My Star Trek Blu-ray Dilemma
As you know, one of the reasons we at The Nerds of Color decided to celebrate Star Trek this week — aside from it being the franchise’s 47th anniversary — was the fact that the latest iteration of Trek, J.J. Abrams’ Star Trek Into Darkness, was being released on DVD and blu-ray today.
Like a good fanboy, I went straight to Target first thing this morning to secure my copy as soon as possible. After carefully examining about a dozen different cases, I finally chose one whose slipcover was minimally damaged by Target’s idiotic security cases (I’m very picky about the condition of the packaging).
It wasn’t just happenstance that I went to Target to get my copy of Into Darkness. You see, when Paramount Home Video announced the blu-ray release back in May, they also announced a series of retailer-exclusives and multiple versions of the disc. As of today, there are nine different ways to own Star Trek Into Darkness on blu-ray (and this doesn’t include options such as iTunes or DVD). Now, giving different retailers incentives is not a new phenomenon. In the past, the kinds of exclusives offered by different outlets ranged from unique packaging (like variant slipcovers or steelbooks) to including little tchotchkes (such as collectible figurines or other paraphernalia).