There's been a lot of MPI bashing here lately, and I want to say that I think they're doing us a great service and they deserve to make a little money for their efforts. The DS Collections (and most of their releases for that matter) serve a niche market, and I just find it hard to believe that their profit margins are all that obscene.
I got to thinking about this after trying to figure out how much it was going to cost me to collect all of the otiginal DOCTOR WHO on DVD, and comparing the cost to collecting DS.
Here's a bit of my post on the WHO forum that got me thinking about this:
"Assuming that all episodes will eventually be released, 700 Who episodes (including reconstructions, animations, etcetera) for $2500 comes to about $3.57 per episode. 1225 Dark Shadows episodes (all of which are extant, save for one reconstruction which includes the audio in its entirety) for $1600 comes to about $0.76 per episode - clearly the better bargain."
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OK, so the DOCTOR WHO episodes undergo extensive restoration -
http://www.restoration-team.co.uk/ - and are
stacked with extra features. On the other hand, DS looks fantastic on DVD, and I don't really care that much about extra features (1225 eps of DS and 700 eps of WHO are more than enough entertainment for my schedule.)
MPI's MSRP is around $60 per Collection? I've never paid that much for a set, they're easy enough to find for $40-$50. I think the DS DVD Collections are a tremendous bargain...