Adywans Star Wars Purist Edition Miami
.The Phantom Edit coverSubtitled The Phantom Edit, the original VHS edit circulated around Hollywood and garnered praise from the likes of Kevin Smith (who at one time was rumored to be The Phantom Editor himself) and even a kind of off-hand approval from Lucasfilm themselves. Nichols cut around 18 minutes from the film, mostly consisting of the juvenile humor of Jar-Jar Binks, the chatter of Battle Droids and young Anakin’s more childish moments.
He also trimmed superfluous story elements (for example the detour through “the planet core”), reduced the amount of politics (which no-one really cared about) and removed the introduction of midichlorians (which everyone thought was a stupid idea). Later on, an updated (and further improved) version was released via the internet with a fascinating commentary track where Nichols explains his reasoning and motives, including why Jar-Jar is just not obliterated from the entire film. He is needed in the same way that the Ewoks are need in Jedi, for the big battle at the finale, but what has been masterfully removed are his scene-stealing antics – the dive into the lake, the long-tongue fruit grabbing, etc. – that can often take away the emotional aspect of a scene.The Phantom Edit opened up the floodgates and Lucasfilm’s “leave them to it” attitude encouraged other faneditors to fire up their computers and get cutting.
Adywans Star Wars Purist Edition Miami Fl
Currently on the Internet Fanedit Database, alone there are a total of 89 different versions of the six Star Wars. Each editor brings their own ideas to the table, and sometimes they see a bit that someone else has done, borrow it, and add a bit more – but always crediting the original source or inspiration. Some of them take the movies in completely different directions, others try to bring them back to the films we all grew up on, still more offer a look behind the scenes of the filming process. Even the celebs are getting in on it with actor Topher Grace’s – but he won’t let anyone but his friends see it!So what follows is a roundup of our favorite ones; please do let us know of any others that you think are worth a look.Harmy’s Despecialized Edition CoverFor the purist:After all of Lucas’ tinkering, this version is an absolute joy to watch.
It is as close as you can get to the original 1977 theatrical release – in the opening crawl there’s not even a mention of it being ‘Episode IV’. The original scenes have been painstakingly restored and color-corrected shot by shot based on a fade-free 1977 I.B. Technicolor Print.Gone are the CGI additions from the special edition. No dewbacks, no shot from Greedo, no Jabba for Han to walk over, no more battalion of troopers around that corner, and the simple, practical effect, exploding Death Star. The best part about it all is that is all in glorious HD too, as the majority of the source material is from the Blu-ray edition, with additional sections upscaled from the 2006 DVD bonus disc and even from TV broadcasts.Adywan’s Revisited CoverFor the completist:This one is the best of both worlds and is what the special edition should have been.
Adywan keeps all the good sections added in Lucas’ special edition, but removes most of the silly ones. So we get the beautiful shot of the Falcon blasting its way out of Mos Eisley, but no Jabba. All of the crazy CGI beasts around Mos Eisley, but no shot from Greedo. Every shot has once again been color-corrected and all the mattes fixed, but Adywan goes that extra mile and actively fixes errors than Lucasfilm and ILM left in. Did you ever notice that the explosion that cripples the Tantive IV at the beginning actually occurs in a different place from where the laser blast hits it? Not anymore; Adywan re-positioned it and this is just one example (of!) that shows the attention to detail he has given to his version.He also actually created additional shots and effects himself to improve the movie even further. Establishing shots of the Death Star are enhanced with additional Star Destroyers and ships, and it floats above new planets and moons.
The shaky and very basic computer animation of the Death Star plans has been completely replaced with a much more ‘modern’ looking one, which closely resembles the schematics shown in Attack of the Clones. The final battle above the Death Star is peppered with extra TIE Fighters and X-Wings, and bigger explosions! And at the end!.Empire Revisited comparisonsThere is barely a scene that hasn’t had an improvement of some kind, and because of this, the Revisited version is now my version of choice. The only downside to it is that it was made before the Blu-rays were released, so it’s not in HD. Adywan is currently working on a Revisted version of Empire and from the released so far it looks like it’s going to be just as good, and this time it will be HD. For Empire Revisited, he has enlisted what has become known as the “2nd and 3rd Units” to help him out and they have even built their own models and re-filmed some parts, including new shots of to add some more bustle to Echo Base.
It’s a slow process (not helped by hard-drive crashes and house moves), but it should be finished sometime this year. When it’s done, work will begin on Jedi and then Adywan plans to return to A New Hope and redo it all again in HD – or maybe even 4K depending on how long it all takes!.The Ridiculous Menace coverFor the comedian:The Phantom Menace was a pretty ridiculous movie if you think about, and faneditor TV’s Frink takes it to a whole other level of silliness. His quest is to turn all six movies into Airplane-style spoofs and he’s off to a good start with The Ridiculous Menace. Loads of dialog is rearranged, cut up and repeated, sometimes turning it into nonsense.
Some voices are completely replaced by different characters (TC-14 is now Bender from Futurama and ‘GOB’ Bluth from Arrested Development voices C-3PO) and Obi-wan refers to himself in the third person at all times. Battle Droids talk like ’80s videogames. Subtitles are all over the place – Artoo has them again, and Jar-Jar’s lines are also translated for our entertainment, even Anakin and Sebulba are now friends thanks to the change in their subtitles.In a great nod to Airplane, the classic “White zone is for immediate loading” announcement plays out and the cruiser first lands on the Trade Federation Battleship, and there are unexpected cameos from Bill Murray, Peter Graves and General Zod! “Darth Darth” entertains himself with a little Rick Astley while his droids search Tatooine. In short, it’s a laugh from beginning to end, even if it is a little too long.
At the time of writing you can watch it all on Vimeo:.The War of the Stars coverFor the adventurous:Have you ever wondered what Star Wars would have looked like if it had been made by Quentin Tarantino? If so, then The War of the Stars is the one for you.
The main source for this fan edit is a restoration of an old 16mm film version of the movie, known in the fanedit community as The Puggo Grande.Jamie Benning’s Star Wars Begins coverFor the info-freak:We’ve featured all three of Jamie’s Filmumentaries (, and ) here on GeekDad before, but they deserve to be on this list too.The Fall of the Jedi coverFor the chronological order fan:Q2 takes a lot of the ideas first seen (or rather not seen) in The Phantom Edit and applies them across the whole prequel trilogy in glorious 1080p goodness. Each film is trimmed down to around 90 minutes, and for that we get less Jar-Jar, less Anakin, less politics, and less superfluous action. No midichlorians, no chosen one, no prophecy.
Artoo and Threepio are reduced to being just another pair of droids in the universe. Indeed, anything that might break continuity with the original trilogy – young Anakin being the creator of C3PO, the names of Padme’s twins, Anakin being rebuilt into Vader, etc. – are gone, so nothing is spoiled when you get to IV, V and VI.Curiously though, some deleted scenes have been added back in. Whenever I’ve watched Attack of the Clones, I always skip most of the scenes set on Naboo, when Padme and Anakin fall in love. It’s just so nauseating to me. But Q2 has decided to add back in a deleted scene of them having dinner with Padme’s family to “enhancing the romance we’re suppose to believe in.” I’m not convinced about that one but it does make a lot of sense to see Senator Amidala discussing a possible rebellion with Bail Organa and Mon Mothma in a restored Revenge of the Sith deleted scene. Overall, Q2 has made the entire prequel trilogy much more watchable and actually enjoyable too – which is no mean feat!So, there are our favorite Fanedits, what are yours?My thanks to Drew for his vast knowledge and invaluable help in putting together this post.Remember!
Adywan Return Of The Jedi
Fanedits are in a very grey area regarding copyright, and we recommend that you follow the before watching any the movies listed here. The TL;DR is basically that you must already own copies of the and that you should never pay money to anyone to own a copy of a fanedit.