Review Detail
9.0 42 10Overall rating
9.2
Audio/Video Quality
10.0
Audio Editing
10.0
Visual Editing
10.0
Narrative
7.0
Enjoyment
7.0
Rise of Skywalker is a film of many choices, that's as true to the final official product as it has proven for many faneditors. This one, put together by the maverick anti-cringer DonKamillo, makes the kind of choices that we need a lot of with this: bold ones.
The narrative is altered to remove moments that seem more random in placement and execution, leaving 3-PO without his memory shows a costly side to the quest. Kylo no longer being a lousy (Adam) driver in the desert gives his entrance a much grander sense of menace, where as you were left kind of thinking he was an idiot when he arrived on the scene.
Rey no longer being related to Palpatine yet still have his power kind of goes unexplained, unless we're meant to take the 'diad' line as the explanation, I also feel the footage kind of lets down the line Rey crosses when she kills Kylo and Luke is very relaxed and forgiving. That cannot be helped, and Kylo's send-off with Han actually works far better in this cut as a moment of passage rather than a plot device to necessitate a random change of heart to further the plot along. It is my choice for the best edited scene of this movie.
I would have preferred if Rey had died defeating The Emperor, as somewhat of a karmic 'price' paid for killing Kylo, and the film should have ended with Luke looking out at the suns on the island from Last Jedi. Maybe you could have inserted a force ghost of Leia from the end of 'Rise' in that scene. Just a thought.
Overall, while it doesn't 'rise' to the same heights as the tour de force that was The Last Jedi anti-cringe cut, this is still a solid and superior cut to the official release that ended the sequel trilogy on a rather drab note.
The narrative is altered to remove moments that seem more random in placement and execution, leaving 3-PO without his memory shows a costly side to the quest. Kylo no longer being a lousy (Adam) driver in the desert gives his entrance a much grander sense of menace, where as you were left kind of thinking he was an idiot when he arrived on the scene.
Rey no longer being related to Palpatine yet still have his power kind of goes unexplained, unless we're meant to take the 'diad' line as the explanation, I also feel the footage kind of lets down the line Rey crosses when she kills Kylo and Luke is very relaxed and forgiving. That cannot be helped, and Kylo's send-off with Han actually works far better in this cut as a moment of passage rather than a plot device to necessitate a random change of heart to further the plot along. It is my choice for the best edited scene of this movie.
I would have preferred if Rey had died defeating The Emperor, as somewhat of a karmic 'price' paid for killing Kylo, and the film should have ended with Luke looking out at the suns on the island from Last Jedi. Maybe you could have inserted a force ghost of Leia from the end of 'Rise' in that scene. Just a thought.
Overall, while it doesn't 'rise' to the same heights as the tour de force that was The Last Jedi anti-cringe cut, this is still a solid and superior cut to the official release that ended the sequel trilogy on a rather drab note.