My Two Cents

My Two Cents

All right, the big news so far today is that Sony Pictures Home Entertainment and Netflix have just set House of Cards: The Complete Fifth Season for release on Blu-ray and DVD on 10/3.

Sony has also announced the return of a classic holiday TV special to DVD in the form of a new Emmet Otter’s Jug-Band Christmas: 40th Anniversary Edition. Extras will include the Behind the Scenes in Frogtown Hollow featurette, deleted and alternate scenes, outtakes, and a lost song (Born in a Trunk).

In addition to Vice Versa and Night of the Living Dead, which we’ve mentioned in the last few days, Mill Creek is also releasing Mary Reilly on Blu-ray on 10/17 and a Suspect: 30th Anniversary Edition on 9/12. You can see the cover artwork below. [Read on here…]

We’ve got a good release news update for you today here at The Bits. But first, a couple of items of note...

This is kind of important for us: It’s getting harder and harder to keep The Bits running, what with server, bandwidth, staff, and other operating costs that seem to be increasing all the time, even as advertising revenue is in decline. It’s a problem many websites are facing these days. But we’re lucky in that we’re an Amazon affiliate. So we’ve just posted the weekly update of our Release Dates & Artwork section here at The Bits, featuring all the latest Blu-ray, DVD, and 4K Ultra HD cover artwork and Amazon.com pre-order links. We’d like to humbly ask all our readers: Please use our links when ordering from Amazon. All you have to do is click through any one of our Amazon links here at the site, then we get affiliate credit for literally anything you order from Amazon in that same shopping session. It make a huge difference for us in allowing us to keep The Bits going. This support is critical; it’s the difference between continuing The Bits or not. So we thank you very much for supporting us in this way. [Read on here…]

All right... let’s have a release news update today, shall we?

First though, I have an update for you on the forthcoming 4K Ultra HD release of Marvel’s Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 (due on 8/22), directly from Disney. I attended a press event for the title yesterday at Disney Studios in Burbank, and was able to ask some technical questions. First of all, Disney seems fairly bullish on the 4K Ultra HD format. As we’ve already reported, Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales will be their second release on the format on 10/5. The studio is currently evaluating future releases in 4K and is likely to release most new release titles day and date on the format going forward, though there may be the occasional exception. Yes, of course I asked about the prospect of Star Wars: The Force Awakens, Star Wars: The Last Jedi, and Rogue One: A Star Wars Story being released on the format in the months ahead, and no, they haven’t made a decision on this yet. Personally, I think there’s a decent chance we’ll see them in 4K in the next twelve months, but that’s just my own opinion... we’ll have to wait and see as Disney makes future announcements. We do expect Disney to announce more 4K titles in the next month or two. [Read on here…]

Hey, folks. I’m be back soon with a larger news update soon. We’ve been doing some server work here at The Bits while we’re in a bit of a lull, plus we’ve been doing some review work as well.

Speaking of which, you may have seen it when I posted it yesterday, but I’ve done a long awaited hardware review: Epson’s PowerLite Home Cinema 5040UB 3 LCD projector. I’ve been demoing it here at The Bits for a few months now and it’s pretty extraordinary. It’s not full native 4K, but it accepts 4K video signals, enhances the imagery via “pixel shifting” to make 4K look almost 4K, makes 1080p HD look more like 4K, displays HDR10 and the entire DCI-P3 color space, and it even displays 3D better than you’ll see in many theatres. If you’re into front projector, it’s one of the best and most affordable home cinema projectors you can buy right now. Do give it a look.

Also, Tim has posted several new Blu-ray reviews, including his thoughts on Paramount’s The Naked Gun Trilogy, Arrow Films’ Pulse, Severin Films/Intervision’s Feed the Light, Grindhouse Releasing’s Massacre Mafia Style, Lionsgate’s Warlock Collection, and Warner Archive’s Batman: Mask of the Phantasm. Enjoy! [Read on here…]

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