Star Wars - Episode II: The Republic Divided

*This rating was given before reviews were required*

*This rating was given before reviews were required*

TMBTM — July 6, 2011

Nothing much to add to the praise: a very good edit of a very weak movie.
To me this edit is at same level of success than Episode 3 by faneditor Kerr
(but also gave me the same feeling that a short edit like this is not “Star Wars canon”, but that’s just me).
I’ll rate this edit a 9/10.

One point was lost because of the following things:
- The end of the crawl have a little transition problem.
- The lenght of the edit. A bit too short for me. But hey, that’s the price to pay.
- I understand the shot of Anakin and Padme “by the fire”, but it felt a bit short.
Maybe just few more seconds would have help to remove the feeling of a “fanedit cut”.
- And last but not least: Padme awaking from her fall at the end and saying “we have to go to that hangar!” (or something like this).
I never liked this scene. Everyone in the theater laughed when she woke up that fast and start running and, well,
how does she know about “that hangar” anyway?

But those really are minor and personnal points. This edit is the ultimate polishing work of Episode 2 to date.

THE REPUBLIC DIVIDED

WARNING MAY CONTAIN SPOILERS!!!!

As soon as L8′s newly created Opening Crawl appeared, I knew I was in for a good ride!
For everything you need to know or expect from this edit is perfectly symbolized by L8wrtr’s new Crawl.
As the original Prequel Crawls are some of the most convoluted, headache inducing, and horribily written prologues
ever to grace the silver screen IMO. But L8 has boiled down the crawl to it’s core essence, simplifing and streamlining it
and putting the focus back where it needs to be, on the characters and main plot.

As he did with the Crawl, L8 applied the same concepts to the entire narrative. He has culled away everything that is either a distraction or needlessly complex, and returned the story to being about characters instead of special effects.

He has made Anakin actually fairly likeable in this version (which I thought would be an impossible task) and even tragic.

The romance feels slightly more real and believeable in this version, though both actors still come across at times as stiff and dull, but that is poor direction on Mr. Lucas’s part, no fault of L8.

Obiwan and Anakin’s relationship has more a Buddy feel to it with the removal of Anakin’s constant whining and disrespect.

L8 has wisely and thankfully trimmed most of the big action pieces which were way too long, too loud and honesty, very boring.
Gone are flying R2D2 (YAY!!!) and wardroid C3P0 (BIGGER YAY!!!).

I found myself agreeing with all the cuts and trims, the narrative flows very smoothly and nothing feels missing to me.
Though personally, I miss Yoda’s lightsaber duel, but I completely respect why it was cut.

Technically I did not notice any significant audio or video issues. All the cuts are clean, all the transistions are smooth, video quality was excellent and the audio sounded great.

While I am not a Star Wars Fan, and not as familiar with all it’s continuity and tiny details of it’s Universe, I found this Edit to be fairly entertaining and a definite improvement over the original. Thumbs Up from me!

Great work as always L8!

Looking forward to your version of the final installment of the Prequel Saga!

This edit makes Attack of the Clones as watchable as possible. The obvious shortcomings (C-3P0 battle droid sequence, the diner, etc) have been completely removed without any hard cuts or other noticeable artifacts. That’s a no-brainer for any edit of AOTC.

Where this edit really makes its mark is how it drastically improves the character development and relationships. With A Republic Divided we have an Anikan and Obi Wan who really are good friends, a love story that isn’t forced, and a title character that we actually like (which makes us care when he starts drifting towards the dark side).

That the character dynamics could be so greatly altered through careful editing shows great skill on L8Wrter’s part, and could be used in a film class to help illustrate technique. Maybe George Lucas would attend!

All the useless scenes are either removed or greatly reduced, so much so that there is relatively little left in the movie that doesn’t matter. That nearly 50 minutes can be cut from this film says quite a bit about the quality of the original. That the shorter edit is a far better Star Wars movie says even more.

I can’t think of any areas where I would recommend any changes or additional cuts. L8Wrter accomplished exactly what he intended with this edit, and it came out fantastically. Congratulations on a job very well done. I look forward to your Episode III when it comes out. Any shortcomings are the fault of the material available, and not the editor. Therefore I gave this a 10/10. I for one will consider this my go-to copy.