Decisions, Decisions

Why do people have to complicate things? Yes, George Lucas, I'm looking at you. And Spielberg, because the edits to E.T. were just silly.

Five years ago, I bought the 4-disc Indiana Jones DVD box set, because I only had VHS copies and they don't hold up well over time. It had all three movies, plus a bonus disc. Now I've seen an ad on TV for a new DVD box set, a "special edition" this time. Apparently, the movies are the same, but the bonus features are different. Oh, and the new set is apparently subtitled in 8 languages (Arabic, English, French, German, Greek, Hebrew, Nepali, Spanish) instead of the usual 3 (English, French, Spanish), and appears to be an all-regions DVD instead of just Region 1.

Either way, I think I'll wait for a used copy of this one to turn up cheap. If the movies are the same (thank goodness - Lucas is too enamored of the ability to re-edit), then I'm not paying extra for new extras. I'll admit, I bought 2 of the Star Wars movies on DVD when Amazon had the original versions on sale, but that's it. The "improved" versions don't do anything for me. I prefer the "real" ones. Of course, I think the last three SW movies were bordering on crap. They spent too much money on special effects, and apparently ignored the script. Yes, the effects were cool - the droids in battle were fun to watch - but they felt dumbed down.

I'll admit, I've got both versions of the Lord of the Rings movies, but with those, there were differences in the movies. I bought the extended versions first, and then picked up the theatrical releases when they were on sale later. I can justify that, but paying twice for the same movie isn't going to happen. Plus, I'm enough of a LOTR junkie that I went for the ultra-spiffy box sets, with the bonus disc and the Sideshow Weta figurines.

In short, I guess not much of a decision, now that I've read up on the specs of the new Indy set, but it's still irritating.