Thor: The Dark World - Converged Edition

[Bobson Dugnutt]

There was a lot of tampering and rearranging and shuffling around a lot of stuff in Thor 2's editing as the theatrical cut is rife with continuity errors and over dubbed shots, and reshoots. This extended cut is trying to mildly move stuff back around in the first act to maybe how it was in a version of the film pre-release. I'll break down some changes here. 

THEATRICAL STRUCTURE
- Loki in Chains with Odin
- Thor in Vanaheim (shortened)
- Thor and Odin talk 
- Celebrating the Vanaheim victory (shortened)
- Jane's date (shortened)
- Driving with Darcy
- Investigating the floating truck, Jane Gets the Aether
- Dark Elves wake up
- Thor talks to Heimdel about Jane, and goes to Earth
- Thor bring Jane back to Asgard
- Malekith and Algrim on Svartalfheim
- Some stuff with Jane and Thor on Asgard
- Algrim gets the Kursed rock from Malekith
- The Warriors Three arrive with prisoners, with Algrim as well
- Loki and Frigga Talk 


ATTEMPTED RESTRUCTURE
- Loki in Chains with Odin
- Jane's date (extended)
- Driving with Darcy
- Dark Elves wake up
- Investigating the floating truck, Jane Gets the Aether
- Malekith and Algrim on Svartalfheim
- Algrim gets the Kursed rock from Malekith
- Thor in Vanaheim (extended)
- The Warriors Three arrive with prisoners, with Algrim as well
- Loki and Frigga Talk 
- Thor and Frigga Talk
- Thor and Odin talk 
- Celebrating the Vanaheim victory (extended)
- Thor talks to Heimdel about Jane, and goes to Earth
- Thor bring Jane back to Asgard

The new structure is a lot slower and means we don't met Thor until about 19 minutes in. It's my best attempt to possible re-create what a pre-release cut could of been, taking hints from the deleted scenes and @"TM2YC"'s own thread on Thor 2. It makes sense why they're restructured it to bring Thor forward a lot more. But I feel there is still missing material with the Dark Elves, as hinted by the "Dark Elves Prepare for Battle" deleted scene, as I believe that it followed another scene of Malekith discovering the Aether's resting place empty. But I have no evidence to suggest such a thing was shot, just a hunch based on the dialogue. 

Anyway, here's just a lost of the other deleted stuff

- Extended Jane's date with Chris O'Dowd
- Extended Vanaheim sequence
- Thor talks to Frigga regarding Loki
- Extended celebration scene with Volstagg telling a tale of their victory
- Jane messes with an infomation beam in the Hall of Science, disrupting some Asagrdians
- Alternate Frigga death, as Odin is now present when she dies
- Alternate scene of Jane alone in the Hall of Science as she's taken by Asgardian guards, Thor is now there as they talk about the Aether 
- Alternate ending as Odin is on Earth, as Jane and Thor break up
- Thor also oversees Asgardian army training, in a very king-ish position. 

Current cut runs at 2:03:21 compared to the Theatrical 1:52:08. There's only 3 unused scenes at this point, being Loki's Correnation, Dark Elves Prepare for Battle and News Report. 

Loki's Correnation has some unfinished effects and generally messes with the already messy timeline in the first act, Dark Elves Prepare for Battle just doesn't work in this cut of the film anymore and the news report is just useless and boring. If there is anything usuable from a trailer or a TV spot or a VFX reel or anything, let me know and I'll try my best to use it in some form. 

Title suggestions also welcome as always. 

Here's a work in progress of the alternate Frigga death. Still working on putting the final shots from the film into the deleted scene and the audio is still all over the place. 

And the new ending, which still needed mixing together with the theatrical ending somehow, I'm not too certain how, but I'll figure it out I'm sure

 

[TM2YC]

I hadn't realised how many new deleted scenes had surfaced since my old edit. I always knew there must be loads more but wow.

^ There is some odd frame blending going on at about 01.22.

You're not going to use those unfinished blue screen shots are you?

 

[Bobson Dugnutt]

I hadn't realised how many new deleted scenes had surfaced since my old edit. I always knew there must be loads more but wow.

There's stuff on the Phase 2 boxset, the newer Infinity Saga boxset, and even some exclusive to Movies Anywhere that I can't use. With the final runtime being under an hour, I'm not shocked there is such an amount like this.

You're not going to use those unfinished blue screen shots are you?

Gosh no not in this form. I'll see what I can do about putting in a new background since there are heaps of good shots of Asgard to choose from. The shot is nice and clear for the most part so it shouldn't be much of a problem. If not then I'll cut it. I'm considering going straight from the Earth scene to the theatrical ending with Thor/Odin and then just ending it from there and not using the little training scene. The ending is still greatly in flux.

 

[The Danger Zone]

Goodness gracious, man! How many of these EEs are you going to churn out?

 

[hbenthow]

If I recall right, at least one of the deleted scenes has a few shots in common with the movie, but graded differently. If you plan to regrade either the movie or the deleted scenes so that they match each other, you might be able to take screenshots of the exact same frames from the theatrical and deleted versions of a shot, and create a LUT with them using Dr Dre's Color Matching Tool.

 

[Malthus]

Really interested in this project Hobson. I like your proposed restructure and choice of deleted scenes. Great job so far.

 

[Bobson Dugnutt]

Really interested in this project Hobson. I like your proposed restructure and choice of deleted scenes. Great job so far.

Hopefully it works out, the Loki scene is a little out of place since it was confirmed to be apart of the reshoots and doesn't make sense in this timeline fully. But hey it works. 

If I recall right, at least one of the deleted scenes has a few shots in common with the movie, but graded differently. If you plan to regrade either the movie or the deleted scenes so that they match each other, you might be able to take screenshots of the exact same frames from the theatrical and deleted versions of a shot, and create a LUT with them using Dr Dre's Color Matching Tool.

The extended Vanahiem sequence shares some of the same footage with the theatrical cut, but there is still some stuff missing like Algrim in the battle which I think was shown in some B-Roll somewhere. I've matched it up as best I could. 

Another clip, I've tried to incorperate the deleted footage that was resused in Avengers: Endgame. It's apart of a longer deleted scene only avalible on Movies Anywhere. 

Here's my attempt to remove Rocket from the scene as well, and use an extra shot of Asgard from Ragnarok to imply a passage of time. I'm considering using another one or two from somewhere so it works a little better. 

 

[lifeincontext]

I'm super stoked about this edit!  I worked a bit on a mixed ending for this as well using the alternate footage.  Looking forward to seeing what you do with it!

 

[The Danger Zone]

@"Bobson Dugnutt", I have a title suggestion:
Thor: The Darker World

 

[Malthus]

@"Bobson Dugnutt", I have a title suggestion:
Thor: The Darker World

I had plans to do a dark world edit entitled 'Darkest World' but that's on hold since the majority of what I had planned to do is going to appear in Bobson's edit. I even knocked up some proto artwork (see below) I'm more than happy to donate the art and the name to the edit.

 

[Bobson Dugnutt]

While I don't mind the title, I don't wanna take that from you as I'm sure your own edit would be different as mine isn't really cutting anything or fixing the little things here and there that need fixing. 

As for posters, I was thinking something like these 

 

A lot of the other posters are very busy and don't look as nice, so these were a little neater in my opinion.

A workprint has been rendered and uploaded, as the theatrical ending is not present in any form right now, with the post credits scene being the end of TM2YC's own Hard Forged Edition, as an Asgardian Soldier turns out to be Loki.

If you want to watch it, let me know in one form or another

 

[Malthus]

As for posters, I was thinking something like these

Of the two I thing the first is more stoking, I really like its simplicity and the vibrant colours. Funnily enough @"DigModiFicaTion" recently challenged me to take a crack at rescoring Thor 2 with a classic rock aesthetic to inject a little Ragnarok energy into it. How were the audio channels? Was there much musical bleedthrough? Looking forward to watching the workprint.

 

[lapis molari]

@"Bobson Dugnutt", why not incorporate the Movies Anywhere deleted scenes? I love the clip where Thor tells Jane to give the kids their ball back. It's a sweet but clear reminder that Asgard has incredible technological advances over Earth.

Also, this is your second edit recently that has me thinking whether "extended edition" is the correct label. With the changes you're making (for the better! Thank you!), this is better categorized as a FanFix than an Extended edit. Don't worry, you'll still be FE's reigning champion of extended editions!

 

[hbenthow]

Of the two I thing the first is more stoking, I really like its simplicity and the vibrant colours. Funnily enough @"DigModiFicaTion" recently challenged me to take a crack at rescoring Thor 2 with a classic rock aesthetic to inject a little Ragnarok energy into it. How were the audio channels? Was there much musical bleedthrough? Looking forward to watching the workprint.

The faneditor Sheepish did an edit like that. It's called "Thor: Convergence". He used "God of Thunder" by KISS in two scenes (the Vanaheim battle and the final battle with Malekith), and a couple of other rock songs here and there. He also regraded the whole movie to be more colorful, removed all of Malekith's dialogue to make him a silent villain, added some effects to make Malekith use the Aether to alter reality (conjuring up snow, then turning the snowflakes into buzzing flies), and added an amazing bit where Malekith uses the Aether to morph his head to look like Frigga and mocks Thor.

Here's a video that shows the reality manipulation and the Frigga bit, which also features the "God of Thunder" rescore (you can skip to 3 minute point, that's where the clips begin):

 

[Bobson Dugnutt]

How were the audio channels? Was there much musical bleedthrough? Looking forward to watching the workprint.

I think it was okay for some scenes, the music would mainly disappear, but others would be a bit overbearing sadly

T is your second edit recently that has me thinking whether "extended edition" is the correct label. With the changes you're making (for the better! Thank you!), this is better categorized as a FanFix than an Extended edit. Don't worry, you'll still be FE's reigning champion of extended editions!

Halloween and Thor 3 might be considered FanFixes as well really, as they do a little bit more like these with moving and cutting things out. This Thor 2 edit more than those seems more in line with a FanFix so I might list it accordingly

 

[lifeincontext]

I'm really liking a lot of the new scenes you incorporated.  Excited to see them in their finished form.

There are a couple of moments in the restructure (mainly in the first act) so far that feel awkward.  I know there's probably transitional material that isn't available, so thank you for doing your best to replicate it.  

I did notice there was a scene that didn't work because the guy who got the Kursed stone was in it, and by that time, he had already been taken to Asgard.  I think it was the scene where he and Malekeith are on their homeworld and Malekeith picks up a handful of dirt.

Anyways, excited to see where this goes!

 

[Bobson Dugnutt]

I'm really liking a lot of the new scenes you incorporated.  Excited to see them in their finished form.

There are a couple of moments in the restructure (mainly in the first act) so far that feel awkward.  I know there's probably transitional material that isn't available, so thank you for doing your best to replicate it.  

I did notice there was a scene that didn't work because the guy who got the Kursed stone was in it, and by that time, he had already been taken to Asgard.  I think it was the scene where he and Malekeith are on their homeworld and Malekeith picks up a handful of dirt.

Anyways, excited to see where this goes!

The first act is definitely a bit ehh still, I need to add new subtitles for the Elves to try and create something new and workable for those scenes. TM2YC also made new subtitles for the scenes, so I might look into the Hard Forged Edition to see what I can borrow. 

And as for the handful of dirt scene, somehow I missed that too. It's been moved back to the start of the film just before Algrim gets the Kursed stone stabbed into him. Now Thor isn't in the film until almost 21 minutes, bit slower. I might also change things up a little more and combine the prologue into Odin's exposition dump in the Hall of Science, but not too sure yet.  

Is there anything else awkward in that first act, or anywhere else for that matter that could use fixing?

 

[Bobson Dugnutt]

Here's the Dark Elves scenes back to back with new subtitles transitioning into the Vanaheim sequence. 

 

[hbenthow]

The first act is definitely a bit ehh still, I need to add new subtitles for the Elves to try and create something new and workable for those scenes. TM2YC also made new subtitles for the scenes, so I might look into the Hard Forged Edition to see what I can borrow.

You might also want to check out Sheepish's edit "Thor: Convergence", which might give you a few additional ideas. Sheepish completely re-worked the motivations of the Dark Elves with new subtitles and other changes. Since the Aether is the Reality Stone, he changed their plan to be more ambitious. In his version, they intend to manipulate reality so that Asgard will have never defeated the Dark Elves in the first place, and their fallen warriors will have never died. He also added special effects to make Malekith manipulate reality in some scenes.
 

Here's the Dark Elves scenes back to back with new subtitles transitioning into the Vanaheim sequence. 

If I'm not mistaken, the subtitles at 1:02 should read "And you shall be as the stroke of midnight" (assuming that Algrim is being described as being metaphorically similar to the stroke of midnight, which I believe is the intention). Those at 1:32 should read "Burning until the flames consume your body" (the flames are plural). Also, at 0:52, there should probably be a comma between "The time has come" and "my lord".

I also noticed that "shall" and "will" are interchangeably used without any particular grammatical logic. Traditionally, "will" expresses a mere eventuality or desire (I will get some coffee"), while "shall" is an imperative or command ("You shall not go to the ball!"). As the old joke goes:
  

A foreign tourist was swimming in an English lake. Taken by cramps, he began to sink. He called out for help:

“Attention! Attention! I will drown and no one shall save me!”

Many people were within earshot, but, being well-brought up Englishmen and women, they honored his wishes and permitted him to drown.

 

[Bobson Dugnutt]

I'd like to do something more radical with the film, but for the time being I'm alright with moving around some scenes and adding others. The Sheepish Edit looks great, but it's not something that I want to go with in my own edit. 

And with the subtitles, they were hotly debated in TM2YC's own thread (the Convergence or The Convergence?) and I'm happy with the wording so they'll mostly be here to stay besides my own gramatical errors. Although I do love the joke you shared. 

In other news, I finally got access to Movies Anywhere though an American contact, so I was able to buy the film again and capture the exclusive deleted scenes such as this one, with a fun new action scene with Thor and Loki.

I'll try to get the 'Jane Wakes Up in Asgard' to fit with the Avengers: Endgame footage, and hopefully it will line up alright with the final film too.