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The Rise of Skywalker - COMPLETE SCORE Discussion - SPOILERS ALLOWED!


Jay

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Ah, I see IMDB has finally added the two source cues!

Soundtrack Credits 

Lido Hey
Written by Lin-Manuel Miranda and J.J. Abrams
Produced and Performed by Shag F. Kava
Oma's Place
Written, Produced and Performed by Ricky Tinez and J.J. Abrams

 

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt2527338/soundtrack

 

They were not there before

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21 hours ago, First TROS March Accolyte said:

Doesn't he say that about the Millenium Falcon?

 

Edit: I've found an interesting bit of info on reddit

https://www.reddit.com/r/saltierthancrait/comments/eisnd8/heres_what_ive_been_told_from_a_source_that/

 

What is the implication here?

 

That the Kylo v Knights of Ren music is tracked for somewhere else and JJ doesn't agree with that choice?

 

OR

 

Does JJ does not agree with the music JW wrote for that scene?

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I think pretty clearly the former. JJ was at the scoring sessions; he would have known what music had been written for the scene, and would have either agreed with JW's choice or asked him to change it.

 

The implication seems to be that the editors stuck in music that didn't belong in that scene, without JJ's permission. The fact that this was allegedly a reaction he had during a screening of the movie, goes to show it was an editing choice he disagreed with. If it was JW's music itself, he'd have had the reaction way earlier, on the scoring stage or at the very latest, in the editing room.

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2 hours ago, Jay said:

Note: The section with Leia's Theme does not appear in the OST version of this cue, so it seemingly either an Insert or tracked music. 

What do you mean? You can here Leia's Theme at 3.16 on the OST. 

Or is it a different version in the film?

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Shoot you're right, it's right there on the OST, I dunno what happened.  Sounds the same as the film.  I'll fix it up.

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We don't know any of the names, I just made up my own. Some day the names will appear on BMI like they did for TFA and TLJ! 

 

Looks like we got TLJ's in late February, before we even knew there'd be an iso score 

 

https://www.jwfan.com/forums/index.php?/topic/28314-the-last-jedi-cue-titles-now-available/

 

 

Though it looks like we didn't have TFA's until two and a half years after the film came out so who can predict these things

 

https://www.jwfan.com/forums/index.php?/topic/25913-the-force-awakens-complete-score-breakdown-chronological-order-film-spoilers-allowed/&do=findComment&comment=1516250

 

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It's hard for me to think of this as anything but the least of the ST scores for me, at least at the moment. TFA had a whole host of fantastic new themes to did into, while TLJ spent a lot of time further developing those themes, with a lot of great, long set pieces to build lengthy pieces. The themes in TROS are nice, but they don't stack up against TFA. The further development of themes in TROS is nice too, but the lengthy sequences aren't there. Obviously I don't blame JW. But the Prologue is a mess, so we don't really have the same sort of fun opening like the last two films (the heavily edited Escape is a great, long piece even when listening to the film version). The final battle is where we might have expected some really exciting and big pieces for the battle (like Crait, Naboo, Endor, and Hoth before it) but, to me, "Battle of the Resistance" doesn't make the same sort of impression.

 

I guess part of the issue is missing music. The final third would be a lot more impressive when considering not just the OST, but the FYC and 'Lando Arrives' and 'Fighting the Guards.' Still, missing a little something, perhaps, but ultimately we must blame JJ primarily. Hopefully if we ever do get an isolated or expanded score my feelings can evolve (like they did on TLJ which I thought initially was just too heavily reliant on old themes).

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1 hour ago, King Mark said:

Right now Revenge of the Sith is about tied with Rise of Skywalker for me

 

I was thinking maybe an earlier scene of Reunion had Force Ghost Yoda and then Force Ghost Luke + Leia  and why their themes are there . I really doubt Williams would have scored the Lando+ whoever scene with Luke and Leia

I thought for sure Yoda would turn up in ghost form, but I think it's sweet that the role was transferred to Luke to be the wise mentor he wasn't in TLJ. He's now atoning for his mistakes.

 

 

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@DominicCobb I agree with your post 100%, especially the part about TLJ. 

 

TROS is my least favorite SW score (not counting Solo or Rogue One.)  It's good but I hope I grow to like it more like I did TLJ. 

 

I still appreciate @Jay's hard work with this breakdown. It helps a lot. 

 

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Due to the poor editing of the film itself, there really aren't any set piece sequences therefore no set piece cues. The Speeder Chase is the closest thing and both the film and music are chopped into a mess. 

 

Just compare New Alliances from TLJ to Rey fighting the guards and Kylo fighting the Rens in TROS. The former is a distinct action scene where the camera shows off the choreography and the music has the opportunity to stand apart as an action cue. I honestly don't remember what music plays in the latter but the visuals definitely did not highlight the action or choreography. The film tries to emphasize the drama but I remember it to be visually messy.

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30 minutes ago, artguy360 said:

Due to the poor editing of the film itself, there really aren't any set piece sequences therefore no set piece cues. The Speeder Chase is the closest thing and both the film and music are chopped into a mess. 

 

Just compare New Alliances from TLJ to Rey fighting the guards and Kylo fighting the Rens in TROS. The former is a distinct action scene where the camera shows off the choreography and the music has the opportunity to stand apart as an action cue. I honestly don't remember what music plays in the latter but the visuals definitely did not highlight the action or choreography. The film tries to emphasize the drama but I remember it to be visually messy.

Even in its highly edited form, the TROS action music is far, far better than the stabby, mickey-mousy approach for TLJ.

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5 minutes ago, crumbs said:

I much prefer the action music in TLJ to TROS. Calling an action cue like The Battle of Crait "stabby, mickey mousing" seems like a gross oversimplification.

 

There's longform musical ideas in there that Williams is able to develop and build over many minutes. The dramatic arc of Escape is unbelievable when you listen in complete form (and even still, we're missing big chunks of it). It builds and builds in tension masterfully, no other composer is capable of writing stuff this advanced (much less in their 80s).

 

His approach for TROS seems directly influenced by the return of Abrams, modular to compensate for chunks being deleted all over the place. He probably wonders why he even bothered with a track like Speeder Chase, given what happened to it. 

Cues like "Escape" and "Battle of Crait" just feel choppy and directionless to me - like a series of concert arrangement clips pasted together and punctuated by 15 second segments of new original score.  This is almost definitely to blame on Rian Johnson's minimal spotting sessions, and the obvious, uninspired temp-track. 

TROS's action cues might not be as long but they feel like they have more of John Williams' creative input.  We get a ton of new interesting thematic ideas one-after-the-other in the span of a couple minutes.  Despite the short length, they still feel memorable and properly developed (a good example of this is the Last Crusade-esque spooky-mysterious action melody heard at 2:25 of Approaching the Throne - in the span of a minute or so, it features three melodic components of the same idea before seamlessly transitioning into action statements of the Victory theme and then March of the Resistance)

 

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Exactly, it's sad to think that they had JW on their side and then throw his work out the window for what? What purpose does the music serve if it can't speak? If they wanted to mess with the music, even before burying it under sounds, why didn't they just track the whole film with older music and not bother with Williams at all?

 

It's just so snotty and a massive warning sign about the role of film music as nothing more than wallpaper that they can fix in post.

 

 

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On 12/24/2019 at 7:27 PM, Erik Woods said:

My gift to you this holiday season. Here's my Fantasy End Credit suite of The Rise of Skywalker end title. I truly disliked the Finale cue on the album so my goal was to fix it by trying my best to eliminate as much previously established themes and only use new Rise of Skywalker themes and music in the suite.

I hope you enjoy! IMO, this is a much more satisfying finale then what Williams gave to us on the album and in the film.

 

 

 

 

 

Thank you, I just came around to listening to this. A very nice alternative to the existing End Credits. While the latter try to bind the whole Saga together, yours concentrates more on this movie, which is legitimate. I like especially the inclusion of more of the concert version of Anthem of evil and the very ending with its overlapping main themes. To  this I have a question: How did you achieve this effect? Where e.g. did you get the Main Theme in the bass tuba at the ends to mix into it? 

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23 minutes ago, Gurkensalat said:

To  this I have a question: How did you achieve this effect? Where e.g. did you get the Main Theme in the bass tuba at the ends to mix into it? 

 

It's the alternate ending to the Jedi Steps and Finale concert suite. Williams wrote both 'quiet' and 'loud' endings. And yes, @Erik Woods alternate credits suite is brilliant and a far more satisfying suite than the patchwork film version.

 

12 minutes ago, Holko said:

Oh wait, there's the key: it's actual sound design, it has personality, it lets the speeders speed by and quiet down a lot, it's not a constant overloud ADD barrage of 25 kinds of noise.

 

Exactly. We can criticise Burtt all we want for what happened on the prequels, but he got sound design. The asteroid chase in AOTC is another excellent example of how sound and music can work in tandem for the best audio storytelling.

 

The speeder chase in TROS is just noise. There's no design. There's no reason Williams' music needed to be buried, or hacked to pieces (except for an indecisive director who doesn't understand the basics of film editing).

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The unrealistically hopeful side of me hopes that perhaps before the Blu Ray is released they will tweak some things in the edit (after all we know they recognize it was rushed and still needs some fine tuning) and maybe, just maybe Speeder Chase will be restored. I won’t get my hopes up, though

 

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49 minutes ago, Bennett Boyle said:

The unrealistically hopeful side of me hopes that perhaps before the Blu Ray is released they will tweak some things in the edit (after all we know they recognize it was rushed and still needs some fine tuning) and maybe, just maybe Speeder Chase will be restored. I won’t get my hopes up, though

 

 

Likewise, but yeah, not getting my hopes up. I don't think any film has more obviously needed an extended cut to fix the blatant issues with its theatrical cut. It's Alien 3 levels of perplexing, just without the studio interference to blame.

 

It would be nice if studios took onboard the criticism and allowed filmmakers a 'V2' for home video, but I guess the damage is already done (plus they usually have those things locked the same time as the theatrical release). But it's so obvious that a few editing tweaks could really fix most of the issues people have with the film; surely JJ regrets cutting the film so close to the bone?

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I love how Alien 3's bonus features do explore the background of the mess, earlier concepts, even lightly trash it here and there - in addition to also having the much better Assembly Cut.

I expect IX's bonus features to be a mix of Rogue One and Solo's: not touching the director change or any item of controversy, barely any real in-depth background info and only things on the level of prerelease web interviews, little or no deleted scenes. :(

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12 hours ago, King Mark said:

Right now Revenge of the Sith is about tied with Rise of Skywalker for me

 

I was thinking maybe an earlier scene of Reunion had Force Ghost Yoda and then Force Ghost Luke + Leia  and why their themes are there . I really doubt Williams would have scored the Lando+ whoever scene with Luke and Leia

I think the Luke+Leia appearance is a case of expanding the purpose of a theme beyond its original conception, kinda like the Force Theme began as Obi-Wan’s theme. Remember that the scene is implying that Jannah is Lando’s daughter. So it has now become a ”emotionally satisfying kinship revelation theme”, rather than representing that merely for L&L.

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Or like I have said Luke and Leia is now the incest theme and scores all instances of incest or possible incest in the star wars universe.

 

 

6 hours ago, Bennett Boyle said:

The unrealistically hopeful side of me hopes that perhaps before the Blu Ray is released they will tweak some things in the edit (after all we know they recognize it was rushed and still needs some fine tuning) and maybe, just maybe Speeder Chase will be restored. I won’t get my hopes up, though

 

 

Sorry to say but this is basically an impossibility.

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I don't understand. Mike Mastessino has been convincing Williams it's better to release expanded editions of his scores for a few years now and JJ Abrams hacked up his score in the film yet Williams still chooses to release only a 1 c.d. OST when he could present all the music like he intended it with a longer album, unaltered by edits

 

it's like he learned nothing

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Just because Williams is open to expanded releases in the future, it doesn't mean he no longer values his traditional 1-disc listening experience he crafts out of his scores.
 

Longer/complete-score albums contain more material, yes, but they don't always flow as well and are not necessarily a great listening experience. He knows this stuff will get expanded releases eventually.

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On 1/3/2020 at 11:59 AM, mstrox said:

The implication is that JJ had wanted a badass epic version of Duel of the Fates, but voila, the movie ended up having some brand new appropriate Kylo-themed scoring there (magically? without JJ Abrams' knowledge?)

 

That isn't implicated at all. You are the one assuming it was supposed to be Duel of Fates.

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