wrkerr

While I do understand your reasons for removing the scene, I am in favor of reinstating it.

In addition to the allusion you mentioned regarding the screams, I also think the scene serves to show the depth of Anakin’s fall to evil. There is a similar heinous act of evil committed by the primary antagonist in TFA, which shows a similar detachment from humanity by way of unconscionable violence (I’m intentionally being vague). This parallel I think is a strong one, and merits keeping the scene in ep4.

The modified presentation you outlined seems like a good compromise.

That’s just my two cents though. I’d be curious to hear others’ thoughts.

FanEdit is the place to go for current info.

For the OT, most of us recommend the despecialized editions by Harmy. They are fantastic restorations of the original theatrical releases. Another popular edition is kk650’s semi specialized OT. He has kept some of the improvements Lucas made over the years, but reverted all of the important or controversial things back to their original state.

I hope you enjoy!

Practically Yoda, I am.

I’m sure she would have been even more aware of the abrupt transition in the theatrical release.

No worries about v4 being out after TFA… I’ve seen enough of your work that I’m confident it will be a fantastic edit. I’m just eager to start seeding v4 when they are out. 😃

My crew (which has watched your edits of ep1 and ep2 thus far) are hardly film critics, but they all really enjoyed them.

Your changes in ep1 are golden. Honestly, I would have been happy to never see ep1 again, but your edits actually made it a pretty enjoyable movie for me. Especially the trimming of the pod race and the Jar Jar antics, and the removal of the Gungan city. You have successfully elevated ep1 from “worst in the saga” to “second worst in the saga.” lol

That brings me to ep2… the new worst film in the Star Wars universe (since you were able to improve ep1 so much). My wife, who had seen all of the theatrical versions once or twice before but wasn’t overly familiar with them, did comment on how abrupt and artificial the romantic development between Anakin and Padmé was. I think the inclusion of the family scene helped mitigate that some, but obviously you can only do so much with the material available. I’m thankful you found a way to include the extended Naboo arrival scene in your v4 as well, as I suspect that may help some too.

The exclusion of the Yoda/Dooku lightsaber battle was met with mixed feelings. My brother-in-law and I both have fond memories of seeing that scene in the theater as the one highlight of the otherwise boring film. After talking and thinking about the reasons you gave for removing it, I concluded that I agree with your choice to exclude it, but I am still torn about it. I know my boys would have loved to see that scene.

Overall in ep2, your edits went a long way to clean up some of the awful acting, and improved the incredibly boring pace some, but when you boil it down, it’s still a downright dull movie with a confusing yet mostly pointless plot. I’m thankful for your improvements in it, but it really only exists to get you from ep1 to ep3, with very few redeeming qualities.

We are really looking forward to seeing your edit of ep3. My plan it to watch it Friday evening, because I have tickets to see ep7 with my oldest son on Saturday afternoon. Is there any chance v4 will be ready by then? 😃

I’ll try to get on this weekend to give you my thoughts on ep3.

That is correct, but rest assured that v3 is a quality release as well. It did not feel like a rough cut, or anything like that. I just watched ep2 last night with my family, and we all were really impressed. My brother in law, who hasn’t seen ep2 in a while, said he wouldn’t have known it was a fan edit if I hadn’t told him.

Great work, Hal 9000! I think your edits really went a long way toward making the movie enjoyable, in spite of its many flaws. I can’t wait to see your edit of ep3 (which we’ll be watching Friday night, in since we’re seeing ep7 Saturday).

I’m new here. I didn’t know alternate SW restoration projects or fan edits existed until just a few weeks ago. When I discovered them, I decided to watch through the saga with my family in preparation for TFA.

We just finished Harmy’s Despecialized OT Saturday. Next we plan to watch Hal 9000’s prequel trilogy. I am so excited to see the fan edits, as I’ve been reluctant to rewatch the PT at all. An edited version, I think, will make a big improvement.

I wanted to watch them in what I suppose would be considered Rister order (4, 5, 1, 2, 3, 6), but thought that might add some confusion, since my boys are pretty young. My younger two boys frequently confuse the names of Luke and Anakin, and Leia and Padme, so the flashback structure would likely be too hard to follow for them. I think release order will be easier for them to follow this time around.

I shared it with the biggest SW fan I know, explaining only that the two were being considered for inclusion in a fan edit of ep2, for the purpose of adding depth to the Padme/Anakin relationship, but with a desire to minimize boring dialogue and bad acting.

This was his response:

Between the two, if only one can be chosen, i would go for the first one, their arrival on Naboo. I think it does a better job at setting up why she would be interested in having a romantic life and a family, and brings out the tension of her work vs. personal life, which is the struggle that Anakin also faces. Overall I think it’s the better scene story wise to set up and help explain where things will end up.

After watching them through once, I can see why you’re torn. Much more is more content is make their relationship believable and both scenes provide a bit of development, but they are not without their problems.

My first impression is in favor of the “Extended Arrival” scene. I too like the mention of her sister’s children and the talk of wanting a family. In the other scene, the dialogue between Anakin and Padme’s father seem very amateurish.

I’m not settled on it though. I’d say I’m 60% in favor of the “Extended Arrival,” and 40% in favor of “Padme’s Parents’ House.” I hope some others can share their impressions.

I’m not familiar enough with the scenes to have an opinion, but I’d be happy to preview a rough cut video and share my thoughts.

I think I agree. Each option has some pro’s and con’s, but none are a clear winner in my opinion, and the whole scene is unavoidably awkward no matter what you do. So I think it makes the most sense to take the conservative route and leave it as is.

There is only one explanation… Lucas’s artistic decisions stopped making logical or coherent sense in the mid 80’s. Maybe he ran out of midi-chlorians.

Thanks for the fast response! I’ll confer with FanEdit.info to make sure I’m getting the right downloads, and I completely understand about the subtitles issue. Personally, I would be interested in English subtitles, but I understand that it would be a laborious task, with relatively few people really benefiting.

My boys are young (probably too young for SW, in some peoples’ opinions). The oldest is five, and he is really engaged in the movies so far. My three-year-old is enjoying it too, and he keeps asking when he’s going to see Darth Vader, but ever since that Dagobah dark side vision scene in ESB, he’s been somewhat apprehensive… perhaps it was too spooky for him. My two-year-old just really loves Yoda. 😃

I’ll be sure to share our impressions after we watch your edits, though I’m not expecting a sophisticated critique from my boys. Hopefully my wife and I can provide some more helpful feedback.

Honestly, I’m just so happy to be able to really enjoy all of this with my family. I really feel like Lucas did such a disservice to his fans, you (and others here) have really recovered something quite special for me. Thank you.

Thanks for this amazing project. I am so excited to watch this through with my boys. 😃

I’m new to fan edits… I stumbled upon Harmy’s DE of the OT a couple weeks ago and got so excited, I decided I’d watch through the whole series with my family, leading up to the release of the new movie. This is my boys’ first time seeing the movies. We just finished ESB, and we’ll probably watch RotJ this weekend, and then be ready for Ep1 next week.

After reading several descriptions and reviews, I feel pretty confident that your PT edit is set we’re going to watch, because your goals make the most sense to me.

That being said, would it be possible for you to provide the checksum of the latest revisions of each file for each movie on the three original posts? I’m trying to track down torrents for all of them, but don’t have access to MySpleen, so making sure I am downloading the latest revision isn’t always easy, especially since the latest version number isn’t even clear on your first posts. Simply searching for a checksum would be much simpler and more accurate.

Also, once you have your final versions of each movie are done and “set,” would a subtitle project be feasible? Is that something that any fan edits have?

Nevertheless, thanks to you, Harmy, and all the others here that are doing this amazing work, I can honestly say I haven’t been this excited about Star Wars since May 19, 1999, the day I went to see Ep1 in the theater (and found myself sorely disappointed). Thank you so much!