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'Godzilla - The Heisei Series' Remastered (a WIP)

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 (Edited)

The Heisei series has always been my favorite of the eras of Godzilla. I love the stories and continuity, I love the aesthetic and kaiju designs, I love the music, the special effects were some of the most impressive the franchise has ever shown, and it easily has the most iconic and quintessential portrayal of Godzilla (at least its easily my personal favorite). Biollante, King Ghidorah, MGII, and Destoroyah are my all time favorite kaiju movies. However, the series still isn’t flawless. Not all of the effects have aged well, the foreign acting (especially in Biollante and King Ghidorah) is laughably bad and extraordinarily cringe, the first entry (The Return of Godzilla) is in my opinion an absolute stale bore that puts me to sleep whenever I decide to put myself through the chore of sitting through it, and other things. But I’d like to fix these.

Here is a link to a Google doc where I have compiled my ideas for all six movies. None of these are completely finalized (in fact the lists for the last 3 Heisei films are more like bullet points then a specific list, but more details will be added as I go on) so feel free to suggest things: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1VClStpc09q0TfAV-_dHSzY6ZfJzaUww_HcdXoGWkk6k/edit?usp=sharing

Changes made to all films
-All films are given a completely new color grade, adjusted to my liking. Most of which are saturation and brightening effects to make them even more colorful. Godzilla vs. Mechagodzilla II especially, as the Japanese Blu-Ray looks very dull and washed out, worse than the Japanese DVD (proving it’s not a problem with the film itself, but the Blu-Ray transfer). The film seems to have a grey filter applied to the whole thing. In fact I’d even say both TriStar transfers are better, even the DVD one. The whole film now looks much brighter and more appealing.
-Brand new subtitles for all Japanese dialogue. I know this may cause controversy, but my goal here was not to create the most accurate translation, rather have the dialogue be as good as possible. I use lines from the fandubs included with Gorizard’s uploads of the Japanese versions on archive.org and lines from the dubtitles interchangeably to my liking, and sometimes I even change the line entirely myself simply to make it better. I apologize if this offends anyone who thinks it’s offensive to straight up make up dialogue, but I thought it would really benefit these edits to take complete advantage of the situation and have free reign to adjust the dialogue in any way I please, to make it all good (not that the dialogue was particularly bad in the Heisei series overall or anything, but this does still give me free reign to do things like explain the time travel plot in Godzilla vs. King Ghidorah better and fix any clunkers, especially one’s present in Godzilla vs. SpaceGodzilla).
-All English in the film is replaced with the English dubbed version. The dubs just generally have better performances when it comes to the non-Japanese speaking roles throughout the films, look no further then Dr. Asimov from Godzilla vs. Mechagodzilla II. Honestly I think the guy who did the dub for him did a really good job. Mileage does vary depending on the instance but in any case the dub is still better.
-Any instance in which a monster has its mouth open but there’s no roar sound effect to accompany it is either chopped, trimmed, or has a sound effect added to it. This actually happens a LOT in every Toho Godzilla movie. This gives me a nice opportunity to add some awesome Millennium Godzilla grunt and growl sound effects, which I think would still fit and make him sound even more ferocious. I also plan on adding later Heisei roars to earlier Heisei films (the ones that sound more like the classic Showa roars) as well as adding early Heisei roars to the later Heisei films. This makes it so Godzilla doesn’t randomly just change his roars in the middle of the series, rather he always has both.
-I’d like to edit the Return of Godzilla / Godzilla vs. Biollante hybrid and Godzilla vs. King Ghidorah so Godzilla has the fiery yellow-red “Sith” eyes the entire series, as I love that design choice in the later Heisei films. Not confirmed, though.

Suggestions are more then welcome.

My Star Wars Fan-Edits

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This is an awesome sounding project! I wish I had more to offer, but I love the Heisei era the most, cheesy effects and all and any improvements to the stories and getting big G on screen quicker is always a win for me!

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Any update on this? The Heisei series is my all time favorite, and this full on fanedit sounds incredible. Cutting the first two movies together especially, since I also find the first one to be a drag to watch through on a marathon.

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WitchDR said:

Any update on this? The Heisei series is my all time favorite, and this full on fanedit sounds incredible. Cutting the first two movies together especially, since I also find the first one to be a drag to watch through on a marathon.

I’m glad to see that you think it sounds great. It’s always nice to see that some are excited for a project, it greatly improves my morale to actually see to it that it gets done.

Admittedly I haven’t been working on this much as I’ve been focusing more on other projects (my dinosaur documentary project and my Star Wars edits), but once I’m done with my Revenge of the Sith edit then I’ll start working on this.

I have been starting to doubt whether I’ll actually be able to effectively combine Return of Godzilla and Biollante, as it will mess with continuity quite a bit. Maybe instead of combining them in a way that makes it seem like they’re happening at the same time (as I originally thought), I’ll edit it so a heavily cut-down 84 acts as like a prologue at the beginning (there is something like that in the actual opening of Biollante but this one would be more expansive), still taking place 5 years before. Godzilla would still look different but not really much I can do about that.

I may also offer two options: one edit of 84 and Biollante combined into one film and another option in which they are still separate movies. I will trim down 84 to pick up the pace (and probably even add the American scenes of Raymond Burr like I did with my 54 edit, because Steve Martin is awesome), and have a separate Biollante fan-edit that still makes a lot of the changes I was going to for that movie:

-Cut the scene where Gondo talks about the prime minister not believing the psychic children. There’s literally an institute designated for psychic children and the prime minister doesn’t even believe they exist?
-Cut the scene where Kirishima and Azuka talk about making the bacteria at night time. This scene really doesn’t give us any new information and I feel like the first half of this movie takes too long to get started.
-Cut the part where Miki draws Rose Biollante. It ruins any suspense and surprise of seeing Biollante for the first time.
-Cut all of the scenes that split the battle between Godzilla and the Super X II, removing that terrible shot of Godzilla’s head rising from the water, removing excess fat, and not stopping the momentum of the film.
-The scene where Doctor Shiragami talks to the news woman and when he, Miki, and Azuka realize Erika is no longer in Biollante is moved after the battle with Godzilla and the Super X II.
-After Miki says “Biollante was calling out to Godzilla!” it cuts to the shot of Godzilla walking to Lake Ashi at night with added sound effects, as the music playing during the clip is continued from the scene that I cut below.
-As a result, the scene of the military getting into position before the first fight is removed.
-Cut the two times Godzilla completely misses Biollante by a long shot with his atomic breath near the end of the fight. Like seriously, it’s as if he intentionally missed! What’s the point?
-Cut the scene with the helicopters after the first fight.
-Cut the entire subplot of “We sent everything to Isle Bay and Godzilla actually appeared in Osaka!” as it just convoluted the film. It doesn’t even need to exist for the plot to make sense, and it takes focus away from the much more interesting subplot of Miki trying to change Godzilla’s direction with her telepathy.
-Cut the part where Azuka makes the soldiers leave the platform. It’s probably the most illogical thing in this movie. Why would you get rid of your own protection and transport? And you really think that you’re more qualified to be in such a dangerous situation then trained soldiers?!

This way people who like 84 a lot won’t be left out. I do think it has it’s good parts, but the pace needs to be picked up.

My Star Wars Fan-Edits

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G&G-Fan said:

WitchDR said:

Any update on this? The Heisei series is my all time favorite, and this full on fanedit sounds incredible. Cutting the first two movies together especially, since I also find the first one to be a drag to watch through on a marathon.

I’m glad to see that you think it sounds great. It’s always nice to see that some are excited for a project, it greatly improves my morale to actually see to it that it gets done.

Admittedly I haven’t been working on this much as I’ve been focusing more on other projects (my dinosaur documentary project and my Star Wars edits), but once I’m done with my Revenge of the Sith edit then I’ll start working on this.

I have been starting to doubt whether I’ll actually be able to effectively combine Return of Godzilla and Biollante, as it will mess with continuity quite a bit. Maybe instead of combining them in a way that makes it seem like they’re happening at the same time (as I originally thought), I’ll edit it so a heavily cut-down 84 acts as like a prologue at the beginning (there is something like that in the actual opening of Biollante but this one would be more expansive), still taking place 5 years before. Godzilla would still look different but not really much I can do about that.

I may also offer two options: one edit of 84 and Biollante combined into one film and another option in which they are still separate movies. I will trim down 84 to pick up the pace (and probably even add the American scenes of Raymond Burr like I did with my 54 edit, because Steve Martin is awesome), and have a separate Biollante fan-edit that still makes a lot of the changes I was going to for that movie:

-Cut the scene where Gondo talks about the prime minister not believing the psychic children. There’s literally an institute designated for psychic children and the prime minister doesn’t even believe they exist?
-Cut the scene where Kirishima and Azuka talk about making the bacteria at night time. This scene really doesn’t give us any new information and I feel like the first half of this movie takes too long to get started.
-Cut the part where Miki draws Rose Biollante. It ruins any suspense and surprise of seeing Biollante for the first time.
-Cut all of the scenes that split the battle between Godzilla and the Super X II, removing that terrible shot of Godzilla’s head rising from the water, removing excess fat, and not stopping the momentum of the film.
-The scene where Doctor Shiragami talks to the news woman and when he, Miki, and Azuka realize Erika is no longer in Biollante is moved after the battle with Godzilla and the Super X II.
-After Miki says “Biollante was calling out to Godzilla!” it cuts to the shot of Godzilla walking to Lake Ashi at night with added sound effects, as the music playing during the clip is continued from the scene that I cut below.
-As a result, the scene of the military getting into position before the first fight is removed.
-Cut the two times Godzilla completely misses Biollante by a long shot with his atomic breath near the end of the fight. Like seriously, it’s as if he intentionally missed! What’s the point?
-Cut the scene with the helicopters after the first fight.
-Cut the entire subplot of “We sent everything to Isle Bay and Godzilla actually appeared in Osaka!” as it just convoluted the film. It doesn’t even need to exist for the plot to make sense, and it takes focus away from the much more interesting subplot of Miki trying to change Godzilla’s direction with her telepathy.
-Cut the part where Azuka makes the soldiers leave the platform. It’s probably the most illogical thing in this movie. Why would you get rid of your own protection and transport? And you really think that you’re more qualified to be in such a dangerous situation then trained soldiers?!

This way people who like 84 a lot won’t be left out. I do think it has it’s good parts, but the pace needs to be picked up.

Sweet! Yeah I just read thorough your SW 6 film edit and am excited to see where that goes as well. Always nice to see edits of ANH include the Scene 38 recreation. Also really intrigued to see how the Jar Jar dub is pulled off in full movie length.

Definitely want to see you get the SW one done, since I’m a bigger SW fan lol. But cant wait to see what you can pull off with this project, since I feel the Heisei series as a lot of potential to be something really great, if tweaked a bit.

You said you did an edit of 54? Can I get a PM of that? Would love to check it out!

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WitchDR said:

Sweet! Yeah I just read thorough your SW 6 film edit and am excited to see where that goes as well. Always nice to see edits of ANH include the Scene 38 recreation. Also really intrigued to see how the Jar Jar dub is pulled off in full movie length.

Definitely want to see you get the SW one done, since I’m a bigger SW fan lol. But cant wait to see what you can pull off with this project, since I feel the Heisei series as a lot of potential to be something really great, if tweaked a bit.

You said you did an edit of 54? Can I get a PM of that? Would love to check it out!

Epic, I’m glad you agree with me about Scene 38. I love how it does Darth Vader justice. The new Vader comics show him to be incredibly powerful and the best lightsaber duelist ever, and the films should be consistent with that IMO. And my Phantom Menace edit is already done, so it technically already has been pulled off.

Do you have any suggestions for either the Star Wars or Heisei edits? You seem very hyped for them and I always love to hear suggestions and feedback. If you have something in mind I’d like to address it.

Yes, my edit of 54 is called “This is Tokyo”. It combines the original Japanese version with the American version. There’s a thread here about it. I’ll PM you the link, as well as the link for the Star Wars edits.

My Star Wars Fan-Edits

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Update on this. I know for sure that I’m actually going to do these edits, and I also know that I am going to do the edit that combines The Return of Godzilla and Godzilla vs. Biollante (and as events happening at the same time, rather then TROG being a prologue), though I’m also planning on making separate fan-edits for both (in which TROG and GVB are separate films). I have even already started working on my GVMGII edit a little bit, doing the color correction work and editing the Godzilla vs. Rodan fight.

Here are changes that are going to be made to all 7 films.

-All films are given a completely new color grade, adjusted to my liking. Godzilla vs. Mechagodzilla II especially, as the Japanese Blu-Ray looks very dull and washed out, worse than the Japanese DVD (proving it’s not a problem with the film itself, but the Blu-Ray transfer). The film seems to have a gray filter applied to the whole thing. In fact I’d even say both TriStar transfers are better, even the DVD one. The whole film will look much brighter and more appealing.
-Brand new subtitles for Japanese dialogue. I know this may cause controversy, but my goal here will not to create the most accurate translations, rather have the dialogue be as good as possible. I will use lines from the fandubs included with Gorizard’s uploads of the Japanese versions on archive.org and lines from the dubtitles interchangeably to my liking, and sometimes I will even change the line myself simply to make it better. I apologize if this offends anyone who thinks it’s offensive to straight up change some dialogue, but I thought it would really benefit these edits to take complete advantage of the situation and have free reign to adjust the dialogue in any way I please, to make it all good (not that the dialogue was particularly bad in the Heisei series overall or anything, but there are still some clunkers and this does still give me free reign to do things like explain the time travel plot in Godzilla vs. King Ghidorah better).
-All English in the film will be replaced with the English dubbed version. The dubs just generally have better performances when it comes to the non-Japanese speaking roles throughout the films, look no further then Dr. Asimov from Godzilla vs. Mechagodzilla II. Honestly I think the guy who did the dub for him did a really good job. Mileage does vary depending on the instance but in any case the dub is still better.
-Any instance in which a monster has its mouth open but there’s no roar sound effect to accompany it will either chopped, trimmed, or has a sound effect added to it. This actually happens a LOT in every Toho Godzilla movie. This gives me a nice opportunity to add some awesome Millennium Godzilla grunt and growl sound effects, which I think would still fit and make him sound even more ferocious.

I may post the first scene of this series soon, the fight between Godzilla and Rodan in GVMGII, which has gotta be one of my all-time favorite fights of the series due to how brutal it is, but this will showcase my color correction work and I still feel it needed some trims and more sound effects.

My Star Wars Fan-Edits

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That all sounds great! Still looking forward to this massive edit!

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 (Edited)

I would like to apologize for the lack of updates on this project. It is still happening for any of you who may have gotten a little worried.

So the first one that will be coming out will be the Return of Godzilla and Godzilla vs. Biollante hybrid, which will serve as the first film of my remastered series. I’m interested in hearing from you guys what name you think would work best. Should I just have it be Godzilla vs. Biollante to fit with the rest of the series, or should I give it a new title?

Here are some screenshots showing off my color correction:
Before

After

Before

After

Before

After

Before

After

Before

After

Not the same exact frame but you get the idea

Here is a list of the changes that also serves as a bit of an outline of how the movie will go.

-Title card is from Godzilla vs. Biollante and partially the music from it (the music when it shows the cells under the microscope), but then it transitions to the music from The Return of Godzilla’s title screen. It makes for a nice mix of the two that pretty much encapsulates what the edit is: mostly Godzilla vs. Biollante with a little Return of Godzilla added to it.
-Then is the ship attack from 84 and so on. As in Godzilla 1985, music from Def-Com 4 is added to the scene in which Goro investigates the ship (meaning we still get the sea lice, which I thought was an inspired idea).
-The sea lice scene is edited like the US cut to be shorter, as to remove bad effects.
-After Goro talks to Okumura and the helicopter arrives to rescue them, it cuts to Professor Hiyashida’s conversation with him in which he shows him pictures of Godzilla from 1954.
-After the scene with the Prime Minister in which he hears about Godzilla but decides to keep it a secret, it cuts to the scene in Saradia between Erika and Shiragami from Godzilla vs. Biollante and so on. The Godzilla cells are recontextualized through the completely new subtitles to be from Godzilla’s 1954 attack. Time gap between Erika’s death and the main events of the movie is 5 months, not 5 years. The entire film takes place in 1989.
-After the scene with Kirishima and Asuka at the Godzilla memorial (recontextualized to be a memorial of the 1954 attack), it cuts to the Russian sub being attacked from The Return of Godzilla.
-After that is the news report about the activity in Mt. Mihara. Even though Godzilla isn’t in it anymore it’s still set up for when it causes the earthquake that damages the roses and causes Dr. Shiragami to accept the position to make the bacteria.
-After Asuka reports the girl’s dreams to Gondo, it cuts to the prime minister being told about the Russian sub being destroyed from The Return of Godzilla and so on. No scene of Miki sensing Godzilla in Mt. Mihara since he’s not in Mt. Mihara.
-The news conference in which the prime minister confirms Godzilla is back has the part where Okumura talks cut, since in this film he isn’t a relevant character and neither is his sister.
-After the newspaper montage from The Return of Godzilla is the scene in which Gondo and Kuroki talk about the bacteria. The dialogue about the prime minister not believing the psychic girls is gone as it doesn’t make sense in this context, as this is after the prime minister has announced that Godzilla is back. From here on there’s no more footage from The Return of Godzilla.
-Cut the scene where Kirishima and Azuka talk about making the bacteria at night time. This scene really doesn’t give us any new information and I feel like Godzilla vs. Biollante takes too long to get started, so this helps with the pacing.
-New subtitles during the scene that introduces Super X II will explain that the first Super X was a failed prototype, but this second one is fully operational and improved. This is to fix any continuity issues that would occur with Godzilla vs. Destoroyah by removing The Return of Godzilla and therefore the first Super X (as if Super X II was the first Super X, then it wouldn’t make sense for the one in Godzilla vs. Destoroyah to be Super X III).
-Cut the part where Miki draws Rose Biollante. It ruins the suspense and surprise of seeing Biollante for the first time. Without it Biollante’s reveal is more shocking.
-Instead of threatening to blow up Mt. Mihara, Bio-Major’s ransom is to trigger depth charges that will awaken Godzilla underwater.
-The volcano emergence scene is cut. I do love the scene, but it has to go for continuity. This type of scene was done better in Godzilla vs. Mothra anyway.
-Instead, Godzilla’s first on-screen appearance uses footage from Godzilla vs. SpaceGodzilla (when Godzilla rises from the water due to the Mafia attempting Project T). Sure there are design differences between the 1994 suit and 1989 suit, but they look much more alike than the 1984 suit, and it’s not like the 1989 water and land suits look exactly alike either. This part is after Kirishima leaves after his conversation at the dock with Shiragami and after it is the news scene with the funny Devil guy cameo and so on.
-Cut all of the scenes that split the battle between Godzilla and the Super X II in half, removing that terrible shot of Godzilla’s head rising from the water (which looks like they took a head from an X-Plus figure and raised it with a conveyor belt) and not stopping the momentum of the film.
-The scene where Kirishima and Gondo learn how the Saradian agent is going to leave with the bacteria and the one in which Doctor Shiragami talks to the news woman and when he, Miki, and Azuka realize Erika is no longer in Biollante is moved after the battle with Godzilla and the Super X II.
-When one of Biollante’s tentacles destroys the deck Shiragami and the reporter are on, her cry is out of sync with the tentacle’s mouth opening. This is fixed.
-Right after Miki says “Biollante was calling out to Godzilla!”, it cuts to the shot of Godzilla walking to Lake Ashi through the forest at night with added sound effects, as the music playing during the clip is continued from the scene that I cut below.
-The scene of the military getting into position before the first fight is removed. It’s pointless fat. It’s not even like the military actually intervenes in the fight.
-Cut the part during the fight where Godzilla completely misses Biollante by a long shot with his atomic breath two times in a row. Like seriously, it’s as if he intentionally missed! What’s the point?
-Cut the scene where Shiragami and Kirishima have a pointless talk in the helicopter about generations.
-Cut down on the military preparations for the final assault on Godzilla in Wakasa for pacing.
-Cut the shot in which Godzilla fires his atomic breath at the tentacles at the ground, but the tentacles split in half.
-Cut Godzilla firing his atomic breath at point-blank range at Biollante’s lower jaw while she has him in her mouth. There is no way that blast caused no visible damage, with the amount of damage it normally does to Biollante it should’ve completely destroyed her lower jaw. Now it just cuts from Godzilla’s spines lighting up to him moving his head out of her mouth and blasting his atomic breath into her mouth.

And finally here is a link to a Google doc where I have compiled my ideas for all six movies. None of these are completely finalized (in fact the lists for the last 3 Heisei films are more like bullet points then a specific list, but more details will be added as I go on) so feel free to suggest things: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1VClStpc09q0TfAV-_dHSzY6ZfJzaUww_HcdXoGWkk6k/edit?usp=sharing

My Star Wars Fan-Edits

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Looking good so far! Yeah I would keep it as Godzilla vs. Biollante, to keep it in line with the rest of the movies in the series.

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I just want to say I’m really excited to see where this project goes. Return of Godzilla and Vs Biollante have flaws that I bet this fanedit will clear right up. I look forward to your next update, G&G Fan!

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Man, I just decided to watch through these movies again recently and it made me remember about this post from years ago! I hope one day you revive this project G&G. Your Return of Godzilla and Godzilla vs. Biollante hybrid was something I was so hyped about!

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 (Edited)

WitchDR said:

Man, I just decided to watch through these movies again recently and it made me remember about this post from years ago! I hope one day you revive this project G&G. Your Return of Godzilla and Godzilla vs. Biollante hybrid was something I was so hyped about!

That’s funny, I also just recently rewatched the Heisei era.

I’ll likely revisit these. But I do know that I’m not gonna combine Return and Biollante anymore. It’s just too different and while the film might be coherent it wouldn’t exactly feel right. Instead I’ll make an edit of Return of Godzilla that’s more entertaining. Especially editing the Tokyo rampage to make Godzilla more destructive, taking shots from the Super X fight.

My Star Wars Fan-Edits

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 (Edited)

WitchDR said:

Man, I just decided to watch through these movies again recently and it made me remember about this post from years ago! I hope one day you revive this project G&G. Your Return of Godzilla and Godzilla vs. Biollante hybrid was something I was so hyped about!

That’s funny, I also just recently rewatched the Heisei era.

I’ll likely revisit these. But I do know that I’m not gonna combine Return and Biollante anymore. It’s just too different and while the film might be coherent it wouldn’t exactly feel right. Instead I’ll make an edit of Return of Godzilla that’s more entertaining. Especially editing the Tokyo rampage to make Godzilla more destructive, taking shots from the Super X fight.

My Star Wars Fan-Edits