The Extras - 2022 Year in Review Plus 4K & Blu-ray Reviews

Episode Date: January 12, 2023

Host Tim Millard takes a look back at 2022 and the terrific line-up of guests on the podcast.  He also provides an update on some of the most popular episodes and thanks the international fans.  Then he provides reviews of the 4K releases of films "Heat" (1995), "Saturday Night Fever" (1977), "Top Gun: Maverick" (2022), and the Korean Zombie horror film "Train to Busan" (2016).  He also reviews some recent Blu-ray releases from Kino Lorber, including "Detective Story" (1951) starring Kirk Douglas and Eleanor Parker, and the "Film Noir: The Dark Side of Cinema IX" box set that includes the noir films "Lady on a Train" (1945) starring Deanna Durbin, "Tangier" (1946) starring Maria Montez, and "Take One False Step" (1946) starring William Powell and Shelley Winters.  He ends the reviews with two recent TV series releases from HBO, starting with season 1 of "House of the Dragon" and the fourth and final season of "Westworld."HEAT 4KSATURDAY NIGHT FEVER 4KTOP GUN: MAVERICK 4KTRAIN TO BUSAN 4KDETECTIVE STORY BLU-RAYFILM NOIR THE DARK SIDE OF CINEMA IXHOUSE OF THE DRAGON 4KWESTWORLD 4KThe Sitcom StudyWelcome to the Sitcom Study, where we contemplate the TV shows we grew up with and...Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify The Extras Facebook pageThe Extras Twitter Warner Archive & Warner Bros Catalog GroupOtaku Media produces podcasts, behind-the-scenes extras, and media that connect creatives with their fans and businesses with their consumers. Contact us today to see how we can work together to achieve your goals. www.otakumedia.tv

Hi, I'm film historian and author John Fricke. I've written books about Judy Garland and the Wizard of Oz movie, and you're listening to The Extras. Hello and welcome to The Extras, where we take you behind the scenes of your favorite TV shows, movies, and animation, and their release on digital DVD, Blu-ray, and 4K, or your favorite streaming site. I'm Tim Millard, your host. Today we have a slightly different show as I have no guests joining me.

Instead I'm going to be doing a fairly rapid review of some 4K titles released this year that I personally purchased, plus some review copies of 4Ks and Blu-rays that just didn't fit into any specific episode. I think this is a good problem to have is there are just a lot of films being released on 4K and Blu-ray these days. So we can all be thankful for that. Now, I'm not going to spend too much time on the background of some of the older films that have been released on DVD or Blu-ray, and they're just coming out on 4K.

So I'll just focus on the extras if there's anything new and what the reviewers are saying about the release and my own personal opinion after watching on my home setup but before i dive into our first title i did want to do a year in review of the extras podcast this is our 73rd episode so congratulations to anyone who listened to more than 10 of them you should be sainted for putting up with me. You're obviously a true collector and movie and TV fan, because this is not a two-man comedy routine or a blab fest trashing movies and celebrities. I like to focus on talking real movies and TV

and animation and film history and our fandom for the best in entertainment. So I just want to thank you for listening. And the real reason I think this show has some merit is the guests. So I want to thank all of our guests this year real reason I think this show has some merit is the guests. So I want to thank all of our guests this year. I think it was a tremendous lineup and I'll go through them briefly in order of when they came on the show. First up is George Feltenstein, who is so gracious to share his knowledge and reviews of the Warner

Archive releases and his knowledge of all of the MGMUA and Warner Brothers catalog as well. Author Alan K. Rohde, who literally wrote the book on director Michael Curtiz, and he just has a wealth of knowledge about classic film. Jeff Briggs, who is our resident Hong Kong cinema expert, and I hope to get Jeff back on soon to talk some more Hong Kong cinema. Extras producer and film historian Constantine Nasser, who's a real friend of the podcast. Author Stephen Smith,

who wrote an award-winning book on composer Max Steiner. Dave Strohmeyer and Tom March, who came on to discuss the wonderful world of the Brothers Grimm and their restoration work. Scott McGee from TCM, who came on to talk about his book on stunts in the movies. James McCoskey and Robert Schaefer of American Zoetrope, who talked about the Godfather Trilogy 4K restoration work they did. Author and film historian Tim Lucas, who just does so many audio commentaries and is a terrific film historian.

John Fricke came on to talk about Judy Garland for her 100th celebration, and he really is the foremost expert on Judy Garland. Herbie J. Palato came on to talk classic television. He's written so many books about various classic television shows, and we talked about The Six Million Dollar Man, Bob Furmanek and Jack jack thexton of the 3d film archive bill hunt of the digital bits to talk about the current state of physical media writer producer and film historian gary garani animation and comic book writer tim sheridan lucifer tv show runners joe henderson and ildi modrovich to talk about the conclusion of that TV show. James Bond expert,

Steven J. Rubin to talk about the 60th anniversary of James Bond. Former Warner Brothers home entertainment, senior VP, Paul Hemstreet, who came on to talk Harry Potter, monster kid and horror expert, Tom Weaver,

cinematographer, Tom Sigel, actor, Jim Beaver and car wrangler Jeff Budnick, who came on to talk the TV show Supernatural, and extras producers and friends Alan Griswold, Daniel Griffith, Emily Summers, and Jason Hillhouse, who came on to talk about some of the various extras work they're doing on current shows and catalog shows. That's quite a list. And I just want to thank them all for being guests this year. It was such a pleasure to

have you on the show. And I don't really focus on this too much, but if you are curious, which episodes were some of the most popular this year, I'm going to go over just the top three in no particular order, but the wonderful World of the Brothers Grimm was just so popular and continues to be. Our August Warner Archive mailbag with George Feltenstein was also hugely popular. And so we're trying to do more mailbag questions in future shows. And The State of Physical Media with Bill Hunt. I know that was interesting for a ton of people, including myself, to hear from him. He just knows so much about the industry.

And moving quickly up the list is one of our recent episodes, and that's Here's Looking at You, Casablanca. So those are all terrific episodes and very popular this year. And if you haven't listened to them, put them on your playlist. Maybe you have an opportunity to catch up on them. And there are, as I said, 73 episodes now. So we have a vast catalog of episodes for you to take a look at and see if you missed or to re-listen to.

This year, we also launched our first Blu-ray giveaway promotion. And that was a big success, of course, as we all want to win free Blu-rays. And I hope to continue to do that in the coming year. So keep a lookout for that. And we just recently launched a Facebook group, the Warner Archive and Warner Brothers Catalog Group, which you may have heard me talking about here. And that's really taking off. So if you haven't joined the group yet and you're on Facebook, you may want to join as Warner Brothers starts its 100th anniversary celebration, which they just kicked off this last week. So lots of good things to look forward to there in the coming year.

We have a rejuvenated Warner Archive release schedule that should look more like 2021 than 2022. And Warner Brothers has announced new 4K releases of the Superman movies, The Exorcist, and the Maltese Falcon all in the coming year. So I'm excited for all of those releases and we'll be buying those. There are also box sets planned, books, and other collectibles that will be released from Warner Brothers. So it's a good time to join before all of that 100th celebration really kicks into gear so that you can stay ahead of the news on those releases.

And we do some fun exclusive videos there and polls and topics. And it's a place where you can really have a community of like-minded people to talk about some of your favorite Warner Brothers, MGM, UA, RKO movies, both classic and fairly recent Warner Brothers catalog films. So many of those we talk about on the podcast, but we go even deeper there in the Facebook group where people share their opinions and feedback. So I'm very excited for this upcoming year. A couple of final notes. I did want a big shout out to our international audience. We have a lot of listeners I know in the UK and Australia. I really want to thank you for your support. There's a lot of you who love animation, Warner Brothers, Warner Archive, classic film. So I appreciate your support of

the podcast. And many of you have also joined our new Warner Archive, Warner Brothers catalog group. And I also saw that there's a lot of people who are joining from Europe, various Denmark, Sweden, Belgium, many other places. So I hope you also listen to the podcast as well as join that group. And I love the international flavor. We recently did a podcast on an imprint films, which comes out of Australia on Roland Jaffe. And there are just great providers of niche releases from the UK, from Australia.

And it's always good to know that we have audience there who can tell us and inform us both on the podcast and in the Facebook groups and on our social media pages so that we can learn more about what's going on around the world. So thank you all to the international audience, and I hope you'll spread the word. So that's it for the year in review. If that's all you wanted to listen to for this podcast, go ahead and shut it off. I'm going to talk about some titles that may or may not interest you. What I love about podcasting is that you can fast forward, you can

skip, or you can just turn it off and catch the next episode. So again, follow us on The Extras Facebook page, on social media at TheExtras.tv. And if you ever have any questions, email me at info at TheExtras.tv. Let me know what you're thinking i answer much more quickly to the social media but i will eventually get around to answering questions that are sent to me an email well the first 4k i wanted to talk about released on august 9th 2022 and that's heat written and directed by michael mann from research he did on ride-alongs with detectives in the Chicago area back in the 1980s and if you're a fan of Michael Mann you already know his emphasis on realism and how much this script takes from real life characters and

scenes. The movie stars Al Pacino as detective Vincent Hanna and Robert De Niro as bank robber Neal McCauley and it's just one of the best one-two punch casts that there's ever been for a crime drama like this. And the rest of the cast is terrific. It includes Val Kilmer as Chris, Tom Sizemore, Michael, and they're part of Neil McCauley's team. John Voight as Nate. Ashley Judd as Val Kilmer's love interest there, Charlene. And then some of the detectives, Wes Studi. And also Hank Azaria, Tom Newman.

And it's just a terrific cast of characters there. So it's an A-list cast, a terrific movie. It came out in 1995. Immediately became a classic. I saw it in theaters when I lived in Seattle and I was just blown away. Now I was talking to extras producer Constantine Nasser and he and I were hoping to do a podcast on this film with one of the producers of the original film, but that just didn't work out. So we never were able to do that. But Constantine was the producer of the extras for this film

when it originally released from Warner Home Video on DVD back in the early mid-2000s. And the new 4K release is actually distributed by 20th Century Fox as they now control the home video rights. They did not create any new extras, so I'm guessing this was time to Michael Mann's new novel, Heat 2, that came out at the same time over the summer. I did buy that novel. I haven't read it yet. It's sitting there waiting for me to get to, and I do plan to do that soon. And I'm looking forward to that. Now, this is a title I discussed with Bill Hunt at the Digital Bits back in the summer, but he hadn't seen it yet. We're both excited about it. Soon after he did a review. So you can look for that on his website. There does seem to be some chatter that the 4k is a little dark, but in general,

this is going to be a nice upgrade from the Blu-ray. This release really could have benefited from an upgrade of the extras or some new extras because it just has so many fans out there. And I can't imagine that Michael Mann wouldn't have made himself available for something new if he had the time anyway. And maybe he didn't because I know he was in Italy filming for Ferrari, but he was doing a lot of press around his book release. So it would have been nice to also have a new, at least one new commentary or featurette or something. There's a lot of cast members still around and available who probably would have been able to do that. Maybe it was complicated by the fact that Warner Brothers is not releasing it and they did the original extras. I don't know, but it is what it is. So if you want to get the upgrade of the video and the sound, I highly recommend it. I looked at it. I thought it looked great. Of course,

I had not upgraded to the Blu-ray. I was looking at the DVD. So for me, it was a no-brainer. I was such a fan of this film that I know that when I moved to LA, I had to go to Kate Mandolini's at some point and sit in the same booth area as that scene that was shot between the meeting of Al Pacino and De Niro's character. And they had a picture of the scene there. And there had been some talk about, did they really film it there and everything? And the answer is yes. Unfortunately, Kate Manolini's is no longer there.

And I wish I had gotten a picture of that, but I do remember going there with my good buddy at one point. And also just some of the locations and scenes around downtown Los Angeles. It's got to be the best shootout that I've ever seen. That whole scene of the bank robbery, downtown LA, they shot on location. And in some of the extras, they talk about that. So let me talk a little bit about the extras on here. There's a great three-part making of documentary. There's a Q&A that Christopher Nolan did where he interviewed Michael Mann. There's deleted scenes. There's Pacino and

De Niro, the conversation, and there's an audio commentary on there as well. Stay with us. We'll be right back. Hi, this is Tim Millard, host of The Extras Podcast. And I wanted to let you know that we have a new private Facebook group for fans of the Warner Archive and Warner Brothers Catalog physical media releases. So if that interests you, you can find the link on our Facebook page or look for the link in the podcast show notes. and then the one that i was hoping to kind of talk to constantine nassar about is return to the scene of the crime where he and a few of the producers of the film went back to the original locations in los angeles and told stories about the you know the picking of those locations and how they figured those out and then the filming there. That's a terrific extra. And part of it is because you couldn't film at those locations because a few of them are no longer even there or have changed way too much

from when they originally filmed back in the nineties. So it's a real time capsule of Los Angeles and the filming there. And since Michael Mann filmed in downtown LA, there's just been so many other films that have used those iconic locations of LA. I still think this is the best of the crime film shot in LA. And so that extra on the locations is really worth your time and really terrific. Well, the next 4K release I want to talk about is Saturday Night Fever. This is the 45th year anniversary release on 4K from Paramount. And it came out November 8th. So just recently.

And this film originally was released in 1977. So it was a huge hit. Everybody knows the score or the soundtrack to these from the Bee Gees for this film. It probably has more songs that are recognizable on this soundtrack than almost any other film. And it was directed by John Badham, who is a terrific director and went on to direct a number of other great films. Dracula, War Games, Bird on a Wire, Point of No Return. And also in recent years, did a lot of TV. I talk about the TV series Supernatural.

He did direct some episodes on that. The TV series Rush Hour, Arrow, Constantine, Nikita. So quite a few there as well. And the cast is terrific, of course, led by John Travolta as 19-year-old Tony Manero, who is a kid from Brooklyn, Italian-American, and he's just growing up, you know, has a harsh reality of a home life that's not perfect. And he's trying to figure things out. But he and his buddies rule the dance floor of the local disco.

And Tony is the king. The other stars are Carrie Lynn Gourney as Stephanie, Barry Miller as Bobby, Joseph Kelly as Joey. Just a really terrific cast there in this film. It's terrific. I hadn't watched it in many, many years, and this film still resonates today the themes everything people think of it for the for the music but it really is a good drama and well worth having in your catalog now the reviews of the 4k transfer are not great so depending on if you already have the blu-ray that came out in 2017 that could impact your decision about this film but if you had the dvd or you go back even before then this one is obviously something really nice to add to your collection of 4ks if you're building that out so let's look at the extras on this release disc one is the theatrical version and that has the audio commentary with john badham and then disc two is the blu-ray that

has the theatrical version and the director's cut on there. Also includes the commentary, has the 70s discopedia trivia track, and then a number of featurettes, which are really good. And those were all created for the 30 year anniversary. There's Catching the Fever, a 30 year legacy, Catching the Fever making soundtrack history, which is really fun about the music. Catching the Fever Making Soundtrack History, which is really fun about the music. Catching the Fever Platforms in Polyester, which is obviously about the costume design. Catching the Fever DJs and Discos. And then there's one that spotlights Travolta. Then there's a piece Back to Bay Ridge, A Dance with Travolta, Fever Challenge, and Deleted Scene. So a really robust amount of extras. Nothing new for this release, but it's a really good legacy group of extras.

So if you don't have this or you haven't upgraded since the DVD, it's well worth your time to get the 4K. And I really enjoyed watching this movie. So if you haven't seen it in a number of years, check out this movie. It's terrific. And it's just a 1970s classic that you want to have in your collection. Right next, I'm going to talk about Top Gun Maverick, which was the number one film of 2022 in terms of box office. Now, Avatar, the way of water gave it a run for its money right here at the end. So it will overtake it probably depending on when they did the final accounting of everything.

It's between those two. But nonetheless, Top Gun Maverick was a big hit. Got people back to the theaters. I loved it. And I know many of you probably enjoyed it. If you're not a fan of it, I understand. It's a, you know, adrenaline action packed movie. Tom Cruise is fantastic. And then he does his, you know, most of his stunts.

And the fun thing is that he's a big aviator himself. He loves to fly. And so you get information on that in some of the extras in this package so top gun was released on i think november 1 on 4k i watched it the 4k looks terrific now some of the extras on here i did want to run through for those of you who haven't purchased it but the ones that go really into the making of the flying and the behind the scenes of the flying are the best. They're just terrifically well done. There's cleared for takeoff, which really goes behind the scenes with the cast. And most of the cast outside of Tom, you know, was a younger cast. So they were not necessarily pilots or they were not necessarily people who flew a lot. And they're probably used to stunt people doing most of the hard work, but Tom really wanted them to be in the cockpit of the planes and doing everything realistically.

So that's a fun piece. Then Breaking New Ground, filming Top Gun Maverick goes behind the scenes as they capture some of the sequences. These all, you know, kind of go together. capture some of the sequences. These all, you know, kind of go together. Those two really take you into the making of it. The cameras that they put into the cockpit to catch all the angles. I mean, it's a fantastic story.

I couldn't get enough of these extras on these two. So if you like the film, you love the aviation shots, and you want to know how they got some of it. If you want to know how they got some of the reaction shots, you know, of the actors and everything, these pieces really take you into it and are a lot of fun. Next is a love letter to aviation. Now, Tom Cruise, as I mentioned, he's a pilot. He has his own plane, and it's a vintage World War II P-51 Mustang. They film him flying it. It's used in the film and it just goes into kind of bolstering his cred, so to speak, on being a pilot and the fact that he's not just acting in this. He actually knows a lot of what he's doing when it comes to being in the cockpit of a plane and everything. So that's pretty, pretty interesting. And it really breaks

down some of what maybe is myth versus reality of Tom Cruise as a pilot. Next is Forging the Dark Star. So this is one of those extras where a studio has worked with a real life company to make a realistic design for an airplane or some kind of spacecraft. So this piece goes into the partnership between the studio, Paramount, and Lockheed Martin to build the Dark Star. And that's based on the Lockheed Martin SR 72. So there's, it's, you know, it's based in reality. These pieces I've worked on before, these kinds of featurettes and they're pretty cool.

You know, you want to give the corporation or whoever it is, some free publicity, so to speak, because they've given so much in terms of authenticity to what it is you're creating. And I think it's one of those types of partnerships and pieces that really actually are beneficial. It's not a sales piece by any means. No one's going to go out and buy one of these, but it's kind of a thing that I find very interesting to get a peek into what is, you know, public domain in terms of the knowledge that's out there. It's not giving away any secrets because nobody would do that. But you know, how many of us know this stuff? How many of us go look into this stuff and this feature at when it's put on a film like this just gives us

insight into some of the great technology and work that's done by companies like Lockheed Martin, building spacecraft and planes that are pushing the boundaries. So pretty cool there. And then I've talked about this on my Facebook page, but the next is this masterclass with Tom Cruise at the Cannes Film Festival. And I watched it. It was on YouTube.

I didn't see it there recently. It may still be up there or possibly it was taken down because I know that when I've worked with some other festivals, we've put a panel or footage that had a limited time online and then it lived only on the physical media disc. It doesn't matter if you buy the disc, you get it, whether it's the 4K or Blu-ray, you get this. It's really interesting if you enjoy panels where you hear directly from an actor or director talking about their process, talking about their career. So when I worked at the studio, the reason why we put these on the physical media disc is so that you don't have to go searching. And of course, if you're buying the disc, you love to have

everything available in one place up on your shelf rather than having to scour the internet. And of course you have a pristine high definition version of it versus whatever you're streaming and you can watch it on your home theater set. So that was pretty fascinating. If you'd like to hear directly from Tom Cruise on his career and his process. After that, there's a couple of music videos and a trailer, nothing else to really speak of. So obviously Top Gun Maverick was the sequel to the original Top Gun 30 years ago or so that it came out. Fantastic movie. If you love the movie and you want to own it, I would suggest buying the 4K and you also get a digital code on mine. So I got the version that was the 4K and the digital code,

and I think you can get the Blu-ray version or the digital code as well. And I'm sure they'll do other alternate versions of this coming out in the future, but I did want to go for that one. So highly recommended there for fans of the film. Okay, next I'm going to go a little bit far afield here to a foreign film. It's a Korean film called Train to Busan, which came out in 2016. And it's called an action horror film, but really it's a zombie film. It's fantastic. Directed by Yoon Sang-ho and starring a, you know, directed by Yoon Sang-ho and starring a, you know,

quite a nice list of Korean actors, Gong Yoo, Jung Yoo Mi, Ma Dong-suk. Now, if I got the pronunciations wrong, don't, don't hold me accountable to this, but it's a great film. If you like zombie action thrillers, there's an outbreak of a pandemic of some kind, which turns people into zombies. It's not a new idea or anything, but these folks have to get, or they think they have to get to Busan, which I believe they're starting in Seoul. And Busan is in the southern part of Korea. So they get on. It's quite an amazing process for them and story of sacrifice and courage and all that good stuff.

So I got the 4K with the Blu-ray, does not have the digital code. It looks and sounds terrific. So if you're a fan of the film, I highly recommend it. There is a bonus feature on there, a little behind the scenes, but I find in a lot of foreign films, they don't have the quality of extras or behind the scenes featurettes and things of that nature that we tend to have here in the U S could be a matter of budget. It could be just, um, preference. I don't know, but it's not really a lot to, uh, to call attention to necessarily. I think it would be nice to have a commentary, but I didn't necessarily see that on there. So,

but it's a good film. So if like korean cinema horror movies uh this was released november 29th of 2022 and has the korean and then i believe english subtitles so depending on where you are you'll want to double check uh the availability of subtitles in your home language so but here in the u S and Canada, I think this should all be good for you. Check all the other regions, check your, your local reviews on this at your retailers. Now, next time I talk about a couple of titles from Kino Lorber that were released on Blu-ray. First up is Detective Story, which is a 1951 black and white film directed by William Wyler. And it stars Kirk Douglas, Eleanor Parker, William Bendix,

and quite a list of great actors here. And this was based on a smash Broadway hit play. It's a gritty and gripping drama. And it's set in the activity of a New York City police station. And Kirk Douglas plays a very kind of rigid detective. And his personal code, I mean, he sees the world really black and white. So he's just become kind of twisted by dealing with all the criminals that are coming through there. And his wife, Eleanor Parker, who I really loved in the film Caged, she has a secret and it comes up over the course of the film and it really throws him. I'm not gonna tell you anymore

because it's a terrific drama and it had Academy Award nominations for Best Director, Best Actress, Best Supporting Actress, and the writing team. So it had quite a bit of acclaim at the time. And this Blu-ray is remastered in HD by Paramount Pictures from a 4K scan of the original camera negative and was released, as I said, by Kino on the 29th of November. So I watched it. It looks terrific with this new remaster and they ported over one legacy extra and that is the audio commentary by author and film historian

Alan K. Rohde. And I listened to it. Alan, of course, did a terrific job. He knows his stuff. He's a friend of the podcast, just a terrific film historian. So it's good to have that extra on there. So if you like the film, you can get it now on Blu-ray. Looks and sounds terrific. This comes highly recommended. Okay, next I'm going to go over the film noir, The Dark Side of Cinema 9. and this was released on october 11 2022 so this collection includes lydia on a train from 1945 and it stars the delightful diana durbin and then also tangier from 1946 starring the beautiful maria montez and then the third one is the 1949 Take One False Step which stars William Powell and Shelley Winters these are all very good films of the three probably the best is uh Lady on a Train

but uh you know depending on your preference I I liked all three of them for various reasons uh Tangier is definitely kind of a ripoff of Casablanca in many ways, but it still is very entertaining. And then Take One False Step has this kind of fun element of what happens if you were to take one misstep. So all of these have either brand new 2K or 4K masters. And Tangier has a new audio commentary from film critic Felicia Feaster. And Take One False Step also has a new audio commentary by film historian Eddie Van Muller. Unfortunately, Lady on a Train does not have a new audio commentary.

It does have some theatrical trailers, which I think are legacy, which is too bad because it probably is the best of the three, though I enjoyed all three of these films. So if you enjoy these films or if you just start building out your noir film library, these all come, I films, or if you just start building out your noir film

library, these all come, uh, I think highly recommended. I enjoyed them all. All right, next I'm going to talk about a recent TV series that, um, most of you probably have heard of, and that's the house of the dragon the complete first season release now this was a follow-up to the original game of thrones series which was just a huge phenomenon those of us who were fans of the original series were obviously really excited for this house of the dragon now i'm a big fan of the books as well i I've read them all. And so I was curious to see what was going to happen here. But I know some of the team that worked over there on all of the extras for the Game of Thrones, which were just terrific. There was always a lot. The quality was always very high. locations and every, you know, the actors and all the action. There was just bound to be a lot of great visuals and great content in those extras. And this first season of House of the Dragon doesn't disappoint in that sense. Season one, just so that you guys know, it's always

tough because there's so much emphasis on being sure that you get this right out of the gate. You have to get the fans engaged. So all of the focus is on promoting the series, getting those first look pieces ready, getting the character, you know, background so that the fans can, can know who the actors are and what the characters are. And then those are all released over a period of time to build the excitement of the premiere. So a lot of those pieces are on here as extras and they're great to have. They tend to be a little bit shorter because a lot of them are put on the website or used online. So those are available. And then there are two exclusive extras for the release here. So what I received from Warner Home Entertainment was the steelbook, which is just beautiful. And that includes the 4k, the Blu-ray and the digital

copy. So it's fantastic. If you're going to get that, there's some other options. You can look at the different various options for you, but they all include the same extras. And that was released on December 20th, 2022. So if you didn't pick it up for Christmas, you're still thinking about it. Take a look for that. And I'll talk about the two exclusive featurettes for the physical media release. On the first disc is Welcome to Westeros, which is a little bit of a repackage to some extent of some of the smaller pieces. But the good thing about the repackage is that you get a little bit more information in one piece. So it's not necessarily much longer than some of the shorter ones, but it's a good one for just giving you a broad view. The one that I really liked was this Returning to the Seven Kingdoms.

That's more along the lines of 25 minutes or so. And it just gives you a lot of the things you're going to want to see in a season one. Background on the writing, the development, the early days, the casting, and then some great footage of the sets, locations, and things of that nature. So that's well worth it. Just that extra alone is really great to have for collectors. And then some of the other non-exclusives that I thought were notable are noble houses and familiar places, which provide a lot of good behind the scenes footage and information. So if you collected the Game of Thrones physical media releases, and you're

now a fan of the House of the Dragon, you're going to probably want to get the season one, pick it up. There's not much to say about the quality of the image. It's a brand new show. It looks and sounds terrific because it is a new show. On my 4k, it just really pops much better than the streamed version, which is why I like to get the physical media because you get the best. And this series was a priority for HBO. So it's a premium. They go to all the locations. They didn't spare any expense. They know the audience is out there worldwide and you just don't get that many opportunities to have another series based on such a successful property, even though it takes place

before the Game of Thrones. So the built-in worldwide audience means that they knew that they could spend the money to do it. So I think you're going to want to own this season one now because it's going to be a little bit of time before season two goes out and you can watch it in pristine quality. Now, if you don't have a subscription to HBO Max or HBO and you haven't seen it, I thought the series was very good, very well done. Now I know a lot of people like to talk about and compare series from one to

another, but I'm not going to spend my time doing that. I'm a fan of the first series. I'm enjoying this new series. I'm going to want to collect them. The first season is always a, you know, where you lay the groundwork for a lot of things and

you build the excitement. But I love the dragons. I love the characters, the sets and the locations and everything that they've created just means that they've got a really good run ahead. And you know, the production quality and the values are going to be great. Storytelling is good. And J.R.R. Martin is involved. So you know that the showrunners will have all the information they need to tell the story. And of course, this new series, you know, gives the showrunners the ability to learn from the last series, what worked, what they can do better. So I'm excited. Season one was great. I'm excited for season two and it's highly recommended. for season two and it's highly recommended. All right, we'll just finish up here with one more TV series. And this is Westworld season four, The Choice. And I received the 4K with the Blu-ray

and digital code review copy. And I did work on this show seasons two and three. I've watched all of the seasons and it was a real pleasure to work on this show. The show and three, I've watched all of the seasons and it was a real pleasure to work on this show. The showrunners, Jonathan Nolan and Lisa Joy are amazing. They've got a huge following, of course, they're immensely creative and the worlds that they create and the characters that they create and the themes that they explore, it's mind-boggling just how creative they are and the team that they put. It's mind-boggling just how creative they are and the team that they put together over there. And it was sad to hear that the show was coming to an end.

Four seasons, of course, is something to be very proud of for any TV series. And I think they can be extremely proud of this show. I was not able to work on season four, but I do know Corey Watson is who I produced some of the extras for home entertainment with for Warner Brothers and the team at HBO that does all the promotional material and do all the featurettes that go with each of the episodes and some of the extra featurettes that are available. It's a terrific team over there. They spend a lot of money, not only on the show, but on the promotion of the show. So all of these pieces are top-notch. So if you own the previous three

seasons, you're going to want to pick up this final season to finish your collection. And I did watch all of the extras. They're terrific as they were in the first three seasons. There wasn't quite as much budget this last season, but there was one exclusive featurette for the home entertainment release, and that's called Westworld and Exploration of Humanity. And I was glad to see that because sometimes on the final seasons of something, budgets can get cut. But in each of the seasons, we were able to sit down with the showrunners, Jonathan Nolan and Lisa Joy, and get their perspective on the season. That's what I always like about an exclusive for the

home entertainment release featurette. So much of the material is shot before to promote the episodes and the premiere of the season. So having a piece that looks back at the end of the season for the showrunners and sometimes the cast, if you can get them as well, provides perspective for the fans. Because most likely people who buy the home entertainment have already seen the episodes broadcast or they purchased the series and they want to see when they're done what the showrunners have to say about that season. when they're done, what the showrunners have to say about that season. So that's a valuable thing to have and why I always look for that on the TV series to see if the studio has been able to provide that. And sometimes it's not possible. You're literally into the next season and you just can't get the showrunners or cast

or anybody to sit down and do some of that retrospective stuff. So I highly recommend it. The pieces are great per usual. And if you're a fan of the show, as I said, you're going to want to complete the series. Well, I hope you've enjoyed today's episode, which was a little different, but it allowed me to review the year for those of you who subscribe and follow the show. And I was able to go over a number of 4K and Blu-ray releases that I wanted to bring to your attention. So I hope you enjoyed that. As always, if you're interested in purchasing any of the films we discussed, there are links in the podcast show notes and on our website at www.theextras.tv.

So be sure and check those out. And just so you know, when you purchase through our links, it does help support the show. So thank you for those of you who do that. If you're on social media, be sure and follow the show on Facebook or Twitter at The Extras TV or Instagram at TheExtras.tv to stay up to date on our upcoming guests and to be a part of our community. And as I mentioned, you're invited to our Facebook group for fans of Warner Brothers films called the Warner Archive and Warner Brothers Catalog Group. So look for that link on the Facebook page or in the podcast show notes as well. And for our long-term listeners, don't forget to subscribe and leave us a review at iTunes,

Spotify, or your favorite podcast provider. Until next time, you've been listening to Tim Millard. Stay slightly obsessed. The Extras is a production of Otaku Media, producers of podcasts, behind the scenes extras, and media that connects creatives with their fans and businesses with their consumers. Contact us today to see how we can work together to achieve your goals at www.otakumedia.tv or look for the link in the show notes.