Star Wars: Episode IX - The Rise Of Skywalker: Ascendant

I gotta hand it not only to HAL but all the talented members of OriginalTrilogy.com, they managed to make Rise of Skywalker satisfying! All of the little details:

-Removing telegraphed plot points

-Allowing the audience to breathe, by slowing the pace/creating quiet moments

-The Palaptine Clones/Earlier set up of Spirit Posession

-Why Kylo reforges his mask

-The Sith whispers in the Dagger instead of the compass

-The fleet at the end shouting "We believe in you Poe" & "For Skywalker"

-Leia's purple lightsaber

-The Force Ghosts fighting Palpatine

-The new take on both "Rey Skywalker" & how Rey finishes the trilogy with her friends

All this and more gives Rise of Skywalker a fresh coat of paint, put oil to lube up the mechanics, and lets me look at this movie through fresh eyes!

The only reason It's not a perfect 10 across the board is because the lack of the Star Destroyers actually using their cannons can't help but spit in the face of the Checkov's Gun rule of screenwriting. Maybe if it were implied that the lasers on the Star Destroyers were only as powerful as the Death Star blast on Jeddah like in Rogue One, that would be easier to swallow/more satisfying.

Aside from that, here's what I'm hoping to see in V2 of this edit:

-The Lightsaber crackle to Luke/Anakin's lightsaber to make it more like Kylo's (excellent visual symbolism)

-A Finn voice double replacing "Rose, please. Go," with something along the lines of "Rose, I'm saving what I love" or "Rose, you must survive" (which could easily be done, since we only see the back of John Boyega's head, you could totally ADR it in). Partly because I feel so bad for Kelly Marie Tran, mostly because this would help create more connective tissue between this film and Last Jedi. I know that line's not in your edit of The Last Jedi, so I guess I'm saying, hey HAL, you know anyone who can do a good Finn impression? :-)

-I would love for Leia's Force Ghost to show up against the showdown with Palpatine. After he says "I am all the Sith," you could show Leia's body becoming one with The Force, then superimpose footage of her in space from Last Jedi (since that both shows her opening her eyes after a long sleep, as well as holding her hand out to use The Force). Would make an awesome moment feel even more complete!

-A Rey Palpatine Alternative. I don't think straight up cutting it and replacing it with nothing works, otherwise the film has no Midpoint to anchor Rey's change of character from all-loving hero to single-minded & rage induced. Right now, my best guess is to get a Kylo soundalike to say "You don't just have power; You have ALL their power," and reveal that Rey is genetic hybrid created from all the Galaxy's best known Force Users. Heck, even changing "you're his granddaughter" to "your his creation" would go a long way in tying her to Palpatine while simultaneously making Rey still feel like her own person, if that makes any sense.

In any case, HAL and OT.com have done the impossible: they made me want to watch the entire Sequel Trilogy in full at least one more time. And that's not nothing!

This is about as good as this movie can get without drastically altering the story. There's a few things that I personally may have removed and/or kept, but overall this is an incredibly functional movie. This may not sound like much, but the original was an incomprehensible, maddening mess. The fact that I could watch this and enjoy it is amazing.

The small changes are what matter here. lengthening some establishing shots, re-ordering a few things. Adding in the Kylo Ren force ghost, the new take on "Rey Skywalker" and the new final shot. These are all things that the movie should've done to begin with.

I still don't love this movie, and there are story choices in it I'll never like or understand. But it is the movie it is, and it is canon, which means we are stuck with it for better or worse. Hal has made it not only tolerable, but enjoyable. It's certainly the worst ST film, but it's far from the disgrace it was on release. Great job!

As always, Hal brings the best. Not his most ambitious cut, but it still manages to improve upon the original and actually create a fun watch. I still had plenty of plot questioning after viewing, but in the moment I actually had a fun time and didn't roll my eyes too much. There were some really brilliant moments here, love the inclusion of the group to the final tatooine visit.

I enjoyed the 'Rise of Skywalker' ride at the cinema but on re-viewings the flaws inevitably become all too clear. I don't even blame J. J. Abrams, he had the thankless task of simultaneously following on from what he setup in his first film, clearing up the mess left by 'The Last Jedi' which had essentially chucked the first film away (like a lightsaber), pleasing fans of TLJ, pleasing haters of TLJ, retconning Rey's backstory from TFA and TLJ because fans didn't like it, starting again with a vague blank slate and wrapping up a three film trilogy all in 2-ish hours. He knows how to make something that looks, feels, sounds, tastes and smells like vintage OG Star Wars but the script is a convoluted, exhausting mess, chasing it's own tail from one pointless plot point to another. Still, there are some real moments of emotion and drama in there which work. e.g. Luke finally lifting his X-Wing and scary zombie Palpatine.

HAL 9000's 'Ascendant' fanedit doesn't dramatically trim the plot but does make tons of little tweaks to make moments play better. None of which you'd ever know about, had this been presented to you as the official finished professional product. Every one of the edits to the video and audio (and story) is 100% seamless. I'd recommend this to people who want a better version of RoS (one to replace their official copy) but not to people who are seeking a comprehensively different version. The new ending is fantastic, again not radically different but so much better, with a bit more finesse and FX work. Congratulations and thanks to the many people that seem to have contributed many ideas and FX fixes to this version. Thanks HAL 9000.

The Rise of Skywalker was a disappointing and flawed film. The knee jerk reaction to try and “fix” the flaws fans had with its predecessor created an uneven and disappointing finale. While no fan edit can fully fix the final film, Hal and co. have done a tremendous job is salvaging it.

So do I recommend this edit? Yes. Yes, yes, yes.

This edit packs a serious punch and will be my definitive edition for the foreseeable future. No noticeable audio or picture problems, no editing issues I could spot, and the pacing of this cut is very good. If you think TROS is unfixable definitely give this edit a try. It's 1000x better than the theatrical cut.

The only thing I wish we saw more of were more force ghosts at the end. Considering “a thousand generations of Jedi” now live within Rey, it would have been nice to see some other ghosts of Jedi we saw in the prequels. But that’s nitpicking, and one can only work with the footage they have.

A well earned 10 out of 10.