Which high-def Matrix collection should you buy?
by Matt Burns, posted Mar 28th 2007 at 9:10AM
May 22 is right around the corner folks and frankly, we don't feel everyone is ready. That day you are going to have to decide which
high-def Matrix film collection you are going to buy. Are you going to go for the
'The Ultimate Matrix Collection' which includes all the films, the IME HD DVD features, tons of extras, and the Animatrix short? Perhaps you don't want all that extra stuff like the Animatrix short and those extra features so you should be considering the 'The Complete Matrix Trilogy' which trims down the from from $119 to a more modest $99. But what if you only want to buy, lets say, the first film from the trilogy - what then? Well, it looks like you might have to find the discs from some third party sources where they are going to split up the collections as it seems Warner doesn't have any plans to release the films individually. The final option is to wait 6 months for the Blu-ray version to be release but why? You could look at this as an opportunity to jump of that Blu-ray bandwagon and onto the HD DVD's so you can watch the Matrix before any of your former Blu-ray buddies.
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Alex @ Mar 28th 2007 9:39AM
I'll stay with Blu Ray. The only one I would even think to own would be the first film. The rest are so bad they are difficult to watch.
Wiz @ Mar 28th 2007 10:01AM
Just to clarify: The Animatrix is not a short. It's a full length movie composed of a collection of animated shorts. Think Heavy Metal.
It's also quite good, and fills in a number of gaps in the background story. Highly recommended.
OK, sorry for being an annoying geek.
MikeUF @ Mar 28th 2007 10:32AM
Anyone know if the animatrix will be in HD....a couple of those shorts would look incredible in high def
pnorth @ Mar 28th 2007 10:18AM
I'm excited to hear all of the blu-ray fanboy rebuttal. There's got to be some great excuses as to why they would rather wait longer for a version that might work on some blu-ray players (LOL but not all of them - that's a big f-you from the BD Disc Association to consumers that bought players that don't support BD Java and other BD functionality). Hopefully BD can get thier act together so Warner will actually want to release it on Blu-ray. It's been almost a year and still not ready for primetime for BD...
Hector Martinez @ Mar 28th 2007 10:40AM
Simple choice, get the bigger collection since it's only a few bucks more, and wait for Blu Ray since HD-DVD is dead.
andy @ Mar 28th 2007 11:28AM
Yep, exclusive content is a sure sign that the format is dead.
I'm sticking with the opening salvos position for now. The cheap chinese HDDVD players that have already been announced and started production should make the situation more interesting.
Big Sam @ Mar 28th 2007 11:08AM
I just want the first movie and the Animatrix if its in HD. But this will probably be the first HD-DVD I buy (instead of rent from Netflix). Unless Lord of the Rings comes out on HD-DVD first...
glide @ Mar 28th 2007 1:23PM
How is this considered "exclusive content" when a Blu-Ray release has already been announced as well?
Tim @ Mar 28th 2007 12:26PM
There isn't really much of a choice. You wait for the Blu-ray version. Many people have fooled themselves into believing that the consumer has a choice. The consumer never had a choice, the industry has already decided that Blu-ray is going to win. At least this time the technically superior format won, that's often not the case. Neither HD format is targeted at the consumer for the benefit of the consumer. They're targeted for the benefit of shareholders' wallets. You don't buy movies on DVD today because you think DVD's are awesome. It doesn't matter if you utterly hate DVD as a format. You buy a DVD because that is what holds the content you've been convinced to watch.
andy @ Mar 28th 2007 1:32PM
It's exclusive because it's only available on one format.
If you want to watch it any time from May until Christmas, then you're going to watch it on HDDVD.
Remember GTA for the PS2. This is the same situation but reversed for Sony.
glide @ Mar 28th 2007 3:23PM
GTA for PS2 became non-exclusive when it was announced that it would be available for the Xbox. I still don't get home something can be exclusive when a release has been announced.
Touting something as "exclusive" for a period of 6 months seems silly.
Kevin Murphy @ Mar 28th 2007 2:39PM
>>wait for Blu Ray since HD-DVD is dead
TJ @ Mar 28th 2007 5:03PM
Sorry Matt, I'll wait for the Single disc Blu-ray release.
I purchased Toshiba's HD DVD player, and that was the most expensive mistake I've ever made. It's only a matter of time until Universal caves and this pointless format war is over.
IME is not enough to convince me to buy any HD DVD over the Blu-ray Disc.
Xyzzy @ Mar 28th 2007 9:39PM
"I purchased Toshiba's HD DVD player, and that was the most expensive mistake I've ever made. It's only a matter of time until Universal caves and this pointless format war is over."
Why exactly was buying the HD DVD player a mistake? (and if spending $400 on something is the worst mistake you've ever made in life, you need to take more risks in life ;) ). The player works great and there's plenty of exclusive movies to watch on it (contrary to popular belief, Universal isn't the only HD DVD exclusive studio -- I watched Luxky # Slevin and Clerks II, neither of which is available on BD and neither of which is Universal).
In addition, and you probabloy already know this, but plenty of "BD Only" movies are available on HD DVD overseas if you want to import them.
I just don't see how buying a player can be considered a mistake, especially considering it's only $400...
Xyzzy @ Mar 28th 2007 8:50PM
I've asked many times, but nobody ever has a good answer -- why is BD considered "technically superior?" Simply because it can store 25G/layer instead of 15G? Who cares? That doesn't mean it's technically superior, it just means that it holds more bits. Is a 160G harddrive technically superior to an 80G harddrive? No.
Currently, HD DVD is by far the superior format -- it has more available features and, while BD can theoretically match them (and claim that they will), they haven't been able to yet (interactivity, IME, etc). Nobody cares about how much space is on their movie disk (nobody said, "9G for DVD? Great, sign me up!"). And frankly, do I care about the difference between 15G and 25G disks for my PC? Not really, both are small by today's standards, when you can get affordable 8G USB thumbdrives.
I just don't see how BD is "technically superior," just because it stores more data. Big deal.
Larry @ Mar 29th 2007 9:21AM
If the Animatrix is not in HD then the choice is obvious you go with the three disc set. It has been almost two years since Blu-Ray decided to go with Java and it is still not ready yet.
John Drinkwater @ Mar 29th 2007 1:00PM
I'll wait for the Blu-ray version(s)...
Joseph R @ Mar 29th 2007 7:00PM
Hmm... HD-DVD or Blu-ray of THE MATRIX COLLECTION?
Well, let's see. Since this is a Warner title, they are well known for releasing many of their HD-DVDs with lossless Dolby TrueHD soundtracks, but the same title on Blu-ray only has the standard Dolby Digital soundtrack(!)
THAT possibility and with Blu-ray still not up to the same interactive features already standard on HD-DVD... well obviously I will buy this deluxe edition on HD-DVD (only $84 + Free shipping right now on Amazon).
chuck @ Apr 3rd 2007 2:12AM
I decide I don't need either as I all ready own them on DVD
Joseph R @ Apr 4th 2007 1:17AM
Chuck, where does "standard DVD" fit-in for this subject?
I'm sure most of us haved own the standard DVDs of THE MATRIX TRILOGY for several years, but this thread is about the forthcoming HIGH-DEFINITION version(!), or whether to buy soon on HD-DVD or wait for end-of-year Blu-ray release... for those who are interested, and own an HD-disc player.
Note to Chuck - this site is called engadgetHD.com!
Dominic @ Apr 4th 2007 5:14PM
Matrix 1 - Awesome
Matrix 2 - great action.. so-so story
Matrix 3 - a total bomb... I dont care if it's HD-DVD and/or Blu-ray... they ran out of CG-FX budget, will look crappy at 1080p