e-mail…was because it kept getting sent to my hotmail ‘Junk Email’ folder instead of my ‘Inbox’ folder. And until doubleofive/Jay let me know that was the likely case, I couldn’t log on…as I never check that particular folder! D’oh.

I rarely check in using a mobile, so the current layout is taking a little getting used to on my laptop. But at the end of the day, I appreciate that the previous server problems were getting out of hand, and things should stabalise for us now. l also appreciate that all of Jay’s efforts are done out of his own pocket, so many thanks are in order for this resource.

Happy Halloween to all.

Imagine if Landis meant Disney are going to re-release the original cuts on the BIG screen, but won't put 'em out on blu-ray, lol.  ;)

Although I've been avoiding threads and spoilers to do with 'The Force Awakens' for a while now (and hope to do the same with it's sequels), I'm not too fussed about seeing early images from the 'standalone' entries.

Nice to see some 'classic'-looking Stormies in these early set photos, but I'm a little disappointed they haven't been given the original footwear - or at least, it looks that way from these distant pics.  Oh, well, I guess the 'pointy, heeled boots' were an 'upgrade' to the Empire-issued kit come the events of 'A New Hope'. :)

Ronster said:

 The Reason his shirt becomes turquoise or greyish is because of the bluescreen removal. Again we are talking about shots that have a falcon cockpit window in it.

But the damage goes far greater than just Lando's lilac shirt.

All shots with a window practically destroy anything blue or with blue in it.

Sure, I'm aware of the various colouration issues in these particular shots Ronster, and I've also read your previous comments on them. 

But I've long since moved on from mourning the loss of the movie's original look, which ended up being replaced by some dreadful 'tinting' and 'crushed blacks' etc. - and the 'rusty'-looking Falcon interiors seen during the latest 9 minute clip are good examples of how things were messed up long ago.

Barring an awful lot of work, there's only so much that adywan can do with picture information which just isn't visible anymore, but I'm pleased he's managed to improve things overall now, as Lando's inconsistent shirt was particularly jarring from shot to shot for me. 

xxtelecine 7xx said:

LOL Wow, It must have taken you as much time to analyze these shots and write up your thoughts as it took ADYWAN to create it...

Good post though never the less...

Let's put it this way, that 9 minute segment alone of adywan's current edit makes me realise that the eventual 'Visual Comparison' record for ESB:R is going to have a truly incredible amount of screenshots and info. when it's finally covered!      

I can certainly appreciate *why* this edit has taken adywan so many years to complete - it's due to the sheer number of things he's ended up attending to throughout the whole movie, whether big or miniscule.  Far, far more than I'd have ever guessed that he'd be able to undertake when he started it.

In addition, I forgot to add in my previous post that it was also neat to finally see Lando consistently wearing a BLUE shirt throughout that clip, rather than it changing to grey in some of the shots.  :)

(by the way xxtelecine 7xx, it's not necessary to quote the whole of a long post in future just to comment with a couple of remarks, as it's a chore for everyone to scroll past the same thing again needlessly)

_______

adywan, something I've been meaning to ask is - do you have some sort of method for keeping a note of all any particular points and suggestions that might interest you from the many, many comments here and over on your 'Revisited' facebook page over the years?  Or do you just mainly check certain things out as you happen to read them anywhere?  Or just try and memorise them as you go along, to check out at a later stage?  Just curious. 

(Also, I recently came across the latest versions of a couple of AT-AT Battle shots that you'd previewed - the new sky replacements are fabulous, and really add to the look of the original shots now.  And I loved seeing the tiny 'Luke' figure in place.  Marvellous stuff) :)  

adywan said:

Here is a new clip.  It's just under 9 minutes long and about 260MB.

First chance I've had to offer some thoughts on your recent extended clip adywan.  Some incredible work throughout once again, whether it be big enhancements or teensy-weensy tweaks since your last previews of these scenes.  It's truly amazing just how much has been altered and improved during this 9 minute segment alone, compared to the SE version!  :)

But I happened to notice a couple of small issues which stood out a little for me during all this goodness, so I'll describe them for the sake of 'feedback'/'observations' for yourself and everyone else (and will number/embolden them for easier viewing amongst my other comments, as this post will be lengthy!  Those of a nervous 'who cares?, just release the edit dammit!' disposition may wish to just scroll past...)   

_______

'Vane/Gantry Duel' Section

This whole section of your clip now has many terrific enhancements and fixes throughout (and I especially love all your improvements to the shot at 00:34 where the tiny figures of Luke and Vader exit the opening of the enormous 'Vane').  It's great to see the addition of the 'piece of tubing' on the end structure where Luke ends up, which was missing in certain shots - it may be a minor fix since your 'Xmas 2011 clip' version of this scene, but it's a very welcome one to see for consistency's sake.  (I also note that you slightly amended the 'airflow' of the steam/smoke coming from your 'Carbon Chamber' pipes, by the way - to allow for the windy conditions in the chasm I presume?  A nice subtle touch)

1.  I was also pleased that you ended up adding a touch of RED to the majority of the many 'missing' (black) chasm 'exhaust ports', as they help improve the background mattes no end.  But I see the ones during the shot where Vader slices the columns at 01:04 in your clip are *still* black (no biggie of course, and l imagine the earlier ones seen when Luke fights Vader at the window before crashing through it are difficult to re-colour too, due to movement unfortunately)  

2.  Also, in the shot of the chasm at 02:40 in your clip (which we see immediately after Luke first looks down), the row of vertical lights on the strip that the 'Vane' is attached to, are *still* WHITE...which unfortunately mis-matches with the all the other shots where you've made them RED now.  These new red vertical lights look great, by the way.

_______

'Underneath Cloud City/Falcon Rescuing Luke' Section

The numerous new cloud shots are all superb, and the re-colouring of the them along with the city's underside really ties everything together better now.  All your time-consuming 'rotoscoping' really paid off here.

3.  It's interesting to see how you've re-structured things where the Falcon approaches Luke now...but I'm a little sorry to lose one of the shots of Luke, as I liked the flow of all the original shots of his precarious situation at this point - and I'll go into this a bit more shortly.  (But first, for the benefit of anyone who didn't notice, I'll summarise your changes - I'll ignore the SE version which crudely chopped things up with various 'shuttle' shots, and only describe the difference between the original (GOUT) version shots and the latest clip) -

In the original (GOUT) version, the Falcon turns around and immediately after Vader says "Bring my shuttle!" there was an initial wide shot of Luke still hanging upside down at the top of the stem he's on (on the left of the frame), before we cut to the distant shot of the small Falcon nearing Cloud City.  Lando then spots the tiny figure of Luke hanging upside-down through the cockpit as they get nearer, and we eventually see another wide shot of Luke making a risky movement onto a lower part of the strut he's on (in the middle of the frame), while the Falcon approaches towards us in the distance (in the left of the frame).  After a couple of close-up shots showing Chewie growling and Leia watching, we then see the small figure of Luke through the cockpit again, where he is now sitting on the lower part of the strut and kicking one of his legs forward, as Leia's voice says "Okay, easy Chewie".  Finally, we see a wide shot where we now see the back of Luke as he sits and kicks his leg out, as the Falcon looms large directly below him. 

In the latest clip however, the Falcon turns around and immediately after Vader says "Bring my shuttle!" we now lose the shot of Luke hanging upside down (on the left of the frame) - it's been replaced with the shot of Luke making a risky movement onto a lower part of the strut, which originally came several shots later (except he's now positioned on the left of the frame, and there's no Falcon approaching in the distance anymore).  We then cut to the distant shot of the small Falcon nearing Cloud City, but when Lando first spots the tiny figure of Luke through the cockpit, it's now a re-use of him sitting on the lower part of the strut, which wasn't seen until several shots later in the original version - although his position still matches with the earlier 'replacement' shot in the clip, where he now continues to sit and kick his leg out until the Falcon looms large directly below him.  Additionally, a shot of Chewie growling has also been removed as the Falcon gets nearer to Luke now.

(For anyone curious, the replaced shot of 'Luke making a risky movement onto a lower part of the strut as the Falcon approaches' can be seen at 1:50:09 on the SE dvd - and is on the original (GOUT) version too, of course)   

I just happen to like the additional, delayed lead-up to Luke making his risky movement onto the lower part of the strut, I guess - I think what jars a little for me is the fact that we now see Luke constantly slowly kicking his leg out in the exact same way during this scene (and I think it's the fact that this Luke element looks strangely like a 'stop-motion puppet' compared to the other shots of him, which is why I preferred to see it used just once like it was the original sequence of shots) - however, if that re-used Luke element could have been made to 'kick out' *less* in one or two of the shots, it would work a lot better I reckon.

I realise that the small approaching Falcon is *too far away* from Luke when we see it approaching him in that particular original shot you removed/exchanged - as it doesn't match with the previous *closer* viewpoint of Luke we see through it's cockpit...but I'd have liked to have seen it retained in it's original place, except with a *closer* Falcon approaching Luke instead, at that point...so that the earlier wide shot of Luke upside-down could have remained.

However, your new version is very cleverly done adywan, and certainly still works fine - and it's always fascinating to see how you re-arrange the order of some shots altogether.

4.  Unfortunately, the detailing on the close-up of the Falcon's 'radar dish' looks all wrong during the shot where Luke falls downwards (seen at 05:43 in the clip)  It seems you've had to leave it as it is though. 

(but nice to see that you've now removed the titchy 'widget' from the top of the Falcon's guns when it hovers below Luke)

_______

'Vader On Executor Bridge' Section

Although each of the Original Trilogy movies had very high production values overall, where design work, set construction, costumes, etc. are concerned...the sheer amount of 'continuity errors' throughout this particular section of ESB always amazes me - I know that 'shortcuts' are part of the 'magic of the movies', and things go unnoticed on a single 'Theatrical' viewing or two...but there sure were are an awful *lot* of confusing 'positioning' issues and set mis-matches during these bridge shots, when scrutinized a little.  Any kind of 'continuity control' seemingly went out the window when these shots were filmed and put together...and they never gave a good indication of where the hell Vader was mean to be positioned. 

Until now. :) 

It's been fascinating to see your continuous refining of various shots these past years, adywan.  And the final re-structuring you've come up with for these 'Executor bridge' scenes are a marvel - the new shot of Vader walking towards the front windows, along with the various new backgrounds you came up with, make complete sense of his movements on the bridge now, and look terrific compared to the original sequence.  (the re-used 'wide bridge' shot is a great establishing replacement for the original shot of 'Vader looking out the window' you removed...and while I liked your earlier 'composite' bridge shot, I reckon you made the right call to *exclude* it at this point, due to the likes of the mis-matching crewmembers in it.  What you've done now works perfectly!  In addition, your new 'walking Vader' figure has turned out much better than the 'workprint' version too)

5.  However, while the flashing 'panel' lights are nice to see in the new wide bridge shot at 07:44, I found that additional amount of times the BLUE strips flashed on and off distracted from taking in all the other goodness overall.  They are certainly a welcome touch as they now tie-in with a couple of other bridge shots where they are briefly seen...but I reckon they would have been less disracting if they had been made to flash on and off a bit *less often* in this particular shot. 

I know you'll be adding these flashing blue strips to a couple of your other shots too...so that gives me an excuse to re-show another of your new wide bridge shots which shows off heaps of improvements when compared to the original versions (and I like that you improved some of those small ceiling lights either side of the large 'pipes' to make them symmetrical) - http://s2.postimg.org/a2m5p0qp5/officer.jpg

At the end of the day, none of the things I've brought up are biggies whatsoever in the scheme of things...especially considering the sheer amount of brilliance overall.

(Finally, I noticed you changed the single green 'panel' light to white when Vader first approaches Piette on the bridge - so checked to see if there was one on the other side of the 'shaking stardestroyer' bridge from earlier in the movie.  There was...and I see that you've removed it from your 'workprint' too, heh.  Now I really must get on with some work!...)

Gah, I'm against *any* further copies of the prequels and SEs (especially the latest versions) being churned out and foisted on the general public...ever!  And they can only water-down any anticipation newbies have for the new movie with such a close release to it, as far as I'm concerned!

Mind you, if the laughably-worded 'selling point' of '...more than 40 hours of previously-released extensive special features' actually includes HD versions of the prequel 'deleted' scenes, then it'll be a must-buy for the fan editors at least! :)

(but they'll probably just be SD quality again, if included at all)  

Possessed said:

Jackpumpkinhead said:

i hate to be "that guy" (*cough Ronster *cough) but is it just me or does 3P0's leg look gold and not silver like is it supposed to be?

 Que?

Yeah, it's not just you jackpumpkinhead.  Apart from his gold foot, the lower half of C3PO's right leg is silver all the way round throughout the movie.  Yet strangely, he suddenly has a gold front shin section in those shots of R2 attending to him as he sits, before returning to silver again when he's standing.

MrToad883 said:

Huge fan of hal9000's and l8wrtr's prequel edits, but definitely would love to give a "one and done" edit a shot. Sounds interesting.

The Prequels:One And Done!  There's your title right there chromesteel.  ;)

Clever cover image by the way.

mariotti said:

I haven't bought it yet, but I have heard there is a commentary.

 What's this 'bought' nonsense?  The fan edit is freely available.

Okay, adywan has now added a lengthy update on the Facebook page about where things currently stand with his 'ESB:R' project.

There's a few things of interest mentioned concerning his 'Han In Carbonite' resculpt etc., and he's planning to release a more finished clip of the 'Gantry Lightsaber Duel' right up to the 'Bespin Escape' in the next couple of days or so.  :)

See here - https://www.facebook.com/swrevisited

Altgr0160 said:

I know this might sound very silly. But deep down I was hoping that by having a color corrected trailer and showing the difference, it could get some exposure, and maybe a chance of influencing the final product. I doubt it, but I think it's worth a shot even if there is a very small chance that we won't get the orange and teal color corrected version in theaters.

Don't worry Altgr0160, there are many out there who are *already* aware of this issue and bringing it up.

For instance, if you'd tried searching 'Google' for color corrected the force awakens trailer for instance, then you would have come across this particular version that someone did a while back - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p7nOq1ATzmM

Who knows?, perhaps we'll get a pleasant surprise come the movie's release, and find that it *isn't* as heavily graded as the trailers seem to be.  

Personally, for all J.J.'s efforts to introduce 'practical' creatures etc., I'd equally like to see him go easy on the colour-grading side of things - having said that, ever since some aspects of the OT got horribly re-graded and ended up with 'crushed blacks' for it's 2004 DVD release onwards, things have already gone to hell on this front. 

Welcome aboard.

For the benefit of jedimasterobiwan and everyone else, adywan posted this on his 'Star Wars Revisited' facebook page yesterday, so hang in there -

Updates on the progress of ESB:R will be posted after the weekend.  Working my ass off just now  ;)

jedimasterobiwan said:

i was quoting his post earlier because i didn't understand his issue with the x-wing.

Heh, I was actually going to mention this issue too, at the end of my previous post.  But I forgot. 

The thing is jedimasterobiwan, that you only asked Ronster a simple 'generalised' question about his post, and he (and we) didn't need to unnecessarily re-scroll down through *everything* he'd already written to know what you were talking about. 

It's like scrolling down one of those long 'skyscraper'* photos, when someone does that, just for future reference. 

(*why do I get the feeling that TV's Frink is itching to put one up now?  Maybe a 'link' to one will be allowable for demonstration purposes, however)  ;)