October 17th, 2019
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It’s a really slow week with Crawl being the biggest release of the week, and it wasn’t a monster hit at the box office. Fortunately, it is also the best DVD / Blu-ray release of the week and was the only real contender for Pick of the Week.
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June 12th, 2016
I've never done a full featured review of Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, although I have reviewed it as part of a couple of box sets in the past. It is widely considered the best film in the franchise and I absolutely agree with that assessment. Last week, the Director's Cut came out on Blu-ray for the first time individually. I assume most fans of the franchise already own this film on DVD, and Blu-ray, and if they are like me, on VHS as well. So the question isn't, "Is this a movie worth owning." It's, "Is it worth buying for the fifth or sixth time?"
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December 13th, 2015
The third installment of the Holiday Gift Guide focuses on smaller releases, movies that opened in limited release, foreign films, classics getting new releases, and a few Canadian films. This year the list looks different to the previous guides for a simple reason. While there were only eight releases on the TV on DVD installment of the holiday gift guide, the first pass had more than 30 films on this list. I tried trimming the list, but that resulted in me remembering more films I wanted to add to it. Even after getting rid of the ones that won't be released until after Christmas, like Bone Tomahawk, there are still way too many releases to deal with. So let's not delay anymore and get to the list, starting with the biggest release...
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October 2nd, 2015
It is a bad week for limited releases. Shanghai is the biggest release on this week's list, but that just means it is opening in way too many theaters to thrive. The film I'm most interested in is A Christmas Horror Story, but I do have a well-known pro-Canada bias.
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March 16th, 2015
The latest home market release for Star Trek: The Original Series is a two-disc DVD... DVD? You would think there would at least be a Blu-ray option. What episodes are on this two-disc DVD? And is the DVD worth the asking price?
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March 16th, 2014
The Horror at 37,000 Feet is a TV movie starring, among others, William Shatner as an ex-priest on a plane that is attacked by an ancient demon. There's no way this movie will be good, at least not in the traditional sense of the word. But will it be entertaining?
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March 15th, 2014
12 Years a Slave recently won the Best Picture Oscar. This creates huge expectations. I am a little worried the expectations are so great the film will be weak by comparison. Is that the case? Or is the film really as good as its reviews and accolades would indicate?
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October 28th, 2013
Like last week, the home market is rather slow this week. There are more than 200 new releases, which is a step up from last week when there were only 161, at least according to Amazon.com. But even so, this week is arguably worse, if you only look at the top releases. The number one release is Monsters University, but number two is R.I.P.D., which bombed both in theaters and with critics. There are not even a few limited releases to help fill out the list, like we had last week. In fact, I'm pretty sure the Christmas Releases outnumber the non-Christmas releases by a sizable margin. Fortunately, there are two contenders for Pick of the Week, including Monsters University on Blu-ray Collector's Edition or 3D Combo Pack and Degrassi: Season 12. The former is the Pick of the Week, while the latter takes home the rarely awarded Puck of the Week.
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October 23rd, 2013
The Captains Close Up was a TV series that aired earlier this year and had William Shatner interviewing, and being interviewed by, the other captains in the Star Trek franchise. The show is obviously aimed at Trekkies, but will it appeal to them? Will it have a broader appeal outside of the core fan base?
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September 10th, 2013
Star Trek: The Original Series started nearly 50 years ago, while this week the latest movie, Into Darkness, comes out on the home market this week. To celebrate, a single-disc Blu-ray, Origins, comes out. So what episodes are found on the Blu-ray? And is it worth picking up?
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September 9th, 2013
Star Trek: The Original Series began nearly 50 years ago and created a TV and movie franchise that is still going on. The franchise has had its share of low points, but the 2009 reboot, Star Trek, revitalized the franchise at the box office. Star Trek into Darkness did even better at the box office. But did it deserve this box office success? Does it live up to franchise as a whole?
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August 15th, 2013
We are entering the beginning of TV on DVD season on the home market. As the fall schedule ramps up, more and more TV on DVD releases will come out. This week we have Once Upon A Time: The Complete Second Season on DVD and Blu-ray, as well as Girls: The Complete Second Season, also on DVD and Blu-ray Combo Pack. Both are worth checking out, but I'm waiting for the screeners for both, so I don't want to award either the Pick of the Week. Instead, I'm giving that honor to The Muppet Movie: The Nearly 35th Anniversary Edition Blu-ray. Meanwhile, What Maisie Knew on DVD or Blu-ray Combo Pack is a close second.
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March 25th, 2013
Star Trek, as a franchise, began nearly 50 years ago and it has maintained a healthy fan base ever since. Star Trek: Enterprise started in 2001 and had quite a lot of pre-release buzz. It was to look at the very early days of humans exploring the galaxy and taking their place in pre-Federation times. The pilot, Broken Bow was seen by more than 12.6 million people. However, the average viewership for season one was just under 6 million and by the time the series was canceled after the fourth season, the show's ratings had fallen to under half of that. It obviously didn't live up to the hype, but now that the show's been off the air for nearly a decade and the hype is not an issue, is it worth going back and rediscovering the show?
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February 1st, 2013
For the most part, January was a really good month and 2013 got off to a really good start. I'm not so sure about February, on the other hand. There's only one film that has a statistically significant shot at $100 million, A Good Day to Die Hard, but I'm a little concerned that it won't live up to expectations. The franchise has been around a long time and it is possible that the target audience has either moved on or are too young to remember when these films were huge at the box office. The film I'm most looking forward to seeing is Warm Bodies, which is earning amazing early reviews (the keyword there is "early"), but it is too high-concept to be a major hit. Last February, there were a couple of films that topped $100 million, plus a few other midlevel hits. I would like to think that would also be the case this year, but I have to be more cautious than that. The evidence points to a weak month ahead, for the most part.
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January 15th, 2010
When one thinks about the career of William Shatner, one usually divides it into three sections: Star Trek, Star Trek, and all the rest. Kingdom of the Spiders is part of all of the rest. It has a reputation for being, and let's be honest here, B-movie crap, but is this reputation deserved?
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