The Complete Thirteenth Season DVD Collector's Edition: The Official Thread

[The Wiggs]

It'd be very nice going back to August and December releases. I'm tired of getting 1 set a year.

[bartyboy]

Have the bootleg all season set is niiiice for me

[Jesse Pinkman]

i hate how long it takes to release the seasons but it is worth it for all the extras IMO

[bartyboy]

Slow releases > season 20 DVD

[The Wiggs]

Everything > Season 20 DVD

[bartyboy]

That too

[B*O*R*T]

i wonder what takes up most of the 8-ish months making the dvd? my first thought was the animation on the menus, but then again it could be getting everyone needed to do a commentary. if it is the animation in the menus, i think i'd rather ditch that (or at least simplify it, we don't want another season 20 menu) and get them released faster.

[Disgruntled Goat]

There ain't a massive team of people working on Simpsons DVDs 24/7, you know. They have other things to do as well. Plus with big corporations like Fox there is inevitably a long approval process and large amounts of red tape.

[Captain Squid]

There ain't a massive team of people working on Simpsons DVDs 24/7, you know. They have other things to do as well. Plus with big corporations like Fox there is inevitably a long approval process and large amounts of red tape.

I haven't seen any FOX DVD's that have the same amount of effort put into them that the Simpsons DVDs do. My guess is that it's a collaboration between Bongo group/Gracie Films and 20th home video. Bongo group does the art, Gracie provides the extras/commentaries/menu animations and 20th authors it. So yeah, like you said. Lots of different parties = slow approval process.

However they clearly were not having trouble getting seasons 1-10 to come out twice a year.

[qwerasdf]

Have the bootleg all season set is niiiice for me

AS DO I, BUT NO COMMENTARIES

[bartyboy]

On seasons 1-6 on mine there is commentary

[The Wiggs]

I'd buy the bootlegs, but I'd rather save my money for the legit releases with all the loaded extras.

[Jesse Pinkman]

i was gonna get every season off some website (this was back before s8 was out on DVD, so 3-4 years ago or so). But then I decided i actually like waiting...

[The Wiggs]

i was gonna get every season off some website (this was back before s8 was out on DVD, so 3-4 years ago or so). But then I decided i actually like waiting...

I know what you mean. It may sound weird, but the anticipation and speculation of getting the DVD sets is part of the fun.

[Charlie]

I haven't seen any FOX DVD's that have the same amount of effort put into them that the Simpsons DVDs do. My guess is that it's a collaboration between Bongo group/Gracie Films and 20th home video. Bongo group does the art, Gracie provides the extras/commentaries/menu animations and 20th authors it. So yeah, like you said. Lots of different parties = slow approval process.

However they clearly were not having trouble getting seasons 1-10 to come out twice a year.

I think that Bongo does absolutely nothing in collaboration with the actual show, they only do the comic books. I don't see them outsourcing the artwork to another company (in the end that's all Bongo is, they only use the publishing rights and happen to be owned by Matt Groening; they don't do anything to collaborate with the actual show). Also, none of the art features any of Jason Ho's badness (heh). I'd say it's the normal production staff - possibly the people that make the promo cards.
The Season 20 DVD weirdly has a 'DVD Executive Producer' credit on the back of the box, which is credited to Denise Sirkot (a producer from Gracie Films). So it seems that Gracie may be in charge of the whole thing.

[bartyboy]

I'd buy the bootlegs, but I'd rather save my money for the legit releases with all the loaded extras.

I got 3 duplicates of the huge set for 15 dollars. That won't set you back too much

[Otis P Jivefunk]

I know what you mean. It may sound weird, but the anticipation and speculation of getting the DVD sets is part of the fun.

lol, I don't find waiting a year for a set very fun. It takes as long to release a Season on DVD as it took to make the whole thing in the first place! 6 months yes, seems fair, and yeah there is some fun anticipating and speculating I agree, but a year is just too much. They will never catch up at this rate...

[qwerasdf]

It looks like mine will be here on August 18th..... from best buy

[Jonny Ringo]

Hey guys, I received my Blu-ray of S13 today if anyone has any questions. It's three discs in a standard Blu-ray case, with a cardboard slipcase so it matches the other seasons (albeit slimmer). Menus are computer game/arcade themed, while the episodes themselves are 1080/24p.

[Captain Squid]

Hey guys, I received my Blu-ray of S13 today if anyone has any questions. It's three discs in a standard Blu-ray case, with a cardboard slipcase so it matches the other seasons (albeit slimmer). Menus are computer game/arcade themed, while the episodes themselves are 1080/24p.

Thanks for the info!

Proof that the Blu-ray version pales in comparison to the DVD version. I know folks hate on the way they store the DVD discs, but I'd much rather have a double sided cardboard fold out featuring awesome art than a standard blue-tinted plastic case. Plus, DVD shelf spine inconsistency turns off the ladies.

[Jonny Ringo]

All the extras are SD (MPEG2), by the way, and really show up the difference between SD clips and the HD episodes, with the latter having more than triple the bitrate and a better codec. The menus look gorgeous in HD too and made me laugh.

[Sideshow Ryan]

Thanks for sharing, got any pics of the blu ray set. Like what artwork is on each of the 3 discs? What type of case is it? What episodes on what disc, quality?

Oh, and is the inside case different from the cardboard slip case, or is it just a "double-cover"

Thanks.

[Charlie]

So I guess that puts to bed all the people that are saying "but the blu-ray will look bad!!!11"

[Remmus]

Blu-ray is better even if it's upscaled. Better codec and better bitrate.

@Jonny Ringo, could you post some pictures?

[Jonny Ringo]

Hi all,

I don't normally post but do read quite often to keep up with the DVD/BR news so am happy to help.

Here are some pics, I've just included links so it doesn't bother people on slow connections:

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v9...e/P1030612.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v9...e/P1030613.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v9...e/P1030614.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v9...e/P1030615.jpg (disc one was in the player when I took this)
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v9...e/P1030617.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v9...e/P1030619.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v9...e/P1030620.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v9...e/P1030621.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v9...e/P1030622.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v9...e/P1030623.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v9...e/P1030624.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v9...e/P1030625.jpg

Treehouse to Brawl in the Family is on disc one, Sweets and Sour Marge to Blame it on Lisa on the second and Weekend at Burnsies onwards on the final disc. One page of the booklet mistakenly refers to a fourth disc, so I imagine the DVD booklet will be a slightly different version of this with the differing episode distribution. The discs support resuming of viewing even when the disc has changed in the meantime, at least on my Sony.

I can't make screengrabs from Blu-rays, sorry, but they look great. I think that The Simpsons is (almost) uniquely suited to upscaling rather because of the relative lack of fine detail, as the animation is very bold and uses clear lines. The BRs really benefit from the differing compression as it isn't oversharpened (with the resulting halo - seen in several seasons on DVD) or stuck with the line twitter/anti-aliasing seen in the first few years of the show in particular. They're very vibrant, but by this point the quality of the masters is very clean and stable anyway (it's difficult to believe that these have ever been on film - which would normally be a bad thing, but for the Simpsons is good). I don't suppose that earlier seasons, with their occasional dirt and lack of stability, would look quite as good.

[Ray Jay Jonah]

Thanks!

[Charlie]

Very nice. I've ordered the Blu-ray so Im glad to see what to expect. It's a shame we don't get the proper box or anything, but oh well. At least it's the actual booklet and not a paper slip like with Season 20. I really like the menus too, as much as I love the style they've used on the DVDs for years now, that also looks very nice.

[Captain Squid]

So I guess that puts to bed all the people that are saying "but the blu-ray will look bad!!!11"

I don't think dissenters were saying that the blu-ray would look bad, I think the point they were trying to make is that the blu-ray will only look slightly better than the DVD. Also, save for the easier to remove discs the blu-ray packaging is bland.

From what I've been reading, the pros of the blu-ray are:

-slightly crisper image
-slightly better audio
-pop-up menu
- HD menus

The pros of the DVD are:

- double-sided fold out case with exclusive artwork
- consistent package size with seasons 1-12
- (assuming) a fourth animated menu for the fourth disc
- optional 3D head variant
- lower price

Really, for the lower price I see that the DVD offers more for the collector while the blu-ray only offers a slight bit more for the videophile. I don't see Simpsons blu-rays becoming the better of the two until we (A) get exclusive blu-ray extras or (B) reach the HD seasons.

[hughes]

So it looks like they've changed the menus, or is that just for the blu-ray?

[Jonny Ringo]

Here is is on the shelf alongside the other seasons:

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v9...e/P1030627.jpg