HALO 2'S LOST STORY: ACT 1 

This is cool

I DIDN'T THINK IT WAS POSSIBLE TO LOVE HALO 2 MORE THAN I ALREADY DID 20:32 I absolutely love the idea of MC driving a ghost off the carrier because it implies that, after starting a chain reaction, it was his best or only available option to get off the carrier quickly! I want to imagine that a ghost-run level precedes this cutscene, similar to the one in halo 4, but instead you would drive the ghost through the cruiser's collapsing engine before driving off the edge. Perfect transition to the cutscene! Also, I cannot believe the amount of effort you put into this video. I am legitimately concerned that you put in TOO much effort for your own health! 30:50 "Why did I animate that?" bro I am stunned you animated your character mascot at all! Most commentary channels just use a handful of still poses that they squish transition between! And to top it off with visually complex gags? WTF. THAT INTRO. All the research you did and collecting all the quotes, the visual representation of the timeline, it is all beautifully done. Documentaries WISH they were this visually engaging! And transcribing that early script despite only being able to see a third of each page just to try to get a HINT at what the dialogue might be? You have a will power that is honestly frightening. You absolutely deserve monetary compensation for your unhinged dedication to making this work of art. PATREON'D!!!

18:55 I like to imagine this alternate version of this cutscene to be the one that plays on Easy mode. As a "punishment" for choosing easy mode, you don't get to have the cool version. Also, great comedic timing on the abrupt stop in the music building up the moment.

22:00 Writing Sgt Johnson: "It's your lucky day chief" (To Pilot) "Tinman coming in" (Chief Lands in Pelican) "For a brick, you flew pretty good" With Sgt Johnson less is more

8:45 The use of "Son" is more a semi humourous addition as the armourer is telling the chief off like a bad school boy

Okay... That was epic. Incredible animation work, I can't imagine how long that would've taken.

animating the armor falling off for no reason was absolutely hilarious

Yoooooo!!!!! Since Lee dropped all his storyboards I’ve been waiting for this!!!! Thanks for all the hard work you do man!!! 🥳🥳🥳🥳

If you haven't checked Halopedia yet, the Earth Ark article actually has voice lines for Arbiter for the cut ending found in a Reach build of all places.

Edit: i turn 26 years old soon. You singlehandedly made me 7 years old again, brother. THIS. CHANNEL. Dude, you are one of the best content creators I have ever seen. Your content surpasses that of 100k+ Subscriber channels with each and every video. Halo's original trilogy is one of the things most sacred to me, and I am going to BINGE. EVERY. VIDEO. YOU'VE. CREATED. The amount of love and care you have put into this just pours out and into my soul, and I love this entire video from 1st frame to the final second. I want to reach out to you personally one day just to let you know what this video did to me emotionally and just how much we may have in common regarding Halo's story and how it's affected us. Dude, I want to see you pass 100k Subs in the next few years, and I'm rooting for you every single step of the way. Good hunting, Spartan. I can't wait for more. My comment on your video... It's finished? Nah, I'm just getting started. Stay EZ. Michael.

18:15 The fighter craft pictured in this storyboard is the "Strike Fighter" conceptualized specifically for Halo 2, which eventually evolved into the Sabre seen in Halo Reach.

YES!!! i always said that the heretic leader shooting inmediately at Arbi while in the middle of a "lore" conversation was too abrupt and jarring, its like yeah i want the Arbi to learn about halo, i mean you have an oracle, i might be abble to come to an understanding with yo.... oh i guess we are fighting now sure..... This explains everything. Also they captured 343 inside a box for coockies so funny.

So basically we lost what would have been the most cinematic and bad ass Halo game there ever was. Not to say Halo 2 wasn't awesome and cinematic but this takes everything to a new level.

14:04 W-was that in the actual storyboard?? What the fuck?! Incredible work, by the way! You're the best Halotuber I've seen by leaps and bounds.

Now that I think about it That second covenant ship story board has chief bouncing atop the carrier for several kilometres Because he goes from the centre to the end And those ships are 5kilometers long.

I really adore Lee's comic style of storyboarding it easy to visualize the camera scene, actions and character dialogs instead of basic hollywood storyboarding

My headcanon is that chief's voice being older than he actually is is due to a throat injury in the war, or a side effect he suffered during the augmentation process, possibly due to the catalytic thyroid implant.

I love that they had Lord Hood rocking a Cape/Boat Cloak + shoulder epaulettes for maximum flag rank bling

27:48 That brute is so happy with how far he slid that bowl It's actually adorable

This is so fucking cool honestly, I can't imagine how much time and effort went into making these storyboards really come to life

35:05 "Oh, I'm getting bitch slapped" HAHAHAHA bust a gut at that

I love the detail of Lord Hood reactivating Operation RED FLAG. A plan mentioned in the fall of reach novel to capture the covenant leadership. Who says bungie ignored the books?

**Let the legend come back to life!**

I'm torn about whether I like Tartarus killing the Heretic more, or whether I prefer the version we got. On the one hand, it establishes that the Arbiter is willing to listen to reason, it makes way more sense than the Heretic shooting the Arbiter while he's listening, and it foreshadows Tartarus's betrayal more overtly. On the other hand, having the Arbiter kill the Heretic gives more weight to his arc of eventually turning against the Covenant. In any event, these continue to be super well-produced! Thanks for the great work!

So much more humor in this draft compared to what we got, I love it 😂

14:35 I think the United Earth Space Corps still fits into what’s been established for canon, as the UNSC is specifically the military branch of the UEG, or United Earth Government, created as a result of the interplanetary war. It’s possible there are honorary and traditional ranks held over from when the UEG was just that United Earth, and the name United Earth Space Corps is kept as a ceremonial thing in certain circumstances. EDIT: Competitive bowl-sliding Brute warden is now my favorite character in the halo franchise.

This is absolutely fantastic! As a huge Halo fan who's been fascinated by the development of Halo for years and years, it is amazing to see the original story presented like this. I freaked out in late 2020 when Lee Wilson posted the storyboards, but you've gone way above and beyond to bring them to life. And as someone who's done his fair share of Halo investigations, the amount of research you've done to make it as accurate as possible is inspiring! I'm in heaven. 😍 P.S. I actually wrote the article on Medium you highlight at the beginning, and I felt terrible about not mentioning you, so I edited it to point out your role in getting these storyboards released lol. Thanks to you and especially Lee Wilson for revealing an ending I'd been wondering about for 16 years ❤

Lately I’ve fallen down the Halo lore rabbit hole and this video came out at a perfect time lol. Love the videos dude keep up the good work.

This channel is severely underrated. The work you put into these deserve millions of views. Love the campy dialog you put in lieu of the actual script. Had me laughing a few times.

For once, the Algorithm has actually GIVEN ME SOMETHING WORTH WATCHING.

this was actually extremely dope, just like the CE one

I love the Covenant Ship cutscenes, lol. Immediately being greeted by Drones, imagine that on Legendary. I'm really curious how that mission would have played out, as the outro has you escape with a Ghost! While you could technically do this in ODST in Uplift Reserve (but you can use any other vehicle, like the Warthog), a "Ghost Run" (which I assume would have happened prior to this outro) didn't occur until Halo 4. Interestingly enough the E3 demo had a short Ghost run at the end too, so maybe this level is where they got that from? Who knows. Here's a couple other things I wanna talk about: 6:54 In the final game, the Arbiter is like "Don't touch me, back off" and is simply escorted away by the Brutes instead. He doesn't let the Brutes lay a finger on him. He is only seen being dragged like depicted here in The Arbiter intro. It's a subtle change, but I really like it. It gives more character to the Arbiter (it's like a sudden burst of anger from him, and yeah I'd react like that too if I was in Arbiter's position) and in a way it's foreshadowing to the Elites vs Brutes conflict later in the game. Even moments as miniscule as this make the Arbiter's story what it is. 20:12 Thank you! This is a good debunk to that narrative I've seen too many times of "Bungie hated the expanded universe". Kinda tired of people using that narrative as a way to slamdunk on OG Bungie, especially on places like r/HaloStory. 26:39 Obvious to point out, but Regret's carrier does a slipspace jump in space rather than inside the city of New Mombasa. I honestly prefer the final version here (it's definitely more impactful and desperate), but still interesting to see. I wonder what gave them the idea to change this up to the slipspace jump being inside the city instead? I also noticed a couple of first-person (POV) shots during cutscenes in a couple bits of these storyboards, mainly as a brief shot in Covenant Ship (Chief holding the battle rifle at 16:12, honestly gives me Reach vibes) and The Arbiter intro (Arby inside the jail cell at 27:43-28:04, pretty certain this is meant to be one continuous shot which again is interesting to see) Very strange to see Bungie was experimenting with these first-person cutscene things (not exactly sure what to call them to be honest, I'm just calling them POV shots) in Halo 2, as they wouldn't actually be a thing until ODST. In that game they were brief moments before the switch to actual gameplay, but that doesn't seem to be the case here. There are one or two POV shots in Halo 2 though that did manage to make it into the game, and it's during The Arbiter intro where Arbiter's being dragged by the Brutes to the Prophets. There's also one with Chief at the very beginning of Gravemind as he's being dragged by the tentacles. But those are very brief, especially compared to The Arbiter's shots depicted here. 29:30 I really think Bungie (or Lee Wilson) was going somewhere with these shots of how the armor is delivered to each protagonist. I'm not fully sure how to explain it, but I think it's an intentional choice. There's a very similar shot at 8:09 with Chief and Master Gunns. That can't be a coincidence, it's way too similar. Notice the camera angle, it's a pan down. It's even a POV shot too. And not to mention at these points in the cutscenes, both characters are depicted as being armorless here. In the final game, Chief is already armored. He just puts on the helmet. Maybe a stretch, I don't know, and again I'm not sure how to explain it. I just know of the juxtaposition we see here and in the final game of Chief being publicly congratulated for his victory and the Arbiter being publicly punished for his loss. That's an intentional parallel, so the similarities I've pointed out here must also be an intentional choice too. Let me know in replies if you have a better explanation for this, but this is just something I noticed. 29:58 I'm fairly certain that Chief would have been the one to fight the flood-infected Arbiters in the Mausoleum, and I remember this being an idea for Halo 3 as well, but I may be wrong on that. You do visit High Charity in both games, and the ship you see in "Cortana" was not in fact High Charity originally, instead it was just a whole level for the Covenant cruiser you see and enter in Floodgate, but it was drastically shortened. But a level called "High Charity" was still planned to be in the game which would have been a much more faithful rendition (imagine the Halo 2 mission but in Halo 3 instead) rather than the one seen in Cortana. Still, regardless of what game it was intended for, it's such a badass idea that I honestly wish they had kept that, or at the very least it sees the light in another piece of future Halo media. Would have been so badass!

the "coughs somehow." made me laugh for 5 minutes straight. goddamn i never thought about that

The brohammer meme before it happened? Huh, Johnson being there made that feel AWESOME AS FUCK

There are quite a few leftover level scripts in the Halo 2 Editing Kit's files, including the e3 earthcity level, alpha moon, and forerunner tank. In theory, all it would take would be to make some interpretive bsps for them and fill in the blanks so that they line up with the script events

Bro it's so great to see you back! I remember when you did Halo CE and mentioned how Halo 2 had lost storyboards as well, and now here we are!!!! It's awesome to see what could have been for the story of Halo

I absolutely would've loved to see this version of Halo 2, I think the funniest part would be oracle being kinda broken after Alpha Halo was destroyed, seeing as he realizes he has feelings.

I am utterly confounded your channel and videos do not have more views yet, but I seriously think this will blow up. Please, keep doing this, this was expertly made!

27:36 aw Brute Jailer just wanted to be friends with soon to be R Beater and Tartar Sauce and show off his neat little sport

So little tidbit for ya at 18:23 those fighters were the cut strike fighter that was seen in the Halo 2 Special Edition DVD, they ended up cutting them cus it would have only existed for cinematics and was just a waste of resources and dev time

I think the distinction between UESC and UNSC is significant because throughout the Marines are repeatedly referred to as Soldiers, or both. I remember there was actually criticism from US military and vets at the time for it, but my opinion was that any US Marine slang or culture was just a carry over prior to the formation of the current branch.

this dude is awesome for covering halo series

This whole things was awesome, but for me? My fanboy levels hit MAC velocities seeing the In Amber Clad in the middle of a space battle chasing down the Prophet. a Tiny Stalwart class Frigate Chasing down a CAS class Assault Carrier as the Home Fleet pounds away at the Covenant fleet just to give the tiny frigate some room as RED FLAG once more in green lit. Wile I can see it being a little silly in release give the size of a CAS to a Stalwart....its still too cool to not imagine.

I love the brute bowl guy and the used opportunity to show off cut spark dialog

Been patiently waiting for this to come! I can't wait for the next 2 parts, very well done Sabertooth. Look forward to what's next, and I wonder if any Halo 3 story concepts exist. I know of very few.

Thank you so much for bringing this to the rest of us. I hope you continue to grow, particularly outside of YT's parasitic monetization scheme.

Lord hood should've had a cape wtf it makes his name make so much sense and it's so crazy I love it

24:30 I'm not the only one who hears "I had to kill her" there right?

I shared this on my channel. Wow is all I have to say.

The editing on this is insane. I've been waiting for this since you did the CE one. Also Master Chief dab at 22:07

10:06 "TAKE CARE, MATE!" Chips, the real MVP of the original trilogy, doing what he does best; supporting Chief. Jokes aside, these vids are absolutely amazing. I've seen a little of the storyboards over time, whether it was officially produced or things people found (like you did with CE) but the way you've done your research, how its put together and the annotations are top notch mate. Keep up the good work

27:08 its likely that, while every frigate and cruiser is outfitted wirh "at least one" MAC cannon, these MAC cruisers may have a different loadout specific to their role: Assault. This loadout may include additional MACs and other offensive weaponry that the standard loadout cruisers wouldnt have by default.

how am i just now discovering this, this should have more views

Lmao the "howdy yall I'm the monitor of installation 04" 😂

Can we please talk about Lord Hood’s cape? Its so funny to me and I bet they chose his title to specifically give him a cape.

Keep up the great work!!!

DUDE! The references to the books would have been awesome. This video makes me wish we got more from Halo 2. Well done on this my guy, extremely meticulous

Love this, honestly surprised how small this channel is. I think you’re videos provide great coverage.

Simply amazing

YES! I HAVE BEEN WAITING FOR THIS FOR AGES!

Amazing work!!!

Congratulations on an amazing video! Can’t wait for part 2, keep up the great work!!

This is absolutely incredible work!

Great work! Amazing looking video.

THIS GETS ME SO HYPE!!! I can't wait to see the next act of your series! Keep up the great work

Love the editing and animation style of your videos, looking forwards to the upcoming parts.

This is amazing work man!!!!

I find it funny how much stuff from the storyboards infinite copies, the falling from the sky into a pelican thing, blowing up the banished/cov ship

awesome work man!!!

THIS WAS SOOO GOOOOOD OMGGG

I have been waiting for so long. Fantastic!

did not disappoint. thank you.

You seriously might be my favorite youtuber now other than me. Amazing animation, notes, pacing, music choice seriously perfect video man.

Amazing work you've done here.

Yooo you deserve so many more subscribers! Your videos are amazing and the animation is so adorable!!

Incredible work!

awesome work wow the screenplay snipe was crazy ha

these are such excellent videos man, not only is it showing off a cool piece of lost history, but you present it in such a polished and professional way like good shit my man.

There wasnt enough room for Forerunner Tank and Cortana Dumptruck on the same disk.

Absolutely awesome work. Skilled, precise, full of passion. Thanks C3 Sabertooth. 👍👍

Brilliant videos dude. Hope you get more viewers.

Hi me again!!! I’m slowly working through your stuff as I promised. I mainly consume RU-vid videos in the background as a podcast type thing while I grind in various games, but these videos are so good that I need to watch them with my undivided attention. I actually had no idea that the planet that contained Installation 04 was so fleshed out. Maybe it’s just me, but I never realized that the Heretic group was actually in a gas mine on that very same planet. I actually think the moon base sounded more interesting. In a perfect universe, Bungie would come back together and recreate Halo 1 and 2 with their perfect vision. It would be really interesting I think. Excited to watch more.

Amazing effort and work on this series! Projects like this evoke the same excitement as watching those BTS documentaries by the Bungie team. The amount of changes and planning that went into the halo series production is insane. All that being said, this wouldn't be nearly as engaging to watch without the superb quality and fun insights you put into these videos. Also, the animations of your avatar are very charming and add to the video narration in my opinion. Can't wait for the next release! side note: that guilty spark scene was ridiculous...you are creating high-art

IVE BEEN WAITINGGG FRRRRR

Finally a new video, nice video

The legend is back!

Sounds like she said no hard feelings in the most aggressive way possible lol. I assume she was referring to Chief caving her father’s skull in.

Fantastic work!

I absolutely love your videos mate! Keep it up!

7:12 Doesn't Halo: The Flood also have a description? 8:40 There are unused level scripts and maybe a map If I remember right of Chief going to another orbital station and watching the one he was on blowing up. 8:47 I think on H2 Artifacts or another interview, that H2 made it quite far into development without Dual Wielding. Which is supported by the fact that two of the Betas don't have it but the most recent one before release does. 14:45 It is interesting that H2A almost reuses this scene entirely though 18:17 Those appear to be the unused "Strike Fighters" ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-DWI7AhQFpTE.html 20:18 Halo 2 actually has some unused music in "Movement of the Odyssey" that may be good to use. Although they are mostly Phish esq.

21:00 this is incredible, gald we've seen an equivalent in halo infinite

Wow that outro to the Covenant Ship level is really quite something

14:35 Another interpretation I had of this discretion is that it may have been an early name for the Marine Corps in Halo. Actually, it makes a lot more sense than having literal Marines in space, despite the obvious sci-fi tropes. But of course, it does match the UESC from Marathon, so who knows.

Let's go!!! The legend returns

22:02 Actually "wort wort wort"

This was great. Loved it. Subbed. :)

Absolutely stunning work. I casually flipped through the storyboards when they were released, but this really makes you feel the impact and emotion these scenes were meant to have. We would not have been ready for these, as they were meant to be, in 2004. S-tier joke at 22:00

Awesome 👏

22:18 Classic line right there my n-

He returns!