Pipeline - Sep 27, 2012

[CBR News]

The ultimate superhero movie is now out on Blu-ray, as "Marvel Studios' The Avengers" hit store shelves this week. Augie takes a look and discovers that he needs a bigger television screen.


Full article here.

[west3man]

Christ. That's a serious caveat (note the spelling issue). Thanks for that heads-up, as my usage model includes purchasing the multi-format pack but mostly employing the digital copy and DVD...at least until I buy an external Blu-Ray drive for my media laptop.

That leads me to the digital copy. First of all, I hope it doesn't expire like previous ones have. That's nuts.

Also, it's ridiculous that I have to use the disc to get the copy. I should be able to enter the code and download. Bam.

Instead, in order to get the Apple's version of thee movie, I have to use a drive that isn't even offered, anymore, on most Apple laptops. That's nuts - especially since the movie isn't coming from the disc, but via download. Have I mentioned how nuts that is?

Anyway, I've finally got it on my iPad. Sadly, I can't watch the extras on the iPad, but at least they exist. We will see if the Blu-Ray disc works in my player.

[west3man]

Also, despite the difficulties, I was remiss in not saying ...


YAYAVENGERS IS FINALLY AVAILABLE FOR HOMEVIEWING N STUFF YAY HOWCOOL IS THAT FIANNLY YAY!

[BamaRainbow]

Until the film is available on DVD with all the "real" bonus features--even on a second disc--I'm going to pass on it. After reading the problems with playing the Blu-Ray, it's utterly insane that you'd buy a copy of the Blu-Ray disc only to find out that your Blu-Ray player is, for all intents and purposes, already obsolete without needing to "update" some "firmware." (What the hell is that anyway?)

If I can buy a box of 10 BLANK dvd discs for $10, how much more of a cost is it for the studios to produce a 2-disc DVD set that has all the cool bonus features that are included as part of the single Blu-Ray (which may or may not actually play on your BR player, depending on how "updated" the "firmware" is at the moment)? I mean, I recall buying 2-disc sets that only cost about $5 more than the single-disc version. But since most of the Blu-Ray packages are now coming out *with* the film on regular DVD, I can't imagine the studios would really be losing money by transfering the (already on digital media to go to the Blu-Ray) bonus material to a second DVD disc and selling that set. And, really, if you're buying a "Blu-Ray combo pack," why would you want a DVD copy that has nothing but the bare bones of the film and a couple of trivial bonus features on it?

I get why the studios might not want people simply renting the movie to have access to all the cool stuff, but I'd hope they understand why home video sales are declining when they pull stunts like this. Who wants to be forced into buying a whole new system (if you don't already have an HD television set, a Blu-Ray player won't do you any good) simply to see some deleted scenes or to see an extended cut (one deemed too long for theatrical release) because the studio doesn't want renters to watch that "3-hour director's cut" of a film (a cut which "everyone" says would've made the film an even better watch)? And even after getting the fancy-schmancy Blu-Ray set-up, it turns out that you need to get periodic updates so that your player will play ALL the new Blu-Ray film releases.

[Hrungr]

I've been bit by that caveat as well.

I too have a Samsung 3D Blu-Ray player less than a couple of years old (and not a cheap one either). Even updated with the latest firmware Avengers stutters, hangs and skips in places. The main movie is mostly watchable, but the other mini-movie for some reason is all but unwatchable. Haven't seen this problem with any other movie...

[mummra the ever living]

I played the blu ray on my ps3 that I bought in 2007 at full 1080 and it worked perfectly!

No complaints here about the disc!

My only annoyance was touched on in the article- the sound! I felt the need to adjust the sound more often than I'd like as the dialogue can get very quiet while the action is very loud.

Also, the Avengers (Assemble) came out a week earlier in the UK and I have watched it more times than my girlfriend feels is natural!

[west3man]

Fwiw, mine worked great on my years-old Blu-Ray player.

[artiepants]

yeah, no problems for me either... wonder if this'll be a recall issue. (and watching this on DVD is really doing yourself a huge disservice)

You can see why they were all cut out for timing purposes, particularly the extended look at Captain America's loneliness.

that's actually the one deleted scene i can't believe they cut ~ every other one made total sense for pacing and general uselessness to the plot, but the Cap scene felt essential to me, not to mention had the funniest Stan Lee cameo in the whole CMU so far...