Review Detail
9.8 17 10
(Updated: September 04, 2020)
Overall rating
9.7
Audio/Video Quality
10.0
Audio Editing
10.0
Visual Editing
10.0
Narrative
9.0
Enjoyment
9.0
Excellent fanedit that cuts out the extraneous/unneeded elements and pares the story down to its essentials, thus focusing the narrative and highlighting the key motivations, themes, and characters (esp harvey's arc) much more effectively. Highly recommended.
A couple of things however, that IMHO prevent this from being 'perfect' (in my eyes):
-Not entirely sure the batman copycat concept works here, esp since the beginning sequence is now purely focused on setting up the narrative elements re the mob, the joker, DA harvey, and batman's mission-- the copycat concept just detracts from 'setting the stage' especially as the dialogue from the copycat has been cut from the beginning sequence -- these copycats could certainly be cut from the scarecrow scene, which would then simply have batman + the tumbler intrude on scarecrow's meeting w the russians before scarecrow gets away. This obviously would necessitate cutting the copycat's dialogue about batman being a symbol in the joker's torture video, and narratively have the joker just dress up a poor random guy in a batman suit before torturing, killing him, and putting a noose over the corpse before tossing it over the side of the mayor's office (which would be a surprise for the audience while still fitting into the 'chaos' aspect of the Joker's MO and how he's causing all this chaos due to batman's presence and how batman should unmask himself to stop this senseless violence and death)
-Would've left the scene w Gordon + Ramirez + batsignal in to 1) provide context re how batman has changed gotham's criminal activity, 2) foreshadow Ramirez's betrayal (mother in the hospital etc), 3) use the batsignal instead to underscore the 'batman as a symbol' theme (which is essentially the purpose of the copycat story component anyway) which then 4) makes the 'gordon taking an axe to the batsignal' shot in the end more poignant and meaningful.
Aside from the above two elements, all the other judicious cuts were extremely well done, as Ryantology jettisoned scenes and elements that weren't really essential to the story and which took screentime away from the main players and the conflicts playing out in the narrative. Everything's much clearer and focused now, and the film's all the better for it. Great work!
A couple of things however, that IMHO prevent this from being 'perfect' (in my eyes):
-Not entirely sure the batman copycat concept works here, esp since the beginning sequence is now purely focused on setting up the narrative elements re the mob, the joker, DA harvey, and batman's mission-- the copycat concept just detracts from 'setting the stage' especially as the dialogue from the copycat has been cut from the beginning sequence -- these copycats could certainly be cut from the scarecrow scene, which would then simply have batman + the tumbler intrude on scarecrow's meeting w the russians before scarecrow gets away. This obviously would necessitate cutting the copycat's dialogue about batman being a symbol in the joker's torture video, and narratively have the joker just dress up a poor random guy in a batman suit before torturing, killing him, and putting a noose over the corpse before tossing it over the side of the mayor's office (which would be a surprise for the audience while still fitting into the 'chaos' aspect of the Joker's MO and how he's causing all this chaos due to batman's presence and how batman should unmask himself to stop this senseless violence and death)
-Would've left the scene w Gordon + Ramirez + batsignal in to 1) provide context re how batman has changed gotham's criminal activity, 2) foreshadow Ramirez's betrayal (mother in the hospital etc), 3) use the batsignal instead to underscore the 'batman as a symbol' theme (which is essentially the purpose of the copycat story component anyway) which then 4) makes the 'gordon taking an axe to the batsignal' shot in the end more poignant and meaningful.
Aside from the above two elements, all the other judicious cuts were extremely well done, as Ryantology jettisoned scenes and elements that weren't really essential to the story and which took screentime away from the main players and the conflicts playing out in the narrative. Everything's much clearer and focused now, and the film's all the better for it. Great work!
User Review
Do you recommend this edit?
Yes
Format Watched
Digital