Uxi

Criterion Robocop rocks. I never go back to the R-rated version. Is the Criterion out on BD yet? Last I checked, it was only the theatrical/R-cut so I had passed. I generally favor director's cuts/extended editions.

Just finished ROTJ and my first marathon viewing of the Saga complete I-VI. Definitely a new experience for the Saga on BD. I take serious issue with some of the pro reviews I've read out there. You can see plenty of pores on faces throughout, most notably on Mark Hamil and Ian McDiarmid's makeup. Harrison Ford's face is especially noteworthy on Endor after the Death Star explosion. Also VERY high detail in the makeup of Sebastian Shaw. There is definitely no waxy face here, other than Carrie Fisher's makeup. I never did notice the blood on Han's fingers after Leia gets shot, either. The blinking Ewoks are pretty cool. Very natural and well executed, especially on the baby Ewoks when 3PO is telling his story. Did they do the whole eyes or was the lighting refined for the Blu-ray? I don't recall seeing the pupils before, either. Most noticeable on Wicket but also on the Chief and a couple others. Similarly, I also noticed much more detail when Vader is looking for Luke under the stairwell. My initial impression was brightness/gamma/lighting but it could just be excellent shadow detail. Audio wise, it's a great mix. Best use of surrounds since TPM. I heards animals, speeder bikes, Ewoks, and blasters. The Battle of Endor. Is. Awesome. Both video and audio. WRT the most infamous change, the "noooo" my initial impression actually watching it in the movie wasn't nearly as negative to when I saw it on youtube when the news broke. I was almost in favor of it at the time. Once the credits finished, I was back to wishing he would leave it out, but now I'm back to being conflicted. I really didn't mind it... if I haven't mentioned it before, Vader's "moment of truth" is my single most favorite moment in the entire saga. I've watched it at least hundreds of times at the movies, on VHS, cable/sat/tv, DVD, and now Blu-ray... I would have been really interested in my reaction if I hadn't heard all the angst on the interwebs about it... I remember initially being confused when the SE first came out and was about to start humming the yub yub song and the new Williams score started. I now love that so much better than the yub-yub and think this may have the potential to get there, as well. It wasn't poorly executed as Hayden Christensen ghost looking down and then in a seemingly different direction from Alec Guinness and the Yoda Muppet... I'll give it some more thought and probably watch just that chapter again in the next day or two. The context was the colorization of black & white films by the studios long after their creator(s) were long dead. The more appropriate analogy seems to be classical artists, who would work on their sculptures and paintings and frescoes for years and decades at a time. Lucas isn't done with it. I understand the tribalism of the fans who think their emotional investment should translate to some sort of say in the original theatrical cuts being out there***: it's also there to a degree in professional sports like football and basketball teams, in pseudo-sports like 'pro' wrestling, and even in politics with most of the party line types. Understanding it only reinforces my belief that it should be opposed, if not derided for what it is. EDIT: *** Correction... the original theatrical cuts are still out there. As I posted many moons ago, probably in one of the many debates with Hurin: former Federal agents fired for excessive force aren't going to round up the collections of people that already own them. What these fans have is a sense of entitlement to the original cuts being re-released and upgraded in every new format and the economics of it be damned. George Lucas owes it to them and should pay for their satisfaction or be slandered and vilified, regardless if he looks physically uncomfortable when seen at screenings of the original cuts. And if they don't get what they want, they feel free to edit and distribute on their own. Now, I'm a proponent of Fair Use and I don't really oppose people making their own edits for their own enjoyment, regardless of what the MPAA says. When they distribute, for profit or not, is where my support turns to opposition. So yeah, if a fan is disgruntled about the changes, feel free to purchase a new or used non-anamorphic DVD, laserdisc, VHS copy, etc or learn to rip, cut, and edit yourself if you don't want to be a criminal.

I hardly watched any Voyager but read about it on Memory Alpha. Definitely shafted Q more. Not much of a Continuum with all the changes they saw in a short 10-15 year period.

You can get two of the three together at any one time on anymoon

Yes the guy who actually owns it versus the people who think they do because they grew up with it and that entitles them to some sort of say.

Heh, Duke, you were supposed to respond with "then you are lost!" I'd put the BD's against the fancuts in any pepsi challenge. Screenshot remotes are one thing. Against the living moving high def picture... that's another. What are you using for a display, Duke? How big, what resolution, and how far do you sit from it?

Is Wave planning a Tread? Gah, that does suck. I have an Shade and a Greem Alpha. I also have the Green Beta. The arched back is the only thing I don't like about the Alpha, so I'll sometimes leave the front unlatched just to pretend. The Beta is pretty much perfect (and would be absolutely perfect if it had the shoulder missiles from the CM. I have the blue CMS set which looks nice except it's linkup sucks and the Beta is far smaller.

Doh, meant to specify the novelization. Carol is supposedly on a planet that Chang's cloaked BoP attacks as part of a series of provocations across the neutral zone. She's severely injured and comatose, which goes a long way to fanning Kirk's rage over David again.

He's using 720p fancut rips IIRC. Which still don't look near as good as the BD set. And sound... well let's just say the audio is most definitely inferior.

No politics boys. Yeah the rate sucks but I keep hoping to see the Fire Valk at half off on HLJ and AmiAmi.

We'd be slightly less screwed with the exchange rate. All the cool releases have been Macross 7 so we'd probably still be out of luck unless a certain company adapted it as "Robotech 7" or something like that.

Really need some sort of hybrid between the Toynami and the CM's. I like how sturdy the CM's are, but like color, detail, and proportions of the Toynami better. Speaking of which, did the Shadow Beta ever come out?

The use of the character was most appropriate in Undiscovered Country, too.

Which reviews and which specific movies? I posted two and you posted one that bear out more what I'm saying. TPM is never going to have a release as good as ROTS. It's complaints are overstated, though. There is DNR and human faces appear to be a bit waxy. To say there's not any detail or to blanket the whole film with it just isn't being accurate. Look at the textures on Padme's costumes. Or Darth Maul's face. Or his horns. The pod-race might be a bit soft but it's colors still pop and there is loads of high def detail. ROTS gets numerous reference quality reviews and TESB is usually right behind it. ANH and ROTJ usually review slightly behind between 80%-85% on most scales (4 to 4.5 on 5-star scales). Even TPM doesn't approach the original Gladiator release level of problems and you're going to be very hard pressed to find a review that says it does. Even if it did that would be one movie out of the 6. I dunno, do you think Eva asked Adolf how his day went?

The people moaning about FOTR EE's green tint would probably disagree. I'm not much of an extras guy any more for precisely the reason you mention (limited viewing/reviewing), though. To say the set falls short in the video quality isn't something your own posted review (or any other credible review out there) has claimed. Have you even seen the set yourself, yet? Even your own link to highdefdigest gives the set an aggregate of 4/5. IMO, it vastly overstates the problems on TPM and AOTC and overrates TESB a bit) but it does hit the mark on ROTS. HDD is notorious DNR haters, though and they almost always overemphasize it. There is a LOT of fine detail in TPM, for example, it's just not in the faces. Say what you want about the pacing / appropriateness of the podracing sequence, for example, but it looks good and is home theater demo material. Count the threads in the texture on Mace's robes, for another example. There are certain issues with some of the releases but excepting TPM, none of these have ever been known as slouches in the picture quality category, though there were certain color timing issues, which as noted to FOTR EE, isn't an exclusive phenomenon. In any case, none of the above cover almost 13 and a half hours of primary viewing material covering different epochs in film-making while attempting a unified look. The saga set not only contains reference and near reference video quality but has reference audio throughout, which is just as important to the high def experience. Watching these movies with your kids really gives fresh perspective on these movies! Especially hearing them laugh at Jar Jar.

I was just wooshing around the room with my FP version and my answer is still no. I would prefer some sort of retrofit kit to add on at least a couple VF-19 style locks but on the whole I like the design. A replacement "gullet hatch" could largely fix the gullet issue, too.

Uh, perfectly happy with my YF-19 FP but that would change the equation drastically....

Just finished Episode V. I really wish they would re-integrate the Wampa scenes (attacking Rebels and 3PO's trick on the snowtroopers) to TESB in an extended cut. I should finish off the first normal viewing of the saga tomorrow with ROTJ. Definitely a better experience watching them numerically back to back IMO than in filming order. Gives a whole different spin to many scenes in Ep IV, in particular. Makes you really appreciate how good a job Ewan McGregor did in mimicking Alec Guinness, too.

Just went through ANH a bit ago. I think the second part of the new krayt dragon screech is the best yet but the first part is weird. Didn't really care one way or the other for the new rocks around R2's hiding spot. They didn't bother my suspension of disbelief, nor was it hindered. I am definitely enjoying watching them in chronlogical order. I'll start TESB in a bit.

Initially thought that, as well, but now I'm thinking it's on purpose to set you up for Ep IV. Ep V is the same way, there's no resolution at all and everything is left hanging in the air. It needs IV and VI to bookend it. There's an immediacy ready for VI, that's lacking with IV, though, since we KNOW it's going to be an 18 year wait for the latter but we know there will be a much sooner payoff with VI. Story could have been left more ambiguous and hinted to either rescuing other Jedi or eluding more clone attacks, etc (which could be fleshed out in live action TV, the EU, or games or whatever). III is WOW reference quality from visuals to audio, though. Like most bullies, he was fronting. He was always a gimped quadruple amputee in a walking iron lung lashing out. Robot Chicken's Emperor summarized it best.

Keep the bonus disc. Empire of Dreams didn't come over in HD in the BD set unfortunately.

Going in my favorites were: VI, III, I, II, V, IV I'll be starting ROTS in a bit, but plan to be through the set on one full viewing by tomorrow night. Then start doing them again with the commentaries, which sound great but I've only listened to snippets of so far.

Just finished AOTC. Wow. My ears are ringing a bit from the battle. That movie started slow but ended great on a high, that's for sure. For some reason, I wasn't cringing at the romance this time. Maybe I'm just used to it but didn't seem as implausible as it used to. Was there an alternation/addition to the scene when they land on Tatooine and the camera keeps panning?

That's a creative decision and just like the edits, not your call.

How dare him! Seriously, though PQ is fine. Could it better? Probably... I suspect the real issue is a consistent look and matching the digital cameras on II and III with the film look on I, IV, V, and VI. The DNR and softening in TPM appears to be deliberate in an attempt to unify the PT. Pushing the envelope and all that is one thing but consistency should have had him using film the whole time.