This is the right place to post this!
I’d also be curious to here about your ideas for having Han and Luke talk to each other.
@jarbear
I don’t think Light Side=Jedi and Dark Side=Sith. It would be like saying God=Catholic Church and the Devil=Theistic Satanism. Any organized belief system can only interpret their faith, rather than knowing the reality of it fully. I don’t think different characters having varying interpretations of the Force that seem to contradict each other is necessarily a detriment to the overall story. I don’t think every line in the movies that mentions the Force should be understood as an absolute fact about the true nature of the Force, you know what I mean?
I was curious if anyone was going to work on the continuity errors. Honestly I think re-casts can be sort of overlooked. The most glaring recast is Daario, for sure though.
I think giving Mel the necklace is actually a good continuity fix considering her needing to wear the necklace is so character relevant. Would love to see some tests if you ever feel like sharing!
@WillS8, totally agree. Too bad we can’t do anything about that!
@Mizukitron, would love to get an update from you on if you’ve made any new observations since you’ve been going back through the whole series.
Yup, that is a really cool example of that idea. I’m not familiar with 3D animation myself much to achieve that idea.
Plus, I realized that she has her new lightsaber on her belt for the entire Tatooine scene, so you couldn’t have her build it from scratch unless you erased it from her belt.
Or, we could just see her put the crystal in, and the lightsaber is already assembled for the most part.
It’s a pipe dream idea but I think it would be cool to see.
Enemies to lovers is a pretty common trope in fairy tales, which Star Wars is one. Lucasfilm’s Strange Magic, which Lucas created the story story for, even has an enemies to lovers plot.
In TLJ the Rey/Ben dynamic feels very much like Rey is being drawn towards trying to ‘fix’ Ben, which is definitely a thing that can happen in romantic fiction with ‘bad boy’ characters.
Which is why Rey going with Kylo at the end of TLJ wouldn’t have worked. Rey basically decided that if Ben is going to change he has to do it himself. He can change, but she can’t fix him.
Maybe it could’ve been handled better, but TROS at least sticks with that. Rey tells Kylo, “I did want to take your hand. Ben’s hand.” She sees the good in Ben, but she can’t force that good person out of him. After that, Ben has a bit of self-reflection and finally has a change of heart. And although he had some help along the way from Rey and Leia, he made that change on his own.
Again, not saying TROS is Shakespeare, but I think having Ben see his father and allow him to forgive himself was a pretty good way to handle his change. Because if Ben is supposed to be symbolic of a lot of angry young men (and women) out there who are mad at the world, or society, or certain people, the first step towards healing is forgiveness. Either forgiving people who hurt you or forgiving yourself for mistakes you made. Either way, the forgiveness is what allows you to move on and start anew, rather than hold on to those grudges that keep you angry.
I wonder if you could distort the Emperor’s hologram here and there to possibly make it fit better. Like the hologram could flicker and the voice could briefly be distorted, to try and make it fit.
They were moving out of an asteroid field so there still could be some interference.
he looks like a preorder bonus
You only got to see this version of the movie if you preordered your tickets. 😂
Regarding Luke haunting Kylo, I was thinking you could reuse the scene of Palpatine speaking to Kylo through the Force with Kylo hearing Luke. It would be hard to have Kylo see Luke, unless you had Luke sneak into one of his visions and say, “Ben! No!”
Some damn nice bling.
I remember seeing that concept art of the black and gold Kylo helmet even before we saw any official image of Kylo Ren. Thought it was really cool.
I think if you change the silver to gold, you could do it in all three films. Then keep the red cracks red.
It could also help imply motivation for why he rebuilds it all of the sudden. With the reappearance of the Emperor, Kylo might’ve rebuilt it to remind the First Order who is in charge. It’s like his crown, reminiscent to Supreme Leader Snoke’s golden robes.
It also sort of adds to why Kylo senses that Hux is uncomfortable with it. Kylo is flaunting his royalty, which upsets Hux and ties back into his desire to dethrone him. But of course this is all subtext.
Based on the Art of book, they played around with different colors for the cracks in Kylo’s mask. I personally liked the gold look, since the kintsugi technique actually uses golden lacquer, and it is a nice visual reminder that Kylo is the regal Supreme Leader. Just wanted to see how it might look.
RogueLeader said:
This idea is certainly impractical and on the extreme side, but I suppose I’m trying to illustrate something I felt Palpatine lacked. Like you said, that sense of decrepitness. I picture creatures like a lich, a mummy, Frankenstein’s monster. I think even overlay a dry, cracked or veiny skin texture could help add to that feeling possibly. They nailed the eyes, but the rest of the face looks rather normal to me.You mean like this?
I honestly have so much fucking fun playing around with these Exegol strobe lights… 😄
https://youtu.be/vKnY8ysDVpEEdit:
Happy April Fools!
Holy crap! Wasn’t expecting that. 😂
What do you mean? His loyal followers brush what is left of his teeth twice a day!
But really, I do a lot of these concepts just to see if actually seeing any of these images inspires us.
This idea is certainly impractical and on the extreme side, but I suppose I’m trying to illustrate something I felt Palpatine lacked. Like you said, that sense of decrepitness. I picture creatures like a lich, a mummy, Frankenstein’s monster. I think even overlay a dry, cracked or veiny skin texture could help add to that feeling possibly. They nailed the eyes, but the rest of the face looks rather normal to me.
But I do think it is better to stay focused on the most necessary, straightforward changes in order to achieve the primaries goals of the edit. Now that the home release is now, it might be a good time to shift focus back some of the big narrative changes that have been thrown around, and how to accomplish them.
It probably is a bit too much (too much work and too creepy), but imagine how freaky it would’ve been to see that face for the first time the lightning flashes. You can find different tutorials where people apply effects to people’s faces through motion tracking, so something like this could be possible. But maybe something a little less creepy. I just think it would be fun to lean into that undead angle.
RogueLeader said:
Pre-transformation Palpatine looks more like Ian McDiarmid with white contacts, to me, instead of looking like the Emperor. I don’t know if that makes sense, but there seems to be very little make-up on him that we associate with the Emperor, beyond making him extremely pale.I believe the intention was to make it like Palpatine’s spirit was possessing a fresh, un-deformed, new corpse body. Once he is ‘restored’ he resembles the true Sith Palpatine appearance.
I got the opposite impression from the deformed fingers.
Also, doesn’t seem like what is left of his fingers have been stitched together? When he raises his hands, I recall there being a line down one of his fingers that resembled a surgical scar.
Does he mention that during his “more than a clone, less than a man” interview?
At the very least, I think it would be cool to throw together some still-image of concepts of how it could look.
This might be a little ambitious, but I think it would be interesting to use some visual effects to alter Palpatine’s appearance.
Pre-transformation Palpatine looks more like Ian McDiarmid with white contacts, to me, instead of looking like the Emperor. I don’t know if that makes sense, but there seems to be very little make-up on him that we associate with the Emperor, beyond making him extremely pale.
I think it would be interesting if we could make Palpatine look more undead and zombie-like. I picture him without a nose, rotting flesh around his mouth exposing his teeth. This could be done in after effects by motion tracking his face and then applying various “undead” elements to it. I imagine the sporadic lighting could make it a bit of a challenge, but on that same token, him being obscured by shadows and darkness could help sell the effect as well.
I just like the idea of playing up Palpatine as this lich, basically, whose spirit desperately clings to what is left of his undead body. I think you could either go in two directions: he is a clone, or he is possessing his undead body. I’ve gone back and forth on this, but based off the visual clues in the film, like the dead eyes and rotting hands, I think it would be better to play up the undead, Frankenstein, angle. It would also better differentiate his resurrection in IX than how it was depicted in Legends.
RogueLeader said:
. . . maybe Ben isn’t trying to use Vader’s helmet to somehow reconnect with Rey, but instead, he is trying to confirm what Palpatine told him, and the flood of painful memories and revelations inadvertently reconnects him with Rey, since those feelings are something they both shared. So not only could it be a more sympathetic angle for Ben to see how he was manipulated, but it could also give more clues as to how Palpatine survived.Building on this, it occurs to me to imply throughout TFA and TLJ - and maybe a little in TROS - that Kylo’s trying to use the helmet to contact Vader’s spirit. Possibly some Vader lines from prior films but also other media, such as the Battlefront games, could be dubbed in to make Kylo think that contact has been made - but it turns out later that it was Palp manipulating him.
Yes, I think there is an opportunity to have Kylo receive a vision of Vader’s helmet in TFA, that could parallel Rey’s vision with the saber. As far as content of the vision goes, I think that just depends on what you want to accomplish. It could illustrate Kylo’s motivation for being on the dark side, and it could foreshadow Palpatine manipulating Kylo through the visage of Vader.
Vladius said:
I was happy with Rey being no one, . . . I have to agree with Gothamknight, the Palpatine thing was better than constantly asserting that she has no history and no reason to exist.In my reedit I’m going with “Rey Nobody” - except that she’s going to be an orphan taken in by Luke (and Mara Jade??) and trained by him before any of the events of TFA. At the end I’ll keep the “Rey Skywalker” conclusion because she views herself as having virtually been adopted by Luke, and thus part of his family.
This reminds me of early TFA theories about Rey being a former Jedi padawan that had her memory blocked through the Force, sorta like Revan.
The new docu shot you’re using fits very well. I think an alternative way to cut the scene would be to remove the deleted Kylo shots from TLJ, and instead cut to one of those establishing shots, but maybe create the shadows of those TIE fighters drift across the landscape (or the TIEs themselves). That might help glue together the planet shot and the ground shot. The bridge shot right now feels a little odd, since we see him on the bridge, then a few seconds later in the middle of a battle.
If you go with the Restructured version of the scene, you could use the shot as it passes by the Destroyer, sans Destroyer, and show it in a hyperspace tunnel, like how we often see the Falcon and other ships traveling through hyperspace.
The wide shot the planet with the laser coming out could show the laser disappearing around the corner of the screen, and then reappear as it approaches the planets, like you said.
Color theming isn’t really something I’m super beholden to, especially since the rules were already pretty lax in the OT. Plus, I kind of feel the Big, Evil Red Laser feels sort of cliché. I also think the dreadnought canon, the battering ram cannon, and the Xyston laser could all be replaced by green lasers, if you stick with the idea that they’re all using Death Star technology. If anything, that would help create more visual consistency between the movies.
I do think some additional touches could be added to drive the hyperspace connection home, like replacing the white of the beams with hyperspace tunnel effect. Also, the sounds Starkiller Bass makes could be infused more with sounds related to hyperspace.
An during the Resistance briefing, Snap says, “They’ve somehow created a hyper-lightspeed weapon, built within the planet itself.” So I think that line alone would help recontextualize the visuals of the blue beam.
Looks like you and I are going to be going a little nuts with our work on Luke and Leia’s sabers. 😉
Here is a test of this idea I had to illustrate Starkiller Base as a literal hyperspace cannon. Basically it ejects hyperspace into real space, which helps explain its ability to travel across the galaxy so quickly. And since hyperspace is effected by gravity, this helps explain how the “laser” splits apart to hit multiple planets at once. It also helps relate it more to the First Order’s other hyperspace-related technologies. I know red is a more intimidating color, but I thought I would play around with what it could look like.
Here is another go at a more intense version of the glow.
