In release news today, Magnolia Home Entertainment has set Frank for Blu-ray and DVD release on 12/9. The film stars Michael Fassbender, Domhnall Gleeson and Maggie Gyllenhaal. Extras will include a “making of” featurette and the trailer.
Meanwhile, Lionsgate has set The Skeleton Twins for Blu-ray and DVD release on 12/16, starring Kristen Wiig and Bill Hader . Extras will include a pair of audio commentaries with director Craig Johnson, Wiig, Hader and others, 2 featurettes (To Whom It May Concern: Making The Skeleton Twins and Sweet Moves), outtakes, deleted scenes with optional commentary, and a gag reel.
And here’s something that will drive you crazy: You remember how Warner Archive released Longmire: Seasons One & Two on Blu-ray? Well... Warner Home Video proper has just officially announced Longmire: The Complete Third Season on DVD. But not Blu-ray. You’ll get all 10 episodes plus The Ghost in the Storm featurette. Ugh. Here’s hoping Warner Archive will have the Blu-ray version at a later date. Such a shame that show was cancelled by A&E.
[Editor’s Note: Looks like I spoke too soon about Longmire! Netflix has just announced that it’s picked the show up for a fourth season – more here.]
Finally, here’s something cool: This is a project I first saw several years ago, and have long been sworn to secrecy about, but since it’s now leaked somehow on AICN I feel comfortable talking about it here. I have this good buddy named Adam “Mojo” Lebowitz. Some of you may know of him – he was a VFX artist on the new Battlestar Galactica, plus he also worked on Star Trek (including Voyager & The Motion Picture: Director’s Edition), Serenity, Babylon 5, and other great genre projects. Anyway, after Ron Moore’s Battlestar wrapped, he was looking for a new project and hit upon the idea of giving the classic 1970s Battlestar Galactica TV series the same kind of special edition upgrade/revamping that the original Star Trek was getting from CBS. So on his own time, he worked on a demo reel intended to pitch the project to Syfy and Universal Studios Home Entertainment. What you see in the video linked below is the result. It’s a “remastered” space battle scene from the classic episode The Living Legend: Part 1...
The original idea was to remaster the entire series, and then the project became remastering just the two-part episodes, and then finally just The Living Legend: Parts 1 & 2. The problem was, while Universal was reportedly interested in the idea, when the rubber met the road they apparently didn’t want to spend the money. But Mojo kept working to bring the budget down, and down, and down some more... and Universal never bit. This went on for years. Last I heard, the studio (apparently) finally decided not to do the project at all, but rather just to repackage the German Blu-ray set for American consumers. Which woule be lame, especially in light of the recent death of series creator Glen A. Larson. So here’s the deal: Classic Battlestar is coming to Blu-ray in early 2015. But don’t expect to see anything like the above on the discs, because Universal turned the idea down. Maybe... just maybe... fans of this series will see Mojo’s demo and let Universal Studios Home Entertainment know (via Facebook and Twitter) that they want more of this on Blu-ray. Because there should be more of this on Blu-ray. It’s pretty fracking awesome. In any case, at least you all now get to enjoy a good look at how cool classic Battlestar remastered might have been.
Anyway, here’s a little more cover art to leave you with...
Stay tuned...
- Bill Hunt