So, I've been keeping an eye on High-Def Digest's reviews of Universal's 6/12 slate of HD DVD releases because, with the announcements of Blockbuster and Starz Home Entertainment backing BD, I'm really starting to get leary of HD DVD and decided to cancel some of my upcoming pre-orders. So far this week they've reviewed five titles with the following PQ scores:
Daylight
Liar, Liar
Sneakers
Born on the Fourth of July
Monty Python's The Meaning of Life
Aside from Born on the Fourth of July, no title was better then par according to their review system, and each reviewer took Universal to task for taking what they preceived to be a quantity over quality approach with these offerings. The review of The Meaning of Life greatly disappointed me as a Python fan, which precipitated this thread. I have seen us touch on this discussion this week, but I felt it needed greater exposure, and I would like to hear other thoughts from BD and HD DVD proponets alike.
So here are my questions.
Is this a trend? It seems to be related to the source material used and mainly catalog titles.
What is Universal's strategy here? It seems to be simply to keep pace with the number of titles BD has released with little regard to what title and in what condition that title is released?
I'm sure these are 'watchable', and, no, I haven't personally watched any of them. I was using the reviews at High-Def Digest and here to try and determine whether they were worth my dollar given my failing confidence in HD DVD. But I have to wonder whether this strategy is really helping HD DVD.
Thoughts?