As someone who is generally against modernizations, remakes, etc., I naturally found the idea of remastering (i.e. meddling with) the original Star Trek series to be an abominable idea. Why? Well, aside from making more money for the company, what purpose could such a project possibly serve? The series - most of which I grew up watching over and over, to the point where I knew most episodes by heart - was absolute perfection just as it was, no "fixups" necessary! I thought the idea was as idiotic as Spielberg replacing guns with walkie-talkies in E.T.
However, I recently bought the remastered version of Season 3 without knowing it and can happily admit to being completely wrong. I watched through my new DVDs of Seasons 1 and 2 (because, yes, I still had the whole series on VHS up until last year), and when I reached Season 3, my first thought was..."didn't the budget go down for the last season and not up? Why does everything look so good?" Only when I double checked the box and found that I'd somehow gotten my hands on the remastered release did I realize just how awesome the updates actually are. Contrary to common fears, they didn't try to make it look like a modern show at all. They simply enhanced, in most cases quite subtly, what was already there. The colors are brighter, the picture quality is sharper with better contrast and the sound is just a bit clearer, all without taking away the feel of the old school visuals and audio. Instead of a plastic toy flying around indistinct glowing globes, a slightly sleeker digital Enterprise floats across orbital views of definable planets. The phaser fire looks a bit less clunky and they even added some extra effects to scenes like the agony booth in Mirror, Mirror...but it blended in so well with the original footage that I didn't even remember it not being there before.
Not a single change in the remastered editions feels out of place and I must say, it's AMAZING. Of course, the original releases have a certain nostalgic charm that can never be replaced for those of us who grew up on the show, but if I could choose just one to have, the new verions are a bit more visually pleasing and only add to my love of the episodes rather than taking away from them. So at this point, I would probably stick with those!
