Star Wars - Episode I: The Ridiculous Menace

I got to watch the entire edit online. I loved it. I often rewatch Episode I thinking I'm going to be less cynical this time and will remember how much I can enjoy TPM with an open heart and mind and I'm always disappointed. No 'more serious more dark' versions of the prequels have ever succeeded with me so an edit that does the exact opposite was a great idea. The experience was uplifting and fun.

I love the montage music, the funny overdubs, the cutaways, the satirical optical wipes, the extended conversations and overstretched moments, the motifs, pretty much everything. This edit was made for everyone on this site. There's no other group of people on the internet that know why "intentional creative decision" on the Naboo exterior is funny.

The editing can be considered terrible at times due to the transparency of the overdubs and video looping. But considering the intention, this edit should get perfect points for intricacy, vision, and humorous success. I didn't know how to rate the visual quality considering I watched it over the internet, but it had to get generous points for being so readily available.

That's all. I think it was wonderful and already love what's being done with Episode II. Thank you for sharing.

Review by Brumous — December 23, 2011 @ 1:15 am

Witness the amazing TV’s Frink as he slices, dices and chops like Bart Simpson with a Ginsu knife. The Ridiculous Menace is a gleeful and manic spoof, a kind of comedic vandalism equivalent to drawing mustaches on somber portraits and throwing cream pies at stuffy politicians. The pomp and dreadful pretentiousness of the original movie is unceremoniously deflated through radical alteration of the personalities and motives of all characters, major and minor. Heroes become cads, villains become clowns, and just about everyone is reduced to a state of doddering cluenessness.

Often the humor builds in layers of ridiculousness until the humor reaches a level of surreality that would do Benny Hill or Monty Python proud. Other jokes fall flat or are obscure, but with the batting average so high and the pace of gags so fast and furious, it just doesn’t matter. This is one funny flick.

The video quality is adequate. Compression makes the focus soft on larger screens but it’s still quite watchable. A number of contributors have pitched in with special effects and those come off well, complementing the hacked and manipulated satiric tone.

The soundtrack has received a massive amount of changes, from new background music to new effects to new dialog. The end credits alone must have 30 different music clips! The detail of audio work goes down to individual inserted words, and this is the one area where technical flaws sometimes get in the way of enjoying the movie. Sometimes the words in a sentence are so mismatched it’s hard to understand what the character is saying. Additional audio processing and pitch shifting might help that out, but that would also mean many more months of work! So, as they say, deal with it.

DVD features are basic, with chapter selections and a few bonuses included to add a few gags. No off-color jokes and thankfully no potty humor, so the disk is suitable for children. Kudos to Frink and his many co-conspirators for assembling the funniest Star Wars Episode One ever. 9.5/10

Review by L8wrtr — December 23, 2011 @ 8:43 pm

The most fanedited movie of them all gets a completely new approach.

At the time of this writing, The Ridiculous Menace is the 16th fanedit of The Phantom Menace that is listed on FE. It is certainly not going to be the last either. But it is the most unique of them all. Where other edits seek to create something better than the original, something that makes it more ‘Star Wars’ in tone, feel and narrative, this edit says “Yippee!!!” and to hell with that.

This edit will not be for everyone. Audiophiles who demand clear and unambiguous sound will cringe at the sometimes choppy dialog with stray and unrelated background elements. If your brain cannot accept this audio aspect, then sadly I have to recommend skipping this. And that’s a shame because this edit stands out as one of the most unique, bold, and entertaining fanedits around. In the pantheon of spectacular Star Wars fanedits, for me this edit has its place up there with The War of the Stars, and A New Hope Revisited.

About the edit itself. What makes this edit a both a joy as well as an amazing achievement is that it is not simply a collection of cheap gags and isolated laughs, strung together against the backdrop of The Phantom Menace. While there certainly are numerous individual jokes, gags and meme-insertions, the true accomplishment of this edit is that Frink has created several new sub-plots and redefined most of the characters. Like a master comedian, Frink consistently introduces something funny, something that by itself is entertaining and funny. Then he builds on it, re-uses the core of the joke, adds to it and then punctuates it later in the edit, where the final joke is not possible or nearly as funny without the build-up beforehand.

To be fair, I do not love everything about this edit. There are some jokes which, like a Saturday Night Live sketch from the 90s, go on far too long. In particular the Pod Race and Senate sequences both come to mind. The jokes in them are good, but the pacing is long and too repetitive, causing the pacing to slow way down. However those hiccups are very few, and even with the slowed down pace, remain funny and entertaining.

As I said before, in the world of Star Wars fanedits, this has a place as one of my absolute favorites. Completely original, bold, ridiculous.

Overall, I cannot recommend this edit enough. The only thing holding it back from a perfect score are the pacing issues. This get’s a 9 out of 10 Yippees!!!!

Review by Captain Khajiit — December 24, 2011 @ 5:50 pm

The nature of the edit is sufficiently well established from previous reviews not to need reiterating. In essence, L8wrtr’s thoughts, both positive and negative, mirror my own, though I rather like the podrace. Video and audio quality are good, save where they are not meant to be. The presentation fits the edit well — especially the main menu — though it would be nice to see TV’s Frink have a go at his own cover art at some point.

This receives nine stars out of ten from me too. Well done, Frink!

Review by Omaru1982 — January 4, 2012 @ 10:20 pm

What can I say that hasn’t been said already, I laughed from opening to end. Brave effort for a fisting and I suppose the humour reminds me of family guy a little, which probably explains why some people don’t like it. I think it deserves a better rating than it currently has and I urge more people see it.

I look forward to what projects you might bring us in the future.