You might want to avoid the Back to the Future DVD

[Guest MarvinisaLunatic]

A good friend of mine who works at Laser Blazer in LA had a little chat with Bob Gale as Gale was making purchases from the store. As it seems, Pt. II and Pt. III have serious letterboxing problems. In order to make the P&S versions, they zoomed in on the letterbox version (rather than leaving it open matte, I suppose), and for the WS versions, they cropped the zoomed version, rather than using the original WS versions. Gale was very upset about this, and made Universal do the transfers over again. So, the botched version will be released, and then a month or two later, a proper version will be released.

 

Pt. I is WS formatting is fine.

 

Link to the forum and following posts on the matter

 

I haven't bought the DVD (planning on getting it after Christmas if I have any extra money) and I would probably not notice any difference, but there are a few people around here who would and this might be a big deal in that case.

[Guest El Satanico]

Yeah i saw this as someone posted it in Chud's new release thread and it pisses me off. Now I'll have to wait two more months before getting it.

 

They cut off the top and bottom of the P&S? My god that's horrible. I had thought they just messed up the widescreen version. This is even worse.

 

God damn you Universal!!!

[Guest Youth N Asia]

With as long as they've been planning this whole thing you'd think they'd make sure it came out right

[Guest SP-1]

I'm going to be SUPER pissed if I get it for Christmas now and it's messed up like that. I mean, how do you return that?

 

"Yeah, um, I can't see all of what I wanted to see in the picture, can I please have my money back?"

[Guest El Satanico]

Well if you get it for Christmas don't open it and just take it back to the store to get a refund. Then buy it when it's rereleased.

 

Universal is allowing people to send the part 2 and 3 discs back to them and then in Feburary they will send the new discs as replacements.

 

Just getting a refund and buying the corrected version in two months is alot easier.

 

And to answer the question I'm sure you're wondering about. Yes yours WILL be defective. This problem is on every copy so don't even bother opening and trying your copy. Go get the refund and save the money until the rerelease.

[Guest imajackoff?]

How many kabillion dollars does Universal have?? Why cant they have pay someone to do the proper quality control on these things before they are released?? yeesh.

[Guest Edwin MacPhisto]

Dagnabbit, there goes Dad's Christmas present. Thanks for the heads up, guys.

[Guest Zero_Cool]

Great scott!! (sorry)

 

Anyway, that pretty much sucks, as I was really looking forward to this on DVD. I'm thinking I'll just wait until Feb.

[Guest Eagan469]

IGN mentioned it in their review today.

 

Sucks balls

[Guest SP-1]

It shall not be opened.

 

Which makes me sad. Universal Quality Control

[Guest CED Ordonez]

Dammit all to hell...On the plus side, that's a few dollars saved until February.

[Guest Kagato Otaku]

Well, crizzap.

 

Now I have to scramble to buy my sister something else. Plus I'm 101% sure I was getting this for Christmas, so I've got to let them in on it too.

 

Thanks for the warning.

[Guest C.H.U.D.]

You can just call the Universal hotline and get the discs switched, if you don't want to wait until Febuary.

[The Dames]

You can just call the Universal hotline and get the discs switched, if you don't want to wait until Febuary.

How do you know about this CHUD?

 

Dames

[Guest Lethargic]

From what IGN said you CAN send in the discs for replacements. But your replacement disc won't arrive UNTIL February.

[Guest C.H.U.D.]

You may want buy them now while they are on sale and send in for the replacements. I hear that when the new batch is released in Febuary, there will be no distinction on the packaging, and the price will probably be $10-$20 more.

[Guest So what? I liked bubble boy]

Thanks for the update. I'm sure to get this dvd collection.

[Guest Eagan469]

I just got the Widescreen Edition for Christmas. Shit. I'm contemplating whether or not I should watch them or wait 2 months.

 

AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Guest starvenger]

You may want buy them now while they are on sale and send in for the replacements. I hear that when the new batch is released in Febuary, there will be no distinction on the packaging, and the price will probably be $10-$20 more.

That's pretty much my thinking, so I bought the set anyways...

[Paul Stanley]

I pray my girlfriend gets me the full screen version now..*i open it tommorow* if its WS then i just exchange it thursday or friday

[Guest NoCalMike]

well this gives me a reason to SAVE money for a change.....Plus with the Oz 2nd season coming out in a couple of weeks, I need the money for that~!

[Guest Lethargic]

What I want to know is what is this "Universal hotline" thing? I haven't found any number anywhere. I found a place to email them on their site but no number.

[Guest C.H.U.D.]

There's only a hotline number for customers in Canada.

[Guest Kotzenjunge]

According to SK's review of the collection, it isn't a problem unless you know the movie frame for frame, and it's only in two scenes.

[Guest Lethargic]

According to SK's review of the collection, it isn't a problem unless you know the movie frame for frame, and it's only in two scenes.

What's an SK?

[Guest Sassquatch]

Scott Keith.

 

He is an wrestling recapper on the net and is an overall idiot.

 

Sometimes he ventures into talking about other subjects rather than wrestling which is hit or miss.

 

A lot of the posters here use Keith as a measuring stick or an example because most of them read his work since this board use to be an off-shoot of his old message board from his old site Rantsylvania.

 

Keith isn't worth anyone's time.

[Guest Lethargic]

Scott Keith.

 

He is an wrestling recapper on the net and is an overall idiot.

 

Sometimes he ventures into talking about other subjects rather than wrestling which is hit or miss.

 

A lot of the posters here use Keith as a measuring stick or an example because most of them read his work since this board use to be an off-shoot of his old message board from his old site Rantsylvania.

 

Keith isn't worth anyone's time.

You coulda stopped with wrestling recapper. Overall idiot and wrestling recapper usually mean the same thing.

[Guest Lethargic]

According to SK's review of the collection, it isn't a problem unless you know the movie frame for frame, and it's only in two scenes.

Here's some stuff I found that says different...

 

"PARTs II and III are HOPELESSLY SCREWED-UP.

 

All three films were shot in "matted" 1:85.1 widescreen; in other words, the fullscreen versions of the films are attained simply by opening up the matte, eliminating the top-and-bottom black bars and adding visual information to those areas of the screen in the process.

 

The widescreen transfer of PART I was done correctly, and is absolutely beautiful. The transfers of the second and third films, however, are COMPLETELY wrong. They're so utterly and obviously wrong that it becomes apparent almost immediately. The framing of this transfer wasn't properly centered; as a result, there's far too much empty space on the top of the frame, and vital information on the bottom of the screen has been eliminated. This isn't a question of the normal picture loss that occurs with open-matte widescreen; the framing is just plain WRONG. I'm talking, like, an entire third of the picture that's fucked.

 

In PART II, when Marty is stealthily hoverboarding over to Biff's car to grab the Sports Almanac, you can't SEE the hoverboard....just Michael J. Fox's dangling legs. Earlier, when Doc holds up the "EMMETT BROWN COMMITTED" newspaper headline, the photo of himself in a straitjacket is mostly gone.

 

In PART III, as Marty walks out of the restroom in his duded-up clothes ("Clint Eastwood never wore anything LIKE this!"), his feet are cut off. One of my favorite shots in PART III, that starts as a worm's-eye view of the front of the DeLorean on the tracks and then moves around the car to reveal the locomotive approaching it, is ruined. The car takes up too much of the picture now, and the bottom of the grille can no longer be seen.

 

These are but a few examples.

 

This is a VERY BAD problem. Bottom line: Buy the full-frame set if you'd prefer it, but DO NOT buy the widescreen set. "

 

And here are some pics to show what the differences are. These probably won't bother some people but will bother enough....

 

Normal version:

 

 

DVD version:

 

 

Normal version:

 

 

DVD version:

 

 

So basically the bottom is cut out of the whole movie.

[Guest Eagan469]

Thanks Lethargic - that explains it perfectly

[Guest El Satanico]

Wow...that's even worse than i was expecting