Four Disney+ Series Are the Picks of the Week

I’ve been collecting physical media for a long time. It was at least as early as high school that I started buying VHS tapes. This would be the early 1990s. I bought my first DVD player in 1999. I was late in upgrading to Blu-ray and I still haven’t forked over the cash to get a 4K player, but I still regularly buy movies and TV series on physical disks. This made me a bit of an anomaly even before streaming became readily available in most places. Even back in the VHS days, I’d go to my friends’ houses and find that they only had a handful of tapes. These would be their absolute favorite movies and ones that their grandma might have bought them for Christmas or birthdays. Most people have just never seen the need for owning a lot of movies. And now that streaming video has entered our homes this has become even more the case.

And yet, it is an amazing time to be a physical media collector. Most studios are releasing Blu-rays and 4K UHD disks of the majority of their new release. Boutique Labels like Criterion, Arrow Video, and Kino Lorber are regularly putting out superb editions of the world’s greatest films, obscure straight-to-video schlock, and everything in between, on disc. As someone who writes a column on the week’s home video releases, I can say emphatically that it is a great time for physical media.

The one major exception is for movies and television series that are being produced by streaming services such as Netflix, Hulu, and Disney+. On one hand, it makes perfect sense that streaming services wouldn’t want to release physical copies of shows being released on their streaming services. They want people to subscribe to their services after all. Yet on the other hand there are thousands of people, mostly in rural areas, who don’t have access to the kind of Internet services that allow them to subscribe to streaming services. Not to mention there are lots of collectors who would love to have these streaming-only items on physical media.

It is with great pleasure that I find several of the Disney+ series are getting really nice looking 4K UHD releases. Those releases are Andor: The Complete First Season, Obi-Wan Kenobi: The Complete Series, Moon Knight: The Complete First Season, and The Falcon and the Winter Soldier: The Complete First Season. Not every Disney+ series is a winner. Out of the four series being released this week, I’d argue only one of them is truly great (Andor) but the fact that these shows are getting a release at all is enough to make them collectively my Pick of the Week.

Also out this week that looks interesting:

Ocean’s Trilogy 4K UHD: I’ve only ever seen the original Ocean’s Eleven (well I’ve seen the original original Ocean’s Eleven, the one with the Rat Pack made in 1960, but we’re talking about the more recent films), and none of the sequels. I find Soderberg’s original film to be pretty entertaining, but not nearly as good as everyone else seems to think it is, and never bothered with any of the sequels. But a lot of folks do love them so it’s nice to see the original Trilogy getting some UHD love.

Madame Web: Dakota Johnson and Sydney Sweeney star in this Spider-verse tale that got absolutely terrible reviews when it came out. Presumably, it still has some fans and they are treated to a 4K UHD release.

The Tin Star: Anthony Mann made several Westerns in the 1950s which helped usher in a new form for the genre, one that was more psychological, darker, and given to nuance. I’ve not seen The Tin Star, which stars Henry Fonda as a cynical bounty hunter who helps a young, naive Anthony Perkins learn the ropes of sheriffing. This Arrow Video release is gonna put it on the top of my list.

Barbarella 4K UHD: Arrow Video is releasing this notorious Roger Vadim film starring his then-wife Jane Fonda as a sexy, space adventurer out to stop a madman from destroying the universe. I’ve somehow never seen this.

Dogfight: River Phoenix stars in this drama about a young soldier about to ship off to Vietnam who plays a game with his fellow soldiers on who can score a dance with the ugliest girl they can find. Lily Taylor plays the girl. Criterion brings us the disc.