Split Unbreakable Glass

Unbreakable is one of my favorite films of all time. I also enjoyed Split and (even) Glass too!

In this fanmix of the trilogy, Wraith makes the tough but necessary choices on cuts for this narrative. And it works well.

Superb VFX work for the opening and closing glass shards. Also great VFX for several visual transitions.

A lot of top notch, above the call of duty video transition work is apparent, including where Elijah was getting the laser treatment transitioning to the flash of the train. And the transition from David back to Elijah's eye. Excellent job of maintaining the original transition style there. Wraith has a great eye.

Nice cut away from David's weight lifting scene ending with the line "what else can we use?" Now that I see it cut this way, I realize that's where M Knight could have easily ended the scene. Again, such a good eye, Wraith. When we see the paint buckets added on later in a flashback it now feels necessary and with purpose, rather than a drawn out scene.

Not a big deal but cutting the beginning of David's weight lifting session makes the scene maybe a tad confusing when David suddenly asks out of the blue, "how much did you take off?"

The scene with David passing Joseph the newspaper articles loses much it's dramatic power with the way the scenes have to jump around in this version (a necessary compromise). But then again, the way this edit is cut and scored, the fight between David and the Beast outside the asylum gains more emotional resonance.

For me the most awful parts of Glass to endure were when the characters start narrating what is presently happening but in comic book terms like, "the enemy becomes the ally." This is just my personal preference as I'm highly adverse to expository. Some or most of these cringy (for me) Glass moments remain in this cut. Others may like them.

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Scroll further down if you don't want to read comments about the end:

The way Wraith ends everything is now more dramatically effective by no longer having family members be an active part of releasing video footage to the public. The moment is now more about resolving the story of the Mastermind. Superb!
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END OF SPOILER
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There were some sporadic framerate issues (random frame skips, one example at 1:13:36). This can happen for different reasons but usually when a video file such as an mkv is converted to mp4 with a tool that incorrectly flags the framerate as variable. The resulting output in an NLE unfortunately will have random, jerky frame skips throughout.

Multiple parts where slow motion was used had a noticeable drop in framerate (without apparent motion smoothing applied), indicative of fanedited material.

There were several very noticeable audio and video editing issues in this cut, a few jarring. Below are the main issues which affected scoring:

dozens of tiny clicks/pops throughout during when audio clips are not faded in the NLE (very audible through headphones but not so much on a tv/external speakers) examples 13s 29s 2m15s 14m56s, 16m49s... recurring until the end

43:16 - 43:21 color grade of the scene changes abruptly
1:10:00 sudden audio jump, makes the video cut seem very edited
1:18:42 the music track added back in here at the comic shop isn't matched up perfectly with itself (noticeably goes off tempo with a double drum hit at the merge point)
1:33:12 very noticeable visual cut to remove McAvoy dialogue, even with the short insert in between, McAvoy is suddenly in a completely different stance and much closer to Casey
1:42:12 audio glitch: Loud computer noise cuts out then back in.
2:03:59 very noticeable audio gap, approaching but not quite jarring
2:06:16 high pitched, JARRING audio glitch
3:24:31 The last words of Dr Glass' ending VO speech are completely garbled underneath the music. : (

Note: the video quality itself is decent and watchable, but there is a moderate amount of blocking artifacts in many scenes in the dark or flat background areas of the picture. Although the audio bitrate is on the very low end for 6 channels, the audio quality is still usually perceptually high overall, but with ever so slight occasional high end muddiness.

Overall, this cut is worth watching alone for Wraith's beautiful and thoughtful job with all the re-scoring choices. Thank you Wraith for the insane amount of thought and heart you put into this project. I did thoroughly enjoy it as an alternate viewing experience. Nothing personal on the audio score; see below for the reasoning. And I can certainly update the score based on any future revisions I learn about.

For reference here's my general rating explanations:

Best in Class / Perfect (or nearly so) = 10
Excellent = 9
Good = 8
Decent / Above Average = 7
Fair / Slightly Above Average = 6
Slightly Below Average = 5
Below Average = 4
Poor = 3
Bad = 2
It really can't get worse = 1

And because I gave a lower score on Audio Editing below is my own personal guideline to explain how I reached the score:

Audio Editing incl. Musical Score
Three or more instances of jarring issues such as very rough transitions, complete loss of sound, or major audio syncing errors = 1
One or two instances of jarring issues or five or more instances of minor issues such as clicks, low audio; or added music masks the dialogue = 4
Four or less instances of minor issues, noticeable but not jarring, added music fits the mood but has minor volume issues = 6
One or two instances of minor issues, nearly seamless, added music improves the scene(s) and blends well = 8
Completely seamless, no mistakes, professional. Must include audio restoration or compelling changes to musical score = 10

I can't say I'm a big fan of the trilogy this edit is based on, but it definitely had some neat ideas. Overall, I enjoyed this edit, but it's not without flaws. 3.5 hours is a lot to ask of your audience. I think this story could have been cut down even more - not every scene felt vital to me. The video quality was top notch, but I wasn't a fan of the constant fade transitions where a straight cut felt like it would have been fine. The audio is a nice 5.1 mix - most of the time. There are spots, namely at about 43, 56, 1:23, 1:43 and 2:43 minutes (there were others), where the audio clearly shifts from a 5.1 mix to an expanded stereo mix with 2 channels being sent to all 5. I have to assume this is from deleted scenes, which are usually a 2.0 source, being inserted into the 5.1 timeline and the editing software converting to 5.1, but I can't be sure. As other have said, there are occasional audio pops, I noted a fairly obvious one at about 2:06. Considering the amount of work that went into this, these audio issues really should have been corrected before release.

That said, from someone who wasn't a big fan of the originals, I enjoyed this edit. Very much recommended for fans of the originals and non-fans might get a kick out of it too.

as someone who loves [most of] the 3 films from this mashup, i wouldn't have normally sought this out in order to watch it. it all came down to a review that i stumbled upon. though it seemed a bit TOO overzealous in it's praise (to the point i thought they must be his own mother), i had to admit that the concept was painted as incredibly intriguing. as a younger editor myself (just a few years, now), one thing i have going for me is dedication to seamless edits, & creativity. so i have a huge respect for faneditors that that provide at least those 2 aspects. Wraith was generous enough to share the link (as well as 2 others). and i gotta say, that initial review didn't seem too overzealous anymore. i was super impressed. i had originally hated the idea of not revisiting every single moment of the originals on future rewatches, but this new narrative.... while it needfully has to cut out some stuff, it does so in an appropriate way. the restructuring, refocusing, relabeling, and even re-revealing (yes, that's a word now) was just.... fucking masterful. what a mind-boggling puzzle this was to redo it in such a way, to begin with, let alone have that finished puzzle actually enjoyable to look at. this edit is not only a phenomenal way to watch the overall trilogy story (either for 1st time OR as a fan), but should be considered a case study inspiration for what fan-editing can achieve. genius-level mapping. Wraith has gifted me two aspects. 1) a new version of an already loved trilogy, that i will watch whenever that rewatch bug starts to bite. and 2) inspiration to be better, think harder, & work more diligently at what i do. may he never have need to stop this aspect of his hobby time.

Unbreakable is one of my favourite movies, but I thought Split was only okay and Glass was a disappointment, so I was excited about this edit possibly redeeming the trilogy for me but also nervous because I love Unbreakable so much. I'm so happy that one of my first viewings of a fanedit was so good - It all went together so well that I'm going to be hooked on fanedits. I feel so much more satisfaction with the story after watching this edit. I'm excited to watch the alternate UGS edit next. I don't know how much the music was changed, but I swear it was noticeably better at multiple points throughout - maybe it was just that it told the story better too.

First of all, the opening and closing animations are beautiful and work very well.

After seeing the way this edit creates a non-linear story, it made me feel like the original Trilogy should have been done like this from the beginning. It just feels right. Congrats to Wraith for such a vision.

The pacing improves a lot. Although there are still issues (that are inescapable because of the source material), going from 353 to 209 minutes is impressive. Never felt “Split Unbreakable Glass” was going too fast or too slow, it looks perfect now.

All the unnecessary dialogue and scenes were cut, and they’re really not needed at all. The Shyamalan’s cameos being gone is a relief, they’re just distractions to the story.

All in all, can’t recommend this enough. It replaces the Trilogy for me
Cheers