Star Wars: Episode VIII - The Last Jedi: Anti-Cringe-Cut

My friends and I came to the TLJ Anti-Cringe Cut after many discussions and debates on how disappointing the original film was - in many ways it was an effort of will to try and forget all of the baffling and obnoxious story/dialogue choices while watching. Thankfully, the Anti-Cringe cut is so well done that this moved to the back of our mind very quickly. We all agreed that this edit significantly improves on the narrative structure and tone of the story, even if some choices seem like they will make it almost impossible to marry up with The Rise of Skywalker (note: we haven't yet watched DonKamillo's RoS Anti-Cringe Cut yet).

Personally, the most significant improvements are in the ordering and timing of Rey's journey with Luke, and the entire Leia storyline. Admittedly there wasn't much to work with in the original, but DonKamillo has somehow constructed a much more satisfying arc for both characters - for Rey, the training storyline is much more reasonable and feels like a slightly more protracted version of Luke's time with Yoda in Empire, while for Leia simply removing the famously cringe space scene in favour of a dramatic early exit helps immensely. One funny note is that removing the entirety of Rose & Finn's Canto Bight storyline didn't feel like anything was missing at all (apart from a slightly jarring reminder they existed come the finale).

All in all this was an amazing piece of work and really explores what could have been with TLJ. Hats off to DonKamillo, incredible work.

STAR WARS: Episode VIII - The Last Jedi Anti Cringe Cut is a fantastic fan edit that successfully addresses some of the pacing and cringe issues in the original film. The editing is expertly done, with a great sense of timing and rhythm that makes the movie feel much more engaging and exciting. The whole Leia experience and the starting secquence was so much more exciting.

Overall, if you're a fan of Star Wars and were disappointed by the flaws in the original version of The Last Jedi, this Anti Cringe Cut is definitely worth checking out.

From a technical viewpoint, this was exceptionally done. Apart a couple nitpicks, the edits were seamless and drastically improved the viewing experience. The only drawback from cutting the Canto Bight and Poe's mutiny subplots is that it means Finn and Poe don't do a thing for the entire hour between the second FO attack and the Battle of Crait (heck, Finn doesn't even show up on screen for that entire time), though it's an acceptable trade off when said subplots were poorly written and for the most part made them look bad anyway.

As for the viewing experience itself, the movie was... all right. I don't want that to sound like I'm trashing on it; the fact that I went from "This movie is utter freaking garbage" to "Hey, I actually enjoyed it" is a massive step up in quality. And it definitely speaks of your abilities as an editor.

The action scenes in the first and third act were far more entertaining with all the fat trimmed, and there were some interesting ideas brought to the surface that were buried before beneath the bloated mess that was the original. There were, unfortunately, a few major story elements that brought it down. I still hate how Luke turned his back on everything just because Ben fell to the dark side, though in fairness you did remove the most offensive parts of it. The Resistance ships "running out of fuel" is still unbelievably stupid. And it still makes no sense that Palpatine is actually alive, though again in fairness moving it from the beginning of IX to the end of this one does improve the reveal. And it does serve as a perfect dark ending: it seems like the heroes gained a small but important measure of victory by escaping, but then we learn they're in even greater danger than we thought.

All in all, it's probably as good a movie as you could possibly make it with the footage available, short of a full scale fan redub. I'd put it in the same category as The Force Awakens. It's not on the same level as the Original Trilogy, but it's good in it's own right.

Was very keen to see this movie very without all of the cringe moments and this edit delivered exactly that. Shaved off a big chunk of runtime which I think it highlights how poor the original was. This is best version of the film I have seen.

Best Version out there!