Weekly RoundUp 4-5-2016 (The “Force Awakens” Edition)

It's a rare week that I can acquire all the info I need for a RoundUp THIS early! Only when there's one of those "special" releases.

If you guys know of any other special promotions on the release of The Force Awakens, please add them into this thread!

Thanks, in advance, for all the "likes" of the OP. I really enjoy putting these together for you folks!

I hope that Amazon comes close to matching that BB Doctor Who S9 price

Thanks for the mid week surprise, Mike! I have TFA ordered from Amazon and I'm guessing I'll see the price drop to the Target price by EOD Tuesday. I just have no interest in going to the store and fighting people after work for a copy, to be honest.

Otherwise, I'll have some disposable cash this next paycheck and I want to acquire a few other things which have been in my want list for a while (BSG, for instance).

Thank you again!

Talk about early birds!

I got the review for Mojave posted today. It can be found here. Still waiting to review Star Wars: The Force Awakens.

I'll be picking up Star Wars this week! Just a heads-up, the Target bonus content is download only garbage rather than a real disc.

Thanks for the early prices, Mike!

EDIT: Apparently, the Star Wars Target exclusive case is made of cardboard. So you'll be paying $5 extra for no case and digital special features that could be pulled down at any time.

TravisR said:

I'll be picking up Star Wars this week! Just a heads-up, the Target bonus content is download only garbage rather than a real disc.

Thanks for the early prices, Mike!

EDIT: Apparently, the Star Wars Target exclusive case is made of cardboard. So you'll be paying $5 extra for no case and digital special features that could be pulled down at any time.

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Man, I am so glad I canceled my Target pre-order and went with standard version from Amazon. Between the price difference on their limited edition vs the standard version, and not having to pay shipping at Amazon, I'm saving almost $15.

I watched TFA for the first time on the airplane during a recent vacation. I think I can wait for a price drop or a used copy.

My TFA is coming from Amazon, so I *know* I'll get the best price!
(... And free shipping via my Amazon Prime membership; can't beat it!!)

Joseph Bolus said:

My TFA is coming from Amazon, so I *know* I'll get the best price!
(... And free shipping via my Amazon Prime membership; can't beat it!!)

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Exactly. Me, too.

I just want the film. And my personal decision is "screw" retailer exclusives and collectible packaging--especially when higher cost is involved. For those who want them, go for it!

Mike Frezon said:

I just want the film. And my personal decision is "screw" retailer exclusives and collectible packaging--especially when higher cost is involved. For those who want them, go for it!

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I almost always go for the retailer exclusive but I'm curious how they can justify charging an extra $5 for a digital featurette and a cardboard box. I'll be getting it at Target either way since they open the earliest but even I may skip the exclusive. Personally, I think the regular cover is the best looking one of the four covers anyway.

Extra $5 MQ available from Disney - not specifically SW, but it should work so std release for 14.99 on release day.

For 250 points at Disney Movie Rewards (and you'll get 150-200 back from your purchase) -- you can get a "$5 off any Disney DVD or Blu-ray Combo Pack"
Sign into your DMR account?Rewards it's pretty easy to find under Gift Cards and Popular

You should be able to print 2 coupons per computer and from reports you can print 2 more from different computers from the DMR Unlocked Offers Page.
Expires 12/31/2016 so good for quite a few months. So far these have worked for DIsney, Marvel, Pixar, adn Touchstone releases. Walmart and Target they
scan automatically and BBY has it's own semi manual system.

This does require one of those Printer Software program installs that so many people find intolerable and a Printer as well as the aggravation of getting it to work depending on your
computer/printer-- no virtual, pdf, or smartphone scans allowed since the store has to collect the coupons to mail to Disney for payment.,

TravisR said:

I almost always go for the retailer exclusive but I'm curious how they can justify charging an extra $5 for a digital featurette and a cardboard box. I'll be getting it at Target either way since they open the earliest but even I may skip the exclusive. Personally, I think the regular cover is the best looking one of the four covers anyway.

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The justification is likely "most Star Wars fans don;t care and are going to pay for it Day 1 no matter what we charge" so lets make a bit more profit now. After the crazies get their fill and judging by the volume reports I'm hearing from retial store employees this will likely be extreme mass quantities so if you want the SB or exclusives, just wait for the later sales.

I hate retailer exclusives, particularly on Blu-ray titles. The last movie Abrams made before this one, "Star Trek Into Darkness" was perhaps the worst example I've ever seen of retailer exclusives. Only one third of the bonus material was originally put on the disc. Another third of it was given as a Target retailer exclusive. Then the other third was given as a Best Buy retailer exclusive. And then only iTunes had the commentary. So there was no way to get all of the content without buying it multiple times, and it was all pretty substantial stuff. They basically took a two hour making-of documentary and cut it into pieces.

For me, one of the worst things about the retailer exclusives is the supply is usually very poor. Stores heavily promote these things, but often run out of them well before end of business on the first day. (That they put them on the weekly circular is kind of a laugh since there's little chance they'll last all week.) The last two times I tried to play the retailer exclusive game, one of the times (the Star Trek Into Darkness release), the Target employees at my store didn't even put the exclusive version of the movie in the Movies section. The Movies section was filled with the regular edition, and the employees there had no idea about the exclusive version. I only found it because I stumbled into another lost fan in the store; they had hid all of the exclusive versions in an endcap located between women's underwear and snack crackers. The other time I tried recently was for some sort of Best Buy exclusive on Captain America: The Winter Soldier that I tried to buy on its street date. I checked the Best Buy website before leaving my house, and the website clearly stated that they had the disc in stock. When I got to the store, they were sold out of copies, and one of the clerks said that they had been sold out since first thing in the morning. I asked to speak to a manager because I wanted to gently complain that their website said it was in stock, and yet they didn't have it. I then had one of the most bizarre conversations I've ever had, where the manager insisted that the website was correct when it said that it was "in stock" at the store, but that they didn't have any copies. He just would not concede the point that it's impossible for an item to be "in stock" and "sold out" at the same time.

I was almost lured back into the game by this until they announced that the Target version didn't include a disc for the bonus features. I still may be persuaded one day to spend extra for additional bonus content, but I'm not willing to spend an extra $10-15 for a digital code for more bonus features that may or may not work forever.

Josh Steinberg said:

I was almost lured back into the game by this until they announced that the Target version didn't include a disc for the bonus features. I still may be persuaded one day to spend extra for additional bonus content, but I'm not willing to spend an extra $10-15 for a digital code for more bonus features that may or may not work forever.

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A clarification for those not following the gory details. The Target item has the extra Bluray disc with extras like all the releases, it just the small amt of Target Exclusive bonus material that
will be digital only

It's shocking - nay, unthinkable - to the 10 year old in me who grew up loving Star Wars, but honestly, I'll get E7 later down the road on Black Friday or something after a price drop to 10 bucks. It was a good film, but it was a pretty poor Star Wars movie.

I did the Target preorder of their retailer exclusive Blu-Ray for the $5 gift card, so I'll be waiting for that one to come in the mail. I was hoping it'd have shipped by now, since there's no way it'll make it here by Tuesday with standard shipping.

Has anybody heard anything about Season 3 of "Banshee" on Blu-Ray? For some reason, I thought it was coming out Tuesday.

EDIT: Forgot to mention! A special thanks to Mike for the extra early RoundUp. The Force must have been with him this week.

I'll be waiting for the 3D version of TFA. If there is one.

Adam Lenhardt said:

I did the Target preorder of their retailer exclusive Blu-Ray for the $5 gift card, so I'll be waiting for that one to come in the mail. I was hoping it'd have shipped by now, since there's no way it'll make it here by Tuesday with standard shipping.

Has anybody heard anything about Season 3 of "Banshee" on Blu-Ray? For some reason, I thought it was coming out Tuesday.

EDIT: Forgot to mention! A special thanks to Mike for the extra early RoundUp. The Force must have been with him this week.

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If you search for it on Amazon, it shows a 04-05-16 release date.

Thanks for your work, Mike.

I will occasionally do the retailer exclusive thing if there is enough stuff to make it worthwhile. I don't like it, but especially if it is additional behind-the-scenes material, I'm usually down for that, if the price is the same. But it doesn't count for me if it's not on a disc, so Target and their digital download exclusive lost me at that point.

Best Buy: I like the occasional steelbook for special titles. I was considering this one. But I just spent $5 extra for the Hateful Eight steelbook this week, and even that was stretching it, but I wanted to do it because I have Django Unchained as a steelbook and wanted them to match. I sure as hell am not going to pay $8 over the cost of the basic edition to get the steel in this case. The artwork they have chosen for the steel isn't as cool as the poster, either.

Wal-Mart: I don't really care about slipcovers that much anymore, and BB-8 is awesome, but he's far from the only good thing about the movie.

That being said, I am happy to get the basic edition here, which I am very glad has the poster as the artwork, as I like the poster very much. Besides...raise your hand if you actually think this is the last time Disney is going to release this film. We'll probably be buying this again very soon anyway, so why pay more than we need to now? (I'm pleasantly surprised the extras seem to be extensive on this version, but given that Abrams usually does commentary tracks and this one doesn't have that, I'd expect a double dip with that before Episode VIII comes out.)

Exclusives are nice if they don't involve price gouging (for Peanuts, Target's exclusive with an extra disc was the same price as the regular one would have been anyway, so why not?) In this case, though, this is a blatant attempt to screw Star Wars fans out of more of our money because they think they can. I'm not falling for it.

Amazon it is.