Star Wars: Episode VII - The Force Awakens: Restructured

In going through edits of the sequel series, I’ll give credit to the go-to selections here, although I’m looking at it from a lens a few years removed from that insufferable final film and amidst the various successes and failures of SW on the small screen.

Force Awakens will be best viewed via Hal’s edit, although TFA isn’t an intrinsically a bad film to begin with. There is a lingering bad taste the final film (a cinema experience, for me, unparalleled in its repulsiveness) gave to the overall trilogy when we realize there isn’t going to be any real backstory, nor satisfying arc, for Finn.

Finn’s character instead was used as a sort of plot device from the get-go and to realize that his story wasn’t any deeper than it seemed from this first episode is indeed disappointing.

But alas, I’m not reviewing the edit, which, by restructuring some of the elements here does put a better spin on Finn and his place in the story. I’ll forever have a soft spot for this film in general, seeing my old childhood heroes come back, and this edit serves these characters well, aside from the fact that Chewie still needs to be blocked out of the scene when Leia and Daisy (er….Rey, sorry) embrace, and the inexplicable indifference the film has to Han’s final scene I will never forgive. That’s just me. But I’m not alone here...

Again, I digress. No fault of our editor, whose work on the prequels I have enjoyed immensely. I feel obliged to keep a copy of the first two sequels on hand. This is one of them.

If you’re hesitant to give a full-blown, four-alarm fire recommendation for a fanedit because the film itself has distasteful elements, I guess this the classic reviewer conundrum. Can you discern good Korean food from average if you have problems with digesting that spice?

It was great. The original film kinda feels too narrow. It was good and enjoyable but I felt it kinda had more to it than what was shown.
This restructured edit exposed the other hidden parts of the film that allowed the entire thing to kinda relax and stretch outward, like a giant settling into its chair.

I never noticed the edits. Perhaps because it has been some time since I've seen the original, but somehow the entire edit is solid and well-paced. Some aspects still ring rather hollow for me: the entire thing with Maz Kanata simply drags on. Especially in light of what was to come later in the trilogy. Focusing more on Rey's character arc was a good thing, but it did slow the film down. It felt like the slow, stretched out middle part of a miniseries. Overall at Takodana, the film simply slows down a little too much, and it feels like something from The Phantom Menace, especially since right before it the escape sequence was so damn thrilling. Then again, it's not the editor's fault that the film itself is pretty much rather long. It feels as if the entirety of A New Hope and half of Empire Strikes Back was crammed into a single movie, but then again, cutting out more than HAL9000 already did would greatly disrupt the film's identity.

Other than that, it was great. Great video quality, great audio. I'd watch it again.

First off I've only watched the original 2 or 3 times so at first i thought HAL was trolling me and copied the same movie LOL but I did notice a few little things after a while. Like the emperors voice in the Ray vision, I knew they didn't foreshadow that for IX, I like that change as well as most of the others I read in the details after watching.

But the big deal which i knew was coming was the Starkiller base. I have to agree with the detractors, i didn't care for it. The editing to achieve this was phenomenal and HAL did a great job like always, but i feel like the reasoning for changing it was weak.

Overall it's a top notch edit nearly seamless.

Fantastic editing that takes a favorite of mine and increases its reverence. The editor is a true asset to the community.

Excellent work throughout. Transforms what was initially a "cover-band" version of A New Hope into a dark mirror of that film's hopefulness. Everything that went right for our heroes the first time goes terminably awful, or at least the things that felt like mere plot points in Episode IV (Obi-Wan's death, the destruction of Alderaan) resonate much more strongly here, thanks to the editor's re-alignment of events. The First Order is framed as dangerous insurrectionists who have managed to strike a blow against democracy, and the galaxy is upended once again, setting the stage for much more tense stakes of the next instalment. No amount of editing can smooth over the lucky coincidence-powered story beats that fuel this movie, but theme and character are at least allowed center stage to distract the viewer from these failings. I look forward to seeing what miracles Hal9000 can work with Episode IX next...