Star Wars is among the most fan-edited franchises there is. There are several good reasons for this: with a fanbase that big and obsessive, you're going to have a few people with the technical knowhow and bags full of ideas, and Star Wars is ripe for changes. The scope of Star Wars fan edits ranges far and wide.
Films
- Few will argue that Adywan's Revisited Trilogy
is the most ambitious fan-powered undertaking you're likely to find. A New Hope: Revisited was finished in 2008 after over two years of work, and the effort showed. Every single laser and saber was re-rotoscoped, the entire film was color-corrected from the 2004 DVDs (which looked like the film stock had been soaked in blue Kool-Aid), the entire soundtrack was remixed, irritating special-edition slapstick trimmed out as neatly as possible, hundreds of technical errors fixed, believable special effects and brand-new footage shot by the editor integrated, and most importantly, Han shot first. The editor even managed to make the saber duel between Obi-Wan and Darth Vader kinetic and engaging. In 2017, The Empire Strikes Back Revisited came out, and Return of the Jedi Revisited is in the works. Adywan also had plans to give this treatment to the Prequel Trilogy (which, by his admission, would have made the films practically unrecognizable), but later decided against it since it would be far too expensive to pull off, he wasn't as invested in those movies as the Original Trilogy, and he felt that giving the Revisited treatment to three movies on his own was exhausting. - The Despecialized Editions are a massive project by Harmy which, using multiple sources such as the LaserDisc, Blu-ray, 35MM scans, etc. completely reconstructed the original and unaltered theatrical versions in HD for Blu-ray players.
- "Purist" versions of the OT also exist, which are pretty much exactly like they were originally shown in the theaters (i.e., nothing to make them more consistent with the Prequels), plus remastered picture and sound quality.
- War of the Stars. The Man Behind the Mask set out to turn A New Hope into a grindhouse movie, and the results are hilarious. The less given away about this one, the better.
- Topher Grace of all people created a fan edit of the Prequel Trilogy that cut it down to a single film. He has no intention of making it available for public viewing, but there were some articles written about what he included, and there have been a few copycat attempts by some fans, such as Turn to the Dark Side.
- Another famous edit is the Fall of the Jedi Prequel trilogy by Q2, which keeps all Original Trilogy spoilers hidden (especially the Vader/Luke twist) and has Padme survive.
- The Phantom Edit is another high-profile edit of the prequels. Edits of Episode I and Episode II are available, each including commentary tracks explaining the editor's choices.
- Labyrinth of Evil is the final chapter in HAL's Prequel Trilogy. Here, Padme is one of the founders of the Rebellion, who ends up surviving and holding a newborn Leia on Alderaan.
- More recently, some dedicated fans have been acquiring, scanning and restoring actual 35mm film prints of the original trilogy that were distributed to theaters back in the '70s and 80s. Considering the age and condition of many of these prints, and the quality of the samples that have been released, these fans are working such absolute magic that an official HD release of the unaltered trilogy may soon be redundant. The most notable of these efforts, Project 4K, eventually managed to produce and release high-quality restorations of the entire Original Trilogy based on these theatrical prints, both in versions with film grain intact for purist videophiles and with grain digitally removed for those used to that method of restoration.
- Rogue One is the first film in the franchise without an Opening Crawl. Cue the fans...
- Ivan Ortega led a project to edit The Last Jedi to remove its divisive elements and add in some deleted scenes; it features, among other things, a training montage for Rey, new soundalike voiceovers for Admiral Ackbar (who doesn't get abruptly killed off but instead pulls a Heroic Sacrifice to cripple the First Order's fleet) and Luke Skywalker (who gives Rey his old lightsaber instead of throwing it away, is shown mourning Han's death, is portrayed as having genuinely tried to save Ben Solo from becoming Kylo Ren, and doesn't get killed off at the end after having projected himself through the Force), and some flashback scenes to flesh out characters. A full ending duel between Luke and Kylo is planned, but not finished as of this writing.
- The Rise of Skywalker: Resurgence is notable as the first released Rey Nobody edit of the film, which also has the revelation that Rey killed her parents replacing the reveal of Rey being Palpatine's granddaughter. Also, Ben Solo lives.
TV Series
- A guy named Kai Patterson reedited Obi-Wan Kenobi from a nearly 4 hour series into a 2 hour and a half Compilation Movie, and it got quite some praise, and even coverage from major geek outlets (which is rare enough to be mentioned). Many things were removed, chief among them awkward moments concerning young Leia (for instance, the ridiculous chase in the woods on Alderaan was axed, going straight to the Bag of Kidnapping) and many a Series Continuity Error. A number of classic themes of John Williams from the Original and Prequel trilogies were also added.
Others
- There's at least one "watchable" edit of the infamous Holiday Special in which the most bizarre things got edited out.
