sherlockpotter

Jar Jar Bricks said:

sherlockpotter said:

It’s the same reason why I don’t like Rey Palpatine. It makes her special because of what she is, not who she is. At least if she “becomes” a Dyad along the way, that’s mitigated somewhat. If she’s born a Dyad AND a Palpatine, she becomes a double-chosen one.

I believe our disagreement here can be figured out by how we view Star Wars.

If you were to take a look at old myths and legends, you would find that most of the time the characters that were written about were special because of what they were, and not necessarily who they were. George Lucas wrote Star Wars while taking inspiration from many of these old myths and legends, and that is why I advocate for elements of the story which might reflect this.

From what I understand, you take Star Wars from a more modern-day storytelling approach. That’s fine. Nothing wrong with it. But I find this other element of Star Wars is what makes it unique compared to most other stories you find today.

Totally fair and valid interpretation. I guess in my mind, Luke was special, Anakin was literally The Chosen One. It’s been done before. So I really dug Rian Johnson’s modern take on self-made heroes, not mythic ones. Let’s shake up the formula a bit. Make it a little more (in my mind) thought-provoking.

But I think that’s why I’m holding out for Rey Nobody, and you’ll probably stick with V2, eh?

RogueLeader said:

It could be along the lines of the theory that Palpatine/Plagueis inadvertently created Anakin/the Chosen One. They thought they could use him, but in the end it was their undoing.

Maybe Snoke did bridge their minds, which inadvertently solidified their bond and made them become a Dyad in the Force. So Snoke/Palpatine’s own machinations led to their undoing once again. I mean, we basically get that theme already since Palpatine indirectly made Rey by having a child of his own.

Yeah, this is basically a kinder, less unhinged version of what I was getting at lol. Snoke bridge “becomes” a Dyad. So things build on the films that have come before.

I’m gonna get an ulcer from this film, guys.

But, like, why would Snoke bother to take credit for bridging their minds then? What does he get out of it? Is he just trying to brag about how powerful his is (when we see him do loads of other powerful things in this very scene anyway)? Does it prevent them from finding out about the Dyad (until Kylo just “knows” in the next film anyway, so whoop dee doo, that was worth it.)?

Plus, I don’t like the idea that both Snoke’s plan and Palpy’s plan only were able to happen because they could exploit this random-ass Dyad connection. That feels lazy. And convenient. (Two terms used to describe any quality story.) At least if Snoke does it, it gives him some agency in the story.

Plot wise, we have an established fact - Snoke bridged their minds. It’s yet another thing that TROS tries to retcon. Does anyone care (no offense, Jar Jar) that the novelization says Rey “downloaded” combat training from Kylo’s brain? When he manually tried to probe her mind anyway? Is this The Matrix? Poe doesn’t have Kylo Ren Combat Training DLC. He was probed too, after all. “Mind downloading” is not established at all in the film. Can’t Rey just be a good fighter of her own accord? Kylo asking about a random girl doesn’t imply some phophecized connection; it implies that there’s a girl in the story.

And what does it matter what Kylo said in lines that were cut from the film? Again, who cares?

And thematically, it serves to make Rey less important as a character. She’s not powerful because of her strength of character, or because of the choices she makes, or because of how she responds to a situation. She’s powerful because she’s a mythical Dyad! Look how special she is, arbitrarily! It could’ve happened to anyone, but it makes Rey special. Why didn’t Poe become a Dyad when Kylo probed his mind? Because he’s not born special. Hey kids, do you want to be important? You’ve gotta be born as a Dyad then. You weren’t? That sucks.

It’s the same reason why I don’t like Rey Palpatine. It makes her special because of what she is, not who she is. At least if she “becomes” a Dyad along the way, that’s mitigated somewhat. If she’s born a Dyad AND a Palpatine, she becomes a double-chosen one. How compelling. Factor that in with undoing yet another Last Jedi ret-con, and that’s the value of making them “become” a Dyad.

(I’m not trying to offend anyone who likes the Dyad concept. I just don’t like ret-cons, and I’m also passionate about Star Wars. Kinda just started typing there and waited to see where I’d end up.)

Speaking of dumb, idiosyncratic Force Powers, is the Dyad line still getting changed to “What Palpatine doesn’t know is, we’ve become a Dyad in the Force”? I liked that change a lot. Makes it sit much better after they established Snoke bridging their minds in TLJ.

Jar Jar Bricks said:

sherlockpotter said:

Don’t we literally see his face melting in the original cut? That doesn’t imply “Palpatine’s real look” to me.

Like I said, not very well implied in the film. He was purposely manipulating the visuals to look that way. Either that, or what you see “melting” is his fake face. Otherwise, why don’t other characters turn into a mini-Palpatine when they are electrocuted?

I believe the novelization that was released around the same time of the movie talks about it. Palpatine thinks to himself, and I’m paraphrasing here, that the face of Sidious will prove helpful in convincing the galaxy to stay by his side, and that the face of Palpatine has served its purpose.

So Hal’s change to ROTS just makes that idea more clear.

I mean, why does lightning disintegrate him in this movie? I dunno, Force Powers are just all out of whack. If you’re not willing to hand wave a lot of the idiosyncrasies in Star Wars, you’re gonna have a bad time lol.

I guess I should read the novels one of these days. Maybe a lot of my questions would be answered.

Jar Jar Bricks said:

sherlockpotter said:

This may be totally impossible, but I’m just spitballing. If we cut around the “Hux is a spy” stuff, would it be possible to imply that Pryde kills Hux in order to merge the First Order with the Final Order on Palpatine’s…er, orders? So it’s like Pryde is staging a coup, as a Palpatine cultist, in order to bring the First Order resources to Exegol?

Not sure if there’s enough footage to effectively portray this, but I thought it was an intriguing angle. The Spy stuff can almost definitely be removed; I have an edit of the Poe’s return/“What did you do to the Falcon?” scene somewhere that I made as a proof of concept.

Removing the spy plot thread would be a really complicated matter which would remove several portions of the film. Imo not worth removing as it would make the pacing even more quick.

I think it would’ve been cool if that had happened originally, but I do think it might be too tricky to pull off a full restructure like that. It was more of a hypothetical idea I had than a “necessary change.”

To be fair though - the spy subplot encompasses two lines of dialogue in the intel pickup scene, a couple of lines in the Poe Return scene, and 90 seconds at best during the Destroyer escape sequence? I’d hardly call it consequential.

Jar Jar Bricks said:

Even in the original ROTS, that is Palpatines real look. It’s just not implied very well in the film because Palpatine is purposely making it look like he is being injured, even though he isn’t. It was a manipulation tactic done by himself against Anakin (and the galaxy as well).

Don’t we literally see his face melting in the original cut? That doesn’t imply “Palpatine’s real look” to me.

This may be totally impossible, but I’m just spitballing. If we cut around the “Hux is a spy” stuff, would it be possible to imply that Pryde kills Hux in order to merge the First Order with the Final Order on Palpatine’s…er, orders? So it’s like Pryde is staging a coup, as a Palpatine cultist, in order to bring the First Order resources to Exegol?

Not sure if there’s enough footage to effectively portray this, but I thought it was an intriguing angle. The Spy stuff can almost definitely be removed; I have an edit of the Poe’s return/“What did you do to the Falcon?” scene somewhere that I made as a proof of concept.

jarbear said:

As we have MR slave away with the Puppet scene/Ligthsaber (Work! WORK!) and hopefully Jonh will be finishing up with Luke’s haircut, I brought this up on a different thread, that started with a comment from Hal regarding the Palpy Clone.

First of all, having the vat full of Palpy clones is fantastic and helps address the Sith Elephant in the Room with his, erm, return.

So now just sitting an thinking about it, “Why have the clones of him as an old guy?” Kinda like, you are going to go on a road trip, and instead of filling up your tank, you fill only fill it up a couple of gallons.

So the thought is, if possible, what about adding a “variety” of clone faces. Maybe take a face/head of Palps as you see him in The Phantom Menace. And maybe another one, could be the face of his “clone son.” I saw a deep fake of using a younger Ian McDairmid and it didn’t look too different, albeit maybe the nose and eyebrows I think?

I dunno if this really matters or helps with anything, but was just a thought I had just thinking about “Why clone old guy Palps and not younger?” Granted, I am ok with the idea that the clone body cannot take it and it pretty much ages/falls apart … but it does still seem “kinda strange” to have clones of his old body … why not the younger model to get some more milage out of it? Lol.

I think we’re going off of “Hal9000 canon,” which implies in Ep. III that Palpy was always a gross, shriveled monster; his “true form” was revealed when he used the lighting on Mace. In that context, it makes sense for Palpy to only have shriveled clones brewing. Also, if he had younger models, it would raise the question of why he isn’t using them to rejuvenate his life? Why bother with the whole “possession” thingamajig?

(Side note: I just watched both Revenge of the Sith and Labyrinth of Evil over the past week, and your edit is once again a massive improvement, Hal. Brilliant work!)

As a closing thought, I don’t think Finn’s line of “How did you do that” really necessarily implies “spice running.” If anything, it implies that Poe had some past adventure (maybe with Zorii?) but it doesn’t matter what that was. But I’ll concede the point lost. Maybe I’ll trim the spice running stuff for my own personal version when Rey Nobody comes out. 😉

Jar Jar Bricks said:

I’m not opposed to removing the “anymore” in “that’s not you anymore”. Although, for some reason, I fail to understand what exactly that would accomplish. So I’m just kinda neutral about it.

If we removed “anymore,” as well as the “spice runner” quipping (which, these last few pages prove, is already divisive at best for how it subverts the emotional core of this section of the movie), it makes Poe’s entire backstory open-ended. The line then becomes: “Babu works for the crew, that’s not you.”

If you just want to watch the films and not bother with EU content, it means that Poe doesn’t run in the same circle as Babu and Zorii; he just knows them from some previous adventure he had. It doesn’t try to ret-con the brave (Hispanic) pilot as a former drug dealer.

If you prescribe to pre-Rise of Skywalker EU, it works with Poe’s backstory as the son of a respectable family, who grew up in a pro-Resistance environment.

If you decide to read up on post-Rise of Skywalker EU, it doesn’t contradict the idea that Poe may have worked with them at some point.

Basically, it opens up Poe’s history to whatever you want it to be, rather than try to narrow it down to something that only appeals to a specific subset of fans.

EDIT: Star Wars: Shattered Empire, Before the Awakening, Star Wars: Poe Dameron, and Resistance Reborn are all official EU entries that describe Poe’s backstory. All of them were published prior to Rise of Skywalker’s release, and none of them even mention spice-running, let alone the planet Kijimi. The only source Wookieepedia has for his drug-dealin’ days is TROS Visual Dictionary.

If we’re actually trying to stay true to EU material, we should cut the lines and keep it vague.

Hal, it’s up to you, ultimately. But I don’t think the EU should be a factor. If we use bbghost’s edit, and cut it to “Babu works for the crew. That’s not you.” It wouldn’t contradict anything that might come up in the EU down the line. BUT, it would help avoid what feels like a disjointed ret-con from the other two films regarding Poe’s backstory.

In other words, it would make the Hal9000 Sequel Trilogy more cohesive unto itself; while simultaneously avoiding closing off any doors to the EU. And actually, it would work even better with EU material that came out before TROS, which said he was raised in a well-to-do environment. Making him a Spice Runner actually restricts the EU much more.

If you leave it ambiguous, it’s the best of both worlds, really. Both sides of the issue are appeased.

That’s just my opinion.

…
That was weird.

Hijacking my previous comment rather than quadruple posting:

Jar Jar Bricks said:

I think a good example here is the death of Ben Kenobi in ANH. Luke grieves for him for maybe a minute, and then it’s back to “Great, kid. Don’t get cocky!”, screams of triumph, and a happy celebration for escaping. Does that disgrace Ben’s death? No, because eventually we find out he becomes a force ghost, so retroactively this type of behavior is more excusable right after his death.

Ben’s death is completely different though. The circumstances around it are different, the characters’ emotional ties to Ben are different, the way the characters “return” is completely different. Plus, Ghost Ben immediately started talking to Luke (“Run Luke, Run!”) - it wasn’t designed to be some big reveal to the characters later on like Chewie’s reveal was.

EDIT: Not to mention, in ANH, they were celebrating the fact that they defeated the TIE Fighters and escaped from the Empire’s Super-Duper weapon. That’s a bigger priority at the moment than Ben dying. Would anybody be expected to just sit around and mope while they’re under attack? The two scenes aren’t remotely comparable.

sherlockpotter said:

bbghost said:

For my $0.02c, here was my solution to the Zorri dialogue: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1akShjAvYRl98exDBBW9U53hnGTunE4th/view

You know, if we go with bbghost’s idea here, and just cut it slightly more to, “Babu only works for the crew. That’s not you anymore,” that solves the tonal dissonance issue, and the “Poe is retconned into a drug dealer” issue simultaneously.

We can just assume that Poe ran into Babu and Zorii during a past adventure, and get on with the story at hand without wasting any more time.

bbghost said:

For my $0.02c, here was my solution to the Zorri dialogue: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1akShjAvYRl98exDBBW9U53hnGTunE4th/view

You know, if we go with bbghost’s idea here, and just cut it slightly more to, “Babu only works for the crew. That’s not you anymore,” that solves the tonal dissonance issue, and the “Poe is retconned into a drug dealer” issue simultaneously.

We can just assume that Poe ran into Babu and Zorii during a past adventure, and get on with the story at hand without wasting any more time.

Jar Jar Bricks said:

sherlockpotter said:

If you think that two minutes is enough time to mourn the death of a cultural icon, then great.

Not what I’m suggesting. I’m saying that if the movie spends so much time on reminding the audience of Chewie’s death, then all of that time is spent ultimately for nothing (except a heightened sense of relief maybe). But relief only works on a first time viewing. And after a first time watcher sees the movie, they might think it was cheap to drag out the grief for that long only to go back on it. Two minutes is enough time for the characters to think an icon has just died.

I felt the same way after I watched ANH. Why did they waste all of that time establishing the Death Star as a threat if it was just going to be destroyed later on? What’s the point of Han and Leia flying through the asteroid field in ESB if they were just going to leave it a few minutes later? Why did we spend so long in ROTJ on the Emperor trying to tempt Luke to join him, if Luke ultimately didn’t?

Hell, why waste an entire trilogy on Kylo being evil, if he would eventually turn good?

The point is the journey, not the destination. Just because something didn’t have a specific payoff doesn’t mean the emotional investment was any less.

Jar Jar Bricks said:

sherlockpotter said:

The film should want you to feel sad that Chewie is dead, not, “Lol it’s fine! Here are some jokes!” The emotional beat doesn’t land if the film undermines it in the next scene - that’s the same exact reason why the Chewie Reveal scene was cut from Ascendant in the first place.

Interesting choice of words there: “the next scene”. If you take a look at the movie, the next scene is actually a whole grieving scene that takes place on the Falcon. As a result, the film has already accomplished making you feel sad. I believe what we’re arguing about is whether or not the film should remain on that grief for an extended period of time or keep the plot going without that weighing down its options (since he is actually still alive).

Oh sure, there’s the “Heroes Regroup” scene, which is all of two minutes long, and already has a bit of (much more gentle) humor when 3PO comes and holds Poe’s hand. If you think that two minutes is enough time to mourn the death of a cultural icon, then great. My point is that, as jarbear says, we’ve stretched out the delay until we learn that Chewie is actually alive. What if we allowed the emotional undercurrent to match? Then the relief comes when we learn Chewie isn’t actually dead, rather than when we learn that “PoE wAs A sPiCe RuNnEr.”

I believe what we’re arguing about is whether or not the film should remain on that grief for an extended period of time or keep the plot going without that weighing down its options (since he is actually still alive).

A) We don’t know he’s still alive. And B) The plot doesn’t get “weighed down” by having a moderately less flippant tone. It’s possible for a film to be serious and still move the plot forward.

I’m with jarbear on this one.

EDIT: bbghost, nice job with your edit! Looks like you had the same thought as MR.

Movies Remastered said:

Here’s the Zorii scene we were talking about https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/1413620/action/topic#1413620

I like it. I think it flows a lot better, honestly.

Jar Jar Bricks said:

I mean, the way I always interpreted it is that he knows Zorri would never actually shoot him. They had a thing going for a while there and he probably believes she’s just venting her frustrations at him.

Furthermore, I personally feel like it’s a good idea to try to make the audience feel a bit better after the last portion of the movie “killed off” a beloved character. Sure, maybe it isn’t right for the trio to be acting that upbeat but it might be what the audience needs to keep them invested until Chewie is revealed to still be alive.

Why do we want a film that coddles the audience? I’ve already said my piece about this, but I don’t think the film should be trying to make the audience feel better. The film should want you to feel sad that Chewie is dead, not, “Lol it’s fine! Here are some jokes!” The emotional beat doesn’t land if the film undermines it in the next scene - that’s the same exact reason why the Chewie Reveal scene was cut from Ascendant in the first place. The surface-level clash of showing that Chewie isn’t really dead has been removed; but the emotional clash of not being sad for him is still there.

The banter works in the moment (yeah, obviously Zorii isn’t going to shoot him in the head); but in the larger context of the film? It’s pretty horrendous.

Hal 9000 said:

The only thing there that I’m inclined to agree with is the reverence paid to Rey by Zorri saying she thinks she’s okay. However, I recall fielding that idea dozens or hundreds of pages ago and someone convinced me not to for reasons I can’t recall. I think it was so that Zorri doesn’t appear to only help them out of a gunpoint threat.

The line is god awful, but Hal makes a good point. Plus, I like the idea that Rey “cares” that someone else “thinks she’s okay,” considering how much guilt and uncertainty she’s feeling right now. (Look, guys! I’m defending the original script!!) Maybe it could be trimmed to just “You’re okay”? I don’t have strong feelings either way.

I’m still trying to find a way to re-contextualize Poe’s Spice-Runnin’ days. It’s tricky, because Zorri says exactly 266 words in the entire film. What an valuable character.

Hal 9000 said:

Maybe Luke hallucinated a second Sun as he was dying from focusing so hard.

The novelization suggests that the Ach-To scene begins near dusk, continues overnight, and ends with the sunrise. If that can be realized well and without making the scene difficult to see, it could be a good way to imply a longer stay on the planet. Especially now that the 16-hour ticking clock has been removed. Yeah they’re in a hurry, but that specific element is gone.

That’s exactly what I always thought until I looked it up on Wookieepedia just now! I mean, heck, I even double checked the “Rey wakes up” shot, and I only see one sun. Maybe I miscounted.

Although, it does make you wonder how TROS’s official story goes through an entire night cycle in, what, 10 hours? Alien planet, I suppose.

The tricky thing about dimming this scene would be, like you mentioned, Hal, making the light sources still effectively “generating” light. Luke won’t just have to be (less) blue; he’ll have to literally glow. The fire, the sun(s)…it might be tricky to pull off convincingly.

EDIT: If we do want to go this route, I think we should ignore the novelization about the scene lasting from dusk to dawn. I think it would be more visually intelligible to simply go from nighttime to daybreak. The scene is only a few minutes long, and I’m worried it will feel oddly paced to try and display an entire night in those few minutes. (Plus, it feels more symbolic to me.)

Huh, I just re-watched the scene and you’re right, the sun is just peeking over the horizon at that moment. So, at what time of day does the scene actually take place? I guess it’s right before sunset?

Granted, the two suns are only visible in one shot in TLJ; every other time, it seems like a uniform light source. I honestly thought it was just a clever metaphor until I looked it up just now. If more effort wants to go into coloring that scene, I guess it should just be about what feels most natural, rather than trying to chart two different stars across the sky.

Hal 9000 said:

I’m not sold, but it would introduce a sunRISE.

It’d have to be subtle enough not to make the scene hard to see. The fire and everything would need to look bright.

Oh man, would it be possible to get a sunrise effect right as the X-Wing is floating upwards? That could look really nice.

jarbear said:

Hal 9000 said:

Here’s sherlockpotter’s medal shot and placement in a full test, LUTs applied and everything else the way it will be in the final:

https://vimeo.com/517559221

Bro … Nice.

Thanks, man!

I appreciate everyone’s feedback during the process to get it right!

I’m kind of leaning towards Ghost Hayden as well, honestly. Shaw feels appropriate in ROTJ because that’s the version that Luke knew. Palpatine has a stronger correlation with Hayden though, in my mind. Plus, the audience is more familiar with Hayden’s face (doubly so if they only see the Special Edition ROTJ); and I like the idea of tying all three trilogies together in one shot. It feels more powerful to me.

I’m still trying to finalize the Medal Insert coloring. I have one version that’s designed to (hopefully) have a beaming effect, and one that’s a bit more flat and constant. Do people have a preference which one?

Beam: https://i.imgur.com/DynQOUH.png
Flat: https://i.imgur.com/TC2woJB.png

(The beam of light is directly above the medal.)

True, but…Luke didn’t seem to know Obi-Wan as well as Rey knew Chewie. (“Just some old hermit living past the Dune Sea.”) Plus, Luke wasn’t directly responsible for Obi-Wan’s death, and he had Obi-Wan’s voice in his head urging him to action. But that’s all nitpicks.

The real thing for me at least, is that Chewie to us is a character who’s been around for 40+ years. He’s one of only a few characters that’s been in every trilogy. The audience knows and loves him; I personally grew up knowing Chewbacca. The movie doesn’t just disrespect Rey’s (should be) mourning of the character’s apparent demise; it disrespects the audience’s. The audience knew Ben Kenobi for approximately…60 minutes? We’ve known Chewbacca for up to 40 years. We should be feeling that pain. I don’t think there should be another joke in the film until cute little Babu Frik comes into frame.

I’ve also been discovering that every time I look closely at a scene for this edit, the more issues I find with each scene. That’s on me, I admit it. Can’t imagine that’s healthy.

Rey quips too; but my issue is more from an external/writing/tone perspective anyway.

I realize I’ve been harder on this movie than a lot of you. That’s fine. Really. I’m just trying to think of ways to add more gravitas, more weight to the “killing Chewie” moment. It’s definitely helped a lot by removing the Hux/Chewie Reveal scene; but the three of them joking so soon afterwards just feels…disingenuous to me. I think Rey should still be agonizing over what she’s done. There’s a reason she “cares” that Zorii “thinks she’s alright.” - She needs to be comforted. She’s conflicted, and scared, and depressed. She just accidentally murdered her friend mere moments ago. How will she live with herself? How will she ever be able to move on?

“Seriously, you were a spice runner?”

(A compromise could be keeping Finn and Poe’s lines - they’re forcing themselves to be upbeat for Rey’s sake - but trimming Rey’s and Poe’s exchange. Still doesn’t quite have the right tone for me from the audience’s perspective - the audience should still be mourning Chewie as well; but again, it’s not just about me.)

Movies Remastered said:

sherlockpotter said:

Hal, I’m sure there will be 15 books published in the next 10 years about Poe and Keri Russell having a fling while running spice. The EU never disappoints 😉

I’m thinking something like this:

ZORII: Babu? Babu only works with the crew. That’s not you anymore.

REY: What crew?

ZORII: Oh, funny he never mentioned it. Your friend’s old job was running spice, “until we learned he was a spy for” (The Resistance) [pulled from a few lines down]

FINN: You were a spice runner?

POE: You were a stormtrooper?

REY: Were you a spice runner?

POE: Were you a scavenger? We could do this all night.

ZORII: You don’t have all night. You know, I’m still digging out of the hole you put me in when you left to join the Resistance. You. You’re the one they’re looking for. Bounty for her just might cover us.

(We can play around with it, Jar Jar; but I’m not sure how well it will fit if he was just playing a part. And personally, I think this particular banter feels a little awkward anyway. Unlike the rest of the script, which sounds like it was written by Aaron Sorkin.)

I filmed a video showing that very scene yesterday. 👍🏼

Dude, really? Ha! Just please don’t burn yourself out on this movie!

I guess the lines could still work in context, I just…I don’t know. I’m wondering if, given that we still don’t know Chewie is alive, and he only just died, it may be too soon for quips. Literally 10 seconds ago, these characters were mourning the death of a Star Wars icon. Now they’re cracking jokes in the middle of an occupation zone.

I almost feel like they have enough banter during the rest of the film. Can’t they take a scene to be serious for once? Chewie is dead! This isn’t a game anymore.