Patali

G&G-Fan said:

Patali said:

For me, this is something I am not a fan of and I think the show honestly handled better than the EU. The idea that Vader is a known public entity, honestly I found stupid. Vader should only be known to the top brass and generals on either side. I saw some comic where the Empire was literally putting him as a public propaganda face in holograms and such. I just don’t think it makes sense. He’s a hand of the Emperor who handles special assignments. Not just an Imperial. I think at the very most, he’d be in whispers of fearful soldiers who might have heard horror stories of a black armored, red lightsaber wielding wizard. To me that is more powerful than the Empire parading him around.

But, I know a lot of EU fans prefer that depiction, so hey, more power to them

Why is it stupid for Vader to be well-known? Scaring people into submission has always been the Empire’s tactic

I think the idea of Force users being front and center in any capacity during the reign of the Empire doesn’t make sense. Han Solo didn’t even believe in the force during “Star Wars”. There were many more Jedi than Sith, and even they were scrubbed so badly the universe has forgotten about them. Someone like Vader wouldn’t be in the public sphere. He’s a Jedi hunter and right hand to the Emperor, an enforcer for special tasks. Like I said, the idea that he would be a frightening rumor is much more powerful.

Seeing him in public holograms and propaganda? It’s outright cheesy. An obvious expanded universe concept, like Palpatine making a bunch of clones of himself.

The EU has its strengths, and it has its clear weaknesses.

Jedi122 said:

Jar Jar Bricks said:

But from what I can tell Obi-Wan learns Vader still lives in the cantina instead of Reva telling him.

That comes from the epilogue to Dark Lord: The Rise of Darth Vader. It’s one change I don’t mind, actually.

For me, this is something I am not a fan of and I think the show honestly handled better than the EU. The idea that Vader is a known public entity, honestly I found stupid. Vader should only be known to the top brass and generals on either side. I saw some comic where the Empire was literally putting him as a public propaganda face in holograms and such. I just don’t think it makes sense. He’s a hand of the Emperor who handles special assignments. Not just an Imperial. I think at the very most, he’d be in whispers of fearful soldiers who might have heard horror stories of a black armored, red lightsaber wielding wizard. To me that is more powerful than the Empire parading him around.

But, I know a lot of EU fans prefer that depiction, so hey, more power to them

I would also appreciate a link!

So, I’ve begun by cutting something close to the ending I want. I may end up including more in this than I have, but here is roughly the ending 5 minutes of my edit that I’ll be building to through the rest of the edit.

This is my very first fan edit, and even then I am NOT an experienced video editor, so editing sound is not something I know and will need to learn as I go. The sound transitions right now ARE rough, but that is something I will hopefully nail by the time I finalize the edit. But, the idea for the ending is here:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1E7Xkh50gROsrbhCabZwUw0pA7VA1uv6W/view?usp=sharing

I agree that making one film of better quality is much preferred over doing two films of stretched content.

I wil say, 3 hours sounds like a bit much for a Star Wars film. I’d say 2:30 - 2:45 should be the absolute MAX. Revenge of the Sith fully extended is only 2:30 and thats probably the most content packed film in the franchise.

Edit: Double

Hey Eddie, I have a question about your process. I know you said when you’re planning and organizing an edit, you figure out the ending you want first and then work backwards from there. Is that how you actually edit once you get started, or do you start cutting from the beginning like normal?

EddieDean said:

This is really interesting!

Thank you Eddie! Yeah, I think I’ve even seen some others talk about the only way to cut it down to a single movie would be to remove the prison sequence. And I think if you want to mostly retain the show’s structure as is, that would be correct.

But I really loved the prison arc. And I found an editor on reddit who said he made a 75 minute cut of just that arc, starting with Cassian being arrested and ending with the escape. In his cut, he is literally presenting it as Cassian being a civilian in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Which, I did find that compelling. Because I think that story, and that opening 10 minutes of him on Niamos is a great way to draw the audience in. Anyone can relate to it and what happens to him. He’s literally done nothing wrong.

However the two issues I had was, the prison sequence is only 70 minutes, not a full movie like I would want. And the show and character are “Andor” not “Keef Girgo A Star Wars Story”. But thats when it struck me, what if I go with that idea. Our protagonist is just a guy who got unlucky… until an hour into the movie it is revealed that he is really much more. Playing around with Cassian’s alter ego, but making it where he’s fooling the audience as well. And of course doing it this way, I get to actually tell the story the show itself told, albeit in a highly altered form.

But I appreciate you posting your ideas of how you would handle it. It gives me something to contrast with. I find it interesting the different things from me that you would drop.

So, I’ve started by just cutting down to that A plot. Starting with Cassian on Niamos (beach planet) as Keef, and then everything involving his arrest, imprisonment and escape, and then those final escape scenes ending with Cassian learning about his mother’s death.

I gave that a watch, and it ended up at right about 70 minutes. I still really enjoyed all of those scenes (except will likely cut that post prison scene of them getting captured in the net by the weird aliens). I can see now that the three acts of the prison arc are clearly defined by the three episodes that contain it, which makes sense and makes things easy for me.

It is going to be a challenge figuring out how to implement everything I wanted above. I think it would feel the most correct to start with an extremely cut version of the Aldhani heist, quick cuts, snippets etc as I outline above. The inciting incident.

However, I want to include the scenes of Mon Mothma and Luthen at the antique dealer. The only issue I am imagining right now is, I want to include their first meeting and the one immediately following the heist… but if I have the heist at the beginning, it doesn’t leave a lot of room to do that first meeting. It’s like Mon would be flying right back to see him with barely any time at all in between. So I would need to pad that out somehow without making it unrealistic.

My thought is, to immediately go from the first scene with the shortened heist, and jump to Mon Mothma at the senate fighting against Imperial overreach, as if word has not gone around yet about the heist, like it is happening simultaneously or very close at least. Then go to Mon’s first meeting with Luthen at the antique dealer. Then I’ll see what else I can pad it out with, before eventually going to the scene with the ISB discussing their response to Aldhani and how they’re increasing punishment for anti Imperial crimes. THEN after that, have Mon go to see Luthen again to confront him about being involved with Aldhani. But idk, still gotta figure it out.

After this intro sequence, we’ll go to Cassian on Niamos and begin the story proper.

Before I started I was having hopes of having fun introducing Luthen as the eccentric high brow antique dealer, before revealing his deep rebel connections. However I don’t think there is enough content to make it flow naturally. At most it would be a surprise for a few small minutes before Luthen and Mon’s discussions reveal his true nature. But similar to the bigger surprise I am creating of Keef’s true identity as Cassian, I want to have as many surprises like that sprinkled in. The Luthen one feels like a natural setup so if I can find a way to work that in as a little surprise for the audience, I want to do so. Even if it’s just for one scene.

As for the ending, I still want to do the intercut sequence for Act 3 as described. The beginning of the prison riot intercut with Luthen and Saw talking about having Kreegyr and his forces take the fall, and cutting to shots of the Ferrix battle implying that is Kreegyr and his forces.

I initially wanted to include Mon in this sequence, some of those final shots when she has to give up her daughter. But, I don’t feel the energy fits. Instead, I have wanted to end the movie on the scene of Cassian finding out his mother died. That sad music that leads out of that scene into the credits I think would be really great for a montage where we can include some of Luthen and THERE is where we put those final shots of Mon and her daughter set to that music.

After that, I would just some kind of transitioning dialogue. Maybe flashing back to when Luthen recruits Cassian, and including some dialogue from Luthen about the Empire, how bad it is or how relentless they are etc… and use that to transition to the final shots of the Death Star ending the movie.

But we’ll see. I am aiming to not exceed one hour of content Outside of the A plot in prison. So hopefully the final run time will land between 2:10 and 2:20, which to me is the perfect length for a Star Wars film.

So, I have just finished Andor for the first time. However, I started it last year, having watched the first six episodes. I thought it was good, however the pacing of that first half did not leave me excited to continue on the show. I did not have an attachment to any of the characters aside from Cassian, and Syril in the first three episodes.

I meant to keep watching but I didn’t end up coming back to it until a few nights ago this year. Woah, it sure does pick up.

I enjoy movie cuts, especially for Star Wars tv. I like tightly paced, packed stories. While I did find Andor to be a high quality TV show, I couldn’t help but imagine it at the standard of a film. Reviewing the content, I felt there was slightly too much for one movie (under 2.5 hours), but in my opinion not enough for two movies, without the pacing suffering. I know that might sound crazy to people who really loved the show, but that’s just my opinion. I have begun VERY basic work on an Andor Season 1 edit.

Goal: Cut Andor Season 1 into a single movie that does not exceed 2.5 hours.

So therefore, if I want to turn it into one movie, under 2.5 hours, it will require some radical cuts and restructuring. However, I believe it is possible. I have never done a fan edit before, but I very much desire to see this. I wanted to do a similar project with TCW, but I find Andor S1 and its length much more approachable.

For me, the strongest arc of the series was easily the Prison-Arc. Every scene in the prison had me completely engaged. I plan on using this as my primary “A plot” which the cut will be structured around.

So the content I would like to include and focus on is:

• Prison Arc as the main A plot and throughline of the film, intercut with:
• Luthen’s various machinations.
• The Imperial investigation into Aldhani.
• The very basics of Mon Mothma’s plot in the later series (Mon Mothma is the tie-in to the greater SW series)
• Flashbacks throughout of scenes with Andor and his adoptive mother.
• Flashbacks to the Aldhani heist.

It will be a lot but if it can be pulled off and trimmed to ABSOLUTE essentials, I think it would make a great 2.5 hour film. Essentially, I will have /very little/ of the first half of the series in the edit at all. Much of what I plan on cutting would include:

• Almost all of Ferrix and its characters, Bix, Cassian’s friends etc. As stated, I will be using scenes of Cassian and Maarva throughout to show their relationship. And at some point I will likely include Cassian being recruited by Luthen in an extremely cut form. But otherwise, Ferrix and its characters will likely be almost entirely cut, including its use in the finishing episodes.
• Most of the Aldhani plot. I will start with snippets of the heist as an inciting act to the story, along with the Imperial response afterwards. As the story progresses, I will use flashbacks to the heist to assist the plot. But in all, it will probably be cut to only a few minutes.
• The Syril plotline. I feel the show only gets stronger as it goes on. The first arc I felt was its weakest. However, Syril was a saving grace to me in those first episodes. His no-nonsense attitude had me and my friend practically cheering for him even though he was going after Cassian who we also liked. However… I do not feel the series progressed his plot in a satisfactory manner. And seeing as his plot is already so tied in to Ferrix in the first place, I really do not see a place for him in this edit.
• The sister plot and any references.
• Likely many other things that I can’t remember right now.

My thinking as far as structure is this:

• Possibly start with snippets of Andor’s past, some of the flashbacks we see (maybe the Clem flashbacks), just enough to show his problems with the empire. Do not include any mentions of his name.
• Begin the plot proper with a short scene/snippets from the Aldhani heist, as the inciting incident of the story. But do NOT show Cassian in the heist, cut around him.
• Introduce Cassian as Keef Girgo, a seemingly regular citizen on the beach planet (if we saw some of the Clem flashbacks, we’ll know he doesn’t like the empire but he will otherwise seem a normal citizen now). Go through the sequence of him being arrested.
• Put emphasis on all the times throughout that sequence and in prison that he is referred to as “Keef”.
• During the Imperial response and investigation, if Andor is mentioned, we will not show any visuals/holograms that actually show him. Keep it vague as to who Andor is.
• In sequences where it feels natural, like when Cassian goes to bed, we can cut in some of the mother scenes from the early part of the series as flashbacks (akin to Jyn’s flashbacks with her father in R1). During the early parts of his story, we will not include her referring to him by name.
• As the A plot in prison progresses, intercut with the flashbacks, eventually, either at the end of Act 1 or 2, it will be surprise-revealed that Keef Girgo is actually the Cassian Andor that everyone is looking for, and we will then show more in depth scenes of the Aldhani heist and how heavily involved he was. Any mother flashbacks from this point forward can include her saying his name. Same with the Imperial Investigations now being able to show his hologram to the audience. In fact it may be one of those things that IS the reveal.

As for B plots, and how the A plot progresses into the third act, I want to include as much as I can of Luthen and Mon Mothma, but to have it make sense in the context of the very limited version of the story we’re telling:

• Will have to include the scenes of Mon Mothma and Luthen meeting, otherwise she has no tie-in to the plot.
• The third act will culminate in the prison break, intecut with Luthen allowing Kreegyr to fall into the Imperial trap, and Mon Mothma giving her daughter up for the cause.
• I want to, via clever and liberal editing, to cut the final episode’s battle/riot on Ferrix, to imply THAT is Kreegyr’s forces falling into the Imperial trap. So as Saw is confronting Luthen about letting it happen (“You’d let 30 men die?”) we will be cutting to snippets of the Ferrix battle as if THOSE are the 30 men. If possible, I will include the Imperial side about the funeral and somehow try to meld those two events even further to make them seem as one thing. But overall it may result in including only a /little/ bit of the battle to sell the illusion that it is Kreegyr’s forces, who, as far as I remember we never even see.
• It will be made clear that Kreegyr and his men died, but we will include shots to show that they put up a fight, making it a bittersweet and hopeful thing, despite how Luthen used and discarded them. I will use the shots of Meero being knocked down to imply that she gets killed during the battle.

So that is essentially it. The third act will culminate with an intercut sequence of:

• Cassian’s Prison Break
• Luthen and Saw discussing sacrificing Kreegyr; Luthen compromising himself even further.
• Kreegyr’s forces being killed by the ISB (Ferrix battle in disguise)
• Mon Mothma giving up her daughter, compromising herself.

After that, I don’t have the exact ending nailed down but I know I want to include Cassian’s call where he finds out his mother is dead after everything he’s been through. We will have not seen this so it will be a surprise gut-punch to the audience. And then I would like to include the Death Star as the true final shot.

So that’s it! I think it is an ambitious idea but if pulled off, would truly be an AMAZING, tightly paced, packed film full of twists and turns for the audience. I would appreciate any suggestions, further ideas, critiques/problems (I know there will be a LOT of problems to solve with this restructure). etc.

And just any general advice for a new fan editor going into a project like this would also be appreciated. Thanks everyone

Please send me updated links!

Thank you for fixing Bobsuns RotS audio! I really like his edit, but had to stop halfway through and switch to yours due to the audio issues. But also… am I crazy or is there a difference in the way the video is displayed on his, its not exactly the same as yours?? All I know is, when I played the video file through the VLC app on my TV, the visual quality of yours seemed way higher than his. Like, there seemed to be some kind of stretching and image being cut off on his, whereas yours had the proper aspect ratio. As well, on yours the image just seemed sharper/clearer and the colors punchier.

I really enjoyed watching his in a chronological watchthrough with TCW (EddieDeans TCWR), because the episode before RotS ends with mentioning Palpatine AND Shaakti going missing, so him including Shaaktis death at the start of the film right there just worked really well.
(Your edit was great also btw, my wife and I really enjoyed it, was her first time seeing RotS)

If you can send me a link to your new Bobsun RotS edit I would greatly appreciate it!
And the Adywan 1080p upscale, if you dont mind. Thank you!

I have not watched most of your edits yet, my wife and were doing a chronological series watch through. We only just finished (well like a month ago) Eddie’s TCW:R and are now looking for movie edits for things like Rebels, Bad Batch and Andor. So it might be a minute. But, can I get up to date links to your latest versions?

As for what excites me about your edits… the thing I desired most out of the series was a LOOOONGG time away from Grogu. When Luke took Grogu in the S2 finale… the greatest moment Disney has had with the franchise… I was very excited at the prospect that we would probably not seee Grogu again until maybe the VERY finale of the series or later even, 2 to 4 seasons of content at the very least. I wanted them apart for years. You can imagine how dissapointed I was when only 2 more Din episodes later (his boba episodes), they’re already back together. That is why I haven’t even given Season 3 a chance, I havent even watched it.

(And of course like a mentioned before, how Boba was shafted in his content, I feel the way you’re pacing his content throughout Mandalorian is the best way to salvage his content, thank you for that)

So with that in mind, my biggest request for you going into these later edits, 6, 7, 8 etc, is, please do your best to keep them apart for as long as you can possibly get away with. I think the longer you hold it off, the more powerful it will be.

Really glad you fixed the abrupt cut of the blue guy getting frozen. I’ve only watched your Book 1 and that was really one of my only notes. It felt jarring especially so early on into your movie.

First of, I love the concept and some of the examples you’ve provided so far. I also like that you’re using the upscaled Adywan’s, as like you said to another commenter, there are scenes in Adywans old version that he will not be replicating in his new version. I very much desire a CGI’d version of ANH to fit in with the Prequels, using things like Adywan, SC38, and good CGI from the Special editions.

However, one big thing I am noticing in your clips that I do not agree with, is the (imo) overuse of new music, like the clip you posted of Luke finding Owen and Beru where it uses RotS music. To me, that sounded over the top and too forceful. The original music was classic and worked great, it hit the emotional level just right, it simply doesnt need to change. Now if there are higher quality versions of the original soundtrack, or a project where someone has cleaned up the audio or something like that, I think that would work better for this project. But using music from other films, I dont agree with. If theres one thing that doesnt need updating, its John Williams amazing music. After all, all these movies are in the same franchise, getting a variety of Williams music is good.

Other than that, I think this looks like a wonderful project and I hope you see it through. Will definitely watch with my kids someday.

Acbagel said:

Book 3: The Tribes update is released, and the film is now available for viewing. Post here or DM for the link!

Patali said:

I have a question about your book 3. I have never watched Mando Season 3, I dont intend to, I’m going to watch your cuts for the rest of the series. You put Grogu’s rescue by Luke in book 4, right? Watching that trailer, and maybe I’m wrong you can tell me, If I am looking correctly, do you move some of the Mando Season 3 Grogu content to /before/ he is captured by Gideon/rescued by Luke? Or maybe I am just confused. But if you did and it works, that would actually be a great way to salvage some of that S3 Grogu content.

Well thanks, I’m glad you enjoy my edits enough to do that! Yes, Grogu is rescued by Luke at the end of Book 4. I’ve got clips from Book of Boba interspersed throughout my saga, so if you’ve not seen that show perhaps those are the clips you are unfamiliar with? There are a few complications with using Season 3 footage early on, mostly to do with costumes/armor as it is acquired at certain points in the story. But I have just a couple of Season 3 shots in the early films, I don’t think any of it is Grogu though. If there’s a specific scene you have in mind I’ll be happy to tell you where it’s from though, I know this footage inside and out by now

I have watched Boba Fett, there was just stuff I didnt recognize in your Book 3 trailer that I assumed was Season 3. It’s been some time since I watched Season 2, I only watched it once since it released, maybe I’m just not remembering it (for example I didnt recognize that shot of the structure on the ocean blowing up)

Sounds great though. Will the links I received for the old versions be updated or do I need to get new ones?

As far as going all in on your edits, I just feel your approach with Boba, integrating his content entirely into Mandalorian and truly making them one show, is the best way to salvage that content. I wanted a full Boba show, I love that character. I actually enjoyed his 5 episodes mroe than the Mandalorian… but… It’s not happening. We got what we got. I feel your approach is the best way to save that content.

I have a question about your book 3. I have never watched Mando Season 3, I dont intend to, I’m going to watch your cuts for the rest of the series. You put Grogu’s rescue by Luke in book 4, right? Watching that trailer, and maybe I’m wrong you can tell me, If I am looking correctly, do you move some of the Mando Season 3 Grogu content to /before/ he is captured by Gideon/rescued by Luke? Or maybe I am just confused. But if you did and it works, that would actually be a great way to salvage some of that S3 Grogu content.

I know this isn’t an idea you’ll be able to implement immediately since you just did a release, but I was watching For A Few Dollars More, and it had this great opening text
“Where life had no value, death, sometimes, had its price.
That is why the bounty killers appeared.”

I feel like something like this, in the star wars blue text, would be awesome at the start of your first movie.

This isn’t here or there, but I did think that scene when Obi and Leia are on the desertish planet, and he has the vision of RotS Anakin in his hood from far away… that was really an artful shot and scene idea that I wouldn’t have expected out of Disney. Hope that remains in any decent cut

Was the AI those first lines “need to do some maintenance” ?

Because if so, that sounds GOOD. I was critical of the example you were testing for the first movie (in the Werner Herzog scene), but this one really works. The fact that I was questioning it at all, you got me.

I truly feel the plot you’re salvaging here (Rey is a Solo/Ben’s sister–Snoke is Plaguies) is absolutely 150% the original plot that Force Awakens was setting up, before they changed it for the next movie.

We messaged about this a few weeks ago. I don’t watch the Sequels, to the point of Im not even interested in fan edits… but this one I am willing to give a try. Can I get a link?

koboldthinktank said:

The only episode that felt like it was cut back a little too much was The Living Force, the condensed version of the Mortis arc. The dialogue and story were fine, but the dream-like vibe and expansive setting felt like they should have breathed a little more - I wish there were more clips of the setting itself, not necessarily more dialogue or story.

Like I said, I haven’t actually seen the original, so I don’t know whether clips like that actually exist in that arc, but I think that’s a rare case where slowing down the pacing would actually help tell the story better (or at least help us feel its impact).

You know whats crazy is, that was one of the episodes my wife and I really didnt care for almost at all. It felt like it was explaining a little too much about the force, and adding lore that the force doesn’t need, and imo didnt feel integral to the characters plots. There was three things I liked from the episode:
-The quigon-anakin vision
-Shmi-anakin
-Dark Ahsoka

IMO, I would like to find a place to insert those quigon and shmi sequences elsewhere in the series as dreams for Anakin, maybe in another arc somewhere where Anakin is sleeping, entirely removed from this arc. I’d like to do the same with the dark ahsoka stuff but it seems too tied into this whole arc to be removed at all, but I feel like trhe shmi and quigon visions could really slot in somewhere else nicely.

Same with the yodas mystical quest episodes. Had some cool scenes but we werent fans.

Acbagel said:
Yes, I agree on that. Tough to replicate gruffness in an AI voice model… I’m trying out some different effects to see if I can make it work. Din actually loses a lot of the gruff sound in his tone as the seasons go on, but early on it’s definitely present.

So, I’ve been watching your first movie and I’ll post notes later (been sick this weekend so I couldnt do it in one sitting, Im gonna start it over and watch in one sitting later this week).

But I will say, for this particular scene, it’s a cool experiment that I think could be useful elsewhere, but for this scene it’s totally unnecessary. How in your current version Din just says nothing… It’s fine. There’s nothing to fix so I think it would only be detrimental in this particular case.

EddieDean said:

Heck yeah! Bagel’s back, baby! Love those final tweaks to movie 1. Lock 'em in! As someone commented on your AI voice line, I agree that it could be a touch rougher, but it does work.

I left the comment on the yotube channel, and yeah that is the only thing I feel is lacking is the gruffness, and it just moves a little fast. The first line sounds good but the second line when he is getting up, something about the line and its diction, combined with that shot of him getting up, just isnt working for me. But still I like the idea of incorporating AI for Din, since him wearing the helmet makes it such a ripe opportunity.

bagel, can I get links to your mando movies? I am interested in checking them out