Revenge of the Fallen Fan-edits of Revenge of the Fallen

[Timstuff]

Obviously, a lot of people were disappointed with ROTF-- myself included. I loved the first movie, but I thought the sequel was just way too bloated, immature, and at times downright nonsensical to be a worthy sequel to the 2007 film.

Well, the good news is that Bay's cut is not the only option. Editing-savvy fans have been having at the film since the day it came out on DVD and Blu-Ray, cutting this beast of a film down to their liking. Due to SHH's TOS I cannot specify how you can obtain these fan cuts, but if you do some research they aren't too hard to track down.

There are many fan cuts currently "in progress," but as of now 3 have been documented as released. The first two are related cuts by an editor named Kevinicus, called "Kitten Calendar Edition" and "The Real Effin' Deal". Both of these cuts leave much of the film's sophomoric sense of humor untouched, but they do make the film about 20 minutes shorter, more tightly paced, and cut down on some of the less-than-stellar plot points. The difference between the two is that Kitten Calendar Edition leaves the Twins unchanged (Kevinicus is a fairly vocal supporter of the characters), and Real Effin' Deal cuts them down significantly. I have not watched either, but they are supposedly well executed and are a decent option if your primary beef with the film is the pacing and plot. Also, Kitten Calendar Edition is availible in HD, with an HD Real Effin' Deal apparently in the works.

Here's a list or changes common between both the Kitten Calendar and Real Effin' Deal cuts:

Spoiler

* *The entire introduction with The Fallen and prehistoric man.
* *All of Optimus’ voice over during the Shanghai scene.
* *Moved the title sequence to the end of the Shanghai scene.
* *Trimmed Sam & Parents at the beginning somewhat (and dogs humping).
* *Trimmed Bumblebee in the garage (crying).
* *Trimmed the last line from the Nest hanger.
* *Trimmed Leo’s roommates some as well as some of Sam’s parents.
* *Trimmed Sam/Alice at party and part of the car scene.
* *Trimmed Megatron/Starscream on Nemesis and trimmed middle and end of scene.
* *Trimmed classroom flirtation bit.
* *Trimmed Sam in his room and w/Alice.
* *Trimmed talk in the library.
* *Cut repeated footage of Soundwave.
* *Cut Sam’s parents with the mime.
* *Trim news bits after Decepticons arrival.
* *Cut Galloway shutting down NEST.
* *Trimmed meat shop (no more talk about teeth).
* *Cut Simmon’s ass.
* *Cut Leo shocking himself.
* *Trim Jetfire talking about his family being there for “centuries”.
* *Leo/Mikeala land in desert
* *Image of Autobots being loaded onto plane and Lennox comments about it being a mistake
* *Removal of Lennox and Epps discussing the phone call and location of coordinates
* *Removal of Checkpoint scene
* *Remove Galloway parachute scene
* *Change footage and trim end of Petra scene to remove Simmons viewing troops parachuting from so far away, and to add time lapse.
* *Remove Simmons pointing at flare right after Sam does.
* *Heavily trim parts of military scenes (mostly parts without robots).
* *Remove Galloway in desert scene
* *Remove repeat shot from first movie of Drone
* *Trim Simmons conversation with Captain of Aircraft Carrier
* *Crop shot of Simmons on walkie talkie to remove wrong pyramid from the background
* * Remove Devastator’s balls (the flagrant scene anyway).
* *Trimmed Sam’s meeting with the Primes (I refuse to call this robot heaven since that’s not what it is). I don’t care a lot for this scene, but I feel it is necessary. I removed the part about Sam’s destiny though, that isn’t necessary.
* *Removed a couple of repeated shots during The Fallen’s retrieving of the Matrix.
* *Removed the audio for “Give me your face!”
* *And I went back and cut out the 6 bogeys coming up from the water for those that feel it’s a continuity error.
* *various other small edits

The other cut, which I've actually seen is from an editor named Gieferg, aptly called "Gieferg's Cut." I was very pleased with this cut in spite of a few minor technical quirks and glitches (mostly audio jumps and clipping). This edit cuts 23 minutes and adds 90 seconds. Overall, this edit speeds up the pace of the film, has far less dumb humor (the parents have a greatly reduced presence in the film), it adds a few nice touches for G1 fans (Soundwave's voice, and there's some Stan Bush music in there), and THE TWINS BARELY SHOW UP! It's amazing how un-missed they are in the movie's narrative, proving just how little they contributed to the story (as in, almost nothing). Now, they're bit players no more prominent than any of the other Autobots, save for the fact that they still act like ******s for what little of the movie they're in. Remarkably, even the annoying stuff that is still there seemed less annoying, just because it's not sitting on top of a massive pile of other annoying stuff.

Here's a full list of changes in Gieferg's Cut:

Spoiler

* - Twins completely removed from Shanghai*
* - dialogue between Sam and his parents at the beginning trimmed
* - kitchen-bots trimmed
* - dogs removed
* - some of Sam’s mom scenes deleted
* - garage scene replaced with alternate version
* - crying Bumblebee deleted
* - trimmed some shots during arriving to Diego Garcia*
* - one shot of Optimus in truck form added*
* - Twins upgrading removed*
* - Epps alternate line after Optimus transforms added
* - Leo’s pals trimmed
* - cut all Sam’s parents scenes at the college
* - added Sam, Leo & Alice scene at the dorm*
* - cut Sam, Leo & friends going to the party (not the party itself)
* - cut entire scene with Sam & Alice in Bumblebee
* - trimmed Wheelie trying to get the shard (no mouse trap, less talking)
* - Sam is freaking out in his room a little less
* - cut Leo’s reaction on Sam in his room
* - most of the dialogue between Sam and Mikaela during escape deleted
* - cut Leo’s “So hot” line
* - Sam’s parents & the mime deleted
* - twins removed from Sam & Leo discussion scene
* - cut part of Decepticons arrival
* - part of Simmons dialogue in meat shop removed
* - “don’ tell my mother” removed
* - some of Wheelie’s lines removed
* - Simmons ass and dialogue before going to museum deleted
* - cut entire Leo’s toilet scene
* - removed Leo line “I’m not going anywhere” when Simmons paralyzing the guard
* - humping wheelie removed
* - cut part of Jetfire dialogue and parachute scene
* - cut the scene in which Mikaela lies on Leo
* - added “Leo refuses…” deleted scene*
* - deleted police chase*
* - deleted hiding from the police*
* - trimmed phone call scene*
* - deleted checkpoint scene (now Soundwave locates Sam after Simmons phone call)*
* - trimmed Epps, Lennox, headquarters talking*
* - Leo & Simmons sleeping removed
* - Galloway plane and Egypt scenes removed
* - Leo’s panic in the car removed
* - paralyzing Leo removed
* - cut part of dialogue between Leo and Simmons where paralyzing was mentioned
* - part of Headquarters talking deleted
* - deleted some military equipment footage during battle
* - removed “enemy scrotum”
* - removed “Transformers heaven”
* - and some minor cuts here and there

and especially for G1 fans:

* - added Stan Bush – The Touch as soundtrack in final battle
* - Linkin Park end title song replaced with Stan Bush – Till all are one
* - added G1 transformation sounds here and there (find them by yourself ) *
* - changed Soundwave voice in G1 fashion *

* only in version 1.3 (DVD release)

It's not perfect, but IMO it's still vastly preferable over the official release, and overall I felt it was a worthy followup to the first movie even though it's a work in progress.