NFBisms

Channel72 said:
Anakin’s downfall should probably contain elements of both systemic failure and personal failure. But I think it should be more heavily weighted towards personal failure. Perhaps something like 40% systemic failure (failures of the Jedi as an institution, experiencing the horrors and injustices of war, etc.), and 60% personal failure (Anakin just being turned on by the allure of power, and his need for control in a chaotic Universe). The greater emphasis on personal failure is really required for Vader’s redemption in ROTJ to have real dramatic weight. It really needs to be Vader’s choice to embrace the Dark Side, and also his choice to save his son in ROTJ.

I agree with this! In my heart of hearts, this is how I see Vader, and I wish the prequels were much better films that communicated that.

Vladius said:

NFBisms said:

NOTE: Everything I’m about to say doesn’t mean I think the prequels are good

I don’t actually mind a lot of the PT’s lore on stuff like this; I find it infinitely more interesting that the story we knew secondhand via Old Ben wasn’t just exactly what those movies are, particularly within a narrative primed to disentangle and even criticize “from a certain point of view”. Even if most official material hasn’t taken full advantage of it (until Andor), I’ve always had a fondness for at least this era’s state of play.

Anakin / Darth Vader is purposefully re-contextualized as a kid, and I think there is some value in foregoing the fabled ‘Jedi Hunts’ (that were sure to have happened between canonical III and IV anyway) to examine what made the monster at earlier psychological and political points. He’s a failure of institution, radicalized by war, exploited by an abuser, abandoned by pedagogy. It’s a different flavor of tragedy than personal failure.

On some level, Vader’s evil is romanticized when depicted in a badass light; which would be far beyond a meaningful reason to do prequel films in the first place. I still enjoy stuff like Vader in Rebels, Rogue One, or the Respawn Jedi games, but I can respect that those weren’t new ground to break into the saga. They’re literally just depictions of what we know from the OT. The wholly imperfect execution didn’t make the prequel direction not worth doing IMO, and I can appreciate that it now lives in the objective text.

With regard to the surviving Jedi and Yoda calling Luke the last, an interesting question emerges in this context - What is a Jedi?

If our understanding of the Jedi has shifted from ANH’s idealized Knights Errant fable, to something closer to a monastic FBI and military branch - is ‘Jedi’ perhaps a political label, and not just a description of one’s relationship to the Force? After all, there are other Force users in-universe that are not Jedi. Whose to say that characters like Kanan, Cal, or Ahsoka are even Jedi [to Yoda] at all? Ahsoka was expelled before she could finish her training, Kanan and Cal gave up many aspects of the path to survive and fight back; none of them were in contact with or under the direction of the Rump Jedi Council of Kenobi and Yoda. Meanwhile Luke is trained by that council, the only project undertaken by them during the Galactic Civil War, and specifically has an uncomplicated view of who they were. It’s ultimately pedantic and matters mostly to justify Yoda’s line, but participation in The Order as institution is an important theme for Anakin’s downfall. It may very well be an important part of what makes “a Jedi” in the non-colloquial sense, to an official of its ranks such as Yoda.

Somewhere along the way this became an unpopular idea, but to me Luke not killing his father as counter to Obi-Wan and Yoda’s direction was always an early suggestion of what the PT would eventually, if dispassionately, present about the Jedi Order. So “The Jedi” may have been purged, but the light wasn’t and couldn’t be. I can square the survivor count with Yoda’s line when I think about how Yoda kind of sucked

Counterpoint - you’re wrong and all of this is worse, even if it was intentional on Lucas’s part, which it wasn’t.

Oh, I absolutely don’t think his intentions are all of this lol

I don’t really know what there even is to be wrong about though, I’m not asserting any real argument - honestly proposing a question more than anything. It doesn’t really matter to me what was intended or how it would/should fit into the OT. The setting just has so many implications and contexts that are interesting to think about as presented. Symptomatic of unclear / muddled writing, perhaps, but at a certain point embracing the emergent themes is way more fun than lamenting what could have been. The Jedi Order isn’t real, but the mechanics through which they interacted with hypothetical people and systems are. What we can extrapolate is much broader than the constraints of narrative tidiness.

Not that any of us are writing Star Wars, but burrowing into that philosophy is the kind of thing the franchise could use more of, as opposed to towing an imaginary line and chasing what George Lucas would do.

NOTE: Everything I’m about to say doesn’t mean I think the prequels are good

I don’t actually mind a lot of the PT’s lore on stuff like this; I find it infinitely more interesting that the story we knew secondhand via Old Ben wasn’t just exactly what those movies are, particularly within a narrative primed to disentangle and even criticize “from a certain point of view”. Even if most official material hasn’t taken full advantage of it (until Andor), I’ve always had a fondness for at least this era’s state of play.

Anakin / Darth Vader is purposefully re-contextualized as a kid, and I think there is some value in foregoing the fabled ‘Jedi Hunts’ (that were sure to have happened between canonical III and IV anyway) to examine what made the monster at earlier psychological and political points. He’s a failure of institution, radicalized by war, exploited by an abuser, abandoned by pedagogy. It’s a different flavor of tragedy than personal failure.

On some level, Vader’s evil is romanticized when depicted in a badass light; which would be far beyond a meaningful reason to do prequel films in the first place. I still enjoy stuff like Vader in Rebels, Rogue One, or the Respawn Jedi games, but I can respect that those weren’t new ground to break into the saga. They’re literally just depictions of what we know from the OT. The wholly imperfect execution didn’t make the prequel direction not worth doing IMO, and I can appreciate that it now lives in the objective text.

With regard to the surviving Jedi and Yoda calling Luke the last, an interesting question emerges in this context - What is a Jedi?

If our understanding of the Jedi has shifted from ANH’s idealized Knights Errant fable, to something closer to a monastic FBI and military branch - is ‘Jedi’ perhaps a political label, and not just a description of one’s relationship to the Force? After all, there are other Force users in-universe that are not Jedi. Whose to say that characters like Kanan, Cal, or Ahsoka are even Jedi [to Yoda] at all? Ahsoka was expelled before she could finish her training, Kanan and Cal gave up many aspects of the path to survive and fight back; none of them were in contact with or under the direction of the Rump Jedi Council of Kenobi and Yoda. Meanwhile Luke is trained by that council, the only project undertaken by them during the Galactic Civil War, and specifically has an uncomplicated view of who they were. It’s ultimately pedantic and matters mostly to justify Yoda’s line, but participation in The Order as institution is an important theme for Anakin’s downfall. It may very well be an important part of what makes “a Jedi” in the non-colloquial sense, to an official of its ranks such as Yoda.

Somewhere along the way this became an unpopular idea, but to me Luke not killing his father as counter to Obi-Wan and Yoda’s direction was always an early suggestion of what the PT would eventually, if dispassionately, present about the Jedi Order. So “The Jedi” may have been purged, but the light wasn’t and couldn’t be. I can square the survivor count with Yoda’s line when I think about how Yoda kind of sucked

Channel72 said:

NFBisms said:
My theory is that this will be a big source of the sectarian rebel tensions in the lead-up to the Alliance. Like I alluded to above, Luthen is basically a bolshevik accelerationist. Revolution on his terms is dirty, brutal, and spearheaded by a professional vanguard of gangsters and spies. Mon’s canonical call for Open Rebellion is the inevitable clash with that clandestine exclusivity, but I think what’s added to it with the development of a culture and religion rally, is that for once there might be a tangible, coherent ideology to the so-called “Alliance to Restore The Republic”, one that addresses what exactly makes The Empire more evil than the Old Republic.

Yeah - I mean, historical parallels are always tricky and inexact, but I think what you say about Luthen here is essentially correct. But I interpreted Mon Mothma as basically aligned ideologically with Luthen, rather than viewing the two as representing opposing sides of something like an eventual Bolshevik/Menshevik split. Mon Mothma finances Luthen’s revolutionary activities. She comes off as less “Machiavellian” than Luthen mostly because she operates as a public figure in the middle of a technological police state. (Mon’s cousin Vel also is presumably aligned ideologically with Luthen.) The fact that Mon does some Menshevik type things - like working with the Imperial Senate and Galactic elite to fight oppressive legislation - doesn’t really put her in opposition to Luthen’s attempts to pull off an “October revolution”. Mon’s public activities in the Senate (and her ineffective opposition to Palpatine) are something of a cover story. She’s a Bolshevik in Menshevik clothing, if anything.

Where I’m coming from with the parallel is more about where Mon ends up as opposed to where she is in Andor S1, and where the bolsheviks and mensheviks clashed in regards to membership. (And either way, early revolutionary days had both factions often working together on a temporary basis, participating in the same activities - extralegal or otherwise.)

I think Mon’s aligned with Luthen right now, but eventually she’s going to open the rebellion up in a pretty public move (Star Wars: Rebels). From then on, the Alliance becomes a known political entity to the Empire, with her as a public face of it. It’s a whole apparatus with a fleet and a council, there’s moralism in at the very least what is a public stance disavowing Saw Gerrera as an extremist. In A New Hope, its legitimacy as something that can gain favor in the Senate is why the Death Star exists. Bail / the Organas are not in exile like Mon is.

It’s still an inexact parallel - I didn’t intend to be otherwise and Star Wars never is - but I see the friction between being exclusive and being broad as one coming conflict in season 2.

To tangent off of this though, the Bolshevik in Menshevik clothing is interesting to say because we actually also get stuff in season 1 hinting at Luthen not wanting to be so clandestine anymore and Mon learning to be less scrupulous. Gilroy and Luna have said we will see Rogue One differently after S2; Draven and Cass’ ruthless activity in that film might be fully sanctioned by Mon herself. And how warranted was Saw’s disavowment really? How does Luthen get out of the picture? I’m interested to see where else any analogy will be imperfect. The mix and match is the fun part.

Yeah. I mean, the movies don’t explore this beyond a very superficial level. But clearly, we’re supposed to understand that the Empire is worse than the Old Republic because the Empire isn’t a democracy, at least after Alderaan. (Oh yeah, also that little matter of blowing up Alderaan.)

…

It’s unclear what sort of economy/ideology the various Rebel factions depicted in the OT or Andor are actually fighting to achieve in some hypothetical New Republic, but presumably the Rebel Alliance that we know and love wants to setup something similar to the Old Republic, rather than something more like a socialist economy with publicly owned industries as suggested (arguably) by the underlying thematic vibes of Andor.

Right, I just meant before the Death Star, there’s already a well established Rebel Alliance. So I was extrapolating based on Andor’s depiction of cultural displacement, what makes that a reality without a planet killer moving people to action. I don’t think the economic mechanisms as you laid out could mobilize the common populace we see in Rogue One/OT (at least per Andor), so I was mostly speaking to what would. If the seperatists alluded to throughout Andor are the same corporatists from the prequels then I’m sure that’d all be in there somewhere as political promise in alliance, but I think there’d actually be some intentional, built-into-the-story eschewing of actually working out a post-Empire government/economy. The Alliance has canonically been a temporary coalition since Rogue One.

Like, I don’t think Andor is rewriting canon to make it more clear. I think it’ll just choose a focus that allows it to sidestep those concerns, while co-opting the historical motifs of revolution broadly.

Also, anyone notice how that deleted scene in ANH with Luke and Biggs is kind of an early “spiritual predecessor” to Rogue One/Andor? It’s a scene that would be right at home in an episode of Andor, minus the corny 70s dialogue.

Yes! Thinking about Biggs in this scene is specifically where I was coming from when thinking about the Rebel Alliance circa Rogue One / A New Hope.

Well, my point about “Alliance to Restore the Republic” was specifically about it moreso as a mission of peoples, not governance. The aspirational “Republic” would be defined loosely by a diversity of sovereign states, not necessarily their representative role or would-be political mechanics; the rallying call being an embrace of mysticism and culture are just important elements of that broader movement. It’s not an understanding of the rebellion that’s particularly novel in simpler terms, but would be, if in friction with the ideological / theoretical rebellion season 1 ends at.

I think that potential reframe as tenuous populist coalition lends itself to an aftermath with a struggling New Republic if anything.

That said, yeah, I wouldn’t want there to be overt reference to the Mandoverse. That exists separately in my mind; that version of SW is more an expression of genre than it is drama / faux-history like Andor. There’s space left internally at LFL to compartmentalize anyway. Different creative teams and mediums necessitate it. The OT is a clear divider between the eras.

Again though, was only speculating for fun! I don’t expect it play out like I theorized at all. When I posted I thought it could moreso be a decent place to start a discussion about season 1’s themes. I disagree about saving discussion for later; between seasons is the best time for stuff like this! Hell, I’d do “complex examination” of Ahsoka too, why not?

But yeah, I was starved for discussion about Andor beyond “It’s better than everything else!” Outside of the extrapolation, the post was just what season 1 was textually about. Ferrix and Aldhani’s oppression was occupation, displacement, and erasure of culture under technocratic hegemon. It’s not a stretch reading of the material. So the line from those ideas to eventually shining a political light on the original sin of the Jedi’s genocide (even as only propagandist symbol), would be pretty straightforward. Feels especially plausible when you consider the pre-determined endpoint (May the Force Be With You) + the other threads that are poised to interweave and synthesize. (eg: Chandrilan tradition as [teen] rebellion, insurgent sectarian tensions, etc.)

Nah, just regular blu

Ian McDiarmid actually already voiced this scene, it was re-released some time around his season 4 appearance.

SparkySywer said:
In the year of our lord 2024 it comes off to me as willful ignorance not to notice that media corporations, and most large corporations in general for that matter, are overtly aligning themselves with social movements that certainly can not be called right-wing. Especially when the director of this show is overtly saying that their works include activism.

and this is an argument from the year of our lord 2018

Ultimately this whole thing is just proxy culture war for which ideas are deemed profitable, no one’s really going to bat for or against the Rey movie but trying to assert how mainstream their politics are to a corporation. Should women direct movies, should activism be in movies? - aren’t even big questions to a leftist, they just are their understanding of Art. So when someone frames milquetoast as radical or even something to have an agenda about at all, it’s a frustrating signal that even the most inoffensive perspective they have is a matter of discourse

It is just idpol, it doesn’t actually matter or do anything to anyone. Corporatism then comes up because that actually means something, and is between the two a more urgent political conversation happening in that sphere. At least in this context, way more meaningful and relevant about Disney’s role, if those are the terms people want to talk about this.

But Obaid-Chinoy’s identity is her own. If someone has a problem with what she says on that, then mask off about it. I don’t think someone gets to hide behind nonpartisan, vague anti-corporation. At that point, you’re advocating for corporation to run as you see fit, not really being against it.

Leftists will personally choose to define leftism to include anti-corporatism despite knowing that it’s not the common parlance, and then act like the average person is just an idiot for using the meaning of the word that’s naturally evolved through real-life political contexts and dismiss what they’re saying out of hand.

How is the common parlance supposed to evolve if no one speaks up for it? In the past years the question of labor and monopoly, where money goes and comes from, have been very prevalent - leftists don’t want to have to justify the most basic respect for diversity when there are bigger concerns, and like I alluded to, some that people on “either side” could probably get behind.

Maybe it’s browbeating, but it’s much easier to dismiss something so petty and purposefully divisive. Women directing Star Wars should be “neat” and technically true. The mechanism that makes that a headline is ineffectual brownie farming, it’s something that ‘common parlance’ needs to move on from.

I don’t think people get passes on this sort of thing because it’s “common” or “average”. This is the incuriosity I talk about; why shouldn’t someone clinging to a broad, reactionary narrative be challenged on their terms?

Remember, what you’re claiming Anjohan did which was dangerous is claiming that the show directed by a woman who said “Every single piece of work that I have ever created has a piece of activism in it,” is going to have a political agenda.

This is not all Anjohan said

Threw together a quick little teaser trailer for this project.

Maybe something that would come out in the week before this hypothetical arc would premiere, if this were actually the finale of Andor. Wanted to use mostly shots that didn’t “spoil” too much, and also felt in line with the new vibe.

Genuinely so long ago I don’t remember, unfortunately. The version of NCC I have on my drive right now doesn’t even have the padawan screams anymore.

If any of you could PM me with links to any older versions of this edit, that would actually be super helpful! I was remaking this earlier this year and am going to get back to it eventually, but I realize across everyone who’s ever asked, is like 16 versions. I was happy with it somewhere around 10 and 14, probably; like three laptops and a few hard drives ago. And even, only some unmade combination thereof would have been the ideal bow

When I get back into it, I would want to stick close to the one people are probably talking about when they say “NFBisms’ New Canon Cut”

Anjohan said:

Well, now you are going back on your initial first post that you removed, so that’s not completely true now, is it?

I withdrew it (before you had responded then btw) because I felt you would interpret it that way, and didn’t want to do exactly what we are doing now lmao. It wasn’t until your reply that I decided I should reframe it to you more fairly, since you had apparently seen it already anyway.

Now, how long are agendas going to be the focal point rather than the film, and tell me, how is that going for them over there?

I just think this is silly. “Agendas” are only the focal point of film if you have brainrot framing it that way to you every time, if you’re looking to be upset about it. And I get if it bothers you, but to prop it up as the problem with the film industry / Disney is laughable, especially when every dipshit decision Bobs Chapek and Iger have made is a matter of public record. Pandering is one spineless tool in Disney’s vast chest of unprincipled means, choosing to die on that hill alone is silly.

For what it’s worth, I don’t think you hate women, the anti-woke position is just silly. I think you’re being incurious, not bigoted. It’s not like me and Nev are pro-Disney

don’t project your fixation on it as everyone else’s

ah right, so if only Ant-Man Quantumania promoted Evangelline Lilly they would have made billions more dollars

Anjohan said:

What? Can you guys read? My problem isn’t female involvement. Any female can make anything as good as a man can and vice versa. My problem is that that is the focal point of the article and often also Disney when it should be about the story and the characters.

Since when did America and their corporations go so off-rail that gender equality and politics in film and tv media started mattering more than the story? THAT is my point. From a European standpoint it makes Hollywood look like a bunch of madmen (and madwomen, equality).

Best faith reading of your response I can muster: Disney is marketing wrong, they should have released an article about Story and Characters.

but elaborate what are you saying here:

the right person with the right passion and the right knowledge

How does (in the best faith reading of your response) a desperate, pandering marketing tactic exclude this possibility?

I feel like this is such a tired talking point because there are way less examples of this than any of you can specifically point out. I’m not denying Disney is falling off hard, and I’m glad for it, but the casually inoffensive left-y politics that make it into a trade article here or there have never been the “sole” tool. You see it once and get all up in arms about it, that says more about you than it does Disney. What is Ant-Man Quantumania’s excuse

Disney is spineless and has no principles or ideology, they’ll promote on any and as many broad terms as they can. If you’re going to attempt analysis of the business, you have to go after more than their empty rhetoric. there’s hundreds more valid criticisms than the (weak) stuff that puts you off personally

Listed on IFDB now!

With the approval comes yet another slightly new release (V5) per some FE guidelines and approver feedback. More or less the same as what you might’ve seen already, just a bit more polished (higher bitrates, fuller stereo) and simple disclaimer at the front of each episode.

.mkv, with snooker’s subs now embedded

Leave a review if you want to!

Speculation because it’s fun:

When Luthen’s bolsheviks are inevitably split from Mon and Bail’s mensheviks, I think Mon will do so in part by leveraging religion as the basis of the Alliance.

We know that the younger generation of Chandrilans (esp on Coruscant) are more conservative than Vel and Mon’s generation, and the Empire is starting to stamp out local customs in the wake of Aldhani. Leida’s mystic tradwife fixation - as negatively as that is portrayed - is still a rebellion in this context (wouldn’t be exempt from PORD), and I think Mon will begin to take advantage of that. The Force and other fundamental mysticism could become a political tool for a religious [or more broadly, cultural] revolution against a coldly secular Empire; rebellion gaining favor and involvement from younger generations like the Chandrilan youth, even students (similar to Nemik) opposed to Imperial seculonationalist hegemony - sorta like the Iranian revolution.

“May The Force Be With You” becomes a common rebel refrain. A wider populace is definitely onboard by Rogue One, not just the convicts, criminals, or tragically displaced that we [mostly] started with in Andor.

Importantly, Mon Mothma’s vibes between BBY 5 and BBY 0+ are very different. If the old ways of Chandrila are the deal with the devil she makes in season 1, I think she will continue to make that deal as a political face of this rebellion. The frumpy modesty of her ROTJ look might now read as martyrdom in old Chandrila’s tradcatch ideology; she’s renouncing the materialism of an Imperial Senator, re-committed to the Old Ways.

My theory is that this will be a big source of the sectarian rebel tensions in the lead-up to the Alliance. Like I alluded to above, Luthen is basically a bolshevik accelerationist. Revolution on his terms is dirty, brutal, and spearheaded by a professional vanguard of gangsters and spies. Mon’s canonical call for Open Rebellion is the inevitable clash with that clandestine exclusivity, but I think what’s added to it with the development of a culture and religion rally, is that for once there might be a tangible, coherent ideology to the so-called “Alliance to Restore The Republic”, one that addresses what exactly makes The Empire more evil than the Old Republic.

It’s always been a fandom talking point that Palpatine’s Clone War Republic was already The Empire, but this route would clearly define “A Republic” as an intergalacticist aspiration, not just a misguided return to what failed before. The Force unifier as culture commonality, not just faith in Jedi or magical will. Empire dilutes and destroys heritage and identity, that’ll be the populist throughline of the rebellion, pre Death Star.

Andor’s already made a really solid examination of imperialistic genocide in real terms (displacement, culture loss / limit) and not just overt violence with everything that happens on Aldhani and Ferrix. My hope for season 2 is that those threads are picked up in a real way further, the pieces are all there.

I could probably help out!

Alright, a few relatively minor updates to the version 4.0s:

• Audio is now decompressed, higher bitrate. Still stereo, but not as loud and crushed.
• A few tiny sound effects here and there that I missed foleying the first time around, have been filled in.
• Final end credits switched from Maarva’s funeral dirge to “Your Mother Is Dead” from the third volume of Andor’s OST. Some users on FE figured it was better to keep the Ferrix marching band singular to its original moment, and ultimately the replacement track flows much nicer from the end of the episode anyway.

The durations should be unchanged, so if you still have the old subs, just rename them to the correct version.

For the most part, I shouldn’t revisit until season 2.

FE wants me to make a 5.1 mix, but that’s going to take a while given pretty much all of this was rebuilt from the ground up in stereo - so in the meantime, I can toy with a full movie version (though I still rec these!), and then export out a file without any score for anyone who wants it.

Vladius said:

Unpopular opinion - I don’t like their depiction, but as depicted in the movies, the prequel Jedi that people call “dogmatic,” “flawed,” “political,” “cold,” etc. were right about a lot of things.

They can be right and still be all of those things.

And now we have subtitles, thanks to the amazing snooker! I’ve added those .srt files to the Google Drive folder for anyone that wants them too.

Alright, just uploaded versions I’m happy to sit with and send out until Andor season 2, a few minor tweaks from the previous to address some of RL’s points above (bats, OG score bleed, staff hits, foley volume).

“Jedha”: v3.8 v4
“Stardust”: v3.2 v4
“Rogue One”: v3.1 v4

Thank you so much for these! I was holding off on “finalizing” until I had at least heard from you, you always have really thorough feedback. A lot of this is already helping tie up those technical odds and ends; I don’t think I have it in me to keep rewatching these for that small stuff (hell, that was the whole process already) so the extra eyes really helps. Relieving that they seemed fine for the most part to everyone already.

I do agree about waiting until season 2 to finalize, but for now “final” to me is about not having to think about this for a while. I didn’t exactly have the healthiest relationship to my previous ongoing edits tbh. For that, I think I’m just going to let go of some of the more radical / alternate stuff I might have been interested in, at least for now. A lot of what you pitched does sound enticing though! Esp. your second ending pitch. When I have the space in my head and life for it, I’d love to help realize some of these somewhere.

I’ll respond to some of the more specific points below:

RogueLeader said:

When I rewatched episode 1 on my phone at max volume, I noticed the sound of bats chirping a lot during in the scenes at Saw’s base. Sort of noticeable/distracting but not terrible.

I was actually wondering if “bats” to denote “cave” was a little too much lol. Can definitely reduce them.

I feel like the added shots during the rebel briefing do stick out a little.

I can live with that, that one shot I replaced of Jyn with a smile[?] on her face never worked for me, especially as the lingering closer to the exchange. Just never tracked to the prior conversation’s tone.

I am overall impressed by your music choices. I thought the music choice when Jyn and Cassian arrived to Jedha was pretty inspired, since the music has a slight “Arabia” vibe, which is appropriate considered Jedha was filmed in Wadi Rum. I also really loved the music choices for Galen’s death, and Cassian’s speech till the end of that episode. Really great.

This reminds me I should release a tracklist.

The Jedha arrival in particular is actually “Lebanon” by Cho Young-wuk from Park Chan-wook’s The Little Drummer Girl (2018) miniseries, which I highly recommend. I actually got on keyboard to play some notes from it as synth, just to better blend it to the the rest of the Andor OST lol

I think you’ve done an impressive job emulating the original score with Brittell’s work at times, and overall giving it the Andor vibe. I will say that I initially felt some of the music choices didn’t have the same “emotional weight” as the original tracks, like Your Father Would be Proud. I have rewatched bits and pieces of the episodes on my phone during and those moments that initially had less impact than the theatrical have grown on me more.

I was feeling similarly, but I figured, eh, it’s a novelty edit at the end of the day, the point isn’t to outdo the original, and ultimately Andor’s vibe is just less theatrical anyway. I actually insulated myself from the original score entirely by episode 2 so as to stop comparing the two. Glad to hear it’s grown on you.

I may be wrong but I think I noticed you re-inserted Chirrut’s line, “Is your foot alright?” between V1 and V2. I don’t have strong feelings either way about it but I’m curious why you decided to add it back in.

Also, I wonder if Chirrut’s staff hitting the troopers could be given a little more umph here and there. Sometimes it sounds like he is tapping them pretty lightly instead of hitting them so hard he is knocking them out.

I had to redo all the foley for that scene between the two versions because I felt V1’s sound work was really sloppy all around. I too didn’t really have strong feelings either way about it, which is why I didn’t bother cutting it the second time around. Good call on the staff hits.

You may interested, but I know there is an unused shot of the little girl Jyn saved looking up in the sky when the Star Destroyer is leaving that you could re-add to this version of the film if you wanted. There are a few other unused shots that could be useful here and there as well.

I would be interested in just seeing what you have at all, even if I don’t end up using them.

An opportunity for this edit: In the Partisan prison cell, Cassian says, “This is the first for me” in regards to being “worst cages than this”. This feels a little contradictory knowing that he has been in some pretty bad cages. You could argue he is being deceptive about his past, or being sarcastic, but I feel like with the added context of Andor, it would be better to alter this line to, “This isn’t the first for me” if possible.

Honestly, this never bothered me and I think Andor actually makes the scene work better for me personally. I like that it’s overtly not the truth now, particularly for the moment when Chirrut calls out that he is carrying a prison with him. It plays more like Cassian taken aback by some mysticism (he is probably carrying Narkina with him), as opposed to him being surprised Chrirrut said something poignant. Just feels a bit more in character.

I always felt like it was less about having been in cages before anyway, and more about Chirrut’s premise to relax. From Cass’ perspective, is he supposed to say “You’re right, I have been in worse cages too, I shouldn’t care about being held against my will”? It feels fitting for him to say something wry that minimizes the conversation through Chirrut’s own terms.

I think if this was a movie edit, I would suggest removing all Bodhi scenes before Cassian finds him (and you removed all but one already), but with this episode format I wonder how it would feel if the following Bodhi scene when he meets Saw was back-to-back with his first scene. You could still cut the Bor Gullet scene, but maybe you could subtitle Saw when he says Bor Gullet, and it could mean, “Torture him.” Or something like that, to explain why Bodhi is in a daze when Cassian finds him.

I was wondering if maybe the Saw scenes would actually play better in Andor’s new context. This is mostly for the potential / inevitable post-season 2 revisit, but season 1 already lays groundwork for Saw’s further descent into madness and paranoia. Maybe season 2 could make the Rogue One scenes land better as the final beats of a fleshed out arc.

As it is though, I still don’t see too much value in including all of them. Bodhi being in a daze contrasted to his first lucid scene tells enough of the story IMO, as does Saw’s brief distrust of Jyn’s reappearance.

I can totally understand if you want keep this edit pretty similar to the original film beyond a few trims, but I’d love get a version of this with the music separate if you wouldn’t mind sharing.

I’ll get around to this eventually, I don’t mind. I imagine it’ll be like when they released that Tom Cruise Mummy trailer without music haha.

Though if I end up too busy, I think some of it should be easily replicated by using something like Spleeter or UVR to isolate vocals on the center channel. Only percussion and vocals can make a clean center channel, given the targeted scene’s OST doesn’t have any drums (which luckily RO doesn’t use all the time). Percussion track in particular can preserve a good bit of things like clicks, taps, impacts, explosions, and footsteps for the foley.

snooker said:

I’m working on my own subtitles for these and I’d be glad to share them when I finish!

Thank you, that’d be great, I’ll fold them into the final versions when they’re ready. The timings at this point aren’t changing.

I was thinking about it, yeah. I’d still have to crack the episode bridges though, since the scoring is very intentional to the format atm, and it was a lot of testing to even get to where it is. For now, I’m going to polish up the current soundtracks before I start on that.

I’d also be lying if I said I wasn’t attached now to the start / end of the second episode moments in particular. The breaks alleviate some of the extended dryness I feel this could easily fall into.

Hal 9000 said:

This fucking rules.

Thanks for checking it out!

Always rules to hear from you snooker, thank you so much for checking it out! I’m glad to hear it all works out that way, it’s what I’d hoped when I first started this