Transcript: Christian Movie Collectors: Building a Faith-Filled Film Library with Mill Creek

Hey everybody, welcome to this video today. This is Pastor Jay here with you and I am the owner and the operator of Classic Cinema Magazine. You can check us out at classiccinemamagazine.blogspot.com. We have all kind of reviews there and everything. And today on this, our video, a special video feature here on our blog, we want to just kind of tell you something about one of my favorite companies that's doing things right now. And that is Mill Creek Entertainment. I want to go on record here as saying that I love Mill Creek Entertainment. They are a great, great group of DVD providers. They're a great group of people, awesome, awesome people. And I'm not saying that just because I review DVDs and Blu-rays and stuff for them. I'm telling you this because I, myself, go and buy stuff from Mill Creek Entertainment. I mean, they, out of the kindness of their heart, send me stuff, certain things to review. And I love that, and I appreciate that so much. But beyond that, I am a customer of Mill Creek Entertainment as well. I enjoy what they do. And I'm going to show you some proof of that today. A lot of people do not realize what Mill Creek has done. And some people do. But I want to share with you some of the amazing box set complete series releases that Mill Creek Entertainment has done. Amazing stuff. First off, Knight Rider, the complete series. Cardboard set. Yes, they're not perfect. They can get smushed. They get mushed. But if you're very careful, and I try to be very careful, this one I've had for quite a while, and it almost still looks brand new. And a lot of people have a problem with the cardboard sleeves. I don't have a problem with it. These can be bought for, Knight Rider can be bought for like next to nothing. Really, when you get right down to it, you can get Knight Rider, I think at one time, I don't know if it's at everybody's Walmart, but at one of the Walmarts where I live, this was on sale, the complete series of Knight Rider for $25, which, I mean, let me tell you, you ain't going to get it any cheaper than that. I mean, $25 for all of Knight Rider? Come on. Also, another one that I picked up, Quantum Leap. I love this show, Quantum Leap. A lot of people, again, give Mill Creek such a hard time over their budget packaging. But this is cheap. This is cheap. You can also buy this on Blu-ray as well as Knight Rider on Blu-ray. and I go for the DVDs because they're a little cheaper, but a lot of people go for the Blu-rays and that's fine. You get much better packaging, but you're paying a bigger price as well. Also, another thing that I picked up that I love, Coach. This is an awesome, funny little series. We'll talk a little more about that in a little bit, but Coach, the complete series. I'll tell you why I love Mill Creek in just a second. and then finally another one that I picked up this of course I bought online and that's another reason as you can see if you see it it's kind of flaked a little bit here see right here and it's kind of kicked in a little bit on the side I don't know if you can see it but it looks a little kicked in on the sides and stuff and so it's a little bit in bad shape this actually I picked up online so it was a little it was I got a great deal for sliders online total price was something like $16, $17, and that's with shipping and handling, so I'm not complaining about this. A lot of people, they give Mill Creek so much flack about their budget packaging. Now I want to tell you why I here to come to bat for Mill Creek Entertainment This is one of my favorite science fiction shows probably of all time I love Sliders. I love Sliders so much for most of my life. The very first time I ever watched it was on the Sci-Fi Channel. I didn't discover it when it was on TV. I discovered it with the reruns. And I fell in love with the show. and I fell so much in love with it that I had to buy it as soon as it came out on DVD. So way back in the day, many, many, many, many, many years ago, I began to collect the box sets of sliders from Universal Pictures. Now, a lot of people sit there and they say about this kind of packaging from Mill Creek Entertainment, Oh, it's so cheap, and it's so yucky, and it's so lousy, and it's no good, and they go through all this type of stuff. And would I prefer better packaging? Of course. Of course, who wouldn't? But the point is, with better packaging comes higher prices. Ta-da! A lot of people don't realize that if you spend a higher price for better packaging, that doesn't always mean you get a better packaging. Let me show you something. I got the first four seasons of Sliders, as you can see here. Season 1 and 2. This is season 1 and 2. This is season 3. and this is season four. Okay? Now, a lot of people look and they see the really awesome shiny casing as you can see there. And this is great stuff. Awesome stuff. Looks awesome, right? Looks great. Let me show you something. Does this look like good packaging? Let me show you something. This is a foam thing that they shoved the discs in. How is that any better than putting them in paper sleeves? Huh? Let's be honest. And this is not cheap. You're not going to get this cheap. Let me go another step. Season 3. This one here, it has this special orange kind of looking... Let me show you this. First off, see this? The disc does not stay in there. Okay, go a step further. Look at that. See this? This is not the cheap... This is from Universal Pictures. Tell me this isn't cheap casing. I hate dual-sided discs anyway. That's another issue for another video. But, yeah. Cheap casing. I'm telling you, people. Cheap casing. It was Season 4. They tried to do a little better. And I guess they did do better. I mean, a little better. This one, Season 4, they did it this way. And it's a little better. At least it's one-sided discs. But, again, it's these plastic tray type of cases. See this? and these are very bad because they can break very easily okay a lot of people thought oh well this is great stuff this this is this is no better packaging okay so a lot of people give mill creek a lot of flack over this kind of packaging i'm gonna tell you something the reason i bought these is because I love the series. After I bought them and I saw them falling apart, I wasn't very happy with it. Now, I wanted to get season five, which would have ended the series. And I wanted to get it on there because that would have ended the series. But online, if you want to continue to have this kind of packaging, season five is going to cost you, like, I think the cheapest I saw way back in the day when I was looking was like about 40 bucks. and it probably is a lot higher than that now. This cost me all of about $17, or I could buy the fifth season on the special Universal Pictures and pay $40. What do you think I'm going to go for? A lot of people say, oh, well, you know, but the quality of the show, they put so many episodes on the disc and they don't. I put this disc of season one and put it against this in season one and for me there not that much difference in quality There not that much difference in quality Mill Creek is doing perfectly fine for me with this Okay, so I'm happy with this. Now, let me go for one more thing before I end this video when it comes to defense of Mill Creek Entertainment. This series here, Coach, is one of my favorites. I always loved Coach. I'm a big football guy, love football, always did. And so when I heard about Coach, I was like, that's what drew me in was Coach. But then, of course, after I was drawn into the show for the football, I began to fall in love with Coach Hayden Fox, assistant coach Van Dam played by Jerry Van Dyke. Love that. And special teams coach Dauber Demenski. And all their crazy antics. Wow, what a great stuff. So I love that show. So what I did was when it first came out, Universal Pictures first announced that they were bringing out Coach. and I was like, yes, finally. So they got the special limited edition. This, this only came out for a very short amount of time and it was the special limited edition season one of coach. Um, of course I had to get this one, uh, way back in the day and you're not going to find this anywhere. This, this is hard to find it very, very hard to find cause it was limited. Um, not the best packaging in the world, I guess when you get right down to it, cause it's like these in paper sleeves, you know, like thing, but, but I love this, and so I bought this, uh, I try to support it, so yeah, I bought that, then I was so excited, it was like, okay, what's next, what's next, what's next, season two, right, season two came out, uh, the packaging wasn't as spectacular, but hey, I bought it anyway, because I love it, I love Coach, so we were so excited, Coach season two came out. Yeah. Then it was okay. Now we're waiting and waiting season three. Yes. Season three came out. And so we picked up that kind of the same packaging as season two. And we were so excited. Okay. We got the first three seasons now season four. Come on people season four. We waited nothing. We waited nothing. And I just, I was getting frustrated because every time I turned around, like every month I would click in on the internet and see if if they were going to release season five or season four. Nothing, nothing, nothing ever happened. And it bothered me. Then finally, Mill Creek Entertainment came along and said, we're releasing the complete series of Coach. Okay. And so I was excited. I was like, hey, let's go for it. So I picked this up and I watched it. And now I've been watching some people here on YouTube in different places and different people writing articles and reading what people say about this. And people are just going crazy about this because this series right here, this complete series set here, has edited TV edits of the series on this collection. Now, look, I understand all of us would prefer the actual unedited episodes, right? Universal Pictures has made it perfectly clear, after three seasons of getting what they thought they could get, and not caring about the consumer anymore. Only what they could get, which they got their little bit of the chunk of money right here with this, and they figured, well, that's all we can get, so we don't care no more. These companies only care about this. They don't care about what you, the consumer, want. They only care about what they can get in their pocket. If it's not doing them any good, well, then we're not going to pay it. We're not going to make it. And so this is what has happened more often than not. We get one season, we get two seasons or so, and then the company says, no more. We're not going to go anymore. Well, Mill Creek has come along and rescued this show and many other shows and said, we're going to give you all of the series. This is eight seasons in a box set of a great comedy show coach, I don't care at this point if it is a TV edit. I would rather have a TV edit of the show than have nothing And that the point Universal is never and I want to make this perfectly clear Universal is never going to release Coach right here on a complete series set You never going to see it If they do I will apologize I don think I will ever have to because Universal is not going to do it They just not Mill Creek has come along and said, hey, we'll give you this and at least you'll have something. And so I thank Mill Creek for this. This is great stuff to me. Let me tell you something. Whether it's the fact that the companies say, well, we only got what we got and we're not going to do anymore. Or whether it's like this type of thing where you buy a couple of these. And again, I bought a couple of these quantum leaps. And these things are going for like bonkers prices. I'm not paying this. I'm not paying this. You know what? I mean, these are nice and all. But let me go one more thing before I end this video as well. A lot of people scream and holler and yell and all about Mill Creek Entertainment for their releasing of Quantum Leap on DVD. Because it's all the paper sleeves and all that type of stuff. the cardboard sleeves and all that. I'll tell you what Mill Creek did here that Universal didn't do here. Universal gave us generic music in these sets. Mill Creek came along here and said, we're going to restore the original music, and the original music is restored here. this is amazing. Now, if you don't like the packaging, that's fine. Buy it on Blu-ray. You're getting the original music. That's amazing. I'm going to tell you something, and this is true. I'm going to say this in conclusion. These companies that have these type of things, that put out all these shows, If you're not going to release them in big format and release all of them, I would prefer you don't release one or two seasons and then quit. If you're not going to release all of it, then just hand over the rights to Mill Creek Entertainment. Let them do it. They do a better job than... Look. Okay, this is maybe a little mean, but I'm going to tell you. I would rather have Mill Creek's release of this than Universal's release of this any day of the week. And that is not coming from someone that has got free product from Mill Creek Entertainment. This, I bought. This, I bought. This, I bought. This, I bought. All of these, I bought. Of my own money. I want you to understand that. I refuse to give to these companies. Because they don't care. And that's just the truth. That's a little harsh. But the truth is the truth. So those of you that are always hating on Mill Creek Entertainment. Don't hate on them. they're giving the collector something that we've always wanted. And that is box sets. Maybe they're not the most spectacular. But with Mill Creek Entertainment we can do something that I love that they put on the back. We can get ready. We can get set. And we can binge on a great TV series. Don't hate on Mill Creek Entertainment. They're giving us some good entertainment. Thank you, Mill Creek Entertainment. Keep up the awesome work. This has been an editorial from Pastor Jay here on Classic Cinema Magazine. We'll see you next time. Bye. Thank you.