Synopsis:

This fan edit trims the final installment of the Star Wars saga into a more economical, focused chapter by removing as much as possible from story elements that don’t support the primary narrative of Luke’s journey to redeem his father.

Intentions:

Whenever I watch The Empire Strikes Back I get a hankering to put Jedi on, and whenever I do I’m massively disappointed. The first hour feels largely unnecessary, with the bloated Jabba’s palace sequence feeling like filler, and then of course, there’s the infamous Ewoks. Rather than building an interesting film about Luke coming to terms with his roots, and Leia starting on a path to become a Jedi, Lucas gave Leia nothing to do in the whole film, and until the last half hour disregarded Luke’s emotional struggles. Unfortunately these problems are much too fundamental for a newbie editor like myself to fix (hopefully Adywan will eventually get round to dealing with them), but by cutting back the Jabba’s palace stuff, and reducing the infantile Ewok behaviour, the film becomes much more enjoyable.

Change List:

- Reduced chat between C-3P0 and Bib Fortuna - Boba Fett taken out of the whole film! - Less laughter from Salacious Crumb - Gave Jabba new dialogue throughout - Took out entire droid torture scene - Took out the Jedi Rocks musical number - Took out beat where Boushh threatens Jabba with thermal detonator - Reworked whole scene where Chewie is led in, set to ‘Bounty For A Wookiee’ from the soundtrack, rather than the Max Rebo Song - Took out horrible beat where Lando very slowly and deliberately reveals his face from under the mask - That frog outside the palace doesn’t burp - Substantionally reworked Leia and Han being caught by Jabba, taken out bad humour, added tense music from soundtrack - Took out entire scene between Chewie and Han in the dungeon - Added new exterior shot of palace for pacing reasons, since the aforementioned scene is gone - Reworked scene where Luke confronts Jabba, many small cuts and changes to heighten drama - Tightened up Rancor sequence to take out bad special effects, shots of Fett, and muppetry - Reworked the ‘sentencing’ scene with tense music, and Han/Luke cheesy dialogue excised - Many changes to Sarlacc sequence, to take out Fett, Salacious Crumb, and generally to ramp up the drama - Took out Ben’s lines about "from a certain point of view" - Took out Lando’s cheesy grin after Han describes him as the respectable one - Took out Han’s "good luck, you’re gonna need it" - Took out 3P0?s line "exciting is hardly the word I would choose" - Took out entire scene between Lando and Han in the ship’s hangar. - Took out Han worrying about the Falcon. - Reworked shuttle scene: the intent being to remind the audience of the scene near the end of TESB, where Luke and Vader are communicating while on separate ships; this adds foreboding and tension that Han’s jokes took away from - Removed Han’s line ‘Hey, it’s me!’ - No longer does Han walk on the twig and the stormtrooper turns round. It always bothered me that Chewie growls a moment earlier. So I made his growl loud enough that the stormtrooper hears, turns, and sees Han. - Made several small pacing cuts to the speeder bike chase - After Luke lightsabers the speeder bike and it crashes into the tree it no longer makes that annoying, comic, out-of-control sound - Whole scene between Leia and Wicket has gone - Han’s line "I hope she’s all right" has gone – it’s too on the nose - Small cuts to the gang’s first scene with the Ewoks, fewer Ewok shots and Han’s 'proper?' also taken out - Several cuts during the scene where they’re going to be cooked for dinner. As much cutesey Ewok stuff as posible edited out - Threepio’s story telling scene has been tweaked, to reduce Ewok cute stuff and Han’s bad jokes - The beat outside between Han and Leia now plays out in near silence: He asks her what’s up, she looks sad then says hold me - When that Ewok (Paploo, or whoever) takes the speeder bike, he zooms away and that’s the end of the scene - When the Rebel fleet appears and "it’s a trap" the ships fly towards the Empire’s fleet... it cuts to Luke watching the battle - During the big battle sequence there are many cuts, mostly from the Ewok section, to reduce silliness and build drama between these three fights - The awful call-back to Empire, where Han says I love you, Leia says I know, has been replaced by tense music - When Luke is hiding from Vader I made the image slightly darker to make his hiding more plausible – it’s always bothered me - Took out the humongous exploding shield generator. It seems to wipe out half the forest - Took out Lando "Yeehaaa" or whatever cheesy line it is, when they escape the Death Star Then the ending: - I used a section of the end credits music, it’s an uplifting piece, but with a hint of melancholy, which seems appropriate; most importantly it feels Star Wars, unlike both Yub Nub and the SE music - The Ewok party is cut right back, I used the Han/Leia/Luke hugging from the GOUT, which is longer, then cut to: - Sebastian Shaw’s ghost

Additional Notes:

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Other Sources:

Special Thanks: