NeverarGreat

Here’s what I came up with. It gets the info across, to me.

That’s pretty cool! Interesting how even if you input the same dialogue multiple times, the output is different in each case.

I thought the first half was pretty fun, even though these kind of movies keep writing games and gamers like someone who just learned what an ‘internet’ was. The second half unfortunately fell apart, abandoning even its own flimsy rules in favor of love conquers all and product placement.

DMC said:

NeverarGreat said:

I recall some discussion of a tool for generating C-3PO dialogue earlier this year, and realized that there’s one place in this edit where it could really come in handy.

That tool was a text-to-speech voice on TikTok. I just took a look and it’s not available for me anymore. Hoping it’s just me 😧

That’s a shame.

Well, 3PO has probably the largest body of voice work of any Star Wars character so it shouldn’t be too hard to find something better to slot in there. Does anyone know of a time he says something like that, or mentions an evacuation?

I recall some discussion of a tool for generating C-3PO dialogue earlier this year, and realized that there’s one place in this edit where it could really come in handy. When the Resistance is discussing the Starkiller’s target, 3PO says ‘Without the Republic fleet, we’re doomed!’ This works well in the original film, but in the edit it feels like a bit of a non sequitur. A better line would speak to the question of Hal and others regarding evacuation of Hosnian Prime, namely why the Resistance didn’t even try to request an evacuation. I’m imagining a conversation like this:

Leia: “The First Order. They’re charging the weapon now. The Senate is the target.”
Poe: “The Hosnian system.”
C-3PO: “And a full evacuation would take weeks…if not longer!”
Han: “Okay, so how do we blow it up? There’s always a way to do that.”
Leia: “Han’s right.”

Something like this would be pretty well in keeping with the style of the film, acknowledging the difficulty then shifting to the dramatic action alternative.

JEDIT: “And the Senate is unlikely to order a full evacuation!”

Good catch, consider it done 😃

That does have promise!

It does seem weird that they would run into such an important person right away, but the rest is reasonable enough.

It has long bugged me that the Rebellion could field a fleet in ANH similar to the one from ROTJ. This was my look at how the battle could work with only the ships seen in ANH. The emitter plot was just the first one that came to me, but it establishes elements like the targeting computers, abilities of the various ships, and attitudes of the flight leaders that will become important in ANH.

Another change was to imply that the spies couldn’t escape the facility because they were trapped and using the only method of delivering the plans that was now available to them, whereas the film made it sound like there was some great strategy in broadcasting the plans through the shield instead of stealing a ship, despite later realizing that the shield must come down for either method to work.

Vader is now introduced by his methods as an effective and ruthless pilot. There needs be no other scene with him, and this gives us some good Vader action without the gratuitous lightsaber nonsense.

Finally, since the Tantive IV is never seen at the battle, Leia has plausible deniability when she is intercepted at the start of ANH and her detour to Tatooine makes sense because she truly believes that she was not tracked. Vader’s mission also comes into focus as there is now an implied history of him tracing the movements of the Rebellion for quite a while.

Definitely something to consider 😃

Here follows a reimagining of the space battle from Rogue One.

The Empire’s base on Scarif is on high alert. Rebel spies are attempting to escape with stolen plans to the Empire’s terror weapon. Base director Krennick storms into the command center. “Raise the planetary shields” he barks to the nearest officer. “Lock down the base, nobody gets in or out.” He spins on his heel. “You and you, follow me!” Two stormtroopers fall in behind the director as he goes in search of the rebel spies.

Two daring agents race through the sterile halls, blaster fire ricocheting inches from their heads. The man stumbles, shot in the side, a box in his hand clattering to the floor. The young woman beside him scoops up the precious data tapes and with with her other hand, pulls him into an open elevator door and smashes the control panel. The doors close on the group of stormtroopers who flood the smoking hallway. “They’re going up in the elevator!” A trooper exclaims, attempting to call back the car in vain. “Don’t worry, we’ve got them trapped. There’s no way out of the spire.”

Inside the elevator, the man gasps for breath. “The communication beacon at the top of the spire…it’s our only hope.” The woman holds the box close. “They must have closed the shield by now. There’s no way to get this data through.” The man rolls onto his back, eyes closed. “The Rebellion knows we are here.” A look of hope on the woman’s face. “They will send the ships?!” The man smiles, breathing his last.

The shield gate of Scarif hovers far above the spire of the base below, its shield surrounding the base in a blue shimmer of light. “Shield secure, director” The commanding officer reports from the shield gate. “Sir!” a junior officer shouts “ships incoming at 67.4!” The commanding officer moves to the window. A group of over twenty spaceships emerges from Light Speed and closes in on their position. “Not to worry” The commander says, “Our shield will protect us. Inform the director that we have visitors.”

The sleek cross-wing shapes of a dozen X-wings and at least that many sturdy Y-wings streak towards the disc of the shield gate. “This is Gold Leader, all wings report in.” A chorus of affirmatives greets him, and the Y-wings move into a delta position in front of the X-wings. “Red Leader, give us cover. Our target is the shield gate.” The X-wings break off. “I hear you Gold Leader, all wings draw fire from the bombers.” The space lights up in green blasts of light as the turbolaser batteries on the shield ring open fire. “They can’t get a good lock on us!” Gold Leader crows. “Alright, let’s hit that shield!” The Y-wings strafe the ring, lasers firing and explosions glancing harmlessly off of the blue shield.

“Sir, we have enemy contact.” The officer reports from the base. “I am unable to reach director Krennick.” Suddenly an alert sounds on his console and a voice comes through. “This is regional governor Tarkin. I have received reports of a rebel incursion in your sector. Do you need assistance?” The officer scrambles to respond. “There is a group of Rebel fighters above us, but we can handle them.” The response is quick. “Where is director Krennick?” In the silence that follows, Tarkin continues. “In any case, I have sent reinforcements to mop up this Rebel disturbance. They should be arriving within minutes.”

“Red Leader, we’re unable to breach their shields with conventional lasers.” The Y-wings regroup after their attack run, joined by the X-wings. “They must have ray shielding. We’ll have to use proton torpedoes.” Red leader pulls up his inventory. “We don’t have enough torpedoes between us to destroy that ring. We need another answer.” Gold Leader’s copilot swivels in her seat, viewing a schematic of the ring. “Sir, we don’t have to destroy the entire ring, we just have to disrupt their shields.” Gold Leader nods. “Send to all ships. We have new targets. Three shield emitters on the equator of the ring, five meters across.” Red leader glances at the schematics appearing on his screen. “Our computers can’t hit a target that small, Gold Leader. It’s up to you.” Suddenly a voice cries out on the radio. “Gold Leader, we have incoming!” From the blackness of space, dozens of sleek TIE fighters appear, led by a modified fighter. Red Leader turns his ship. “Gold Leader, make your run. We’ll hold 'em off until then.”

The elevator reaches the top of the spire, the young woman stepping out onto the empty platform. Above her, the vast communications array sits waiting. Above her, she sees distant blasts of light of a battle engaged. “They did come after all!” With renewed hope, she rushes over to the console and attaches the leads to the precious box in her hand.

Pursued by several TIE fighters, an X-wing spins out of control and crashes into the shield. Another breaks formation and is shot down by the modified TIE fighter. “Gold Leader, their ships are closing on you. We can’t hold them off forever!” A trio of Y-wings flies low over the shield, approaching the glowing emitter. A streak of light from the lead Y-wing impacts close to the emitter and flashes out. “A miss! Gold Two, take your shot!” A second streak of light, and this one hits. “Group two, Group three, are you in position?” There is an answering chirp. “Gold Four, reporting. We are almost in position.” Gold Leader looks around at the curve of the ring where the other group should be. “Group three, where are you?” There is static. Suddenly from that direction an explosion and a squadron of TIE fighters swoop around the curved structure at the Y-wings, the modified TIE in the lead. “This is Gold Leader, I’ve lost Gold seven, eight, nine…” The comm goes dead as Gold Leader’s ship explodes in a fireball.

The young woman looks into the sky. “Message ready to transmit.” The computerized voice intones. But the shield is still up. From the elevator shaft come sounds of grinding machinery and she readies her blaster for a final stand.

“Torpedoes away!” Gold Four shouts, striking the second emitter. It goes dead and they cheer, a celebration cut off by the appearance of the TIEs. “Gold Four, get out of there!” Red Leader moves in behind the TIEs. “We’re out of torpedoes, Red Leader. I’m sorry.” The Y-wings swing away from the ring, heading for the safety of deep space. Red Two and Three fall in behind their leader. “Looks like it’s up to us, Red Leader.” The man nods. “Just keep them off me for a few seconds, and pray my computer can hit it.”

In deep space, Gold Four turns to see several TIE fighters in pursuit. “We have to get out of here now, Gold Four!” Shouts Gold Six. “No. Draw them out as long as we can.” He winces as Gold Six explodes into a million points of light.

“He’s got me!” Red Five shouts as his engines go dead, shot out by the modified TIE. He spirals out of control, lost to space. “Damn!” Red Leader swears. “That TIE pilot is a machine! Red Two, stay on me!” He swerves in and out of support structures on the ring, followed by Red Two and three pursuers. “Almost there, Red Two. Three, two…” Red Two flames out, crashing into the side of the ring, another casualty of the modified TIE. Red Leader takes his shot. The final emitter goes dead and Red leader engages his Hyperdrive. “All wings, we’ve done it! Retreat!” The surviving ships turn into streaks of light as the shield fails. The TIE fighters shift their flight path, their leader moving straight toward the exposed dish of the spire.

The young woman pulls the lever to transmit and the message goes out into the universe. She stands free of the dish, observing the dark shapes that are approaching from above. Streaks of green light impact all around her, severing the dish and destroying the top of the spire. “You’re too late.” She says, as the structure falls around her. “This is our victory.”

The TIE fighters leave the planet, headed for the menacing arrowhead shape of the Star Destroyer now in orbit above the damaged base. The fighters dock in the landing bay, its pilots exiting their ships and removing their helmets. The pilot of the lead ship emerges, a cloak billowing out behind him as he leaps down onto the metal deck. A turbolift takes him to the bridge where he is greeted by the captain. “Lord Vader, we have the trajectory of the Rebel transmission. Should we investigate?” The voice that emerges from the mask of the pilot is not fully human. “No. Send to the Senate, and inquire as to the location of the princess of Alderaan.” The captain looks troubled. “You think they sent it to her?” The caped form moves to the star-speckled window. “I know that wherever the plans were sent, she is their eventual target.” The information goes through, and in a moment the response. “She is headed back to Alderaan, detouring through the…Tatooine system.” Vader turns in recognition. “You have your heading, captain.” He strides away from the bridge, his mechanical voice echoing through the space. “This victory by the rebels shall prove to be their final defeat.”

As good as the previous crawl was, I didn’t like how the senators calling for the Resistance were implied to be the ones in endless division. Here’s a new attempt:

The last Jedi has vanished. In his absence, a sinister Imperial power has risen to threaten the galaxy.

As the Republic fractures under the threat of war, a few brave senators have secretly called upon a daring RESISTANCE to find Luke Skywalker before the light of the legendary Jedi is lost forever.

Emerging from its hidden Imperial fortress, the evil FIRST ORDER hastens toward the wasteland of Jakku, sanctuary of the true believers who have discovered a key to the Jedi’s return…

I think ‘a few brave senators’ casts the Republic in the light of being worth saving while also recognizing that the Senate will be unable to directly help the Resistance. I also wanted to lead into the third paragraph by subtly implying that Luke (or the idea of the Jedi in general) is under imminent threat.

Just a look at where things are, and I’ll be moving on to addressing other issues in the film.

J0E said:
I probably would’ve been fine with a fan edit of TLJ if they would’ve stuck the landing on ROS.

This is what I think is lost in the hate of the ST in general and the sentiment that they were doomed from the beginning; a good end would have forgiven all ills. Star Wars fans are indeed quick to condemn the new, but they are equally willing to contort any content to fit their canon if it takes even the smallest effort to keep with the spirit of what came before, as this community illustrates.

We just removed the frames used in Restructured.

I’d say there’s a bit too much blue, especially in the highlights. The reds look a bit purple/pink and the greens are a bit teal. It is striking though, and some shots look a lot nicer.

The trouble with ‘Luke Skywalker has vanished’ is that it gets crushed right into that first line, and it’s bugged me ever since I first saw the movie. The original TFA crawl has this issue in several places, actually, and is one reason why I’m so set on making sure every word has sufficient space. I’m not too concerned with ‘the last Jedi’ being the sequel’s title since that’s the sequel’s problem, and leading with a title instead of a name immediately puts the conflict in big, general terms before getting down to the specifics later on.

Maybe waning stars is better than darkening, though I feel like the general term ‘darkening’ implies a more general and reversible change in the galaxy instead of ‘waning’ which implies a more permanent change, at least to me.

I dunno, the crawl as it is feels pretty good to me.

Indeed! Still playing with the wording, I don’t care for ‘village’ since we only see the village for the first scene. Here’s the new one:

The last Jedi has vanished. In his absence, a new Imperial power has risen to threaten the galaxy.

Descending into endless division, some members of the Republic Senate have secretly called upon a daring RESISTANCE to find Luke Skywalker and restore the light of hope to the darkening stars.

Emerging from its hidden Imperial fortress, the evil FIRST ORDER hastens toward the wasteland of Jakku, sanctuary of the true believers who have found the key to the Jedi’s return…

Those are some great ideas! I really like ‘endless division’ and ‘mysterious hidden base’, among others. Trouble is, it has to fit well on the lines and ‘mysterious’ is just too long no matter how I slice it. Along those lines, I need to keep the paragraphs quite short to prevent it being too wordy which is most of the problem in the first place. That’s also why Luke goes without a Jedi title, keeping it implied that he’s the last Jedi. I’m pretty sure people wouldn’t be confused by that.

As for the First Order, I do want to keep some aspect of ‘Imperial’ in the final paragraph to directly call back to the first paragraph, and it’s probably weird to capitalize it as part of the First Order. Making the base ‘Imperial’ may have the added benefit of implying that this was a half-completed project of the Empire that the First Order merely made operational.

Adding ‘humble’ into the description of the village hopefully prevents confusion with Luke’s Jedi Knights. It’s important to me to establish the entire village as a single group, since without that information one could come away with the idea that only Tekka was an ally of Luke like the original crawl suggested. That makes it weird when the First Order makes a point of destroying the entire village and I even felt strange that Tekka pulled these random innocents into the whole thing. But maybe that was just me. So here’s a new attempt, checked to make sure it fits:

The last Jedi has vanished. In his absence, a new Imperial power has risen to threaten the galaxy.

Descending into endless division, some members of the Republic Senate have secretly called upon a daring RESISTANCE to find Luke Skywalker and restore the light of hope to the darkening stars.

Arising from its hidden Imperial fortress, the evil FIRST ORDER hastens toward a village on Jakku, a humble sanctuary of true believers who have found the key to the Jedi’s return…

Also: I could change ‘light of hope’ to ‘light of the Jedi’ with little issue. Which one seems best?

Hi everyone, I’m back! Hopefully I shall see to the links soon.

In the meantime I have been considering the situation of V2, and in particular how the edit could use a new crawl. The old one definitely has issues, particularly with the attitude of the Republic. In Hal’s crawl, it is implied that the Senate refuses to consider the First Order a threat. This is fair of the political situation in the lore but it does cast them as at best hapless fools and at worst deserving of their fate. My old crawl for comparison painted the Republic as instrumental in the creation of the Resistance, yet unwilling to directly take action against the First Order. Neither of these takes is entirely true nor effective.

Here is the old V1 crawl:

It is a time of despair. Luke Skywalker, striving to restore the legendary Jedi Order, has vanished.

In his absence, sinister forces have mobilized under the banner of the IMPERIAL FIRST ORDER and claim to possess a weapon with the power to destroy any star system that defies their brutal supremacy.

Fearing for its survival, the New Republic secretly authorizes the formation of a fierce RESISTANCE to find the missing Jedi and restore peace and justice to the darkening stars…

And here is my latest take:

The last Jedi has vanished. In his absence, a new Imperial power has risen to threaten the galaxy.

Descending into chaos and division, members of the Republic Senate have secretly called upon a daring RESISTANCE to find Luke Skywalker and restore the light of hope to the darkening stars.

Arising from its barbaric hidden stronghold, the IMPERIAL FIRST ORDER hastens toward a village on Jakku, sanctuary of Luke’s faithful disciples who hold the key to the Jedi’s return…

This attempts to split the difference between Restructured and Starlight V1. Now the Republic is thrown into chaos by Luke’s disappearance and the Imperial threat, with only members calling for the Resistance instead of the body at large. The talk of chaos also links into Hux’s speech about the disorder of the Republic.

I have abandoned the attempt of establishing the extant threat of a weapon in the crawl since it only diverts attention from the quest for Luke. However, I feel like the weapon is important enough to hint at, thus the talk of the barbaric hidden stronghold. The crawl now also follows the pattern of A-B-A in its paragraphs, where the original TFA crawl was A-B-B in its continued talk of the Resistance through the last two paragraphs. This return to the First Order perspective preserves the continuity of the pan-down and emergence of the destroyer.

All PM’s (hopefully) sent!

Several people have asked specifically for the high bitrate version, however, and while I still have the small one, I no longer have the ability to host the large file. Since the only other option right now is the 'spleen (which many people can’t access), perhaps someone who already has the full file may find a way to make it available.

Anyway, thank you all for the kind words and reviews! I’m actually trying to take a hiatus from the site right now for my mental well-being, just popped back in to see Ascendant off and tend to the links. I’m planning on being away for a while more, so if anyone wishes to get this project I hope that they may find assistance from the good people here.

Happy Life Day and may the Force be with you!

It’s such a weird idea that the actor they chose as the face of Anakin Skywalker is ‘wrong’ because of movies made afterwards. Sebastian Shaw works for the Anakin Skywalker of the OT where he was a contemporary of Obi-wan, a relic of a bygone age.

The right question here is whether or not the prequels are wrong, since their continuity is contingent on the OT, and in this case it’s pretty clear that they contradict the established canon of the OT.

I’m speaking of the Clone Wars TV show, where Anakin is by this point orphaned and the trained warriors are the clones.

Darth Malgus said:

So…

1. Dave Filoni is overrated. I enjoy what he’s done, but he takes forever to develop his characters, plot, and to tell an actual story; I think Bad Batch was the worst about this. He also relies on the exact same premise for all of his shows: “A group of mercenaries doing mercenary things adopt a young mysterious orphan and form a family”. Rebels, The Mandalorian and The Bad Batch are just reskins of the same exact show; even TCW could be argued to fall into this trope.

“A group of trained warriors decide to protect the life of a genetically important orphan with unusual mental powers while fighting in a conflict created by Sheev Palpatine, and through this they form an unconventional family.”

BedeHistory731 said:

That’s why there should’ve been more thought towards chronological viewing in the prequels, namely to preserve spoilers from the OT. I know that’s an unpopular opinion for some, but I’d prefer watching I, II, and III where:

• we have no idea what Yoda looks like, but we know his name as an exile of the Jedi Order
• Obi-Wan had two apprentices, either one likely to be Vader (but we know it’s Anakin - situational irony)
• we don’t know that Padme gave birth to twins

Unpopular, but I appreciate prequel rewrites that keep this stuff in mind.

I’m with you too.

And for arguing that the prequels were made to enhance the OT, that ignores how Luke’s primary motivation for becoming a Jedi and redeeming his father was the belief that his father was ultimately a good person and not a genocidal child-murderer. If Obi-wan had shown Luke the prequels in his hut Luke would absolutely have vowed eternal vengeance against that monster.

Indeed.

https://imgur.com/gallery/tcGash8