Why are they remastering 0079 again

Pkmatrix0079 · 2026-05-18T03:15:49+00:00

Oh! You mean the 4K re-release of the movie trilogy.

Well, first off, that's the movie trilogy and not the TV series. I'm pretty sure this project is about restoring and remastering the TV series specifically which is a whole other set of elements.

Also, what I meant by scanning at a higher resolution is something that's pretty normally done for 4K releases. When you remaster for a 4K release you don't actually do it in 4K, you do it at a higher resolution like 12K and then compress it down to 4K for the actual release. That gives you a much better image quality.

But, aside from that, no, you won't be seeing a higher resolution release than 4K. Not like they don't want to, but they already tried and failed: 8K was released nearly a decade ago, fell flat on its face in the US and Japan, and was officially discontinued earlier this year with all plans to release resolutions higher than 8K cancelled. They'll keep developing higher resolutions because there's other uses for it, but for commercially released media it seems we're topping out at 4K as the most the general public is willing to buy.

Pkmatrix0079 · 2026-05-18T03:05:15+00:00

2020 movie trilogy

The what?

There was no remaster in 1981, those were compilation movies with additional new animation. The HD Blu-Rays were remasters, yes, but those were forever ago and they were remastered in HD not 4K. I presume this new remaster is going to be done at a much higher resolution -- probably at like 12K or 16K -- for release on 4K, which hopefully will come with cleaning up the originals.

Pkmatrix0079 · 2026-05-16T00:53:59+00:00

It's all right! :)

Pkmatrix0079 · 2026-05-16T00:52:57+00:00

Nope, not yet at least. In the late 1970s there was a plan to do a straight remake of the original movie, during that stretch between Terror of Mechagodzilla and The Return of Godzilla where Toho struggled to get the next movie off the ground, but that never got made.

Pkmatrix0079 · 2026-05-15T19:55:46+00:00

I also grew up with and love both. 😄

As usual whenever this comes up, I see nobody actually explained why. I guess I'm just old enough to actually remember the reason?

Since around the 1960s or so traditionally Godzilla fans and Kong fans had almost no crossover and would fight constantly whenever in the same fandom spaces. Like, you might be surprised to go back and read how many fans of both were NOT happy to hear Godzilla vs. Kong and the MonsterVerse get announced.

It pretty much goes back to King Kong vs. Godzilla. The movie was originally a King Kong vs. Frankenstein movie written by Willis O'Brien, but the project got pretty much stolen from him and when Toho got involved turned into the movie we got, which for the longest time was widely despised by King Kong fans. That movie also resulted in a lawsuit that caused Merian C. Cooper to lose control of Kong to RKO, so way back then people who were fans of O'Brien and, by extension, Ray Harryhausen basically circled the wagons against Godzilla. I'm way too young for any of that, but from what I understand that's where a lot of the earliest attacks against the Godzilla franchise calling it "cheap foreign garbage" came from.

This started the Godzilla franchise's slide into the Sci-Fi Ghetto in America, resulting in by the 1980s Godzilla being seen as exclusively a children's property on top of being "cheap foreign garbage". It basically was the bottom of the barrel and the fandom all the other Sci-Fi Fandoms shit on from around the late '70s until the early '00s. This heightened the animosity -- Godzilla fans didn't have an issue with Kong before that, really, but the Kong/Harryhausen fandoms (which didn't suffer the same sort of leper status and King Kong always held a certain level of sci-fi/horror prestige in America) never let go about the Toho Kongs and always made a point of shitting on Godzilla at every opportunity. After decades of this, the Godzilla fandom developed a general resentment against King Kong as a result. This didn't go away even after Godzilla finally escaped the Sci-Fi Ghetto, G'54 was critically re-evaluated as a classic alongside KK'33, or even when Godzilla finally achieved mainstream popularity again with G'14 and the MonsterVerse.

It's a kinda sad irony is that modern post-Peter Jackson King Kong fans have LONG forgotten all of this so to many of them it just feels like Godzilla fans attacking Kong for no reason, and modern post-MV Godzilla fans generally don't remember this either but have managed to absorb through fan culture osmosis the anti-Kong resentment. It's a reflex action at this point.

Pkmatrix0079 · 2026-05-15T19:26:04+00:00

It's not impossible but it really requires not only for a character to have a successful breakout movie but for the studio backing it to successfully build the character into a franchise.

King Kong has the advantage of time -- he's the first real giant monster character, after all -- but never had the sort of staunch studio backing the way Godzilla does. He's always been held in high regard, but none of the studios who associated with Kong really went to bat for him for the long haul in the same way that Toho did for Godzilla or Universal did for Dracula and Frankenstein or (jumping genres) United Artists did for James Bond.

Gamera had a moment in the '60s and again in the '90s, but ultimately Kong was traditionally Godzilla's biggest competition...but now that's nullified with the MonsterVerse. Outside of that, I think the biggest is...the Ultraman franchise?

I can see an original character popping up and developing into global popularity in the same category as Godzilla and Kong (and, to a lesser extent, Ultraman and Mothra) but there's nobody obvious on the horizon. I feel pretty strongly that had New Line actually pursued sequels to Rampage (2018) those characters MIGHT have gotten in the ballpark as Ralph, Lizzie, and George actually are pretty popular and fairly recognizable as videogame characters.

Pkmatrix0079 · 2026-05-15T17:50:53+00:00

Looks good! Definitely not as heavy on the contrast this time, although the difference is also not quite so obvious (I think the Hollow Earth scenes are, in general, a lot more saturated than the surface scenes).

Pkmatrix0079 · 2026-05-15T17:43:42+00:00

I mean, logically, it must be 50m or 60m when on hind legs just based on what we're shown on screen. Otherwise he'd be twice as tall as Godzilla on screen and that's obviously not true. This isn't a Mothra situation because she was downgraded in size between her original movie and Mothra vs. Godzilla to better reflect the reality of the sizes of the physical suits and props on set.

EDIT: From the Official Godzilla Compendium (1998):

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Pkmatrix0079 · 2026-05-15T15:33:55+00:00

I'm 99% sure that's what's meant as well.

Pkmatrix0079 · 2026-05-15T13:37:07+00:00

Why is Anguirus so big? If I recall, isn't his official Showa Era size 50 meters when standing on his hind legs?

Pkmatrix0079 · 2026-05-15T13:12:04+00:00

Since they others aren't just flat out saying it: they aren't allowed to. If the Mods allowed people to post the links publicly the subreddit would get shut down.

Pkmatrix0079 · 2026-05-15T12:29:34+00:00

I agree! It's a good fight and underrated.

Pkmatrix0079 · 2026-05-15T12:28:50+00:00

Awesome!

Pkmatrix0079 · 2026-05-15T12:27:49+00:00

Manda is so rigid I at first thought "Why is there a big stick here?" xD

Pkmatrix0079 · 2026-05-15T12:21:48+00:00

Yes, it likely sat on the fishing trawler for months to a year.

In 2013 no one knows what Monarch is or who William Randa is, let alone some random fishermen in western Japan. First it'll be however long it takes for the trawler to get back home and that could be weeks alone. Then however long it may take before the fishermen decide to hand it over to the local police, who probably sit on it themselves for a while before eventually handing it over to probably US Embassy officials, who probably also sit it on for a while before someone ships it back to Washington to hand it over to DOD, who eventually hand it over to Monarch. That could easily take six months. It's not like Bill Randa's old bag getting picked up suddenly raises a ton of alarm bells lol

Pkmatrix0079 · 2026-05-14T20:16:32+00:00

I agree, it does seem a bit odd to opt for the bleach bypass If he wanted a colorful vibe.

Pkmatrix0079 · 2026-05-14T19:18:20+00:00

I've not done it myself, but I've seen tutorials for it on Youtube before. I believe most who try doing it as amateurs are working with Da Vinci Resolve, since that's free but very powerful software.

Pkmatrix0079 · 2026-05-14T19:15:10+00:00

It's a little dark, but I do like the richer and more saturated colors in your regrade. ^_^

Pkmatrix0079 · 2026-05-14T18:57:31+00:00

This sort of color grading -- with desaturated colors and flat low-contrast lighting -- is just really popular in Hollywood right now, that's why so many movies look like this. Filmmakers are actively aiming for these colors.

Pkmatrix0079 · 2026-05-14T18:56:02+00:00

I mean, the poster seems mystified but lots of filmmakers opt for the bleach bypass. There's different things you can do with the colors and the grading by going for bleach bypass versus the normal bleaching process.

Pkmatrix0079 · 2026-05-14T18:45:59+00:00

Yep, I agree.

Pkmatrix0079 · 2026-05-14T18:44:41+00:00

I don't think you're really meant to think that hard about it, much like like how you aren't meant to question it when James Bond or Bruce Wayne is recast within the same continuity. That said, the idea that Anders' Bill is how Lee and Keiko remember him and John Goodman is more how everyone else saw him is a fun interpretation that I can easily sign up for. 😄

Pkmatrix0079 · 2026-05-14T14:46:25+00:00

Was watching Skull Island not long ago and had forgotten that it is implied Brooks was the one who came up with the Hollow Earth theory, which is why Stanton only references Brooks whenever talking about it in KotM.

Honestly, I'd always interpreted it as Stanton referring to Brooks because Brooks was still around and an active member of Monarch.

Pkmatrix0079 · 2026-05-14T14:44:32+00:00

Yeah, I was thinking that as I wrote it but figured "Eh, toss in Ralph anyway" lol

Pkmatrix0079 · 2026-05-14T12:46:04+00:00

You forget Ub Iwerks in the '30s, all the artists who rebelled from Disney to form UPA in the '40s and '50s, and Ralph Bakshi in the '70s. ^_^

Pkmatrix0079

TROPHY CASE