I’ll state it plainly – this is a bone-head move. We don’t need another edition of The Hangover on Blu-ray. At least not yet. And not in a version that adds so little to the original disc’s feature set.
Honestly, this is the shit that I find frustrating, as an evangelist of a physical, optical-disc format – we, in our forward thinking, high-tech future lives, don’t really want to own more stuff but we suffer through our growing Blu-ray libraries for the love of film presented in its best possible format. With current download caps and bandwidth restrictions movie downloads and streams just won’t cut the mustard yet. But we look forward to the day when all of our films will exist on a local server or in the cloud, accessible on all our devices at any time. We don’t need or want multiple copies of the same films on our shelves. So why do the studios insist on foisting them on us? Why do they want us to buy two or three times when doing so clearly hurts consumer loyalty as well as hurting perception of the format on which their home video market future depends? How long will they persist before we lose enthusiasm for buying discs, certain that no matter what edition of a film we purchase it will be supplanted within a years time with a superior one?
Granted, none of us needs to buy this new Hangover: Extreme Hangover Edition Blu-ray set, but if you’re a fan of the film, you either already own the original disc and will feel cheated that you won’t have all the new features or you’ll buy this new edition and feel cheated out of your hard earned dollars. This is the now time-honoured tale of the dreaded double-dip. And the fact that this one comes so hot on the heels of the first release, combined with the fact that some of the new extras are BD-Live featurettes that should, by all rights, be accessible through the original discs network portal, is a bit insulting. Wasn’t that the whole point of BD-Live in the first place – to add features and value in the months and years following a Blu-ray discs release?
Don’t get me wrong, I love me some Warner. Like I said in my Top 5 column this week, no other studio is releasing as many catalogue films on Blu, or spending as much on film restoration. And they should be applauded for that. But they need to take a look at the wisdom of their double and triple-dip releases before it starts to negatively effect their business and the perception of the format. I know my friends are beginning to tire of it and are already starting to stray from the Blu-ray fold.
THE HANGOVER: EXTREME HANGOVER EDITION
(October 12, 2010 – MSRP $49.99)
28-page wedding album featuring missing photos
Video: 2.40:1 VC-1 1080p
Audio: Dolby TrueHD 5.1
Special Features:
- Picture-in-Picture commentary featuring Bradley Cooper, Zach Galifianakis, Ed Helms and Todd Phillips
- FOUND! A stash of incriminating photos exposing the events that culminated in an unforgettable night of mayhem (new)
- The Madness of Ken Jeong
- The Dan Band!
- Gag Reel
- Three Best Friends Song
- Map of Destruction
- Action Mash-Up
- BD-Live
- Iron Mike Online Teaser
- Cursing Mash-Up
I, too, am getting fed up with the double-dip releases. I love this movie, but there is nothing new here that warrants the purchase for me.