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

Review by The Aluminum Falcon — October 8, 2011 @ 5:56 pm

*This rating was given before reviews were required*

Review by Steelio2006 — August 28, 2011 @ 2:16 am

*This rating was given before reviews were required*

Review by Sunarep — March 31, 2011 @ 4:24 pm

I remember talking to Boon about the rating system for the greatest fanedits and the fact that star wars fanedits can join the greatest fanedits with a lower score than the minimum for non-star wars fanedits to enter the greatest fanedits.
At first glance this seems unfair – why should Star Wars get a special treatment and have it “easier” to enter the hall of fame?
Well watching the Spence Edit of Return of the Jedi made me realize why: Star Wars doesn’t have it easier, it is a lot harder and when it comes to star wars movies I guess most people can be very obsessed with details and critisize even the tiniest changes because it is not what THEY wanted it to be because everyone has THEIR OWN interpretation of what star Wars should be.

Having said this I really tried to let go of this attitude and watch this fabulous edit as if I had never seen Jedi, as if i had never listened to the entire soundtrack over and over again – making it very easy for me to spot the edits in the music

And I must say: this edit is great and bold. It is not my preferred version of Jedi (see above, everyone thinks to know more about star wars than the other fans) but it is a refreshing take.
The reason I downloaded is was primarily that I had always wanted to watch an edit starting with dagobah. The entire introduction is handled very well, though jabba might fall a bit short (then again I’m saying this having the original in mind). Boba Fett and the dance numbers as well as droid torture are thankfully gone and not missed. The ommission of the Rancor (again something I like about the original) is really well done and you might not notice that there has been a scene in between.

The Speeder-bike chase was fantastic, same goes for the ewoks – they are not annoying, sure they are still cutesy cutesy, but they don’t get thrown in your face and the removal of Leia meeting Wicket is also nice.
Like TMBTM I never minded the fact that the rebells destroyed the deathstar where the emperor was since it was about vader to me, but it still works. The transition from ewok stealing the bike to stardestroyer was a little abrupt and could use a little more smoothing, but i was amazed that it really worked (with the scenes from TESB to indicated that they are now on the executor)

The stardestroyer scene is another example of how little things can disturb you just because it is star wars. In no other fanedit of a non star wars movie would I have pondered about the geography, the location of the executor etc., here it just fell into my eyes because i just know star wars and it is another example of how freakin hard it can be for an editor to deliver a star wars edit

Seeing as I heard/noticed a lot of cuts (because of my familiarity to the source material not because of technical problems) in the first segment I thought I would feel the same about the battle of endor, but nope, here really everything fits and flows fantastically.

The duel between Luke and Vader is quick, but well done. I prefer the original but this is just personal and the way spence handle’s it flows very well.
Ending with the fire is awesome as well, especially considering that after the prequels lucas said that the story was about anakin skywalker so it makes sense to end at the fire with the celebration in the sky.

This review is based on an xvid rip, so I can’t comment on the DVD:

The editing is top notch, the ideas are great and intriguing
This is not a replacement dvd for me, but it is refreshing to watch some new ideas when it comes to Jedi

Originally I would have given 8/10, but seeing that most of my “problems” were due to the fact that I know too much about star wars it went to:

9/10

Review by MHBroly — March 26, 2011 @ 12:16 am

*This rating was given before reviews were required*

Review by jelio — March 22, 2011 @ 7:05 pm

*This rating was given before reviews were required*