Well… it’s dimmer. Unlike the DVD and Blu-ray releases, the HDR version is a film-sourced transfer, matted to 1.85:1 with some of the colors dialed up. (Note the colors on the eyes of Mr. Krabs, Plankton, Gary, and Patrick’s pants.) I still need to check the rest of the HDR version and see how it compares to the original transfer.
Well dang…this is more or less what I was trying to accomplish a decade or so ago lol. Glad to have confirmation it was considerably darker on film, the way I remember it being in theaters. Are you certain this is how it looks with HDR, or is there a HDR grade that was supposed to be applied but wasn’t in these screenshots?