Molly Tumanic

Two years ago, if you walked into a Best Buy store you would find that, within the world of music and movies, the trends and choices have changed. But then you ask yourself: Has it been for the better or worse?

The most recent example in my mind occurred a few weeks ago when I was browsing the new releases.

“The Texas Chainsaw Massacre,” a movie released last summer as a remake of the 1974 original, has many versions for sale.

First there is the Platinum Series Special Edition, which is a double-disc set including deleted scenes, an alternate opening and ending, a documentary, three commentaries, trailers, an art gallery, a music video and collectable metal cover.

Then there is the regular release, which is essentially just the movie with trailers and a music video.

The Widescreen Special Edition Dolby Digital Format includes commentary, deleted scenes, alternate footage, trailers, bloopers, posters and photos.

To say that being a consumer of popular media today necessitates a complete understanding of the complicated aforementioned lingo isn’t enough.

To truly understand what format suits you as a consumer also asks for self-reflection and experience.

First, you must ask yourself: Do I need all of these extra features? Do I like this movie enough to actually enjoy these features?

A lot of times a viewer wants two things in a movie: to be suitable for screen and sound and to be a reasonable price. The problem with this line of thinking is the potential to grow to like the movie enough to desire the special features. In that case, what do you want with the original DVD you bought?

The other part of the formula needed for a complete understanding of buying movies today is experience. Without watching and hearing the special features firsthand, you could be tricked into buying a whole list of special features that have no value.

My suggestion is to watch or hear commentary, deleted scenes, bloopers, etc. That way you can gauge what features you like to have with your movie collection.

The greedy and tactical distribution masterminds often release your favorite movies in the simple format first and then wait a few weeks to dupe you into buying the extra features version.

This process was best exemplified by “The Lord Of The Rings” trilogy.

I wouldn’t be surprised if, in the next couple of years, we start to see the process done again because certain stars weren’t originally available to do the commentary for the DVD.

This process isn’t limited to the movie business. We can see that very recently CDs are coming with features as well.

The first time I started noticing this trend was after Michael Jackson lost money on “Invincible.” His record label rereleased nearly all of his previous efforts. The disks included previously unreleased songs, demos, pictures and commentary.

Almost immediately after Jackson’s example, we start to see online and DVD features included with CDs.

This was partly in response to the Napster craze, which made the music distribution industry want to offer downloadable music.

I was first exposed to this feature when buying the 2002 Weezer album “Maladroit.” This came complete with multimedia computer files that accessed live performances and had exclusive access to their Web site.

After that, we saw that older and more classic albums were rereleased as enhanced and remastered editions.

A current example of this is Elton John’s breakthrough album “Goodbye Yellow Brick Road.” This encompasses all categories, as it has three disks, unreleased demos, bonus songs and the making-of documentary on multimedia features.

Interestingly, this relates more to the DVD examples because the choices involved when buying this product are now extensive.

Not only can you buy the original CD, but also the “Deluxe Hybrid” with Bonus DVD or the DVD by itself.

Other artists are following suit with their best-known efforts -Pink Floyd, The Who and John Lennon, to name a few.

Two factors are responsible for this trend. One is that the distributors are providing die-hard fans and collectors more products from their favorite movie or music. The other simply is to get us to pay more for the same or similar thing.

It can be debated either way because examples of each can be found everywhere nowadays. Sadly, two examples of the greed portion can be found in Jackson’s “Invincible” and Blink-182’s “Take Off Your Pants and Jacket.”

Blink-182 released three of four different, yet similar, versions of the same album in 2001. The only differences lie in the final so-called “special” song and the picture on the CD.

Jackson’s was even more obvious in that the songs and CDs were the same but the cover came in about five colors. Both artists tried to boost sales by forcing fans to buy many copies of the same product.

Whatever the case may be – for fans or for money – this new age of technology and choices created dizziness both in language and decisions in what to buy.

My fan side is happy, while the burnt hole in my pocket from purchasing five editions of the same movie isn’t as glad.

As long as this doesn’t spiral into something worse, we only have to get used to this trend rather than continue spinning our heads.