daveybjones999

Dune Complete
I really loved both Dune films and wasn’t planning on making an edit, but when I saw the final scene from Dune Part 2, I knew I needed to create one to turn it into 1 long epic movie. I’m not going to be simply stitching the 2 parts together I’ll be cutting some scenes out to make the movie flow a bit better and to cut down on runtime, as well as some slight restructuring of the film. I’m moving the intro to part 2 until after Lady Jessica looks over the burning of the city, before continuing onto Duke Leto’s death. I’ve shortened the movie from around 5 and a half hours to around 4 and a half hours, still lengthy but way more manageable

The Edit is complete so send me a PM if interested, The file is around 9.5 Gigs. I’ve included my cut list below.

Edited Part 1 out of the title card
3:52-5:43 Removed breakfast scene between Paul and Jessica. It introduces the voice and the Bene Gesserict, but these are better introduced later on.
7:45-9:13 Removed dialogue between Leto, Gurney and Thurfit, to improve pacing and also remove the call and response between the Emperor’s announcer and Duke Leto
12:54-16:18 Removed conversation between Paul and Leto, it’s a good bonding moment between them, but I really want to get to the Gom Jobbar scene within the first 20 minutes
17:21-17:55 & 18:12-18:15 Trimmed training fight between Paul and Gurney
19:05-20:47 Removed first scene on Ghedi Prime
26:00-26:08 & 26:21-26:26 Edited out some of Jessica’s crying during the scene to make the character appear stronger. It’s still clear she’s scared for Paul, but she maintains more of her inner strength
42:58-44:38 Removed tree scene, it does have some world building in it, but it slows down the pacing too much
55:25-56:14 Removed conversation between Paul, Duncan, and Gurney, doesn’t really add anything we already know how great their bond is.
73:38-73:56 Removed lady Jessica walking down a hallway and crying
Moved scene of them finding Baron Harkonnen to before Duncan meets with Kynes
97:32 Add Prologue to Dune Part II

Some more edits to improve the flow of the action
106:36-107
119:06-112:11
145:54-155:17 Removed final scene to improve pacing into part 2

Part 2
0-:52 Remove Studio titles
2:29-2:43 Removed Title Card
3:03-11:41 Removed fight between the Fremen and the Sadukhar
16:11-16:29 Removed council mocking Stilgar
21:11-21:27 Removed Jessica asking what would happen if she refuses to become the Reverend Mother
21:29-21:39 Removed some dialogue to improve pacing
32:49-33:05 Removed Paul questioning Chain’s sand walking technique
59:15-60.27 Removed Paul and Chani scene after he rides the sandworm
63:39-69:49 Removed Raban trying to fight the Fremen and losing, and also the scene between Shadam, Irulan and the Reverand Mother right afterwards
109:28-110:42 Removed scene of Chani’s friends death

I’ve Cut out around 40 minutes from both films with 22:54 minutes cut from Part 1, and 17:12 From Part 2
The film is now 4h 29m 12s w/o credits and 4h 37m 19s w/ credits

Again the Edit is complete so send me a PM if you want to check it out. The file is around 9.5 Gigs

I’m so excited this was far and away my favorite short of Volume One, and even though Screacher’s Reach from Volume 2 gives it a good run for its money, it’s still my favorite one. It also makes a lot of sense that of all of the shorts this is the one to get a full limited series as it didn’t feel like a short it felt like an episode 1 for a full length show, and the short was the length of a standard 30 minute episode of TV. I’m assuming it’ll be a full 12-13 episode season, but it could be just 6-8 given Disney+'s propensity for only doing that many episodes.

Not only is the short from Volume One, The Ninth Jedi, getting a follow-up in Volume 3 it’s also getting a limited series as well. That was my favorite short of Volume One so I’m very happy with this news.
https://www.starwars.com/news/visions-presents-the-ninth-jedi

Even though I do like the sequel trilogy, well 2/3 of it, I completely agree that Cobra Kai does the legacy sequel thing way better because it remembers to ensure that both the old characters and the new characters get somewhat equal focus and allow both to have character arcs and progress. Also, I think the writing is way better in Cobra Kai because I think only 1 of movies in the sequel trilogy, The Last Jedi, was actually well written. Force Awakens was fine but focused too much on setting up mystery boxes that they had no idea what the answers that were within them would be. Much of the film was also was derivative of A New Hope because they were terrified that the Star Wars fanbase would hate it like the prequels and decided not to write something new and original. Rise of Skywalker is a complete trainwreck from a writing level. The Last Jedi is the only one of the sequel trilogy that even attempts to do something similar to what Cobra Kai did, in that every single character in that film goes through a character arc and tries to give everyone some character development, even if a lot of people dislike what they specifically did with those character arcs. Cobra Kai does all of this, and more, successfully enough to where I consider the show better than the originals.

This sounds exactly what I’ve been looking for. I’ve always suspected that this would be a fantastic way to watch the series, and that the prequels would be especially well served by something like this, so I’d definitely love to see this when you complete it.

THe reason why lots of people haven’t been watching or talking about this show is because Star Wats has eroded pretty much all of the trust people had in it due to everything since Mandalorian Season 2. Fett got good ratings, but nobody liked it, Obi Wan got a similar treatment with Decent ratings but nobody loving the show, Andor was incredibly well received, but had the worst viewership numbers for a Live Action show at least until Acolyte came out, The Mandalorian season 3 had great viewership numbers but disappointed most everybody, Ahsoka also got decent ratings, but people mostly seem to think it was just OK, and then the Acolyte happened and almost everyone seemed to hate it. All of those series have trained people interested in Star Wars to not bother with a new show, at least not until it’s over, also Skeleton Crew is very much a kids show and for some reason, a lot of people seem to have no interest in those. That’s likely why not that many people are watching or talking about the show even though most of those who have watched it seem to enjoy the show. I also think a lot of people might’ve been waiting for the show to end and see what the consensus on the series was before hopping onto it. I know that, despite overall liking Ahsoka and The Acolyte, I was still disappointed enough in both of those shows that I decided to wait until it was finished to see if it was worth my time and now that it has, I’ll be watching it over the weekend.

They also had to stop and restart production for both the WGA and SAG strikes as well which also probably led to its budget ballooning so high as well. Still over 291 Mil for one season, and over 645 Mil for two seasons is still way too much money.

SparkySywer said:

JadedSkywalker said:

Can someone explain why everyone thinks Mace is this badass lightsaber duelist. He went out in a very weak way. Blown out a window due to unlimited power. After Anakin chopped his hand off.

To be fair the power was unlimited

Speaking of which someone should do a Wicked Star Wars edit where instead of Palpatine shouting, Unlimited Power, he starts singing Unlimited from Wicked’s Defying Gravity instead. Or am I the only one who’d find this funny?

I’ve got 2 off the top of my head

The Acolyte
Episode 5 Night. This is an absolutely fantastic episode, in a mostly disappointing series. The action is fantastically directed, and the episode is incredibly well-paced and tense. Jecki’s death and the Qimir reveal, up to Yorde’s death is the standout in a fantastic episode.

Star Wars Rebel.
Season 4 Episode 10 Jedi Night. Kanan’s sacrifice and death was one of the highlights of a great series. Kanan was a great character and seeing his arc come to a conclusion and sacrifice himself was very poignant…

Finally, a new Star Wars project that not only am I excited for, but am not worried about it turning out poorly. I really enjoyed both previous volumes of Vision, and it looks like they’re returning to it all being anime, like season 1.

They have no idea what they’re doing anymore, it’s really sad.

I’d love a link. I never finished the season, or series despite buying all 3 seasons on Blu Ray and trying to get through it multiple times. This edit seems like a much better length.

Another new Star Wars project that will likely never see the light of day. He has some Star Wars experience, having written some episodes of Rebels, but his other works have been really hit or miss so if it does actually come out it’ll likely be a coin flip whether it’s any good or not.

I think this is nearly perfect. The reveal works so well and it’s executed fantastically. I only had 2 minor issues, first off it’s very unclear what Rey says right before she picks up the dagger. Not sure if the line is AI or not, but it needs more work to be intelligible. I only have one other really minor nitpick, I don’t like the shot of Palatine’s chair spinning to face the audience from Return of the Jedi. It feels like it slows down the vision a little bit, but it isn’t a huge issue. Also, the Sith eye effect is perfect it feels like it was meant to be there the entire time.

When the new Halloween came out in 2018 I absolutely adored the movie, however after the made the full trilogy it became apparent that they had no idea what to do past the 2018 movie as the trilogy doesn’t work at all. Kills was fairly disappointing and its attempt at social commentary was hackneyed and cringey, and while I really enjoyed Ends as a finale to a trilogy it was a complete failure focusing on an entirely new character and barely featuring Michael Meyers. However there are still lots of things I did like about the 2 sequels, so I’ve decided to edit all three of them down into a single long movie. Most of the edit is going to be focused on 2018 and Kills, with a heavily truncated Corey free version of Ends as the third act.

I cut out a bunch of dumb jokes from 2018, such as making Alison’s dad way less of a joke, and removing the dumb cops and there sandwich discussion
I started with a trimmed flashback sequence from Kills, before transitioning into the Halloween 2018 title sequence, and opening on the extended scene of Laurie in the shooting range removing the asylum sequence and the podcasters driving up to Lauries house.
I cut out the Dinner Scene and the Bus Escape scene. I really like both of these, but the dinner scene is just reinforcing what’s already been established about the family’s relationships, and we also have a scene of officer Hawkins arriving at the aftermath of the bus scene as well.
Cut Podcasters at Judith Meyer’s grave and of Hawkins at Hospital with Sartain
I added the deleted scene of Allison jogging and seeing the dead dog.
After Alison is found after Oscar’s death I cut to a condensed version of the bar scene from Kills to reintroduce the characters from the original film
After Sartain drives off with Alison and Michael I cut to the Cameron finding Hawkins and calling the ambulance
Rest of 2018 plays without much editing just some minor trims here and there
Kills edits
Cut Karen in the Morgue
Slightly trimmed Sandra’s husband’s death scene
Cut out Alison and Karen’s questioning, as well as implication Michael isn’t after Laurie.
I cut out the entire subplot with the escaped mental patient and the hospital
Little John, Big John and their deaths have been removed.
Cut out the Marian, doctor, and nurse kills, leave in them finding their bodies
After Karen’s death I cut to the first scene after the credits in Ends, Then after Laurie washes out the burnt pie we cut to the grocery store scene.
After the grocery store we cut to the end of the movie where Laurie makes it look like she’s going to commit suicide.
It really is Michael that Laurie shoots down the stairs.
I cut immediately to Alison stopping her car to hear about Laurie’s supposed suicide and then play out the Ends till it’s over, removing all references to Corey.
The edit is a bit longer than I would’ve liked at 2 hours and 43 minutes with credits.

If you’d like to check out the edit leave me a PM.

I enjoyed The Acolyte, but like every single release since The Mandalorian Season 2, with the exception of Andor, the show really needs a movie edit so I’m throwing my hat into the ring to create one. It’s taken me a while to finish this edit, way longer than I expected. I pretty much got to the point where I didn’t know if I wanted to make a 2 film edit or remove the flashback episode from the series, but I eventually decided on a 1 movie edit with a significantly shorter flashback inserted after the events of episode 5.

Also since The Acolyte is not getting renewed for a season 2 I was able to cut all of the sequel teasing at the end, and I also completely removed the Vernestra Rwoh stuff from the later half of the season. I’m also changing the ending of the series so that we don’t continue after Osha kills Sol and bleeds her lightsaber. While creating the edit that seemed like a much stronger ending, but since there was still some stuff that needed to be resolved, I ended it where the show did, but now that there is no sequel I think I can end the series there and have a much stronger edit. This edit runs for around 2 hours and 42 minutes with credits.

I’ve also created an alternate version of the combined flashback episodes called Tragedy on Brendok which is 46 minutes long, but I don’t have a cutlist for it.

PM me if you want a copy.

My cultist from the series is below, note minor dialogue trims and removal of recaps and the title card are not noted below. Some cuts for each have timestamps, but most do not.

Episode 1
Remove the space walk scene for timing purposes and edited the confrontation between Osha and Yorde to remove exposition. I also removed the scene of the bar owner confronting Osha.
Heavily trimmed Osha’s dream sequence. Cut right from Vernestra over to Osha in her flashback vision, for timing purposes
28.08-29.08 Cut out the short scene of Jecki Sol and Yord leaving to get Osha
36.17-End Cut final scene of Mae meeting with her master as it doesn’t really work as anything other than an end of episode cliffhanger.

Episode 2
Cut out first confrontation between Mae and Torbin
Remove Osha’s first conversation with Jecki
Removed Yorde asking Sol if he believes Osha’s story
Removed conversation between Osha and Sol on the ship
Cut out Jecki’s explanation of her plan, it’s pretty self explanatory and doesn’t need elaboration
Slightly trimmed cutting from the fight between Sol and Mae
Removed Mae and QImir reuniting.

Episode 4
2.33-4.27 Removed goodbye scene between Jecki and Osha, the dialogue just isn’t good and I’ve decided to remove the whole, Osha doesn’t want to go apprehend her sister plot. In this edit she’s determined to stick around for the whole thing.
Removed the meeting with the other Jedi and cut right to Sol and Vernestra’s conversation afterwards. The meeting refers to and sets up a minor subplot that won’t get resolved in this edit.
10.31-13.07 Removed scene of Sol convincing Osha to come with them for the reason I stated in the last change. Removed the scene on the ship Even though I like it cause it doesn’t really add anything to the story and I need the runtime for later on.
13.42-14.00 Cut out Yorde ordering Osha to give back the weapon it’s contradictory to a later scene of his.
Removed scene of Mae trapping Qimir and deciding to turn herself into the Jedi
Cut out Osha and Jecki’s conversation about the dead bug to save time
Removed the Jedi losing Basil and Sol telling Osha he’ll explain everything later on the ship

Episode 5
2.06-2.32 trimmed some of the opening to get to the battle a bit quicker
5.19-6.18 Removed first scene of Osha and Yorde running away

Episode 6
Cut out all scenes with Vernestra
15.26-17.01 removed Mae finding and resetting Pip as well as all shots of Basil as possible
Cut out conversation between Mae and Sol where Sol realizes Mae isn’t Osha

Episode 8
Removed all scenes of Vernestra and the other Jedi
Removed scene of Qimir and Osha leaving the planet and the Darth Plagues Cameo
Heavily edited Mae and Sol chase sequence to remove Basil
Movie ends with Osha turning Sol’s lightsaber Red.

PM me if you want a copy

One more post about The Acolyte, because I’m still thinking of the show, honestly it shouldn’t have been an 8 episode show. I gave my thoughts about this after the show ended, but it should’ve been a 6 episode show. I’d keep episodes 1 and 2 the same, but then I’d push back the flashback another episode. Then I’d have episode 3 be a combined version of Day and Night with the first half cut down a bit. That way the story momentum continues a little longer and ends on most of the main cast dead and Osha and Mae switching places. Then you combine the 2 flashback episodes into one focusing more on the Jedi side of the story, with key scenes from Osha’s side of the story to show that the coven really do care for the girls. That way episode 6 becomes the new episode 5, and when we start it we know what’s going on and that allows the momentum to continue from episode 5 into the final episode.

Structurally the season is a complete mess. After a solid first 2 episodes that set the stage decently well, we go into a flashback that doesn’t really reveal what happened. That completely took the wind out of the shows sails and killed the momentum of the story so that now the story has to build up again and right where it starts getting good, the episode ends making everyone wait a week for the best episode of the show. Then after Night airs the story slows down a bit and we have to build momentum again, and right as the momentum is building we get the second flashback episode, but because the show dragged out the reveal of what happened for far too long the answer ends up feeling really unsatisfying and also kills the momentum of the story again right as it’s gearing up for the climax.

Now with the new 6 episode structure, it allows the pacing to build more naturally and the flashbacks don’t kill the momentum of the story as much. The show naturally builds from episodes 1-3 where almost everyone dies and we get a big change in the focus of the story, and then we go into the flashback episode which now doesn’t kill the momentum as much. Then episodes 5 and 6 build nicely into each other and the climax is able to build up to its conclusion better. Now this wouldn’t fix all of the problems with the show, the reveal still would’ve been disappointing to a lot of people for one thing, and there are still issues with the script and acting, but it might’ve done a bit better for viewership.

With editing the show from 8 episodes down to 6 and restructuring the entire story to keep plot momentum building it might’ve stayed on the charts longer. Episodes 1-3 all charted, really low but still they were on there, but then it dropped from the charts until the finale partially because episode 3 was very widely disliked. But now with Day/Night as episode 3 there would’ve been a much higher chance it would’ve stayed on the charts longer because now episode 3 is both a long enough episode for streaming, but also ends on a real high note, rather than that high note being episode 5 after it lost a large chunk of the audience. This way audiences likely would’ve stuck around for episode 4, and maybe they still drop it after the flashback episode, but as we saw it came back onto the charts for its final episode and that would’ve likely made it look better to Disney. A 6 episode show where the first 4 episodes chart, the 5th episode drops off, but then audiences come back for the final episode, looks way better than an 8 episode show where only the first 3 episodes chart, episodes 4-7 are off the charts, and then people come back for episode 8 before interest dies again. That being said personally I still don’t think the show would’ve done that well even with these structural changes but it’s interesting, for me at least, to think about

Vladius said:

daveybjones999 said:

MORC said:

I believe a cartoon set in-between OT movies is a better move than a post RotJ one. TCW fleshes out the period very nicely, yet we have virtually nothing between 4-5-6 despite those being the most well regarded movies.

Honestly, that’s kind of why I don’t want them to do that. The original trilogy is great, and a series set between them focusing on the Rebels during that time period could be a great show, but 1, Star Wars Rebels already exists, and 2, people are already still annoyed at Disney for de-canonizing the old EU so just imagine the outrage a series set between the original series would cause, especially if it isn’t good. I’d much rather them do something like that for the sequels and set it between episodes 8 and 9. The Clone Wars already went a long way towards redeeming the prequels for lots of people, even though the quality of the movies didn’t actually change people’s perceptions of them did, so I’d much rather them put the energy towards doing that for the sequels and trying to mend something that actually needs fixing, instead of adding things in between movies that don’t need them. I’d definitely be interested in them finding some way to appeal to original trilogy fans but I’m 100% certain in the inevitability that if they try everyone’s just going to hate it because even if I do like, or at least tolerate, a lot of the recent Star Wars Disney+ offerings I have 0 faith in Disney to do something like that for the original trilogy and have it be any good.

Why do you care whether or not people think the sequels (or prequels) are “redeemed?”

Personally, I don’t really care I’m fine with liking them and don’t really care that much anymore about what the fanbase as a whole thinks about it. I was just saying that while there’s potential in doing another series around the original trilogy with the original characters there are already tons of stories from that era with those characters. Also like I said Disney can’t really afford many more misses and I think they have a greater chance of missing with the original trilogy characters. I mean what’s the worst that can happen with them trying to do a series with the sequel characters if it’s bad? People will just talk about how awful the sequels are and they’re already doing that, but if they try to do something with the original trilogy cast and mess it up (again in some people’s eyes) fans will be even more annoyed with Disney than they already are.

MORC said:

I believe a cartoon set in-between OT movies is a better move than a post RotJ one. TCW fleshes out the period very nicely, yet we have virtually nothing between 4-5-6 despite those being the most well regarded movies.

Honestly, that’s kind of why I don’t want them to do that. The original trilogy is great, and a series set between them focusing on the Rebels during that time period could be a great show, but 1, Star Wars Rebels already exists, and 2, people are already still annoyed at Disney for de-canonizing the old EU so just imagine the outrage a series set between the original series would cause, especially if it isn’t good. I’d much rather them do something like that for the sequels and set it between episodes 8 and 9. The Clone Wars already went a long way towards redeeming the prequels for lots of people, even though the quality of the movies didn’t actually change people’s perceptions of them did, so I’d much rather them put the energy towards doing that for the sequels and trying to mend something that actually needs fixing, instead of adding things in between movies that don’t need them. I’d definitely be interested in them finding some way to appeal to original trilogy fans but I’m 100% certain in the inevitability that if they try everyone’s just going to hate it because even if I do like, or at least tolerate, a lot of the recent Star Wars Disney+ offerings I have 0 faith in Disney to do something like that for the original trilogy and have it be any good.

Honestly, I’m not surprised. While I did like it, the show had lots of issues, especially structurally, and the viewership numbers were awful.

There have only been 3 bad/awful Star Wars movies or shows, The Clone Wars 2008 movie, Rise of Skywalker, and Book of Bobba Fett. Obi Wan, Mandalorain Season 3, Ahsoka, and The Acolyte are all very middling shows but I wouldn’t label any of them as being bad. All 4 of these shows have enough legitimately great things about them that I consider myself glad to have watched them, but they all have huge problems that stop them from actually being good as a whole.

Vladius said:

Kellythatsit said:

rocknroll41 said:

Great write-up Acbagel!

Unfortunately I don’t think simply making “a little something for everyone” (i.e. different things for different people) is enough to unite the fandom, as each group generally seems to think Star Wars should only be made for their tastes specifically (even if not everyone admits it). Doesn’t help also that a ton of YouTubers nowadays make an entire living from hating Star Wars, no matter what it does.

Of all the groups you mentioned, I’m in the one that you described as “not very protective, fine with whatever direction Disney takes.” I honestly think at this point they should just keep doing whatever they’re doing, cause people will get mad no matter what. There was a time when even ESB was divisive, ffs!

Yeah I agree with this also. But Lucasfilm/Disney also need to have the balls to stick with projects or story direction. Don’t crib notes from fans. Sure learn from mistakes but don’t throw the baby out with the bathwater.

Key example: Solo.
The movie was perfectly fine. Did it set the world on fire? No. Were there other key issues that also effected it’s performance? Absolutely. But don’t set up an ongoing story and then abandon it because “shit happens”. Learn the right lessons and fix the errors. Make the next one a banger. Ensure the next in the Solo series is unmissable.

It’s the same now with the Acolyte. It was a bit hit/miss but there’s more story to be told. Learn the right lessons. Fix the main issues. Whether it’s pacing, character development, production quality, whatever. But back in your story. At the end of the day we just want good, well told stories that we can reflect on with satisfaction.

It was way more than “a bit” hit or miss, and the story literally can’t go anywhere because it will always result in the prequels happening. All it does is bash on the Jedi more in dumber and dumber ways.

They are cribbing notes from fans, the large group of prequel/Filoni fans who like anything that has prequel/Clone Wars/Rebels characters in it.

I think you’re forgetting that tons of people love the prequels and would love to see a well-told story of how the Jedi got to the point that they’re at during them. Just because some people don’t like them or how the Jedi are portrayed during the prequels doesn’t change that. There’s a whole lot of good storyline potential to exploring that shift regardless of whether or not some people want Star Wars to tackle that or not. What Disney Star Wars needs to do is appeal to fans of all 3 trilogies, but they really seem to only be catering to Prequel fans which is the main issue. Other than Andor there’s no Star Wars project attempting to appeal to fans of the original trilogy, and there are also no projects currently out trying to appeal to fans of the sequel trilogy. The only thing even attempting to target those fans is the currently in production Rey movie. They need to appeal to fans of all 3 and to do that they need to greenlight projects targeting each of these 3 eras.

I think what they need to do is very simple, but also kind of difficult to do. Focus on creating high quality films and series and not just producing a glut of content to drive subscribers to Disney+ like they’ve been doing since Mandalorian Season 2. Of all of the Star Wars streaming shows the only ones to have actually been produced and paced like actual TV shows have been Andor, The Mandalorian, and The Bad Batch. Literally everything else has felt like a movie idea that got suddenly stretched out into a 6-8 episode streaming series for no reason other than to get people to stay on Disney+ longer. If they’re going to make a TV miniseries or show, then make a miniseries or show, and not an extended 6 hour movie padded with filler to extend the runtime.

Just found the thread and decided to throw my hat into the ring. I have not seen Rogue One or Solo because I had zero interest in them when they came out, and while I still have no interest in ever watching Solo, Andor made me want to watch Rogue One, but I’m gonna wait until season 2 is finished and watch it as a finale to Andor.

The movies that I hate
10 Clone Wars. Really bad opening episodes to the tv series edited into an awful movie.
9 Rise of Skywalker Really enjoyed it when it came out, but have realized it’s an empty husk of a movie filled with fanservice in an attempt to lure back fans who hated The Last Jedi

I feel lukewarm on these next two
8 Phantom Menace I have a general fondness for this movie and I like a lot of aspects to it, but most of it is just kind of slow and boring
7 Attack of the Clones, I like the movie, but it’s hampered by lots of poor acting and some really cringy moments

Every film from here on out is a legitimately great movie
6 Force Awakens is a great film and a really good reintroduction to Star Wars that unfortunately suffers from being too similar to A New Hope
5 A New Hope The one that started it all, I feel putting it at number 5 is really controversial, but I have some minor pacing issues that put it here
4 Revenge of the Sith I love the movie it finally delivers on everything that the prequel trilogy purported to be about and Anakin’s fall is handled really well. Still has some issues with poor dialogue and acting choices, but the final act is some of my favorite moments in Star Wars
3 Return of the Jedi A fantastic ending to the original trilogy, sure it has some minor issues, like Han not getting much to do, but it does a great job of ending everyone’s character arcs and is incredibly poignant and emotional
2 Last Jedi the only thing stopping this from being number one is the Canto High sequence is the least interesting part of the movie, mostly because of that awful chase scene on the Farthier’s
1 Empire Strikes Back One of the 5 favorite films ever.

Having had time to sleep on the finale and think on the series as a whole I think I’ve identified the biggest issues with the series. This post will mostly be focused on the negatives of the show as I see them so while it may come across that I thought the show was bad, I do still ultimately like the show. First off the show has a big issue with characterizing both Mae and Osha, with Mae facing the brunt of the characterization issues. Her character starts off well enough with her drive for revenge and when we learn the reason for it her motivations make a lot of sense, but the issues start to show when we get to her character arc. When she decides to betray her master in episode 4, and turn herself into the Jedi it doesn’t feel natural. On paper I could see how it could kind of make sense, she wanted revenge on the Jedi because she thought they killed her entire family including Osha but with the revelation that Osha is alive her need to reconnect with her sister takes precedence. However, it doesn’t come across as a natural course for her character development to take because we didn’t really get to know enough about Mae beforehand for this to come across as making sense for her character. That has a lasting negative chain effect on her character arc up until the final episode.

This brings me to Osha, the show does a much better job with her characterization and other than the weird opening to episode 4, it does a much better job of seeding her character arc through the show to where it makes sense. Her feelings of loss, her anger at her sister, her failure to become a Jedi all of this stuff is written decently, which unfortunately brings me to the real reason the characters don’t really work as well as they should have, Amandla Stenberg’s performance. I haven’t seen them in much but I really liked them as an actor in the stuff I have seen. They were fantastic as Rue in The Hunger Games, and their performance in The Hate U Give was incredibly nuanced and raw, but they don’t do that great of a job here. Maybe it’s because of the dialogue writing which seems to be trying to emulate George Lucas’s way of writing dialogue in places, but the acting for both characters mostly comes across as stilted throughout much of the series. There are places where her acting is good and on point, but because she is ostensibly the main character having stilted acting muddles the character arc both characters are supposed to have even more.

This brings me to the other issue that hampers the series, the pacing. For better and worse this is very much a Disney+ streaming series in that the show is too long for its own good. Like so many other series this show feels like a movie that was forced to be artificially stretched out into a series due to the Disney overlord’s demanding more content to get people to subscribe to Disney+. Now I have no idea whether or not this is true, for all I know it was always pitched as an 8 episode series and they just didn’t do a good enough job of writing that amount of episodes but it still feels that way. The episodes have the issue of both being too short, and not feeling like they have enough happening in them at the same time. I think episodes 4 and 6 suffer from this predicament the most in that despite being relatively short it doesn’t feel like enough happens in them to justify the runtime. The 2 exceptions to this rule are episodes 5 and 8. With episode 5 it’s because despite being really short it’s packed full of action and things going on, and with episode 8 it’s because it’s one of the longer episodes in the series and also has a lot going on in it because it’s the culmination of the series. If the rest of the episodes had enough material in them as those 2 we would be having a much different discussion. I also think that making this a weekly release was a mistake and that they should’ve dropped all 8 episodes as a binge as I feel that watching all episodes at once would’ve worked better. That brings me to the biggest issue which is the structure of the series with the 2 flashback episodes.

The first flashback episode shows the events mostly from Osha’s point of view and adds even more questions to be answered such as what exactly are Mae and Osha. The problem with the flashback episodes is their placement in the series. On paper putting the first flashback as episode three after we’ve introduced all of the characters and the full scope of the conflict makes sense, and putting the final flashback episode in episode 7 right before the finale, with the final events of episode 6 being what they are makes sense, but in practice it completely ruins the pacing and buildup to that point. Putting the first flashback in episode 3 instead ends up putting the story to a halt just as it was starting to ramp up and build momentum, and putting the second flashback in episode 7 makes the series feel as if it won’t be able to conclude it’s story in the final episode. Also separating the flashback was also a mistake as both don’t really feel substantial enough on their own. The 2 flashback episodes should’ve been combined into 1 episode and I think then it should’ve been placed either as the first episode or putting right after episode 5 would’ve been the better way to go.

All that being said I did enjoy the show as a whole and I think the finale was really good and really ties the whole show together really well. I really loved what the show did with Sol in revealing that he really did all of this for himself, he told himself he was doing it to save Osha and Mae, but his actions really show that he was doing it more to prove the force vergence was real. While he tries to justify his actions as being to save Osha and Mae, and that he didn’t do anything wrong, it’s clear everything was really to satisfy his own ego. The fight scenes also continue to be excellent, the fight between Mae and Osha was really good, and I think it helps that because it’s an action sequence they’re allowed to use stunt doubles. I think the two best performances in the show were Sol and Qimir. Lee Jung-jae and Manny Jacinto are fantastic throughout and give incredibly nuanced performances and they’re the glue that helps keep the show together. After finishing the show I feel like the story, despite being hampered by pacing issues and some weak performances, ended up being pretty good and satisfying. Also, I think that The Acolyte should’ve been a movie instead of a series, but if it had to have been a series I don’t think it shouldn’t have been an 8 episode series but a 6 episode series. If I had to restructure the show I would’ve combined episodes 3 and 7 into one long flashback episode, and I’d combine episodes 4 and 5 into one episode as well. Episodes 1 and 2 would be the same episode 3 would be the combined episodes 4 and 5 Day/Night, episode 4 would be the full flashback episode Destiny/Choice and then episodes 5 and 6 would be the original episodes 6 and 8. I’ll probably make another post once I finish a rewatch but I did enjoy my time with The Acolyte and I’m looking forward to the various fan edits that will inevitably come out as I really feel condensing it down into a movie will do wonders for the story.