I like that Vader/Luke deleted scene in isolation but I think it was wisely cut out for better pacing and dramatic reveal.
I does not track for me with Leia’s character that she would be afraid of her inner darkness so much that she would quit being a Jedi. If anything that would be sort of a reason to keep being one and working on that. Idk. It’s a good clean up but I don’t personally mind the original idea of Leia sensing the death of her son at the end of her Jedi path (which explains why her body only disappears after Ben dies).
"Nobody can claim those the Force made.”
I understand what you’re going for but I believe from a dramatic standpoint this wording kind of defuses the tension for the audience on whether or not she will prevail at the end against Palpy. This basically implies that she will win because it’s rigged by Deus Ex anyway.
Also, it’s not a really true statement. Palpatine definitely claimed Anakin as his servant for the bulk of his life, even though he was made by the Force. Sure, he came around at the end but that was after decades of being used as a tool.
No problem! Hey krylozdac, would you mind drafting up those same tests with these lines instead? I just want to see how it would sound.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1HkIoQzFIqkMwVeJ9Hl-k3Q_zAmiOhREA/view?usp=sharing
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1ciu5FBt4cltg0hBY4MVA48r_Y7wVw57y/view?usp=sharing
Better late than never!
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1QefSEGWnl20lQNRj8iIqGTQ7tPBLpHOU/view?usp=sharing
I will paste here the original intent of this idea when it was for Ascendant:
Basically, given that we see in the crawl that Kylo is on Mustafar chasing whispers of a hidden power and we see Vader’s castle, what if as soon as Kylo finishes killing the cultists he hears the voice of Vader guiding him towards the Wayfinder and that’s what makes him turn his head so suddenly?
I think this way the audience can make a stronger relation between Vader, his castle, the Wayfinder and it quickly reintroduces Kylo Ren’s existence in the shadow of his grandfather. By doing this, when he arrives on Exegol, the reveal of “I have been every voice you have ever heard inside your head” feels even more surprising given that its giving you a twist on the earlier assumption that Vader was talking to him and also when Palpy says “Become what your grandfather could not” it now feels like its something that has meaning to him as a character.
No problem! Hey krylozdac, would you mind drafting up those same tests with these lines instead? I just want to see how it would sound.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1HkIoQzFIqkMwVeJ9Hl-k3Q_zAmiOhREA/view?usp=sharing
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1ciu5FBt4cltg0hBY4MVA48r_Y7wVw57y/view?usp=sharing
Oh does sound good! I’m gonna try to send it tonight when I’m free.
Btw, what are you using to train the voice?
Oh you guys are completely right. I read the original itent some days ago and forgot about that aspect. Sorry!
Yeah, like I said, once I put Kylo wandering through the snow at the beginning in, his line ideally won’t come in too soon. He hears a Sithy whisper, and this puts him on edge as he goes deeper.
A hypothetical first-time viewer wouldn’t know it at the time, but I chose “You are unworthy” because it is meant to refer to the idea that Rey is possibly the superior heir to the Sith throne, at least in Palpatine’s mind. I think it’s best to leave it vague so we can keep that.
The thing about the insecurity of Rey being a worthier Sith heir wouldn’t land with either Kylo Ren or the audience given that as far as he and we are concerned, at this point of the story the Emperor just wants to have her killed. The drama is that instead of doing that he’s planning on having her side with him. It is not revealed till later that Palpatine wants her as the heir. Therefore I think leaning into that at this point of the story is a bit premature.
On another note, there’s an old concept I brought up at the Ascendant thread but it wasn’t executed properly because I didn’t have a good enough Vader clone. Sounds like you have figured it out.
The idea was this:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1gjKx7o3NC9aTZX1nDYD8ItbkJ6xn8BSp/view
Basically, it’s sort of a way to create a tenous link between the Wayfinder and Vader given that it’s his and it’s in his castle. Also reestablish who Kylo’s grandfather is before the Emperor brings him up and adds a little bit more of set up to the reveal of “I have been every voice you have ever heard of inside your head.”
As an added benefit for this particular edit, it would make their confrontation and Vader’s ‘killing’ more cathartic imo.
Agreed on both fronts. Here is another test:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1HnI8y_Diz62HWHn6T7p12_c226L4Y3Z8/view?usp=sharing
But keep in mind I’m (still) yet to add back in the part of him wandering through the snow and hearing a whisper that draws him deeper into the forest. Once that’s in I think most of the pacing issues will be gone. I’m just waiting to add that back in until we’re satisfied with the dialogue.
I really dig this idea.
I think the line “you were never real” comes in a little too soon. I think it shouldn’t start until we see the the back of Kylo Ren. Otherwise it seems like he notices too soon. The previous iterations of the lines felt more straightforward.
I think it would be cool for Vader to say something like “You’re unworthy of the dark side.” Then Kylo stabs him and retorts “I’m the master of the Knights of Ren.” I think this would segue nicely to the next scene.
I feel like this concept of them being surrogate parents deviate too much from canon.
They do reference a raid at the Festival of Ancestors so I’d think it shouldn’t be too removed from that point in the film.
I would make the argument that the line “Leia knew it too” does not necessarily mean that they knew all throughout the previous movies. It could be taken to meaning that she and Luke have known since his death. It’s ambiguous enough and I think it’s better than spelling it.
True, but the conversation starts with Rey outwardly confessing her vision to Luke, whereas her lineage is something Luke has to coax out of her, it’s clear that carries a heavier burden to her in the moment, and is what’s convinced her the vision will become true. Saying Leia knew about the vision but not her lineague is a much less impactful revelation, since we can assume she believed, like Rey did before the rest of the movie, that she could overcome it by focusing on her Jedi training. You might as well just say Leia sensed her pull to the dark, or the darkness inside her, which would work for the Nobody cut, but for the Rey Palpatine version it makes more sense for the conversation to stay focused on the big reveal.
I quite agree. I think the “You are family” line makes the “Leia knew it too” line work much better.
I skimmed through the changes. The AI voices are very well integrated now. Kudos!
I was opposed to Leia telling Rey “You are family” from a writing standpoint because I thought it undercuts her journey and I still believe that, but I must say it made me quite emotional hearing that on the scene. Not only for what it means to Rey but because it made Leia feel more alive and present in the movie than ever before.
Good God that’s awesome.
Yes, you’re right. That part I wasn’t clear enough about. So are we to assume that Kylo Ren knows before getting to Exegol that he knows Palpatine is guarding the Final Order fleet?
I have always bumped into something that I want to bring up. The original crawl states that Kylo “rages in search of the phantom emperor, determined to destroy any threat to his power”. The film supports this by showing that when he arrives to Exegol the first thing he does is turn on his lightsaber before getting down the temple and also the first thing he says in retort to a seemingly benign statement by Palpatine is “I killed Snoke, I’ll kill you”. The movie makes it very clear that he’s going to Exegol to kill.
However, Ascendant’s crawl says that what he seeks on Exegol is a “hidden power that would allow him to destroy any threat to his rule”. This is not reflected in the behavior that he shows in the film. If his mission is really to get this power it would make little sense why he would be so confrontational and gung-ho on killing whatever is on Exegol. Sure, he has always been an erratic character but you would imagine he would be in a more exploratory attitude if he still presumably does not know how to retrieve the power he seeks. I think it runs the risk of muddling the character motivations. Is he there to retrieve a power or is he there to kill it?
Lol no arguments here. But like you said before, they probably wanted to make it seem like they had planned this all along. Dear JJ can’t even plan his vacation.
As dumb as it sounds, I think it is better for it to have a name you can refer to. Otherwise the different factions of the bad guys can get murky in a film that if anything requires clarity.
The way I see it, the Final Order is to the First Order what the Republic was to the Resistance.
I’m on the camp of not explaining it. I never bumped into that one in the movie theater as I felt that it was a power that made sense for Jedi to have originally and to have abandoned by the time of the PT as they got more dogmatic and became more and more detached.
I applaud the incredible rendition for the Force healing illustration. However, I do think that at a conceptual level, it is a tad coincidental that Rey was reading up about that particular power the very day she would need to use it twice (and presumably for the first time since it is suggested she doesn’t leave the base).
I think having her verbally tell BB-8 that she read up on it in the books is enough of an explanation if one would actually want to include one. I personally don’t think it’s super necessary to have any explanation (after all, nobody questioned Baby Yoda using it) but that’s beside the point, I guess.
Alluding to the concept of Force healing before it happens feels a tad premature imo vs having Rey look up the Wayfinder on the book because she saw it in her vision, which serves a plot function that strenghten the connective tissue of the whole first act and pays off in the third act.
I think Palpatine’s plan was clear enough in that the audience never expects him to be trustworthy about what his true intentions are.
I’ve been thinking, in order to give some useful plot function to Rey’s vision, how about showing glimpses of Kylo Ren using the Wayfinder and going through the Nebula? I think this would motivate Rey checking out the Wayfinder on the book (if that’s still something that’s being kept), which then feeds into her showing Leia. Also it makes it so that when Rey gets the Wayfinder from Kylo’s Tie whisperer, she has at least already seen it there before and it doesn’t feel as much like it’s coming out of nowhere.
I love that touch about Finn being an inspiration. However, she says “It wasn’t a decision, but like an instinct”. But her saying that Finn inspired them very clearly makes their mutiny a conscious decision, otherwise why mention it? I think it has the risk of becoming muddles between conscious decision and unconscious instinct.
I think you have to at least keep the line about the stormtroopers one by one deciding not to do it because that’s where the whole instinctual Force aspect comes into place.
Goddman, just when I think it can’t get any better. I think Palpatine’s lines are officially in the menu boys.
Not to derail the topic, because I think it’s a worthwhile discussion but I’ve been fostering this idea in my mind about what could be done to alleviate the pacing of the first act. I’m sure people have brought this up before but what if the opening search for the Wayfinder in Mustafar is skipped over? No Star Wars movie has ever opened on a montage and even with the added establishing shots in Ascendant, it feels disorienting for me to jump around so many locations in such a short amount of time. What if the movie opens with Kylo Ren arriving on Exegol?
I’ve seen this done in the fan edit by reddit user StraightCutsNoChaser called The Third Cut and it was effective enough. The only thing is that the crawl would have to set up that new opening.
I’ve come up with this:
The spark of hope burns!
Following the heroic sacrifice
of Jedi Master Luke Skywalker,
the tyrannical FIRST ORDER
silences acts of insurrection
across an inspired galaxy.
As Rey, sole heir to the Jedi,
continues her training, General
Leia Organa dispatches secret
agents to gather intelligence
for the rising RESISTANCE.
Meanwhile, Supreme Leader
Kylo Ren follows clues left by
his former master to a hidden
location, sensing that it holds
a dark power that could be a
threat to his rule…
Later on, during Rey’s vision there could be added glimpses of Kylo Ren flying through the Nebula using the Wayfinder. This would explain why she’s suddenly studying the device in the Jedi texts whilst she waits for the Falcon to come back and it would also visually establish the Nebula and the Wayfinder in Kylo’s ship, which both things will pay off in the third act.
Now in retrospect, it can be inferred that the clue referred to in the crawl was the Wayfinder. You are able to cut out Mustafar and retain all the relevant plot material.
I think this way the movie doesn’t have to jump around as much and it doesn’t have to get the audience asking awkward questions about what the Wayfinder is, what is it doing on Mustafar, who is Kylo massacring and has the added bonus of motivating Rey looking up the Wayfinder on the Jedi texts.
I like the idea but I feel like it is important to reestablish her parents importance in her story considering the movie is about to talk a whole lot about that.