Star Wars - Episode VI: Return of the Jedi – The Spence Final Cut

First off, a big hand must be given to musiced921 for supplying me with this edit. I was actually looking for the one without the Ewoks in it, but obviously it didn't satisfy Spence at the time, hence why he re-did it, and this is the edit I ended up receiving. Nevertheless, it was an interesting edit, running rather leanly at just one hour and thirty three minutes, it rearranges scenes, creating a more meaningful first scene for Luke that establishes his path.

In the original cut, he kind of acts a bit high and mighty already, almost as if he didn't need to go to Dagobah and complete his training, but here the crawl and the scene on Dagobah is structured to follow on from Vader's arrival, and we follow Luke on his journey to Tatoonie, not entirely sure of himself as Yoda says he must confront Vader to be fully realised. It's a very well woven scene, and gives both Luke and the audience less detachment from what Luke had been up to in between Empire and this.

The idea of placing the Emperor on the Star Destroyer is another great touch. After all, why would the Emperor risk making himself a sitting duck on the Death Star when chances are his plan could go tits up? Being on a Star Destroyer at least gives him the chance to take off as soon as things do.

The restructuring of the battle of Endor rattles along, there is more urgency, you feel this is a costly battle as good men die and Luke feels more entrapped with the walls closing in, his fateful duel with Vader is even accompanied by familiar cues such as duel of the fates!

I've seen a few edits that have utilised the ending with Luke burning Anakin's body as the fireworks rage on, but it's still powerful imagery to end the original trilogy on. I'd still somewhat like to see the Ewok party as it gives us all a chance to see the group of friends, now very much a family, a chance to be together one last time. Luke can always bury Vader after seeing the ghosts. Maybe the ghosts could have been watching Luke burn Anakin, there's an idea. Ah well.

And lastly the additional end credits are a hoot...though I do wonder who 'lordsidi' is and what he did to warrant an "absolutely no thanks to..." credit. Feels a bit weird to promote the DVD version of this in the credits when all I have of this is the MP4, but ah well...if someone could track the DVD version down, let me know what I'm missing, because it doesn't tell you anything here.

Most fans of Star Wars can admit that Jedi is nowhere near on-par with Empire. Having been released thirty years ago, I decided to do some research to find out what the awesome community at Fanedit.org was doing about this film. Spence's final cut was the first edit of Jedi that I watched, and I wasn't very moved. Many of the cuts made were great, and I have to compliment the editor on the entire last act (save a few music choices I'll mention). The complete rearranging of the final battle added more tension than I ever felt during that scene. The Ewoks and their "shenanigans" were limited and tolerable, drawing the focus to the Rebellion in a much more convincing way.

Most of my problems come from personal preference, though I'll try to stay unbiased: The Tatooine scene was cut way too short. Jabba's palace has this slow buildup in Jedi, which I think adds more to Han's rescue in terms of tension and adventure. Some cuts of redundant conversations were good, but the scene moved much too quickly, which resulted in a "tying up loose ends" scene from that whole Cloud City arc from Empire. The strongest part of Jedi, I felt, suffered the most amount of cuts in this edit.

There were a lot of smaller cuts, mostly with Han, that I actually approve of. His humor was tagged down in this edit, I think that adds a ton to his character's growing maturity (which, of course, stemmed from the moment he joined the Alliance). Some transitions from scene to scene were a bit too jarring, but the characters didn't suffer from it.

The biggest problems I have with the edit involve the choice of adding tracks from the prequels. I love those soundtracks, but Duel of the Fates did not fit at all. That scene didn't need music, it dragged my focus away from the Vader/Luke conflict. The new song over their last conversation was also distracting and too overbearing. Simplicity and a minimalistic sound worked well in both those scenes in Jedi, they seem too bogged down now.

Was the edit truly bad? Not at all, and I can see why it won Edit of the Month. Would I watch it again? No, most of the cuts were just too radical for my taste.

I really like Return of the Jedi, but in terms of ending a saga, it's really disappointing. The story is flat and tensionless. The special editions added more nonsense to an already weak entry to the saga.

I presume the source for this edit was the 2004 Special Edition DVD + 2006 GOUT DVD (for replacing SE nonsense), so the quality isn't the best. Same goes for the editing. It's not bad, but in some places it feels choppy. Especially in Tatooine where Luke senses his friends. Still a minor problem though, it doesn't hurt the experience.

Spence has created a great narrative in this edit. He fixed the Tatooine plot perfectly, for example. In my opinion, the Dagobah scene should have been left as it is, Obi-Wan and all. Also the new ending is IMO too abrubpt. I wish that would have been left in. The biggest problem, though, is the Death Star/Star Destroyer swap. In the original movie, we find out that The Emperor is confident enough to see the final stages of the Death Star II, and so he is in it. The Rebels decide to end the war once and for all with this information and destroy the Death Star. There was tension there, but not enough. Here, though, he goes to the Star Destroyer, and the Rebels attack the Death Star. Huh? This plan makes no sense, why not destroy the Star Destroyer? Also the tension is gone here. And Luke ends the war. It's abrubpt again.

Finally, we end up with a fanedit that is just as good as the original, but I prefer the original because of the narrative making more sense. It's a good edit, though. Just not as good as I expected.

I share much of Spence's disappointment with RotJ. So I was really looking forward to this. I like a lot of the narrative revisions here. Starting with having Luke on Dagobah at the beginning. It always felt wrong that Yoda tells him his training has been completed when he just returned for the first time since Obi Wan and Yoda pleading with him not to go to Cloud City until he completed his training. That said, I'm not crazy about the flashes to Luke on Dagobah when Han and Leia are in trouble at Jabba's Palace. I get the intent but I think viewers would be okay without these flashes.

The whole Jabba's section is much tighter, which was needed in my opinion. Getting rid of Boba Fett and his awful death scene go without saying as positive changes.

A minor quibble, but Luke now separates from the rest of the group as they leave Tatooine for no apparent reason and just shows up to the briefing late.

One random thing that's not really a complaint with this edit is the terrible matte painting of the Falcon when Han and Lando are talking. I'm hoping Adywan is able to redo that when we (eventually) get his Jedi Revisited.

Once we get going on the mission a lot of cheese has been removed and we get to the point a lot faster. In particular, Han is no longer the chump he was originally portrayed as. With a lot of that cheese trimmed the focus is now more strongly on the Luke/Vader/Emperor storyline, which is how it should be at this point of the story.

Speaking of which, Spence obviously thought strongly that these scenes should happen off the Death Star (and I understand his reasoning). I can't say I ever had similar feelings. Though what he's done, he's done well. I still really don't feel it's necessary. But it doesn't detract either. I very much like the Luke/Vader duel happening uninterrupted but it comes at a cost. I feel Vader's defeat comes too soon. I would've liked to have seen the shield destroyed and the attack on the Death Star begin before Vader's defeat. The cut back to the Throne Room when the Emperor attacks Luke is jarring as well.

Again I get the intent but the Anakin's Theme music over Vader's death just doesn't work for me. I didn't mind the earlier use of Duel of the Fates.

I love cutting out Han being a chump about Leia loving Luke but the cuts feel a little rough. I also like ending with the funeral pyre but right after it irises to the credits the music got twice as loud. Not sure if that happens for everyone. Seemed weird.

Overall I enjoyed it. It would be very close to replacing the original for me were it in HD. As it is, I'll probably show both to my kids and see which they prefer.

Really liked it. This is my go to edit of Return of the Jedi. Thank you. If I'm watching the OT, its gonna be Harmy's Despecialized Ep 4, Lucas' Ep 5, and this to cap it off. I always thought it was silly that Luke appeared to be skipping in and out of his Jedi Training. I was fairly ambivalent about moving the confrontation with Palpatine off the Death Star. It never bothered me before that this took place on the Death Star, and it doesn't really bother me to have it on a ship. I felt the parts where Luke is sensing the danger on Tatooine seemed a little jarring. The transitions between the two scenes felt too quick. I do believe this movie is better off with most of the Jabba and Tatooine nonsense cut out. Not my best review, sorry, but I did enjoy it.