Star Wars - Episode III: Dawn of the Empire

Would probably give this a slight edge over HAL9000's edit of ep III as this has the Yoda Palpatine fight. Again this didn't feel like a fanedit at all and is better than the theatrical cut.

This is an excellent edit, very well done.
There seemed to be some visual compression issues on the lava scenes, likely due to the MPEG-2 encoding (Y U NO use h.264?), but other than that the picture and sound quality are great.
Editing is very well done, trimming unnecessary bits and slight reorganization of scenes.
The extras are missing on the Blu-ray but are available on the DVD.

L8's Episode III is a masterpiece. I see the entire saga in a new light and it helps fit in much better with the OT than Lucas ever tried to accomplish.

The version of Anakin that was in Lucas's head but never portrayed on screen is in this cut. I never thought that I would care for Hayden as Anakin, but here, with thoughtful editing, is a nuanced performance. Much like in Episode II, which was a revelation for the character, Anakin's outbursts are much more restrained towards the Jedi. It obvious that there is something mentally wrong with Anakin. He's almost autistic is in his dealings with people and his strict desire for conformity and following strict order. Anything that disrupts that can be seen as a threat and his previous alliances may go by the wayside in support of a specific order.

Gone is almost all of the unnecessary humor aboard The Invisible Hand. It's a lean-mean action sequence that tells its story and gets the job done. There's no messing around with R2, no obvious Palpatine is evil beats, and the saber battles feel more at home within the OT than ever before. This does bring up the one slightly odd edit in the film, which is the truncated introduction of the Jedi to Grievous. There are a few cuts that don't quite work, but I ultimately have no great issue with them. By the time you realize something is off, we're onto the next action sequence.

L8 is a master of pacing and putting the Opera House scene much earlier in the film helps solidify Anakin's actions early on in the film. He's a man who is being pulled apart in multiple directions and it is a careful ballet at work here. He has a vision that his wife will die in child birth and he seeks to save his future because he couldn't save his past. At the same time, he is aligning himself with Palpatine because the Chancellor is the only man who can help save Padme. While the Jedi are telling Anakin to basically be glad that his wife will die in childbirth, they also want Anakin to spy on the only man who seems to care for Anakin's plight. At the same time, the man who gives him this mission is his near-brother, Obi-Wan. There are so many power moves at play that Anakin ultimately chooses his love for his wife and family, all the while not knowing that Padme is making behind-the-scenes plays to end the rule of Palpatine.

That's right, Padme Amidala is a founding member of the Rebel Alliance. George Lucas is a moron for having something so surprising and so profound and then eliminating it from his movie in support of having a woman stay at home and make babies. Wow.

I never thought that I would say this but the politics are what really make this Star Wars film for me. Something that was so confounding and boring in the theatrical versions are molded into a piece that is not only understandable, but interesting! It really helps ratchet up these prequels into a more adult fare.

There's too many changes to count here and since it has been years since I watched the theatrical version of Episode III, it was really difficult to see what was cut. The Jedi Purge is handled very well. It's slightly difficult to understand what exactly happened to Yoda, but you can connect the dots. I understand that L8 wanted to save the Yoda has a lightsaber reveal for the Palpatine fight (which plays much better in this version), but his defensive move against the Clone assassins is one thing that I do miss.

Mustafar is just plain amazing. The very odd banter between Obi-Wan and Anakin is gone and only the critical lines remain. Sure, some of it was Ewan McGregor's best work in the series, but it is ultimately not needed. That final blow by Obi-Wan is shocking in its execution. It's unexpected, even by someone who has seen the film before. I would love to see that moment with someone who has never seen Episode III. You would jump out of your seat by how brutal the cut is.

That's what I really came away with from L8's Episode III. Brutal. It's an unforgiving film that is by far the darkest the series has to offer. There's very little levity here and that's almost all gone by the end of the first act. Through a master edit, Episode III comes away as Lucas's best film since the original theatrical Star Wars in 1977. It's too bad that he didn't see what he had and chose to muddy the waters with too much dialogue and removing sequences that are critical to his saga.

This edit was absolutely awesome. The reorganized scenes made this movie so much better. One of the best episode 3 edits out there.

********** This Review Contains Spoilers ************

Let’s get the important stuff out of the way first. DOTE is by far the best Episode III edit I’ve ever seen! It works on every level and turns this movie into one of the best Star Wars films hands down. The movie did such an amazing job of making Anikan a powerful decisive leader, it almost made Hayden Christensen seem like a good actor. I was shocked by much I really believed that he was becoming Lord Vader, and that his beliefs and ideals were turning him to the dark side as much as his anger and jealousy. L8WRTR’s vision of this movie is stunning to behold and a must have for anyone’s SW collection.

From the very beginning it was clear that this movie was going to focus as much screen time as possible to making Anikan’s turn to the dark side believable, which is the way it should have always been conceived. The initial confrontation between Dooku and Anikan really sets the tone by having him furiously avenge his fallen master. It would have been only that much sweeter if Anikan had yelled something along the lines of “no, Master” out of concern after Dooku collapses the platform onto Obi Wan.

The fight editing was superb, one of my favorite parts was Palpatine’s quick transition into what I’ll call his ‘Sith Form’ during his confrontation with Mace Windu. I thought you did an amazing job with the Palpatine Yoda fight, I don’t care what anyone says, this scene needs to be included for Yoda to have any kind of resolution. The only thing I would have done differently here was to cut the lightsaber section just a tad more so that as the senate platform rises the viewer never sees the fight from a close up angle. Otherwise I thought Yoda’s defeat and subsequent exile was terrific. I felt Obi Wan and Anikan’s fight could be shortened a bit more. Some of the scenes where they are wrestling early on just seem unnecessary and the fight is plenty long without it. Anikan’s shocking defeat at the end works so much better now. I thought that was an amazing cut!

All of the sequences leading to the birth of the rebellion are extremely well executed. A common criticism of the prequel trilogy is that they focus too much on politics, and I used to agree with that. However the way you’ve focused these scenes and removed the filler has made the political half of this movie extremely engaging. It’s important in this film to make the viewer care about what is happening on the political side because if they don’t, then Anikan’s turn and the setup for “A New Hope” doesn’t work at all.

The rest of this review is going to be nit picky, but these are just my opinions and it should be stated again that this movie is amazing on every level.

The scenes following Order 66 that show all the major players moving into position for the finale seemed a bit rushed. I don’t exactly recall how it played out in the original film, but there were just too many cuts all happening too quickly for my taste.

The birthing scene I also thought was extremely well done, I just wish you had excluded Senator Organa’s scene with Leia at the end. It is too much of a spoiler if you watch the movies in the order intended, but it works just fine if you watch the movies in Machete Order. If you leave this scene out it almost makes it seem like just the one child survived, but since that is never stated it makes it a great surprise for ROTJ.

I happily give this film a 10 out of 10. This is a great triumph of the Fanedit community and I encourage everyone who has been looking for a “definitive version” to dive into this film just one more time.