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Star Wars Abridged — 9 films cut to 3 (new preview for sequel 3-in-1 available)

subjectzero

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@Zarius I've learned quite a lot about the narrative nature of Star Wars by doing all three 3-in-1s to compare and contrast. It actually made me warm up to the prequels a bit more in that it's very apparent the prequels were better conceived as a trilogy (or I'd argue a duology) than the other two. I still think it was the least well executed, but definitely better thought out in broad strokes which becomes very apparent when you're trimming it down to a single movie.

Glad you enjoyed it! The work continues apace for the other two films! In the middle of a spotting session for a final edit of Abridged II!
 

subjectzero

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Finished my final pass of Star Wars: Abridged II - The Rebellion. I still need to go over all the transitions one more time and check since Davinci Resolve has this annoying tendency to sometimes glitch audio transitions when I make some edits. Quite happy with this one and it means I'm circling toward Abridged III - The Resistance for a couple of passes... I think it needs the most work so it'll take a bit more time to finish.
 

Zarius

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@subjectzero Left you a review on IFDB. It's just a copy/paste of the one I gave here, nothing really new to add, but I hope it does the job of interesting more people to check your edit out
 

subjectzero

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@Zarius thank you so much for that and all your support on these edits! Just one person enjoying it makes it all worth it!
 

subjectzero

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Great news e'rybody! Star Wars: Abridged II - The Rebellion is complete! Clocks in at 3 hours and 35 minutes and here's the broad-strokes of all the changes:
  • Cold open which truncates the battle of Scarif
  • New scroll text to say “Abridged II: The Rebellion”
  • Inserted the scene from Rogue One between Krenic and Tarkin overseeing construction of the Death Star and tried to keep all of it from being visible because…
  • There’s only 1 Death Star and that’s the uncompleted one from RotJ. It’s still being built throughout this edit. Consequently…
  • Alderaan isn’t destroyed. Tarkin, in command of a Super Star Destroyer, bombards the planet from orbit
  • The rebel base is located on Hoth, not Yavin, which is where we transition into ESB
  • The Wampa sequence is removed entirely
  • The Battle of Hoth has been completely changed. Luke is no longer a part of the snowspeeder battle (which still takes place) but, rather, part of a space battle happening in orbit around Hoth. This new space battle was created using footage from the battle of Yavin, battle of Scarif, and a small bit from battle of Endor
  • Luke hears Obi Wan telling him to go to Dagobah while in the cockpit
  • At the same time, Vader feels the force in him from the bridge of a Star Destroyer (the force is strong with this one)
  • The asteroid chase sequence has been removed (more about why later)
  • Bespin has been re-edited so that Han escapes with Leia and the rest
  • No Jabba side story
  • Footage from Luke healing from his Wampa adventure is now a post Vader duel scene set on a starship at the Sollust system rendezvous with the fleet
  • The Han/Leia kiss happens here instead as they’re repairing the Falcon in Home One’s hangerbay
  • Luke leaves the fleet to go back to Dagobah
  • The battle plan for taking out the Death Star don’t include the ground battle
  • Han pilots the Falcon in the final battle at Endor and takes out the Death Star. The footage from the asteroid chase has been repurposed here
  • A new ending has been put together using footage from Rise of Skywalker
full
Only one more fan edit to finish off! I think it'll take a bit longer to wrap up Abridged III due to it being the roughest cut of the three and the amount of splicing and plot changes.
 

Zarius

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Thanks for sending me a copy @subjectzero

While your prequel edit was a great little 3-in-1 that tackled the baseline of that trilogy, this was where the meat of your overall saga starts to tenderise...and boy was it worth the heartache and hard work. This was such a great film to watch from start to finish.

I was bowled over by how darn COMPLETE it was, you left breathing space for all of the pay offs, the themes all make sense, Luke's growth over a span of hours feels just as rewarding as spending three films with him going through this, his Jedi training and his youthful naivety is far more logically structured when they're paced back to back rather than months and months later like in the gap between A New Hope and Empire.

It also makes perfect sense for the Death Star to be in a continuous state of construction and not resemble it's trademark 'whole' self, it lends itself well to scenes from A New Hope where they're discussing the Death Star's vulnerabilities.

Han and Leia's blossoming love story is a real highlight, no longer feeling like we missed any information at the beginning of Empire, the romance is founded in the first act, goes through some teething in the second, and blossoms in the third.

I kicked myself recognising beats from Empire, and then seeing so many swerves with the narrative. It was just an epic sort of editing, really taking a creative approach, Han escaping his carbonite fate entirely has rarely been a concept utilised by other editors, with yours being amongst the first, and perhaps even the best at it so far unless I'm missing any.

The bridging of Luke heading to Dagobah and the battle over Hoth was smartly crafted, I like the idea of Luke involved in an X-Wing dogfight that doesn't require the Death Star trench, there's so little of them besides A New Hope.

(I initially deleted this bit but since Subjectzero caught it before my edit, I'll put it back in)

Ending is really good, and definitely functions...but the Yoda voiceover is lost a bit in the echo.

I found no hard cuts, no quick cuts, no extra frames, nothing, the editing was of a very consistent and professional standard.

I hope this review of your current version is helpful, and I would stress to the academy and any other viewers that this is highly recommended in it's present version and a rich and rewarding remix of a very familiar and cherished story. Subject has worked tirelessly on this edit and his progress has been one of my real privileges to experience. Without a doubt he's creating a very different kind of movie and has taken tremendous chances.
 
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Zarius

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To be honest, if you have problems with the Yoda voice over, you can just remove it and let the final scene play out as it is, it works fine with or without the VO.
 

subjectzero

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Just did another quick pass of Abridged 3. I thought I would make more changes as I went through all the transition points but it wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. Still need to do a full watch of the film again for some spotting but it looks like this is getting close to release and my trilogy will be complete.

To be honest, if you have problems with the Yoda voice over, you can just remove it and let the final scene play out as it is, it works fine with or without the VO.
Yeah, I think I'm just going to get rid of it completely. It's not a necessary line and I think the ending will be better without it.
 

Zarius

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@subjectzero I know you haven't sent me the absolute final version just yet, but I went ahead and posted my review to IFDB based on the prior version anyway (leaving out the Yoda critique since you've presumably fixed it now)
 

Racerx1969

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I'm in the middle of watching Abridged II and found one glitchy transition during the Obi-Wan/Vader duel. There's a quick cut to stormtroopers running then back to the duel and it gets all pixelated like you see when a live sports broadcast briefly loses connection to the cameras (thinking auto or bike racing coverage). It almost looks like some stray frames in a viewpoint cut for the duel.
 

subjectzero

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I'm in the middle of watching Abridged II and found one glitchy transition during the Obi-Wan/Vader duel. There's a quick cut to stormtroopers running then back to the duel and it gets all pixelated like you see when a live sports broadcast briefly loses connection to the cameras (thinking auto or bike racing coverage). It almost looks like some stray frames in a viewpoint cut for the duel.
Hrm. That's in the edit but not in the source material... Seems like its a DaVince Resolve thing. Hrm. I'll see if I can somehow fix that.... thanks for pointing it out!
 
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visualpaul

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I think I found a small flaw in the prequel edit. During the "I sense a plot to destroy the Jedi" scene, Grievous is mentioned, even though he is not mentioned elsewhere in the film
 

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Loving the sound of this trilogy, did you end up finishing up the third film? I'm downloading the first two now to check out over the weekend!
 

Zarius

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Watching it now....there's an awful lot of instances where the video appears to slow down a fraction or two.

I've had that happen sometimes with drafts of mine and I always have to save it in another type and re-render it from there to keep everything stable.

There's a few moments also where hard edits occur just as some tracks are beginning to play.

Narrative is top-notch though, I can't fault that. You've weaved a very tight story together and you go well above the norm to make your vision come to life.
 
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