Falcon and the Winter Soldier: The Spence Edit, The

This is a Masterclass in how to take a borderline train wreck of a show and turn it into a solid, mid tier Marvel movie. I was blown away with how good this edit was, and honestly it took one of my least favorite Marvel properties and put it above the middle of the pack which is amazing.

I have 2 small knit picks (Both at the end of the film):
1. towards the very end, when Cap flys off and we smash to the Exterior of Isaiah's house, i feel like it should go to black for a second or two, maybe a J audio edit of the knock on the door from the next scene and a fade in as the door is answered. As it stands it feels too smashed together and the fly off moment needs just a second or two to breath in my opinion.
2. I wish there was one more post credits scene where Valentina sets the stage for Walker to become U.S.Agent "its the same... but black..." scene. its a decently funny scene and in the same way that at the end of Black Widow we have a set up towards the Thunderbolts it would make these films post credits the darker parallel to the OG Nick Fury gathering the Avengers in Phase 1... just a small thing

This edit saved this show in my opinion. while its not perfect it will be what i watch when i go back through the MCU in the future and what i will eventually show my kids when they are old enough.

Amazing Work Spence!

Despite enjoying the show back when it came out, it suffers from "butter scraped over too much bread" effect, being one of the main reasons I've never re-watched since then.

This edit helps the experience greatly by focusing on the meatier parts , e.g. Sam's struggle with the concept of Captain America, his banter with Bucky and Isaiah's story.

I feel like the Flag-smashers screen time was reduced too, which is appreciated 'cause they're godawful.

So yeah, damn good experience in general. It might even go into my Marvel re-watch rotation now, thanks Spence.

Overall this is a really good edit! I imagine it is challenging to condense down a 6 part series into a movie format, but I'm glad this exists. The original was so drawn out and it just gets boring at times. There are a few story threads that are a little bumpy, but again when multiple threads are covered in shots it can sometimes happen when trying to remove the bad/undesired. So far this is the best edit of this series I've watched, and for now IT is the version I'll go to when I want to watch it again.

Wow, wow, wow... Absolutely recommed this fan-edit over the full length tv-show. If you want the review in short

Technically, absolutely fantastic. At no point did I feel like there were some rough transitions between the scenes, or the audio didn't match. Everything matched, everything was as seamless as possible. Well, except for maybe one moment. The moment that I hoped the editor would cut. When John Walker was first introduced, there was this shot where he looks directly into the camera and nods, and then the black screen appears, when the original episode ends. That was practically the only moment, where I was like 'yeah, that feels like an editor cut'. Could've been smoother, but didn't really bother me

Narratively? The original is not a mess, but it has a lot of rough spots, which a fan-edit can't possibly fix. That said, the edit did its best to cut the junk and leave the necessary stuff in. While watching I could just feel the scenes where additional reshoots would help to strong the transitions and the story. Fan-edit doesn't have the resources for that obviously, so I ignore it, but take note nevertheless. As the other review said, the Sam's final speech is one scene that still brings the whole thing down in terms of the enjoyment. I can't begin to think how to restructure that scene to get the point across without sounding so blunt and childish. I give it a pass, but it's still there and it still sucks just as much as it did in the original show. Flag smashers? Suck. Their leader? Oh my... How do you fix THAT in the fan-edit? They all are still there. The credit where credit is due, though. They're not that frustrating in the fan-edit. One other thing. The ending felt rather abrupt, like there was supposed to be at least some dialogue between the two main characters, instead of the montage barbeque. If it ended just on the museum scene with Isah, that would be better, in my opinion

Overall, I enjoyed it. And if I ever would want to rewatch the whole MCU, then this fan-edit is what I am going for, instead of wasting whatever hours on the original tv-show. This one does the same job in the shorter time, but gets all the original ideas across. The perfect example of why MCU should've stuck with the movie format

P.S.
Even in the shortened time, John Walker is still the most interesting character in the story. Makes me wish that the original would concentrate solely on him and his journey of being forced to take the iconic mantle, failing to live up to it, losing his partner, losing his 'cool' and killing a terrorist (the senators better NOT stop calling them that), then being discharged, and then still showing up to the final battle and making the choice of saving people instead of the vengeance. Damn... They really should've made the movie about him with Falcon and Winter Soldier as background characters

This was a very entertaining fix of a relatively boring TV show!

The most impressive part is that half of the show is missing but it didn't feel like anything was gone. The Zemo breakout was so well done, it was awesome. I loved that it just happened and that was it. I've seen a billion jailbreaks, I don't need a other one, so solid work there. Someone else mentioned her mask being on "instantly" but I'm happy to chalk that one up to "she put it on off-screen, which works perfectly for me.

I only threw a 9 in for narrative/enjoyment because there were a few things that went by very very quickly. Like the refugee vote felt like it came out of nowhere. Maybe it would've made sense to scatter that info throughout so that it wouldn't feel tacked on. I was also slightly confused at points, like "ok we're here, now we're here, now we go here, meet this girl/guy, that girl/guy dies, etc." That kind of pacing is great for a TV show, which needs one climax per episode, but a movie only needs one total, so it must have been hard to make it work.

Overall, a very good job and far far more enjoyable than the show was with twice the length.