Star Wars - The Epic Picture

I found this to be a rather unique and quite bold fan edit. Some parts did feel disjointed in places but the overall narrative worked pretty well through I can understand why some would need a couple of viewings to really grasp the overall work fully.

Some lines of dialogue could have been cut in order to better streamline the world building you where trying to do with the fanmix, mostly little gripes here and there but nothing major.

Besides minor flaws here and there I personally enjoyed this more so with the mix of high tech and low tech worlds in the setting and just the idea alone of Darth Vader being a future Rasputin was enough to sell this whole thing to me hehe.

It was far from perfect, there are flaws that stick out as other reviewers have mentioned but what has been created is a pretty interesting piece of work oozing with style and some thought provoking themes.

Star Wars: The Epic Picture... where do I begin

This edit had SO MUCH potential and SO MANY interesting aspects but the way it was executed... ughhhhhh

The plot to this movie... I don't even know what it is! You have a bunch of unrelated war movies and Star Wars, then you just kind of cut them together... what? I found certain parts to make sense, funny and unexpected things happen, but still aren't well edited together. This edit seems like a "first cut" of the project, so many things need to be revisited, rearranged, and fixed!

A/V Quality:
Fine, nothing noticeably bad here other than star wars deleted scene film scans but that isn't the editor's fault.

Editing:
Oh my... the fade-outs! The dreadful fade-outs! So many choppy cuts! Almost unbearable at some points.

Narrative:
Don't even get me started, this is NOT a cohesive story, this is NOT multiple cohesive stories, this is a complete and utter mess

Story Analysis: HEAVY SPOILERS BELOW
The movie starts off with an intensely christian Ian Mcdiarmid getting lit on fire by a demon (darth bane?). Then the movie moves on to a bunch of other world war two movies for quite a while, also every once in a while cutting back to Darth Vader for no apparent reason. The movie drags on for quite a while, then Darth Vader talks to the Emperor and has a ridiculous vision of how Christopher Lee and Ian Mcdiarmid are partners and how the emperor is deformed from being burned (refer to scene at the beginning) and how Christopher Lee had the plague but was saved by becoming Darth Vader, this montage was easily the most entertaining thing about this edit but doesn't actually serve a single purpose for the story. Many scenes in this movie just seemed straight up pointless, there's a scene where Harrison Ford and his group of soldiers try to convince a Nazi soldier that they are holding medecine (why?) and another scene where a woman bathes and then makes love to a German Soldier (whyyyy?). Halfway through the movie, A New Hope starts, and runs for pretty much the rest of the edit, this is just a shortened version of Star Wars, and actually works due to the fact that it serves a purpose. The movie ends with the death star destroying a planet while the trench run happens, then it just cuts to a bunch of previously shown characters looking sad. I don't even know what to say about this... what. a. mess.

This edit could have been much better if the stories were all intercut and came together but they just didn't, it made no sense. John Williams' score is only present in the Star Wars scenes, and should have definitely been used throughout the entire film to provide the same atmosphere and emotion. What a disappointment, I'm sorry T-Bone, but this is a complete failure. :(

!This review contains massive spoilers! So up to you if you want to read on that's your call.

Okay before I start, I made a pledge last year to be totally honest in my reviews, even if it was very negative. Previously I just choose to never write the review, which I thought wasnt being honest. So I'm not going to sugar coat this one. Sorry...

Audio/Video Quality - 7/10

Most of the source material is decent looking HD but some material is jarring sub-SD. I also cannot fathom why this edit is based on the 2011 SE and not something like Harmy's DE? So yes this has a wierd pinkish hue and bizarre CGI additions. There is often the use of slow-motion but it is very jerky and unnatural looking. Some scenes featured a wierd blurring round the edges that appeared then disappeared. There are also a couple of aspect ratio problems where the image bled from scope into the 16:9 frame.

Visual Editing - 2/10

Almost all of the edits here are done by quickly fading in and out of black (Accomapnied with a harsh audio silence). Fades to black (Even well executed ones) are the mark of lazy editing in my book. There is no effort to colour grade the different "planets", add establishing shots or make the disperate elements gel in any way whatsover. The trims to ANH itself are brutal and obvious with nothing done to make the cuts match or smooth over the audio gap. The worst bit though is actually the lack of edits...

e.g. Christopher Lee is still called Rasputin instead of Vader??? (So was Christopher Lee supposed to be Vader or what? It wasn't very clear) when the name could have been removed, we are forced to watch 7 seemingly unedited minutes of Kwai before Guiness even features and 20 minutes of Kwai with little or no tangible connection to Star Wars. Again the Navarone footage goes on and on and on with just Ford's presence to link it to SW at all.

This edit is almost 3 HOURS LONG. You really need to justify this ammount of someone's time. At least try to make it as short as is practicle to spare the audience. But there was no attempt to make any part shorter than it could have been. This aspect of the edit made me a little angry if I'm honest.

A warning: Although this should be a family friendly Star Wars edit, don't show the family as the bizarre decision has been taken to make Greedo swear several times in his subtitles (I added the *) e.g.

"..and put a f*cking bolt in your brain here and now"

This bit ^ made me wonder if this was supposed to be the fanedit equivelant of 'The Room'. A fanedit so misjudged it becomes unintentionally funny. Lastly there is an obvious error in the fanedit credits at the end.

Audio Editing - 3/10

Most of the audio features sudden and very harsh audio fades or no fades at all, the audio just cuts out. At points the audio was badly mis-matched to the video but I'm not sure if this was a "deliberate creative choice". Music qeues start and then stop dead, no gradual fade out or fade in, they are there and then they are not. There is almost no attempt to match the soundtracks of the added footage to the SW universe. Even a little JW music here and there would have helped.

The total failure to make any effort on this front meant the sudden dubbing of blaster sounds over one scene in the middle genuinely just made me laugh. Also many SoundFXs are missing or mis-timed. The deleted ANH footage is the worst with no additional FX added to complete the largely incomplete soundtrack.

Narrative - 3/10

Scenes follow no logic order, or character arc. Characters are bitter enemies and then quite friendly one cut later. There are many pointless minor characters that get loads of screen time for no reason. Either plot elements are introduced with no resolution, or explanations for later events are removed. If you know Star Wars I'd call the narrative incoherent, in the unlikely event you don't know Star Wars, I'd imagine it would be baffling in the extreme.

Enjoyment - 3/10

First off the few highlights: The Emperor redub was a lot of fun. The new Cantina music was groovey. The ending montage was quite well done. The cutaway to the Death Star during the bridge chat was cool. That's it I think.

In conclusion, this is only for Star Wars ADDICTS who have limitless reserves of patience and a high tolerance for poor editing. The ambition is Epic, but the execution is most definitely not. This is the worst fanedit I've so far watched and 3 hours of my life I won't be getting back.

Again, I'm sorry for the harsh review but I'm just being honest.