NeverarGreat

Hmm, that’s an interesting suggestion. But the rearranged sentence introduces ambiguity in ‘their domain of evil’, which is somewhat uncoupled from ‘the sinister FIRST ORDER’. One could interpret the domain of evil to be connected to the Resistance, which is obviously not what we want. It also has three commas in a row, whereas my original sentence was intended to break up the two commas across the entire paragraph.

I go back and forth on ‘his’ or ‘the’, since ‘the’ is more straightforward, but ‘his’ gives a more poetic flair and (to me at least) evokes the idea of a darkening fate or destiny.

How about this:

EPISODE VII
THE FORCE AWAKENS

The galaxy is in crisis.
Luke Skywalker, striving
to restore the legendary
Jedi Order, has vanished.

Sensing Imperial malice
behind this catastrophe,
several valiant Senators
in the New Republic have
authorized a task force
to search for the last Jedi
within the domain of the
sinister FIRST ORDER,
heir to the fallen Empire.

Sworn to an errand of
secrecy, leaders of this
brave RESISTANCE have
sent their greatest pilot
to the planet of Jakku,
unaware of the shadow
now rising to extinguish
the darkening stars…

EPISODE VII
THE FORCE AWAKENS

The New Republic grieves.
Its hero Luke Skywalker,
striving to restore the old
Jedi Order, has vanished.

Fearing a sinister power
behind this catastrophe,
a few desperate Senators
have secretly called upon
an intrepid RESISTANCE
to search for the last Jedi
in the domain of the evil
FIRST ORDER, heir to the
fallen Galactic Empire.

Answering this call, the
ace pilot Poe Dameron
has discovered a clue to
Luke’s location on the
desolate world of Jakku,
unaware of the shadow
now rising to extinguish
his darkening stars…

Giving the clones a chip instantly robs them of any agency they could have had as individuals. Truly one of the worst things to come out of The Clone Wars show.

It’s also quite bizarre from a motivation angle, since there are so many ways in which the clones could have turned against the Jedi. For example, Palpatine could reveal that Yoda and the Jedi are inherently mistrustful of the clones and will intend to take over their peacekeeping duties once the war is over, relegating the clones to ignoble retirement or outright termination once their purpose has been fulfilled. Then the impetus of the clones to destroy the Jedi at the end of the war could grow organically from within their ranks, nurtured by the machinations of Palpatine.

I think saving Anakin’s fall for post Episode 3 is a good idea, and is what I’m leaning towards in a rewrite. It’s also interesting to think of ending the trilogy on a high note, and would probably mean shifting the viewpoint backward in time. There’s still the issue of Anakin’s children which put some constraints on the timeline, but it may be solvable.

Doing some quick math, both Anakin and Obi-wan would be in their mid-60s by the time of ANH based on the ages of their actors, which means that they would be in their mid-40s during the birth of the twins.

Obi-wan claims that Vader was a young Jedi when he began hunting down and killing the Jedi, so he must have turned rather early in his life while also allowing for him to have become a good man before that. So how old is the average student before they become a Jedi? It must be that to become a Jedi takes more time than is implied by Luke’s training, significantly more in fact. It is also known that a Jedi begins their training before they are in their twenties, so the training may take two decades or more.

If Anakin began training in his 20s and became a Jedi by the time he was 30, that may still be quite young for a Jedi based on historical trends. This would also indicate that Luke underwent an unusually rapid course of training, and the derision he meets from Jabba and his entourage may be simply due to them understanding that a Jedi would have been old by necessity of lengthy training.

However, this means that since Anakin and Obi-wan were similar in age, Obi-wan would have been remarkably young to be a Jedi as well. Why was this? Well, the common factor here is Yoda, who significantly rushed Luke’s training by all accounts. Perhaps he also rushed Obi-wan’s training, and this is the original flaw that led to the destruction of the Jedi. Yoda may have been visited by a young man filled with a zeal to embark on a worthy crusade and fight in the Clone Wars. In fact, Obi-wan’s training may have mirrored Luke’s training where he realized that his friends were in danger and left the training unfinished, having promised that one day he would return to Dagobah to complete what he started. But in the meantime, he would train acolytes of his own to help him fight this war. Interestingly, there is evidence that Luke remembers Dagobah and Yoda seems to remember Luke, so perhaps Obi-wan did return to Dagobah to complete his training after taking Luke from his mother at the end of the Clone Wars. It fits!

Sorry for the stream of consciousness, but I seem to think best by writing.

Anyway, I’m getting the impression that Anakin and Obi-wan are peers and partners in the Force more than student and teacher, helping each other learn through a trial by fire and war. “I was a Jedi Knight, same as your father”, takes on more meaning now. There’s the tension between that statement and “When I left you I was but the learner, now I am the master”. Perhaps that is because Obi-wan was never officially made a Jedi Knight, merely claiming that he was and making Anakin a Jedi Knight after taking him through his incomplete course of training.

Or perhaps the term Jedi Knight is actually two separate distinctions. To become a Jedi is the more difficult, lengthy, and spiritual journey, and the knight appellation is similar to a Knighthood in the UK. Essentially, Yoda may be a Jedi but not a Knight since he is not in service to the Republic, and Obi-wan may be a Knight but not truly a Jedi since he may not have completed Yoda’s training, at least not before the time of the Empire.

To put all this in some order, here’s how I see a potential timeline:

Episode 1 sees Obi-wan, having returned from Yoda on Dagobah several years ago, fighting in the first Clone War at the age of 25. He claims that he is a Jedi and commands his own squadron. The Jedi are an obscure and fading image of the Republic’s former glory, with few knowing of how they were once peacekeepers in the galaxy. He recruits Anakin (also 25) and together they win the day, ending the first Clone War. At the end of the film Obi-wan is awarded a Knighthood by the Republic, and becomes the youngest Jedi Knight in the Republic’s history.

Episode 2 takes place 5 years later, at the outbreak of the second Clone War. This is a far fiercer conflict and looks to span the entire galaxy. Alderaan asks for help. Obi-wan again asks Anakin to fight, and vows to teach him the ways of the Jedi even if no other Jedi in the galaxy shall train him.

Episode 3 takes place another 5 years later, and they have a chance to end this galactic conflict. Obi-wan now has several students under his wing, and Anakin is rewarded by a Knighthood. The Republic has an unstoppable army and has brought peace to the universe, and the Jedi are ready to go out into the universe and become peacekeepers in it like they once were.

This leaves the story with our heroes at the age of 35, ten years before the birth of the twins. This also leaves a lot of the story to the imaginations of the audience, which is important in Star Wars.

StarkillerAG said:

NeverarGreat said:

1: How would Obi-wan be made to acknowledge that Grevious is his prior student? I suppose some introduction could be made during the crawl since that is also the case in the theatrical version, but it would need to be buttressed by dialogue from Obi-wan confirming their history. This would have to happen early in ROTS, since Obi-wan could only have taken another apprentice during the Clone Wars after Anakin had become a Jedi Knight.

Actually, I was planning to have Obi-Wan mentor Grievous before TPM: in my planned saga edit, it will be established that Padawans can tutor other Padawans in a Japanese senpai/kohai sort of fashion. And I don’t think it’s possible to have Obi-Wan mention a previous apprentice, but I was planning to add some redubbed lines from Yoda hinting at it. For example, after Qui-Gon says that Obi-Wan is ready to take an apprentice, Yoda says something like “Your Padawan had an apprentice once. Know how well that turned out, we do.” The teases would get more explicit in AOTC, until Grievous is finally revealed in ROTS.

2: If Grievous is already so far gone as to have a metal cranium, it would be pretty clear that this is not the character in the OT when we see the back of Vader’s head in ESB. There’s also the problem that Vader in the OT and Grievous in the PT have entirely different ways of moving, with Grievous being much more alien and animalisitic in his movements.

One, I’m planning to edit the OT too, and I already knew that I would have to cut out that helmet bit. And two, I feel like Grievous being more alien and animalistic could be explained by him, well, having an alien and animalistic body. It would be implied that after Grievous’s apparent death at Obi-Wan’s hands, his robot body was upgraded into a more lifelike, human form. Of course, this wouldn’t turn out to actually be the case, but still.

3: Obi-wan in ANH says that Vader betrayed and murdered Luke’s father. However, there is no one-on-one fight between Grievous and Anakin, and Grievous dies in act 2 long before we see the last of Anakin. If the film is cut to imply that Grievous survives, this would also necessitate Anakin surviving to be killed later by Grievous, but this introduces many more problems as well as leaving unclear how Grievous would ‘betray’ Anakin if he was already a darksider when they met (this is a problem with my latest Prequel concept as well, but it could easily be fixed by having Obi-wan’s apprentice meet and befriend Anakin earlier in their adventures).

I thought about that too, but I figured it would be fine if the audience already knows that Obi-Wan is lying to at least some degree. There are some edits that already do that by having the “reveal” in ESB be that Anakin survived the Mustafar battle and became Vader, but I think my idea is an improvement by allowing Vader to still be described as Obi-Wan’s apprentice rather than just some generic mook.

Ah, well if you’re editing the OT it would be a lot easier to make this work!

More generally, as far as redubbing a major character, Grievous is a good choice due to not needing any lip sync. I’d be curious to read your version of his dialogue incorporated into the scenes of the film.

It’s an interesting idea, but one that comes with a host of problems to solve.

1: How would Obi-wan be made to acknowledge that Grevious is his prior student? I suppose some introduction could be made during the crawl since that is also the case in the theatrical version, but it would need to be buttressed by dialogue from Obi-wan confirming their history. This would have to happen early in ROTS, since Obi-wan could only have taken another apprentice during the Clone Wars after Anakin had become a Jedi Knight.

2: If Grievous is already so far gone as to have a metal cranium, it would be pretty clear that this is not the character in the OT when we see the back of Vader’s head in ESB. There’s also the problem that Vader in the OT and Grievous in the PT have entirely different ways of moving, with Grievous being much more alien and animalisitic in his movements.

3: Obi-wan in ANH says that Vader betrayed and murdered Luke’s father. However, there is no one-on-one fight between Grievous and Anakin, and Grievous dies in act 2 long before we see the last of Anakin. If the film is cut to imply that Grievous survives, this would also necessitate Anakin surviving to be killed later by Grievous, but this introduces many more problems as well as leaving unclear how Grievous would ‘betray’ Anakin if he was already a darksider when they met (this is a problem with my latest Prequel concept as well, but it could easily be fixed by having Obi-wan’s apprentice meet and befriend Anakin earlier in their adventures).

These are the problems that I can think of off the top of my head. The frustrating thing is that Grievous has many aspects that would make him a good fit for this role, like being a cyborg with a raspy voice and being trained to kill Jedi, but the leap between that and Obi-wan’s fallen apprentice and onetime friend of Anakin Skywalker is just too great in my opinion. I’d very much like to be proven wrong, however, so if anyone wants to try and make this work all the power to you!

Has anyone ever done a fan subtitle of the Wookie scenes? That might be worth the effort, especially if they were funny.

If I were in charge of a prequel story with Anakin Skywalker, I would not have him transform into Darth Vader during those episodes, at least, not fully. Instead, this would happen between the Prequels and the Original Trilogy.

Anakin in the PT is essentially Flash Gordon with a few notable changes. He comes from a farming planet in the colony worlds and is recruited to fight in the Republic Space Force by General Obi-wan Kenobi, who is secretly part of an order of Jedi Knights, reclusive warriors under the personal command of the Republic’s High Chancellor who are rumored to use a mystical energy source to achieve amazing feats. He is similar to Hans Zarkov except that instead of the magic of science, he uses literal magic that he implies is mere scientific trickery.

Obi-wan comes to believe that Anakin may be able to use this Force, and inducts him into the order of Knights, overriding the normal order of training where a Knight would be trained under a peaceful Jedi Master, one who had devoted their life to balance and tranquility. He confides with Anakin that this is not the first student he has had, and his prior attempt ended with failure. Nevertheless, Anakin agrees to the training. While training, Anakin and Obi-wan are tasked by the High Chancellor with protecting the planet of Alderaan. They are joined in this quest by a Republic translator and diplomatic envoy to Alderaan, who is to become the mother of Luke (A Dale Arden-style character). She is secretly a princess of Alderaan but she conceals her true nature from the Jedi in order that she could ascertain their true interest in the planet. For you see, even at this time Alderaan was wary of the increasing power of the High Chancellor, and they sought to protect their autonomy from the growing reach of the Republic Army and its secret service of Jedi Knights. Anakin and ‘Dale’ fall in love, but it is only Obi-wan who suspects her true identity. Having saved Alderaan, the trio go on to have many more adventures during the wars.

The wars rage on, with legions of genetically identical clones fighting the Republic forces. The Jedi are increasingly isolated since the old Jedi Masters now believe that the Jedi have become too warlike, and the Jedi recognize this as well. They distance themselves from the Republic, but even as they do so a mysterious dark warrior arrives and begins hunting down the Jedi. One by one, the Jedi start disappearing, always at the hands of this mysterious warrior. During the climactic battle for the Republic, the mysterious warrior appears in black armor to fight Obi-wan, claiming to be his prior student. He says that he is faithful to the High Chancellor, and that the Jedi have betrayed the Republic even in its time of dire need. Obi-wan say that the Jedi have given everything to the Republic, but this is not enough for the dark warrior. He strikes Obi-wan down, and it is believed that he is dead. Anakin hears of this and hunts down the dark warrior, finally fighting him above a pool of lava. They both fall into that pit and it is only at the end that we learn that Obi-wan survived. He goes to ‘Dale’ to tell her the news. he sees that she has a baby boy, and she gives this to him to be raised with Anakin’s family who are moving to the outer rim in search of a new home, escaping the war-torn desolation of their blasted homeworld. Obi-wan, seeing that ‘Dale’ is sick and not long for this world, goes to watch over the boy. The final scenes show that one of the warriors has survived the fall into lava, and returns to the High Chancellor to help rule over this new Empire that he has helped to create.

TL;DR: I don’t think that Anakin’s turn need be difficult or complicated. He was a simple man of action who fought in the wars for the Republic, in whatever form that government would take. Nobody bothered to ask him about his politics, and by the time anyone would have thought to ask it was already too late.

Check your PMs 😃

Fair enough.

In fact, Ben says that ‘for a thousand generations the Jedi Knights were the guardians of peace and justice in the Old Republic’, which could mean that the Old Republic was around long before the Jedi. Either way, one of them is way off in their reckoning.

This is just more evidence that each trilogy takes place in its own self-contained universe, with only the illusion of continuity to connect them.

The Last Crusade is the best Indiana Jones movie and y’all are just wrong.

On topic, Sunset Boulevard. We saw this at the Alamo Drafthouse and it was pretty great on the big screen.

I was thinking the other day about the final scene of ANH, particularly how it might be treated in an Andor-style show set just after ANH.

I’ve always assumed that the medal ceremony was a great way to end a film but a terrible decision from an in-universe tactical viewpoint, but actually it could serve a critical propaganda role. If that ceremony were broadcast out into the universe, it would send the message that not only did the Rebel Alliance destroy the Death Star, but it was destroyed by just a single lowly pilot with the aid of his friends. Furthermore, the Alliance feels so confident in their victory that they are willing to remain at their base even as the Empire moves to regroup and strike back.

I can imagine a Nemik-style manifesto inspired by this:

“And so in a single brilliant flash worlds across the despairing galaxy saw something impossible; not the quarreling factions of the so-called Alliance, but a vision of unity. A farmhand, a smuggler, a Wookiee, even two lowly droids, standing shoulder-to-shoulder with the leaders of the Rebel Alliance and a Senator of the assassinated Old Republic. This was the real coup that turned Imperial blood to ice. The loss of their superweapon was a blow to the Empire’s materiel and money…but this vision of unity in the face of annihilation obliterated their thesis of order, the crucible of their unassailable power.”

I think Luke’s death would have worked if it felt in any way inevitable. I remember watching it for the first time and thinking ‘Oh that’s neat, Luke made an illusion so that he could live’, and then he goes and dies immediately afterwards. Sure, it’s established that Rey would die if she projected herself across the galaxy, but Snoke can do it without breaking a sweat so it just makes Luke canonically no more powerful than Rey and weaker than Snoke, a guy who dies in one of the most embarrassing ways imaginable.

That’s a slick attempt! I agree that the music at the end of the scene should continue to cover the intro to Palpatine’s office, or the music should be deleted in that transition completely.

Also, this isn’t a critique with your work but with the scene itself, but the sparring scene feels weird and has since the beginning. The biggest problem for me is the strange cut near the end when Obi-wan leaps into action again. It feels like there’s a missing shot, and I assume this was a cut point in the original scene but there’s definitely a loss of continuity here. The lines ‘Your weapon’s gone…it’s over.’ followed by ‘Your need for victory, Anakin, it blinds you’ feel superfluous to the flow before and after. Obi-wan’s next line ‘You’re a great warrior, Anakin…’ feels like the proper end to the action, and it may be best to just delete the second false ending altogether. I’d suggest cutting from Obi-wan being disarmed straight to the wideshot of Obi-wan spinning out of his crouch to put an end to the fight.

As to my thoughts on overall placement of the scene, I’m still unconvinced that it wouldn’t work better after Palpatine’s office. That just seems like the most natural place in terms of the exposition and flow of Star Wars movies, and I’m not too bothered by the differences in character appearance. Any AOTC edit which uses upscaled deleted scenes is going to be at least a little suboptimal, visually speaking.

My ideal placement is still Senate - Palpatine’s Office - Sparring - Padme’s Apartment (sans elevator).

Yeah, sites like this and fanediting in general exist despite the forces of capitalism. There will always be a group of passionate (or deviant) weirdos who do things regardless of profit motive, but I imagine that a vast amount of troubling, manipulative, or exploitative content online only exists because there’s money to be made doing it.

https://i.imgur.com/YbftNwO.mp4

Mango, I think I speak for everyone when I say you don’t need to apologize to anyone here. Personal life comes first, especially in a place like this. I’ve learned over the years that one should take care of oneself and only work on projects if they give enjoyment in return.

Prepunishment: the feeling of hearing a convoluted setup to what you are sure will be a tortured and unsatisfying pun.

I think the added clarity is nice, though it does bring to the forefront the inherent issues in the voice. It sounds like ‘I love you’ is too close to the camera for a line delivered from a medium distance away from the camera. For instances like this I find that adding just a touch of reverb can help ‘place’ the sound into the environment, though you don’t want to overdo the effect.

Another issue may be that the line is too centralized in the mix. If the sound is coming from the central channel it gives the effect that the camera is placed directly in front of an actor, so putting some of the voice in the left and right speakers, and even maybe some reflected sound in the rear speakers, may help for a surround mix.

Finally, the line is definitely lower in energy than you’d expect for Finn’s usual shouted delivery, so perhaps instead of increasing the volume of the line, you could try decreasing the volume of the surrounding effects.

All in all, I think your first attempt sounds more natural in terms of timing and volume, but these suggestions may give that version the clarity you’re after without highlighting the limitations of the line.

Sounds pretty great to me!

^That’s rad! I bet the new bad guys have a ton of new ships and weapons if they have a new leader.

I want to hear about the New Republic. Does Thrawn make an appearance? And does Mara Jade pop up, or do they go crazy and have Luke married?

Let’s not forget the classic scene where he sees the Jedi temple in flames and the sound of lightsabers and blaster fire, and decides that this is a good moment to act like an uptight neighbor breaking up a house party.