War of the Stars II: The Future in Motion

Overview - Fuse the strongest of the original trilogy with the weakest, redraw Luke’s character so he now carries Anakin’s bad seed, alter Vader’s character, juice the mojo for Fett, those are just elements of an exceptional edit.

Video - Quality choices top to bottom. Now, I KNEW when an alteration was made, but my reaction was always Ooh or Whoa. War Of The Stars is an genuine alternative, not a nip n tuck edit, the flow twists in unexpected directions. The editing was seamless, which I appreciated more during repeat viewings.

Audio - Great sound. Loved the musical alterations (Planets repeated perhaps once too often). Aside from that, again there are countless modifications and the audio editing is demonstration time.

Narrative - The first two thirds of War Of The Stars is inspired. Changes in story structure, character behaviour, Luke’s peccadillo, Darth’s red-eyed fury. Fun times. Jedi is what it is, though TMBTM minimized the Ewoks, brutally truncated all threads (in the best way), slammed the action. Jedi roared past and I did not cringe once. That is a feat.

Enjoyment - A terrific version. Truly. Must see for Sith faithful. Have rewatched a couple of times, this will be going to Star Wars buddies who think they have “seen it all.”

Thank you TMBTM! :]X

Simply amazing! Very coherent story which is full of surprises, none of them too cheesy (though I had to laugh out loud because of the "Roger, Roger!"). Some edits and effects are near to flawless, some are easily spotted, some elements are a bit "off", but nothing really spoiled my enjoyment. I would have preferred a bit less Wampa-shooting, some more scratches to better match the film to the lesser quality of some segments, and an improvement of some audio (in a few audio bits, speech is strangely "pitched", maybe due to an extraction from background music or effects).

To bring back an important character which was killed in the first installment "War of the Stars", the solution TMBTM has chosen was obvious, but some details and ideas in the process were ingenious. I had such a lot of fun - even with the segments of Return of the Jedi (I hated this movie almost as much as the prequels, when it first came out: I just saw it a single time in the theatre then, which speaks volumes – but TMBTM brought back the joy!).

So, in the alternate universe where Star Wars was War of the Stars, it too was an outstanding success. So, with a higher budget, the broke out of the Grindhouse and made... something truly amazing. While perhaps not as hysterically funny as the original, this is an amazingly unique take on Empire and Jedi. It preserves the altered character personalities and plotline of the previous edit, and takes them in some really interesting directions. The use of footage from a variety of sources, a lot of very impressive special effect work, and a quality new soundtrack only enhance this altered reality version of these movies. This is a worthy followup. Another must-watch.

War of the Stars 2 - The Future in Motion is another stellar fan edit from Mask, which only suffers because its inevitable comparision to its predecessor, War of the Stars.

In the original, Mask's heavy use of degraded footage allowed for the inclusion of imperfect video and sound in all editing choices and extra footage. Here, a more serious attempt at filmmaking is approached so when extra footage is markedly bad, it is jarring, not charming.

This film also suffers due to it's run time. Yes, the original movies all hover at about 2 hours. But here, the narrative has too many crests and valleys as it transitions from the Episode 5 material to Episode 6.

These complaints though, are really the only substaintial faults that can be leveled against this. Outside of them, the film is amazing.

Mask has done a brilliant job weaving dialog, scenes and nearly 100 unique special effects shots to create yet another ingenious reimagining of Star Wars. Suprises present themselves from its opening sequence all the way to the closing moments of the movie. This is truly indicative of the magic that comes with fan editing as scenes we're all familiar with become innudated with new meaning. I imagine that had Lucas had the same ideas Mask has had, maybe we'd have a different Star Wars altogether.

Like War of the Stars, this film isn't meant to replace one's OT of Star Wars, but it is a must-have compliment to it.

I know that, 6 or so years from now, looking back at Episodes 7, 8 and 9, I'll be thinking about what creative spin Mask is going to mold out of it all. And...I'll be looking forward to watching it!