After several twists and turns, "Banglasia" was officially declared banned. One of the reasons the first versions of the movie was banned was that it portrayed sympathetically the gay lifestyle in Malaysia. The Malaysian Home Ministry claimed that the film “accentuated negative sociocultural lifestyles such as lesbian gay bisexual transgender (LGBT)” and at the same time “ridiculed the capacity and role of security troops in maintaining peace as well as national security.” Nevertheless, the original uncut film version was publicly shown for the first time in Southeast Asia at the Singapore International Film Festival held in December 2015, also at the New York Asian Film Festival and Osaka Asian Film Festival in the same year. In 2019, after several times of appealing, the film was finally unbanned. In December 2015, Namewee had opened up a Kickstarter campaign seeking to raise USD 500,000 within 40 days to partially recoup their initial production cost of more than RM4 million (USD 1 million) so that they can afford to release the movie globally for free. Part of the funds would be used to pay for extra post-production editing, and qualified donors would receive their mentions of name in the front and end credits. Wee however failed to reach his accomplished goal as he confirmed on his Facebook page where he only collected USD 186,468, which did not even reach half of his intended money needed. On 12 February 2019, Banglasia movie producers received official notification of approval from the board. After a six-year wait, Namewee and the filmmakers say they are relieved that the movie will finally make it into cinemas although they have had to make cut 7 scenes and do a reshoot to update the story with new scenes to make it relevant. Scenes cut from the film include gun shooting scenes, LGBT-suggestive scenes, a scene mentioning about the MyKad, and a scene which compares the safety of Malaysians and Singaporeans. The scenes cut do not affect the storyline. Namewee retitled his movie as Banglasia 2.0, announcing that his movie is headed for release in Malaysia cinemas nationwide on 28 February 2019.