Columbia House releases movies and TV shows under license from the studios, and according to its own business model, which is very different than retail sales. From what I understand they are offering DVDs by subscription, just as they did with the VHS tapes. They are almost certainly starting with a version of
The Gathering, though it may be on a single disc of its own, rather than a double-feature disc like the WB release. Then, every five or six weeks, the subscriber will receive a two-episode disc which can be returned at no charge.
Since they're just making the offer now, it will probably be awhile before they actually ship the first disc (they'll see what the response is before they start making the things; if it is poor, they'll cancel the release.) Then it will be at least another month before they ship disc 2. At this rate they may not beat Warner Home Video's rumored "fall" release date by much, if they beat it at all.
I'll try to give them a call tomorrow and get some details (like aspect ratio, extras, release dates.)
Whatever they're doing, it is unlikely to tell us much about what Warner Bros. will eventualy do, because their whole approach is so fundamentally different. They've released other series on these 2-episode DVDs that were released in boxed sets to the retail channel by the studio responsible. I'm not even sure if this tells us that the DVD masters are well along. If they're doing 4:3 only, with no extras, Columbia House could easily be porting the LD transfers to DVD and shoving the discs out the door.
Regards,
Joe
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Joseph DeMartino
Sigh Corps
Pat Tallman Division
joseph-demartino@att.net
