Best Montages in the past 5 years?

That's the spirit Deany. And I'm sure you'd do a good job. Honesty will get you a long way. 

Personally, I find it difficult to be critical in some cases. Especially towards people editing for me, since I tend to love whatever they are doing for me without being susceptible for any flaws there might be. 

On the other hand, whenever I do  try to be critical, people will often just look at me weird, wondering why I decided to go so indepth. I guess another issue is to know exactly who's in need of some actual criticism, and who would rather get a 'good job'. It can be tricky to tell the two apart. 

Hahaha oh no man, I don't mind at all. Like I said you had a really long list of videos to critique on so I understand. 

If you want, you could always critique Drive 4 on it's flow and syncing.  Although I had 0 intention to make it some ground breaking video in terms of visual effects/transitions, I did try to step up my game for generating a solid overall flow  with coherent syncing. So regarding those two things you could really help me out a lot for future video's. But please don't feel obligated to do so though. 

Marksman, getting me all caught up with H3 montages. 

Makes me want to edit one.

Flow:
An essay on pace, music, and the timeline of a montage.

Part 1 : Music

• This is hard for most people. Everyone has favorite songs they love to use, but we mustn’t use them every time. Don't fall into the trap of thinking “i love this song, it would be great in a montage.” It's always tricky to mend songs together that are completely different. The first and final songs can be different, but the song(s) between them need to be similar to both of the other songs in order to mend them together, or this is where the editing comes in, find a way to mend two different sounding songs. When I’m watching a montage that uses multiple songs- I don't even want to notice that the song changed. Thus, the flow is held perfectly together. The music is crucial to the pace and in turn, is crucial to the flow. We sync our clips to the music. In a way, the music is the foundation to the montage that we build on. If our music isn't on point with where the flow should be, our montage could fall apart. Don't build your house on the sand; let it be rock solid. Here is how i envision the music being related to the flow of the montage. Side note: here is a song transition i did in one of my montages that i thought i mended really well. (Ignore the rest of the montage)

Part 2: Clips

• The quality of the clips should be interchangeable with, and follow, the tempo of the music. Thus, we sync our clips with the music (obviously). Get us hooked at the beginning with a few nice clips, but save the best for last – the “climax” of the montage. The big build up. It's what we have all been waiting for. This is what the placement of the quality of clips should look like.

Part 3: Pace

• Quality of clips + tempo of the music = the pace of the montage. Clips will always be synchronized to the music when it can be. That is just how editing works. If the tempo of the music is way too fast when it shouldn't be, our flow is completely thrown off. The tempo of our music should be the fastest during the climax of our montage. Hence, putting the best clips during this time now gives us a great climax. If our dullest/slowest songs is playing when our best clips are... goodbye flow/climax of our montage. Consider pace.

Part 4: Parting the Montage

• There needs to be a reason for splitting a montage into parts. Is the montage way too long? If it's a 30 minute montage, I see the need for 4 parts. However, this doesn't mean that a “two part” montage isn't a good idea. If a montage is 15 minutes it might not be a bad idea for an “intermission.” These parts make or break the flow of the montage. If a montage is going to be broken down into parts, consider assigning a sub-title to each part, not so different than this essay. Lets say we have a 5 part montage. Before we decide this, let's consider each part to be a contributing and important factor to our flow and montage. We'll do this by providing a theme, and message to each part (this would fit a Hyena montage well too):
• Part 1: “The Dream,” this is where our intro is, it gives us a taste of what the montage is going to be about. Part 2: “Hope,” Here we get a glimpse of the spectacular clips we are going to see later on during our climax of the montage. This is where the audience gets their hopes up. “This montage is going to be great.” Part 3: “The Fall,” It's important to not only to have our peaks, but our valleys as well. We don't want the entire montage to feel like we're on speed. It's okay to slow down toward the middle. Perhaps consider a different color grading technique for this part. Let if feel darker. Part 4: “Triumph,” This is where our climax lives. The big build up begins after part 3 and finishes with a bang. This part eventually starts to close the montage out. The audience want's to exit the window feeling satisfied, or whatever you want them to feel. Give this part a different color grade as well. How do you want them to feel? Alive? Maybe brighten the colors let a little more light in, etc. Finally, Part 5: ?. This part is for you to decide how you want the montage to end. What type of montage is this? Is it a final? Then maybe the montage should end with a bitter sweet feeling. Bitter, that there won't be any more of these, but sweet as in the montage was sweet.
• In Dlongo | The Halo 3 Montage by zhestaL, we have a montage broken into parts, intentionally or not. Part 1: if it was labeled like we have done above (The Dream) it would fit perfect. In fact, this is a perfect part 1. It gives us a taste of the clips we are going to get without spoiling them. He cuts away from a few clips before we see the actual kill and maybe even the entire clip. It also gives us a taste of the editing we will see; great syncing and transitions. However, after part 2, we just end up receiving more of the same. It's extremely similar to part 1. We get the same feeling, color grading, etc. This is the flow of Dlongo. The montage is broken down into the same parts that tell us the exact same thing.
• Ishii's Halo 3 Montage 8 is a victim to most of this above. Why is the montage broken into 4 parts? The answer is because four different songs are used. Each part gets a different song. Like I said before, it's very important that the music mends together nearly seamlessly, if there isn't a reason for the montage to be split into parts. Ishii's montage has a similar flow to Dlongo, but the music Ishii uses sets a different mood for each part, but is it the right mood?
• Then, we have FatRat's Halo 3 Montage 3. This montage is broken down into two parts due to the “intermission.” This was a nice choice since we just went through a whole song with a fast pace and tempo. The intermission has slowed us down and given us a chance to think about what we just saw. Then, part 2 begins with an even faster pace than before. This is good since our climax happens in part 2. This montage has nearly perfect flow, the only down side is this music transition here. Now, it was almost nice. It was timed very, very well. He syncs the clips sniper shot with the music transition, and with a heavy beat in the music. Good sync, but the song was so vastly different than the one before, that it messed up the flow. We immediately notice the song change and it's very abrupt. This is what the flow of this montage looks like.

Concluding remarks

This is NOT meant to be a template. Be original. This is just a study on flow, not a guideline for everyone to follow. This is what I find to be real flow. Flow is everything to a montage. It's what makes us keep watching and keep interested. It keeps us from not clicking away. It's what keeps our attention through a 15 f-ing minute montage. Consider the flow of your next montage. This is how the flow looks with all of the above combined. Good luck, and happy editing.

References:

Dlongo | The Halo 3 Montage by zhestaL

Ishii :: Halo 3 Montage 8

FatRat :: Halo 3 Montage 3

Thank you so much to those who took the time to read the entire thing. I really think this could be helpful.

Okay, heres an interesting exercise. Try to describe how you want your next montage to be by only using words. Write it down. Create your next montage only using words. Describe every single moment. How does it start; what message is it trying to convey about the rest of the montage? What clips do you want to strive for at this mark? How does each moment make you feel, how does it flow, what type of music does it have at each part and why, etc. I believe it's incredibly important to always be asking yourself question when editing a montage. What does this part in the timeline mean? Why am i using these transitions with this music at this point in the timeline? Does it sound amazing? Does it sound complete? Are you satisfied?

Anyway, this may seem silly, but it just popped into my head and i think it could be a very creative tool on helping someone idealize their next montage.

I'm gonna go cook some breakfast.

Edit: 

Literal story boarding is actually a really good idea for theater/cinematic shots and how they transition to and from the actual clips.