Wait, This Movie is a Remake?

Took my eight-year-old to see Paws of Fury. Seemed like it was going to be a typical animation featuring funny animals in a feudal samurai setting. Then I saw a scene early on where an evil lord saved a prisoner from execution to send on a suicide mission to become a samurai to defend a nearby village from bandits. The twist was he wanted the village to be destroyed so he sent the most offensive candidate possible: a dog in a society made entirely of cats. Then it hit me like a ton of bricks: they remade Blazing Saddles as a kid's movie! The original movie was a classic Mel Brooks movie from the 1970's that parodied Westerns. In that one the main villain sends an African-American to become sheriff to a prejudiced lily-white town.

Has it ever happened to you that you've seen a movie to realize that it's a remake of some other movie you've already seen?

I can't remember the specifics, sadly, but I remember watching a fair few "oh, this is Count of Monte Cristo" films a few years back.

It does feel like a familiar plot in movies; after all, who wouldn't want to come back from disgrace as a powerful mysterious stranger to wreck vengeance on all who have wronged us?

Maybe it's not memorable because in movies that kind of character is often the villain instead of the hero. Gustav Graves in the James Bond movie Die Another Day has a character arc like that.