NeverarGreat

My feelings on the project are complicated.

On the one hand, it is clear that he has spent a vast amount of time and money to bring together a large collection of sources for a restoration, and he clearly believes that the results have been worth it. I appreciate and applaud the enthusiasm.

On the other hand, the results he touts in his videos of doubling the detail in the final result simply aren’t apparent to me. The resultant image has less grain, but the way he has described his detail recruitment algorithm makes it clear that there’s not much benefit in stacking sources and the majority of the detail may be coming from temporal super resolution instead. The issue is that he describes his algorithm as using a weighted average in determining a pixel’s value across multiple stacked prints. However, if an image is blurry and low-detail from several generations of printing, it will be blurry in the average of these values as well. Worse, if you have a single high quality print stacked with several lower-quality prints, a weighted value would result in the lower-quality image. The only appreciable gain would be in removing the grain, which is what we see from his process.

I made a comment to this effect and even started an entire thread discussing a potential solution:

https://originaltrilogy.com/topic/Info-The-Ultimate-Super-Resolution-Technique/id/52162

I would really like to do a test to see if this would actually work.

Yes, my understanding of the separation master is that the cyan version was mis-aligned, something that could be corrected digitally with ease today.

As for the Kodak negative, I haven’t ever heard of a way to stop the fading of a print entirely. At some point those Kodak prints will completely fade to red no matter how well they are stored.

StarkillerAG said:

But the whole Chosen One thingy is about him destroying the Sith and bringing balance to the force. If he didn’t actually kill the last Sith, that makes the whole thing seem really stupid. I know some people didn’t like the prophecy, but that doesn’t mean you can just ignore it and pretend it never happened.

Tell that to the guy who brought him back.

At least with him being a clone, you can justify that he technically died, but just came back a shell of his former self. Palpatine surviving Anakin’s sacrifice pretty much renders the entire George Lucas saga pointless.

A prophecy that may have been fulfilled at the end of ROTS with an equal amount of Jedi and Sith.

A prophecy that Anakin spends not a single line of dialogue in the films acknowledging exists.

A prophecy that could just as well have referred to Anakin’s inner struggle.

A prophecy that misread, may have been.

thebluefrog said:

NeverarGreat said:

One explanation is that ol’ Palps levitated himself onto a walkway down the elevator shaft after shooting blue ribbons out of his hands and then hopped onto a shuttle.

Another possibility is that his body landed on a catwalk and a Praetorian guard found it and got it out on a shuttle for future reanimation.

Or if you wanted to get really crazy and use clones, the Palpatine on DS2 could have been the clone, explaining his clear insanity.

The absolute worst way to go would have the original body die and bring him back as a clone.

The problem with the “he just landed” answer is basically…it’s mundane. The climax of the the entire trilogy is negated by him escaping like Grevious “time to abandon ship hee hee hee.”

Three words: Ming always escapes.

It also, from a narrative sense, ruin Luke’s confrontation since Palp was never in danger since he can just walk away even from falling 1000000 feet.

On the contrary, it clarifies that Luke’s only intention was to save his father. He believed that if he were taken to the Emperor they would all die in the Alliance attack. Palpatine dying from either his hand or his fathers was never stated by Luke as his goal.

Thematically, it ruins the whole trilogy, since Anakin’s sacrifice is instantly negated. Sort of like how JJ kept undoing Chewie and 3po and Ben Solo’s deaths 30 seconds later. At least with a clone, it thematically fits in the sense of “he came back…but wrong, undoing death has consequences.”

Anakin’s sacrifice is also clarified - His intention becomes unequivocally one of saving his son rather than doing another murder.

One explanation is that ol’ Palps levitated himself onto a walkway down the elevator shaft after shooting blue ribbons out of his hands and then hopped onto a shuttle.

Another possibility is that his body landed on a catwalk and a Praetorian guard found it and got it out on a shuttle for future reanimation.

Or if you wanted to get really crazy and use clones, the Palpatine on DS2 could have been the clone, explaining his clear insanity.

The absolute worst way to go would have the original body die and bring him back as a clone.

CourtlyHades296 said:

Here’s my 25 favorite films

14. Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (1989)

Huzzah! A man of quality!

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I think people take issue not with the ability of droids to feel pain so much as the cartoonish manner in which that is expressed.

CatBus said:

Lots of classic films (My Fair Lady, Lawrence of Arabia, for example), have had partially or completely destroyed negatives and managed to go on to have extraordinary restorations, using IP’s, private collector prints, and so on. That said, the film stock quality for those films was much better than the film stock used for Star Wars and Empire. It’s a matter of will, and that’s the main thing missing at Lucasfilm.

Exactly. It should be possible to use at least 2/3rds of the separation masters and IP’s/Technicolor prints and wind up with a brilliant restoration without even using the original negative. The reasons for not doing it have nothing to do with Lucasfilm’s technical ability.

Star Wars is notable for how poorly the original elements of the film have fared. For one, the film negative had severe problems with fading which made it difficult to restore even in 1997, and it has only faded more since then. There is also the fragility of the negative - certain parts were lost when subjected to the cleaning process.

Most restorations, when faced with these difficulties, would turn to an interpositive print or (ideally) the color separation masters, but in the case of Star Wars the separation masters were botched in production or storage and the interpositives were badly degraded due to the many print runs struck from them.

Most old black and white or Technicolor films don’t have the problems of Star Wars due to being very dye stable over time, and after Star Wars Kodak fixed their dye stability issues. So Star Wars suffers from a number of issues and extenuating circumstances which are fairly unique to this film.

skenera said:

NeverarGreat said:

For the de-blue’d Luke, I’m a bit worried that when a final grade is applied Luke will look too washed out. Maybe it would be worthwhile to do the blue reduction on top of whatever final grade you settle on so that the look can be precisely adjusted.

The amount of blue can easily be tweaked by increasing or decreasing the opacity of the de-blued clips before applying the LUT.
Comparison: http://www.framecompare.com/image-compare/screenshotcomparison/7KZYLNNX

That comparison is showing the issue I feared - overlaying the de-blued Luke is bringing those unwanted green/blue tones back into the rest of the frame.

(Although, I really like the de-blue + LUT)

For the de-blue’d Luke, I’m a bit worried that when a final grade is applied Luke will look too washed out. Maybe it would be worthwhile to do the blue reduction on top of whatever final grade you settle on so that the look can be precisely adjusted.

Hal 9000 said:

The voices of the Jedi that guide Rey during the climax of TROS are replaced by a pointed monologue from Yarael Poof.

I thought you said that would be bad.

Fryin High

JadedSkywalker said:

Did they force heal Luke’s X-wing?
I just had to suspend disbelief and not think about stuff like the ship being under water for 30 years. Or his door being made out of parts of the X-wing. The door Chewie tears off its hinges.

Huh. I had to go back and check, but it definitely has markings on it which match the back of the wing, and when it hits the wall of the hut a panel pops out.

The only way I would believe that ship would fly again is if Poe got his hands on it.

He can fly anything.

thebluefrog said:

Burbin said:

• The Holdo maneuver is a one in a million,

This is something that needs to be retconned out as well…after the pretty visual effect wore off, everyone immediately asked “well why don’t they just ram everything if a smaller ship can take out an entire fleet in one shot.”

The “one in a million” excuse doesn’t work since they can just launch every ship over and over and over until it works. If you only need one sniper to take out an ENTIRE evil government, why waste time with waging war, just keep sending snipers.

I’d say it doesn’t work because a one in a million shot would be met with a shrug from the villains, like Tarkin on the Death Star. Hux and company clearly act like it’s an existential threat once they realize what she’s doing.

Best to cut the line in TROS, since it only draws attention to the problem without fixing it.

Anakin Starkiller said:

Episode 5 shows the moment when Anakin realizes that Skywalker is his son, and the film documents his quest to capture him. He is plagued by visions where Luke rejects his offer and throws himself into the bottomless pit, and knows that the future is always in motion. When the pivotal moment is reached, Luke accepts Anakin’s offer and goes with him to the Emperor, and there the Emperor is defeated. However, at that moment Luke turns on Anakin and tries to destroy him. The attempt fails but Luke escapes back to the Rebellion and the Empire devolves into chaos and infighting.

Isn’t that basically TLJ?

So you noticed 😉

The Prequel Trilogy would be an easy remake.

Age up Anakin in TPM, give the movie some attitude with his hot rod racing and contrast this against the doctrinal Jedi Order. Cut Qui-gon and give Obi-wan the agency to take him under his wing and train him.

For AOTC, make Anakin more sympathetic with an express goal of freeing his mother and the rest of the slaves in the galaxy, which gives him justification for wanting more power for the galactic government to fight injustice.

ROTS stays with Anakin as he more gradually loses his humanity to wounds suffered as he fights battles to ostensibly bring the lawless planets of the Outer Rim under Republic security, but he gets word that his mother has died before he reaches Tatooine. The Jedi oppose him in believing that he has gone too far, and Anakin genuinely believes that Obi-wan and the Jedi would let the galaxy burn to uphold the status quo.

The Original Trilogy should not be remade. Therefore, the best way to go about that is to make an alternate Episode 4 and 5 which could exist alongside the originals instead of supplanting them, with the end of Episode 5 beginning a new branch of continuity which will overwrite the Sequels.

The story of Episode 4 would follow Vader as he searches for the Rebels in protecting the Empire he helped create. We see him maskless several times, a figure who has sacrificed everything to safeguard the galaxy from injustice. He recognizes that the Empire does evil, but he always has a justification ready at hand. After the destruction of Alderaan he has a crisis of faith in his Empire. He contacts the Emperor, who assures him that when he takes command of the station he will punish Tarkin severely for his rash actions. The battle with Obi-wan on the Death Star is presented without cuts, with new lines and slightly enhanced choreography where Obi-wan berates him for the destruction of a peaceful world, but Anakin eschews responsibility and blames Tarkin. In his final battle with Luke, Anakin realizes that the boy could actually destroy the Death Star and so intentionally misses Luke’s X-wing, allowing him to take the fatal shot. After his narrow escape, he believes that the Force left him alive so that he could overthrow the evil Emperor and set the Empire to rights.

Episode 5 shows the moment when Anakin realizes that Skywalker is his son, and the film documents his quest to capture him. He is plagued by visions where Luke rejects his offer and throws himself into the bottomless pit, and knows that the future is always in motion. When the pivotal moment is reached, Luke accepts Anakin’s offer and goes with him to the Emperor, and there the Emperor is defeated. However, at that moment Luke turns on Anakin and tries to destroy him. The attempt fails but Luke escapes back to the Rebellion and the Empire devolves into chaos and infighting.

Episode 6 chronicles Anakin’s attempt to win back his son, a son who views his father as evil incarnate. The Alliance has grown in a year so much that it now rivals the weakened Empire. The film contains the final battle between father and son, one trying to bring order to the galaxy through Imperial rule and the other attempting to revert the galaxy to a state of weakened democracy. Anakin finally convinces Luke that to dissolve the Empire would bring decades of chaos and unrest, so in the final battle Luke kills his father and takes Anakin’s place on the throne, ending the war and reconciling the Empire and Rebel Alliance. In the final scene Luke declares this union to be a theocratic First Order, ruled by an order of Jedi Knights and backed up by the power of the Imperial machine.

Episodes 7-9 detail the ruin of this theocratic republic, which takes the worst aspects of the Republic and the Empire and merges them into one. Ben Skywalker, son of Luke Skywalker, must discover in the netherworld of the Force a way in which to transform the government into something which upholds the original philosophy of the Jedi.

Very nice! Maybe some more rotation of the forward part of the ship and slightly less movement in the aft portion would make it more dynamic.

Hal 9000 said:

I’m ready to be done with all of this. I’m committed to finishing this out, including a Nobody cut, but I’m so ready to let this whole thing be finished.

Indeed.

I heard a theory that Bombadil is the gatekeeper of the story. In traversing the threshold of the Old Forest and passing through the mist of the barrows, the reader enters the dream world of the adventure.

But agreed that this style isn’t for everyone. I have strong feelings for it in part because of its meandering prose - It feels like a world in which to live rather than a story to consume, if that makes sense.

jarbear said:

NeverarGreat said:

jarbear said:

Lol, double the Hondo impossible/lore breaking move.

What would a Hondo maneuver even look like?

Sorry, I meant more like what Dominic’s suggestion of having another “haldo maneuvered” Star Destroyer for the Naboo shot instead of the smoking ship. I wasn’t clear. My bad.

And I was just being difficult 😉

jarbear said:

Lol, double the Hondo impossible/lore breaking move.

What would a Hondo maneuver even look like?