Season Three: could use some serious fan editing

[T'Girl]

The entire Xindi arc could have easily been done in only one episode at the end of season two, followed by six (at most) episodes in season three. Devoting an entire season to it was stretching the Xindi concept, the augment arc was nicely told only three episodes.

I for one generally enjoyed Northstar, but that could have been told/inserted anywhere prior or following the Xindi arc. Northstar added nothing to the Xindi story.

Hatchery, re-written, could have also have been moved out of the Xindi arc. It added little to the arc, but was independently a interesting enough story.

The argument could be made to also remove Similitude, but I personally feel that it is a excellent story, and I can't see it working as well outside the Xindi arc.

What little important plot information that was revealed in E2 could simply be moved to another episode, revealed in another form.

 

[mswood]

mswood, the Multiquote button is your friend.


Personally, I loved Season 3.

I think the "we could get cancelled any second" situation, which no other Trek show ever had to worry about, had a lot to do with the lack of follow-up for several dangling plotlines ("North Star," "Damage," "E2", post-war trauma). It seems to me that when the staff saw the writing on the wall, they jettisoned a lot of Season 3 setup in order to do the Action! Space Battles! Cool Guest Stars! TOS-Tie-in! stuff in Season 4. A shame, there was great potential for another 4 seasons of coolness.

Actually I generally dislike the idea of addressing multiple persons in post. I find it rude.

Since each person is an individual, I like to give an individual a response.

As for season four, while it seems popular with "trek" fans. I generally disliked the season as a whole, because I don't think it works.

 

[horatio83]

Besides, whether you like of hate it, the best way to watch is to enjoy shows as they were intended, and not some bastardized fan edit. I mean, what's the point?

Really? I've got to spell it out?

Quality = run time of good scenes divided by total run time

Ergo,

Fewer bad scenes = better quality

​

Laurence Olivier trimmed Hamlet down for his movie, you know. But I guess since he "bastardized" the text, no one should ever watch it?

It's fine to not be interested in fan edits, but there's no need to accuse those who do like them (or even the thought of them) of wasting their time.

A bad comparison as the text of Hamlet has to be always edited before you stage it. The entire text would probably take about five or six hours and there are some lines which refer to contemporary events that are always cut out. II, 1 is also always cut out as this scene merely sets up the atmosphere of mistrust for the second act yet is not necessary for the plot.

Furthermore the guy who works with the text in the case of a theatre production respectively the editor in the case of TV/movies is always part of the production team. Fans are not and they are usually not professional editors which make fan-cuts the work of amateurs who are out of the production process.
The classic is probably The Phantom Menace without Jarjar. Of course this character is annoying but the movie does not work without him. One point of TMP is to show the innocence of the Old Republic. The fans who thought that they can outsmart Lucas totally missed this.

So we have stupid and uninvolved amateurs. Does not sound like the basis for quality work.

 

[sonak]

I liked season 3. It was a huge improvement on the aimless seasons 1 and 2. However, the biggest problems were with the story.

1. The whole conflict was a sham. It was contrived TCW b.s., not a real conflict like with the Dominion on DS9. We knew nothing of either the Xindi or the sphere-builders.

2. The idea that they'd announce their presence and plan with a "test" on a populated part of Earth was absurd. Good thing they didn't have a brain and do it on some hidden, unpopulated moon, otherwise the ENT couldn't have gone on a mission to find the superweapon. Lazy writing.


But as I wrote, the season on a whole was strong, one of the better seasons of televised Trek. The mission gave the show some urgency, and Archer had to mature from the "just sort of farting around" captain of early ENT to actually being a serious captain.

 

[horatio83]

Yeah, it neatly paved the way for the Coalition of Planets stuff in the last season. Without the Xindi mission he'd probably not have realized how important it is to stand united against the Rommies. But if the series had continued the Romulan War might have repeated some themes from the Xindi story which itself borrowed from the Dominion War.

 

[moviejim]

I make fanedits and I think their pretty good,well I did one on Star Trek 2 the Wrath of Kahn and I call it the Kirk shoots first edition. So a fanedit of Enterprise could do some good.

 

[T'Girl]

I did one on Star Trek 2 the Wrath of Kahn

Youtube address?

 

[moviejim]

Actually its on media fire here is the link if you want it
http://www.mediafire.com/?lr8j93y1l6rid

its 11 files and you will have to unzip it.Thanks, if you like it tell someone

 

[Gaith]

The classic is probably The Phantom Menace without Jarjar. Of course this character is annoying but the movie does not work without him. One point of TMP is to show the innocence of the Old Republic. The fans who thought that they can outsmart Lucas totally missed this.

If you're referring to The Phantom Edit, then you speak without knowledge, for it does not eliminate Jar Jar. Moreover, there are probably a dozen or more Ep. I edits listed at fanedit.org, and I defy you to find one that does.

So we have stupid and uninvolved amateurs.

Again, if you're referring to Mike J. Nichols, editor of The Phantom Edit, you speak without knowledge, as he was already professional film editor when he made his Ep. I cut.


... We are Star Trek fans. Uninformed calumny does not become us.

 

[horatio83]

So we have a stupid and uninvolved professional. Still implies total crap as do your suggestions of cutting Season 3 episodes down. You'd probably cut an episode like Similtude all together because it does not contribute anything to the Xindi weapon story arc.

 

[Hopeful Romantic]

mswood, the Multiquote button is your friend.

Actually I generally dislike the idea of addressing multiple persons in post. I find it rude.

Since each person is an individual, I like to give an individual a response.

That's nice. However, board rules ask you to use the multiquote function to avoid spamming, or the inadvertent appearance of same. Have another look at the FAQ and humor us, okay? Thanks.

 

[sonak]

fan edits (except for humor or something) are a dumb idea in general.

Entertainment is art-a completed piece of entertainment represents the vision and completed product of writers, directors, actors, etc at a specific point in time. You start tinkering with that and it's an entirely different product.

 

[Gaith]

Entertainment is art-a completed piece of entertainment represents the vision and completed product of writers, directors, actors, etc at a specific point in time. You start tinkering with that and it's an entirely different product.

Uh, yeah - that's the whole point. Sometimes a "different" artistic product is better; sometimes it isn't. But to say that it's always "dumb" is an astonishingly narrow-minded assumption.

Movies are not sacred products from the gods, and they're not necessarily the pure expression of creative minds, either. Studios muck with artists' visions and re-edit movies all the time. I shouldn't even have to provide an example for this, but I will anyway: look up what happened to The Golden Compass. Or consider the film Two-Faced Woman, where the studio forced the filming and inclusion of a scene that would appease the censors at the cost of debasing the story's very foundation. Without that added scene, the movie becomes better. Doesn't make a lick of difference who makes the cut.

There is no inherent difference between a corporate employee cutting out a given scene and a fan doing the same. All that matters is whether the overall quality of any given edit, no matter who makes it. And Kevin Smith and a Salon.com film critic both found that The Phantom Edit, to take but one example, was a superior product than Lucas' Phantom Menace. Would you call them "dumb"? If so, please provide your professional or academic credentials for doing so.

 

[sonak]

Entertainment is art-a completed piece of entertainment represents the vision and completed product of writers, directors, actors, etc at a specific point in time. You start tinkering with that and it's an entirely different product.

Uh, yeah - that's the whole point. Sometimes a "different" artistic product is better; sometimes it isn't. But to say that it's always "dumb" is an astonishingly narrow-minded assumption.

Movies are not sacred products from the gods, and they're not necessarily the pure expression of creative minds, either. Studios muck with artists' visions and re-edit movies all the time. I shouldn't even have to provide an example for this, but I will anyway: look up what happened to The Golden Compass. Or consider the film Two-Faced Woman, where the studio forced the filming and inclusion of a scene that would appease the censors at the cost of debasing the story's very foundation. Without that added scene, the movie becomes better. Doesn't make a lick of difference who makes the cut.

There is no inherent difference between a corporate employee cutting out a given scene and a fan doing the same. All that matters is whether the overall quality of any given edit, no matter who makes it. And Kevin Smith and a Salon.com film critic both found that The Phantom Edit, to take but one example, was a superior product than Lucas' Phantom Menace. Would you call them "dumb"? If so, please provide your professional or academic credentials for doing so.

I don't think they're products of the "Gods" or "pure," but they are finished products of art that represent a completed vision at a specific time.

Would you support some museum-goers "improving" a painting on a wall with some minor work? Of course not. A movie is no different. Again, parodying it or something is different.

And what's with the "professional" or "academic" credentials stuff? I don't need credentials to have an opinion on fan edits.

 

[Gaith]

Would you support some museum-goers "improving" a painting on a wall with some minor work?

If they owned a legitimately purchased copy of the work, and wanted to modify the copy hanging on their living room wall? Absolutely, I'd support that. Why not?

 

[horatio83]

I think this fan edit nonsense is caused by the general desire of fans to have an influence upon the product in times of the internet. Yet art is not an on-demand or modify-as-you-want-it, it is a take-it-or-leave-it product.

 

[lurok]

There's no real difference between fan edit and any other kind of artistic cut-up (collage, sampling, etc), imho. I don't think any 'art' is sacrosanct from tinkering with by anyone. And the Dune Third Stage fan edit is pretty darn good, if not an improvement. As for Xindi arc, others have said earlier and better (should have been compressed to fewer episodes). I find find first half of season 3 pretty tedious but love individual episodes like North Star, Similitude, Carpenter St, E2, Twilight.

 

[moviejim]

fan edits (except for humor or something) are a dumb idea in general.

Entertainment is art-a completed piece of entertainment represents the vision and completed product of writers, directors, actors, etc at a specific point in time. You start tinkering with that and it's an entirely different product.

I agree when I make my edits I add humor to them.

 

[sonak]

Would you support some museum-goers "improving" a painting on a wall with some minor work?

If they owned a legitimately purchased copy of the work, and wanted to modify the copy hanging on their living room wall? Absolutely, I'd support that. Why not?

they'd have the legal right to do that of course, I just think it's silly.
As Horatio83 above put it, art is a take it or leave it thing. Unless it's deliberately DESIGNED to be fan participatory, I think it should be accepted or rejected on its merits.

 

[Mr_Homn]

Would you support some museum-goers "improving" a painting on a wall with some minor work?

If they owned a legitimately purchased copy of the work, and wanted to modify the copy hanging on their living room wall? Absolutely, I'd support that. Why not?

they'd have the legal right to do that of course, I just think it's silly.
As Horatio83 above put it, art is a take it or leave it thing. Unless it's deliberately DESIGNED to be fan participatory, I think it should be accepted or rejected on its merits.

Well, it's a good thing not everyone has the same narrow-minded opinion.

Most fan edits i have seen are not my cup of tea, many of them are out-right bad... but that's different than calling the whole idea "dumb" or "silly". There have certainly been some good ones. It's not that much different than a director's cut, just without the added benefit (or burden) of the director's allegedly original "vision". Most of these directors cuts come out years and years later, effectively being created by a very different person even if its technically the same creator.

There are plenty of movies that could have been good if they were edited with more care. Some fan edits simply trim the fat, or re-arrange some things, and the final product is better for it.