{"id":53361,"date":"2013-07-10T12:00:29","date_gmt":"2013-07-10T19:00:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.highdefdigest.com\/blog\/?p=53361"},"modified":"2013-09-11T17:21:05","modified_gmt":"2013-09-12T00:21:05","slug":"zavvi-2013-steelbooks","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.highdefdigest.com\/blog\/zavvi-2013-steelbooks\/","title":{"rendered":"Full Metal Jackets: SteelBooks As Far As the Eye Can See"},"content":{"rendered":"

At this point, I feel like I should just start signing my paychecks over directly to Zavvi. The UK retailer has turned into a real haven for SteelBook collectors, especially in recent months with a seemingly endless parade of metal case exclusives. Zavvi has announced so many Blu-ray SteelBooks, in fact, that I’ve had trouble keeping up. Here’s a quick roundup of some of the titles I may have neglected to cover until now.
\n<\/p>\n

‘Withnail and I<\/a>‘
\nRelease date: June 25th, 2013
\nPrice: \u00a314.99 GBP
\nRegion code (announced specs): B<\/p>\n

Bruce Robinson’s pitch-black comedy about two self-destructive alcoholics seems like a very odd choice to get the SteelBook treatment. The artwork is, much like the movie, weird and kind of ugly, which seems perfectly fitting.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

‘Beverly Hills Cop<\/a>‘
\nRelease date: August 19th, 2013
\nPrice: \u00a314.99 GBP
\nRegion code (announced specs): B<\/p>\n

The artwork here is a decent but fairly basic design. It suits the movie well enough, but it doesn’t jump out at me as anything special. While I like ‘Beverly Hills Cop’, it’s the kind of movie I’m satisfied catching on cable when I run across it. I didn’t feel the need to buy the Blu-ray when it first came out, and I don’t think I’ll rush to get it in SteelBook either.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

‘28 Days Later<\/a>‘
\nRelease date: October 7th, 2013
\nPrice: \u00a315.99 GBP
\nRegion code (announced specs): B<\/p>\n

I like the design of this one, but I don’t feel like I need to rebuy the movie just to get a SteelBook. I felt bad enough about “upgrading” from DVD to Blu-ray in the first place, and I fished the disc out of a bargain bin at the time. (The majority of the movie was shot on cruddy standard-definition video; only the lossless audio and the movie’s final scene justify any improvement over DVD.)<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

‘The Goonies<\/a>‘
\nRelease date: October 7th, 2013
\nPrice: \u00a314.99 GBP
\nRegion code: The Zavvi listing’s specs say Region B, but Warner Bros. almost never region-locks its Blu-rays. This will most likely be region free.<\/p>\n

The front cover image here comes from the original Drew Struzan poster art. It’s not Struzan’s best work, but given the choice between this or some generic Photoshop montage, I’ll gladly take this.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

‘Gremlins<\/a>‘
\nRelease date: October 7th, 2013
\nPrice: \u00a314.99 GBP
\nRegion code: The Zavvi listing says Region B, but it’s a Warner Bros. disc so it’ll probably actually be region free.<\/p>\n

It’s a simple but classy design. I like it.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

‘The Prestige<\/a>‘
\nRelease date: October 7th, 2013
\nPrice: \u00a314.99 GBP
\nRegion code (announced specs): B<\/p>\n

I adore this artwork for Christopher Nolan’s twisty, vaguely sci-fi-ish dueling-magicians thriller. I wish I found the movie more satisfying, but I probably need to give it another chance to see how it holds up to a second viewing.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

‘The Day After Tomorrow<\/a>‘
\nRelease date: October 7th, 2013
\nPrice: \u00a315.99 GBP
\nRegion code (announced specs): B<\/p>\n

Bad movie. Artwork is nothing special. I’ll pass, thank you.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

‘Planet of the Apes<\/a>‘ (1968)
\nRelease date: October 8th, 2013
\nPrice: \u00a314.99 GBP
\nRegion code (announced specs): B<\/p>\n

This one I don’t get at all. Of all the iconic images associated with ‘Planet of the Apes’, why would you put this one on the front cover? Nothing about this says ‘Planet of the Apes’ to me. And of course the inside artwork gives away the movie’s twist ending. Frankly, I think this case is a total botch job.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

‘The Wicker Man<\/a>‘
\nRelease date: October 14th, 2013
\nPrice: \u00a314.99 GBP
\nRegion code (announced specs): B<\/p>\n

I’ve only seen the ridiculously awful remake with Nicolas Cage. The original is supposed to actually be a good movie, isn’t it?<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

‘Seven Samurai<\/a>‘
\nRelease date: October 21st, 2013
\nPrice: \u00a314.99 GBP
\nRegion code (announced specs): B<\/p>\n

Akira Kurosawa’s masterpiece is given a very handsome and classy SteelBook case. If I didn’t already own the Criterion edition of the movie, I’d jump right on this one. However, I think the Criterion will hold me over for now.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

‘From Dusk Till Dawn<\/a>‘
\nRelease date: October 28th, 2013
\nPrice: \u00a314.99 GBP
\nRegion code (announced specs): B<\/p>\n

It’s kind of hard to resist this front cover artwork. Yowzah! I wish I liked the movie more. Strange that there’s no title on the front. That will probably change when the design is finalized before release.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

‘Captain America: The First Avenger<\/a>‘
\nRelease date: October 28th, 2013
\nPrice: \u00a315.99 GBP
\nRegion code: Zavvi’s listing says Region B, but Paramount’s Blu-rays are usually region-free.<\/p>\n

‘Thor<\/a>‘
\nRelease date: October 28th, 2013
\nPrice: \u00a315.99 GBP
\nRegion code: Zavvi’s listing says Region B, but Paramount’s Blu-rays are usually region-free.<\/p>\n

These two Marvel comic book movies previously received the SteelBook treatment with different, arguably superior artwork. But those older copies are long out of print, and these reissues are fairly nice on their own.<\/p>\n

I’m undecided about purchasing ‘Thor’. I liked the movie, but I don’t know that I liked it enough to rebuy just for SteelBook. On the other hand, my OCD compels me to get all the Marvel films in metal cases. On the other<\/em> other hand, I thought ‘Captain America’ sucked and have no intention of buying that one (nor will I buy either ‘Hulk’ or ‘The Incredible Hulk’), so my completist impulse has already been thwarted.<\/p>\n

These also don’t appear to include the 3D editions of the films.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

‘The Fifth Element<\/a>‘
\nRelease date: November 4th, 2013
\nPrice: \u00a315.99 GBP
\nRegion code (announced specs): B<\/p>\n

I’m all over this one. I love the movie and think the artwork looks terrific.<\/p>\n

Keep in mind, however, that in addition to the region coding issue, the video transfer that Fox\/Pathe used for the European Blu-ray of the movie is different than the “remastered” disc that Sony issued in North America. It had some contrast boosting and a heavy yellow tint applied. Some viewers claim to like it better, while others don’t like it at all. I plan to just put the Sony disc inside the SteelBook.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

‘Daredevil<\/a>‘
\nRelease date: November 4th, 2013
\nPrice: \u00a315.99 GBP
\nRegion code (announced specs): B<\/p>\n

This seems like a scraping-the-bottom-of-the-barrel title. I suppose it looks nice enough to satisfy the small handful of ‘Daredevil’ fans out there, whoever they may be. The listing doesn’t specify whether the disc contains the Director’s Cut that is supposedly enough of an improvement to elevate a pretty bad movie into a merely mediocre one.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

The region coding information for all of the above should be taken with a grain of salt until confirmed by someone who owns the discs.<\/p>\n

Zavvi will<\/em> ship to North America.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

At this point, I feel like I should just start signing my paychecks over directly to Zavvi. The UK retailer has turned into a real haven for SteelBook collectors, especially in recent months with a seemingly endless parade of metal case exclusives. Zavvi has announced so many Blu-ray SteelBooks, in fact, that I’ve had trouble…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":53365,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[140],"tags":[3590,2946,67,564,3266,6580,3034,2948,452,946,1494,1428,3497,6581,567,1532,6582,6536],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.highdefdigest.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53361"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.highdefdigest.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.highdefdigest.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.highdefdigest.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.highdefdigest.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=53361"}],"version-history":[{"count":15,"href":"https:\/\/www.highdefdigest.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53361\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":56184,"href":"https:\/\/www.highdefdigest.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53361\/revisions\/56184"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.highdefdigest.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/53365"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.highdefdigest.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=53361"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.highdefdigest.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=53361"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.highdefdigest.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=53361"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}