There’s something far more important going on with the HD format war than anything that ever happened during the DVD generation. It hit me last night as I was watching a HD feed of Night of the Comet on Universal HD. Which made me reflect on my recent viewing of Krull on HDNet. Which reminded me of my marathon session of the Die Hard trilogy in preparation for Live Free or Die Hard. Which I then promptly revisited Lethal Weapon 1 and 2. Yeah, that’s a pretty deep reference there.

All that made me realize, it’s not about which format wins, or has the best sound, or what the storage capacity is. At the end of the day, physical media won’t be a factor. As more and more studios prepare their catalog for the next era of pixel-popping eye-candy, more and more of these HD transfers are making their way onto cable and satellite broadcasts. And because high definition televisions are showing up in more and more households, there’s a wide audience to revisit these classics in HD. Like me.

So I’m watching these classics, or guilty pleasures, or whatever you want to call them; and after repeated and countless viewings on VHS and standard definition DVD, this is the first time I’m able to experience these films as they were intended. In some cases, the first time since I initially saw them in the theater 20 years ago; in others, having never seen them during their theatrical run, the first time ever.

It’s been a recent practice of remastering transfers to HD for standard DVD releases, and as such the titles from first half of the DVD generation have suffered considerably. Some never received a proper widescreen release; others are barely above VHS-quality. And I’m sure we’ll see the same in the HD generation – dirty prints being shoveled out in 1080p, only to be cleaned up when it becomes cost-effective to do so.

While HD-DVD and Blu-ray beat themselves into oblivion, I’ll be quietly curled up on my couch with a bag of popcorn, reliving the glory days of my youth in glorious digital 1080p.