I think an issue with any heavy rearranging is gonna be Kenobi’s costume changes. I feel like trying to change his costumes to match with VFX will be too much trouble than it’s worth.
I really loved the thought process you had with your ROTS edit, so seeing you get back into editing a little bit makes me really happy, even if you just play around with it a little and never release anything official.
Having just caught up with Better Call Saul, I’m really inspired by the vision you have for the series. I’m definitely here for brainstorming (that’s all I feel like I do on this website), but if you ever need help with any rescoring or refoleying, I’d be happy to lend a hand however I can.
I know others don’t agree with this, and that’s totally fine, but Cosmonaut Variety Hour summed up my own feelings about the show rather well!
Sasquatch, thought I’d share some ideas about what you shared.
I think one idea I felt made since was that Palpatine was waiting to reveal himself until after Luke Skywalker, his greatest threat, was dead. I think the way poppa’s edit ends, where Kylo Ren hears a voice saying, “Find me.” at the end of the film helps with that idea some. But there’s never really a line that ever makes that clear, if that was the intention.
At the very least, I could see a brief glimpse of that shot thrown included in a vision in one of the ST films.
This might be a little out there, but for some reason this idea popped into my head. What if destroying the Hosnian system served two purposes? Yes, it was to paralyze the Republic, but what if it also served as huge sacrifice to resurrect Palpatine from the dead?
I could picture a new sequence in TFA, where we use that shot of the Hosnian destruction can be seen from the sky, but we see it above a few different planets. Coruscant, Naboo, etc. Finally, we cut to Exegol. We see the Hosnian cataclysm through the opening at the top of the Sith temple. We see hooded figures chanting. We hear cries of a billion voices echo through the Force. Then we see a figure rise from the black liquid (the shot could be color corrected to better match Exegol). A line could be potentially added of one of the cultists saying something to clarify that a sacrifice or ritual is being performed, without revealing who we are seeing. Maybe we could even have a close up of Snoke to imply he is there to witness it. Anyway, you would have to do it in a way that wouldn’t disrupt the flow of the film, and didn’t feel too disconnected. So maybe Snoke being there could help it feel connected to the rest of the film more.
I do like the idea that maybe Palpatine’s spirit could have potentially been pulling strings, but wasn’t physically resurrected until the Sequel Trilogy. Regardless, the “I trained Snoke” line could help imply that Snoke was serving Palpatine, and maybe he trained Snoke either as a disembodied spirit, or even before Vader killed him.
One idea I’ve had for a long time is to have Kylo’s first TROS scene be him touching Vader’s mask and seeing a vision that leads him to the Wayfinder. Perhaps in this vision, Kylo could get a glimpse of Snoke on Mustafar or Exegol, to help connect him even more with the Sith Eternal.
Vlad, I see your point. I do like Owen’s line, “Jedi are vermin. I kill Vermin on my farm.” Going back, you could easily cut Reva cutting that woman’s hand. Not saying people should do that, there’s just a lot of ways you could trim the scene.
Omni, if you keep Reva as the person who hired the kidnappers, but cut her scenes on Tatooine, then I think a good introduction would be when she speaks to the kidnappers over hologram, like you suggested. We get enough scenes in Episode 2 that establishes the animosity between her and the other Inquisitors, as well as her motivation to find Kenobi.
I think how much Leia stuff to keep from episode 1 is another thing that depends on runtime. Maybe enough to establish her character and how she was kidnapped.
Oh don’t get me wrong, I also feel like just having Obi-Wan walk away is a weird choice that I don’t agree with. Especially when Obi-Wan, earlier in the same episode, said, “It ends today.”
Just to have him walk away again, it basically puts us back at the end of ROTS, except Obi-Wan is less guilty now I guess.
And that alternative isn’t bad, but you still end up with Obi-Wan leaving Vader for dead, and not actually making sure he is dead.
I was curious about Vlad’s interpretation of if Obi-Wan (and by extension Yoda) were wanting or expecting Luke to kill Vader, so I tried to see if I could find Lucas saying anything about it. I did manage to find this quote from Lucas in the Making of Return of the Jedi book.
“The mission isn’t for Luke to go out and kill his father and get rid of him. The issue is, if he confronts his father again, he may, in defending himself, have to kill him, because his father will try to kill him. This is the state of affairs that Yoda should refer to.”
I think that lines up with what Vladius is saying.
I think you could keep the convo with Obi-Wan and Owen without having to keep his interaction with Reva. Did you like that as well? I just felt like it was a little convenient, and they were trying hard to make Reva look bad by cutting the woman’s hand off, but I could see why someone would want to keep all of that stuff as well.
I have been thinking about how you could truncate the plot ever since NFB posted his opening test, and here’s my take on it. If I were to do an edit, I would prefer to keep scenes with the strongest and most interesting character interactions and moments. And I would rather cut or remove stuff that raises questions regarding continuity in relation to the Saga films. My exception to this would be Obi/Leia relationship. Sure, it could bring up questions about how much Leia really knew about Obi-Wan in A New Hope, but I think the strengths of their character interactions in this series outweigh those potential issues, so it is worth keeping.
After a NFB-type opening, you could keep Owen confronting Ben, but cut everything with the Inquisitors and the runaway Jedi on Tatooine. You could keep some of the Leia stuff and her getting kidnapped, or just show Bail calling Ben for his help.
It seems some people suggest cutting episodes 2 and 3, and having her being immediately taken to Fortress Inquisitorius and have them rescue her. Personally, I would rather keep 2 and 3, and completely cut the Fortress Rescue. Because 1) It is too reminiscent to the Death Star rescue, and 2) Some of the stronger Ben and Leia moments are their interactions in 2 and 3. I would like to keep the scene at the end of episode 4, when Leia and Ben hold hands, and move it to when they escape Jabiim in episode 5.
This also gives you a lot of wiggle room with how much you want to keep of both Vader duels. You could keep their first duel, or have Obi just run away and/or get burned, or have him go through the tunnel and escape with Tala and Leia to Jabiim. Kenobi getting burned has no effect on the story beyond him being in a bacta tank very briefly, which could be removed if you didn’t want to keep that. I personally feel like the logic doesn’t work for the set up of their second duel (why couldn’t the Star Destroyer continue to follow the transport?), so imo, that whole duel could be removed without it really changing anything. I think it would be cool to rework that duel into a short nightmare Ben has while he is in the bacta tank, then you wouldn’t have to worry about why Obi-Wan leaves Vader alive, or try and rework the duel where Vader leaves Obi-Wan buried under rubble. A lot of the force stuff in that duel just felt over-the-top to me.
And then you could have Reva “die” on Jabiim and remove all of the stuff with Luke, Owen, Reva etc. in episode 6.
Would it work if the kidnappers weren’t hired by Reva, but once they realize he is a Jedi, they contact the Empire for a reward and then the Inquisitors show up? Reva could still post the planet-wide bounty after they arrive if need be. One benefit to this is that you could make trims throughout so the Empire/Inquisitors never know there is a connection between Obi-Wan and Leia/the Organas, or that Leia is specifically the girl he is traveling with.
Anyway, just food for thought. I feel like this general outline would give someone quite a bit of flexibility.
Holy shit, NFB. I think I felt the same way as you going into the series and had the same response, so as someone who also loves BB/BCS, this is little edit was really cathartic. Honestly if you weren’t personally up to do an edit I’d love to help.
Man, crazy to think how far this project has come. I’m sure there may be additional updates or fixes in the future, but congrats on reaching a “complete” version.
I have a lot of good and bad thoughts on the finale, but I have to say, the darkness of the shots in these episodes were worse than the Long Night episode of Game of Thrones. My dad and I just had to guess what was going on on Tatooine. Maybe it would be better if I watched it on my phone or something, but it ruined any potential emotional moment Reva had. Sounds like it was emotional, at least!
Also, I have to say the shaky cam cinematography of these lightsaber duels is embarrassing. I think it is going to make this show feel dated when looking back it years down the road.
I think the finale did tie up some things in an interesting way, but I feel like Obi-Wan leaving Anakin/Vader alive is a weird decision. Like, years down the road he is going to tell Luke that he HAS to kill Vader, but he couldn’t even do it himself… TWICE… when he easily could’ve finished him off.
It was cool to have Hayden in the suit and Ewan do a scene together. I think Obi-Wan was tearing up, but again, kinda hard to tell with how dark it was. I didn’t like the Force Unleashed level of force powers. I think it would’ve been more clever if they found a way to bridge the combat styles from ROTS and ANH. Maybe Vader would be very intense against Obi in their first duel, like ROTS, but then Obi would be a lot more controlled and thoughtful with his attacks and counters against Vader in their second duel. This would make Vader be more careful when fighting him again in ANH. Not sure if any of that makes sense.
I think it was Ady who mentioned this, but it does seem weird that Reva wants to kill Luke, but we are never told or shown that Reva understands the significance of Luke, and if she does, how she concluded that just based off Bail’s message.
Anyway, I agree with Nev that the highlight for me was the stuff between Obi and Leia, regardless of any potential continuity quibbles. Fun but generally disappointing though.
Maybe the distress signal isn’t a 2,000+ year-old Jedi signal, but maybe the distress signal the matches the ID of Qui-Gon’s old Jedi star fighter. So Obi-Wan wouldn’t receive direct vision from Qui-Gon, but the fact that it is Qui-Gon’s old signal would make it an unexplained mystery linked to Qui-Gon, not necessarily suggesting Qui-Gon is still alive or exists in some other form. Feels very Twin Peaks-esque.
This would allow you to keep some of the dialogue related to them responding to a distress signal. If you had trouble cutting around the diamond, I think it could still work. Maybe this was a mystery Qui-Gon once discovered himself before he took Obi-Wan as an apprentice.
Or, if you wanted to leave Qui-Gon out of it, maybe Yoda just sent them on a “mission”, but knew this location was a conduit of the Force, and wanted them to test them for whatever reason.
John Williams would know exactly how to do it, I just don’t understand why they didn’t have him instead. I guess he was busy or cost too much. I know he’s getting older, so that might be another reason.
John Williams at his prime, maybe, but I think it is time for Williams to retire from Star Wars and let other composers take over. I personally think composers like Michael Giacchino and Gordy Haab, who does the music for Battlefront and Jedi: Fallen Order, can emulate the signature Star Wars music that John Williams created 40 years ago better than John Williams can in the present.
That being said, I do like Ludwig’s score for Mandalorian, which is totally different, but I can’t help but associate the classical score with Star Wars’ space opera roots. And elements of the Mandalorian theme has vibes of the Rocky theme from the 70s, as well as a mythic quality with the traditional instruments. It feels like the Kenobi score is erring on the side of generic science fiction music rather than something fitting for a swashbuckling fantasy.
This is sounding great! I also preferred the idea to make the Mortis stuff more ambiguous and dreamlike. I love that you brought up David Lynch! Lol, why not have fun with this episode? Make it feel like the Black Lodge.
I was actually going to say a similar thing, that cutting stuff and making transitions between places and time a little confusing might be an advantage that adds to the dreamlike nature of the episode.
Cutting scenes with just the Mortis gods and only showing the POVs of only our heroes is a great idea.
I might try to rewatch the episodes and see if I can add ideas to it, but I like everything you have in mind so far!
Tue alternate titles was actually something my friends also brought up when I showed them your edits before TFA released. I think it sticks out to casual fans who may not be into edits in general. Most people might not have this issue, though.
Excited to see what you do with Mortis!
If you were to use the new sparring scene as an intro for Anakin in an AOTC edit, it’d be cool to try and structure his arc so he eventually learns the lesson when facing dooku at the end, then imply he is knighted as a consequence.
If the end duel had Obi-Wan facing dooku alone, getting injured, then have Anakin show up, but let’s dooku go in favour of rescuing Obi-Wan after a successful duel (essentially replacing yoda in that scene) you could establish a sort of ‘lesson learned’. Like he could stop some falling rocks then lose an arm perhaps.
Just an idea anyway - I’m sure one of you will think of a better solution!
I think a point of that scene is that Anakin never took that lesson to heart. Within the context of Kenobi, Vader still sort of makes the same mistake.
And I think it still works within AOTC if he ends the movie failing to learn that lesson, since we see his growth when he doesn’t rush in to face Dooku again at the beginning of ROTS.
Well, the flashback takes place sometime shortly before Episode II, so they could potentially cover a story a year or two before Episode II, where they both look like that and before the war began (I think Outbound Flight would fit in this time period). You couldn’t go too far back though, or Anakin would be need to be younger, which Hayden couldn’t do now. Even though the Clone Wars show covers the time period between Episodes II and III, they could still do a live-action show about some untold adventures during that time. That seems like a no brainer to me. Honestly I expected to see a flashback of one of their adventures during the Clone Wars.
I don’t think there has been any canon story that covers the very early days of the war, when Anakin still had his padawan braid. This had been covered to some extent in the 2D animated Clone Wars micro series, and some of the comics, but they could tell a new story during that time.
Glad you’re getting back into the swing of things, Eddie!
Regarding the Siege of Mandalore stuff, I think it would be best to cut it according to what benefits the pacing of the episodes themselves, and don’t base your decisions on Revenge of the Sith.
I do think the idea of 3 episodes is good, because it gives the audience the flexibility to sandwich ROTS into their viewing if they want, or watch each episode back-to-back since it is divided into three clean acts. I know one of the benefits of Refocused is that the runtime for each episode can be however you want it to be, so I think something even more radical, like one big movie, could be a fun option too. I could picture a movie version that starts with a flashback to Ahsoka leaving the order, show her living her life and how she gets involved with Bo-Katan, the Siege of Mandalore, and then bookend it with the Vader epilogue to mirror the flashback at the beginning.
The thing is, I think most people watching Siege of Mandalore edits will probably watch multimedia versions, since they’re apparently so popular, so I would say just take whatever approach suits your viewing tastes. I think there is definitely an appeal to just continuing the format you’ve been going with and do 3 episodes, beginning, middle and end.
Personally I feel like Vader/Anakin shouldn’t have shown up as a Force ghost at the end of the movie at all.
Kind of funny from a canon perspective because the galaxy also found out that Leia was Vader’s daughter because of another hologram of Bail spilling the beans that was lying around…
The flashback was cool though.
OK, Here is the sneak peek at the new ANH:R HD edit of the Obi-Wan/ Vader duel.
The editing in the HD version differs slightly from the SD version . In the final version there will be two audio tracks: The main 5.1 track will be the music less versions, while track 2 will have the added music as seen in the original SD version of ANH:RLooks great! I just can’t help but think that, knowing what we now know, I don’t think Obi Wan would call him “Darth”, would he? I think Anakin or Vader would be better. Maybe both?
Try to imagine a scene where a younger Obi-Wan is confronting Count Dooku and says, “You can’t win, Count.” It feels like a perfectly natural line that he would say, in my opinion. So with that in mind, I think you can easily interpret it as Obi-Wan just calling him by his Sith title. In the past a lot of people have suggested Obi-Wan says it mockingly. Of course, all of this is a retroactive interpretation, but I think it works enough that it doesn’t warrant changing it.
Anyway, great work Ady!
It seems you’ve laid out a way that it could be filmed, and giving the “Sith cult” a face seems like a plus. But you would have to find a solid actor to play the role of essentially evil Oz. It does seem it would be exposition heavy. Might be worth scripting out and see if it how it sounds on paper.
This sounds really great. I like the flow and all the lines sound like things troopers/officers would say. Amazing what some time to reflect can do for creative block.