Adam Tyner

Shout Studios has a martial arts sale going now.

Brian T

I’d love to get the Ti Lung / David Chiang box, but even on ‘sale’ that price is tough to justify for as many movies as are in some of the regular Shaw boxes for a fair bit less. I know it’s a web exclusive, but a ‘low stock’ quantity hasn’t appeared on the listing yet, so maybe I can hold off . . .

Also, FYI, the first and second Shaw boxes were around $90 at Amazon back in November or so.

Aside from that, there seem to be some ok prices on various singles here.

Brian T

Vinegar Syndrome Partner Label ‘Going Out Of Print Sale’ this weekend, though only the Altered Innocence titles are actually leaving the site:
https://vinegarsyndrome.com/collecti...ut-of-print-pl

Adam Tyner

Deaf Crocodile is moving to Diabolik for distribution.

Brian T

Makes sense now. Their wording was confusing. Seemed like some the DC stuff was just going OOP, although I did question that regarding the more recent titles already being on that page.

What’s behind all the jumping around? Obviously Diabolik has been trying to become a player for a while now, albeit with lesser titles as we’ve seen with the Cauldron series and their Asian weirdness on Neon Eagle, but what was the deal with Deaf Crocodile? Just OCN spreading some love around, or was there economic motivation?

I’m also guessing with Diabolik we won’t see any deals like we did when VS would move partner label discs into their various sales (which was the only way I could justify the Deaf Crocodile releases that I’ve bought). I’ve rarely found bargains at Diabolik.

cinemaman

Well, I have never seen the David Chiang set for under $140 or the Brave Archer set under $60. Those were the price points I bought them. I hate site exclusives, but the Chiang set is one of the better SB sets out there - you really do not want to miss out on that if you like SB films.

I signed up to get a 10% discount so got SB V3 for $99, which was a great price, imho.

Brian T

I’ve noticed that the Ti/Chiang has never been much cheaper, which is why I’m still hovering over it! The only other mitigating factor is that I have all of these films on the older Hong Kong IVL discs, which are still (mostly) excellent despite being a lesser format. I’ve also probably got some of them on American DVDs from the previous wave of interest in Shaw titles back in the day. Mind you, I have virtually all of the movies in the regular Shout Shaw collections on Hong Kong discs, too, and that didn’t stop me from buying the first two of those. Still waiting on a further drop on Volumes 3 and 4, though. $99 is indeed a fair price, but Amazon set the $90 threshold for me at Black Friday, and I’m reasonably confident that those two will drop later in the year, somewhere.

I thought I read somewhere (here maybe?) that Shout had acquired enough movies for, like, five or six wide-retail ‘Shaw Collection’ boxes, but the lack of anything new makes me think their acquisitions were enough for these six boxes in total (including the two web exclusives).

Adam Tyner

None of the labels that've decamped have gone into great detail, but Deaf Crocodile posted this on the other forum a few hours ago:

I definitely am not in the know, but I suspect that being under the OCN umbrella is a mix of pros and cons that can prove really advantageous when you're trying to get a foothold but are more of an anchor once you've gotten more established.

A partner label is swiftly introduced to a decent-sized and hungry audience, and I'd imagine a lot of the process is turn-key (possibly authoring, surely printing/replication, definitely distribution), but with that come restrictions; the longstanding rumor of partner labels being limited to a title a month was recently dispelled, but it sure seems like there's something to that, and I would have to think OCN gets a sizeable cut despite these labels rarely selling titles in big numbers. I’ve seen murmurs about labels not having as much autonomy as they’d like about what gets released when.

I can imagine that being appealing for labels who have some other revenue streams (especially foreign labels dipping their toes in American waters), but for labels where this is mostly what they do, I can understand the urge to take off the training wheels — to assume more risk but enjoy greater rewards. Terror Vision sure did go big once they went on their own.

But again, I don't actually know anything, so don't take anything I'm saying as gospel!

Brian T

I suspect you’re right about a lot of that.

Terror Vision came to mind, actually, although I have to admit that once they left OCN and the ease of just finding them ‘lumped in’ with all of the other partners in one handy place, and after an initial perusal of their website some time ago, I virtually never remember to check them out! In a way, that’s probably for the better since they probably won’t have sales as often as VS/OCN and I don’t need the temptation anymore, especially at full price for increasingly ever more obscure oddities like those Japanese DOOR movies (when one realizes just how many ‘V Cinema’ movies Japan cranked out for decades, that’s a rabbit hole I’m no longer prepared to go down).

Perhaps to my own discredit, I also don’t haunt forums (except here) or social media very much at all, so I’m lucky if I stumble across new titles from de-camped OCN partners if they happen to be listed on Amazon, or through Diabolik, or some other catch-all retailer. Actually, one of the video stores here in Toronto (Bay Street Video) does seem to get copies of everything from all of these companies regardless of affiliation, which is a helpful way to actually check out the physical products while I’m downtown (similar to the VS store). Their prices can be steep though, which tends to drive me back online, where the prices aren’t much better!

I guess if Deaf Crocodile is going through Diabolik now, I’ll probably have no choice but to cut down on their releases because, as I said, I’ve rarely known Diabolik to have discount sales of the type that often allowed OCN customers to sample lesser-known stuff for something closer to an entry-level price. But then, if that relationship was strangling Deaf Crocodile, then their leaving makes sense.

I bought a few of the Deaf Crocodile animated titles (plus CASTLE IN THE CARPATHIAS) earlier today from that ‘Going OOP’ section. The prices were not that good (probably could’ve waited for a further drop before they left permanently). I’m sure DC will still distribute them under the new arrangement, but I still feared a permanent price hike at that point. Otherwise, I had hoped they might turn up in a future OCN sale.

In a way, this further fragmentation of the boutique industry was inevitable once the seemingly unending list of new labels realized they no longer needed an umbrella over them, or no longer need to join up in the first place. The marketing model for these products is basically perfected now. Copy, paste. For shoppers, though, I think having so many disparate entities under their own roofs will make things more difficult to keep track of going forward, at least for me. Based on the stock numbers of Terror Visions’s releases, though, people are buying them, so there’s that. If staying under a larger banner means possibly folding, then they gotta do what they gotta do.

Brian T

Spring Sale at Sentai Filmworks. Pretty much the same titles and prices as in their plentiful other sales throughout the year, but there are some good deals:
https://www.sentaifilmworks.com/coll...rice-ascending

PhantomStranger

Amagi Brilliant Park for $4.99 is an awesome deal. I paid like $80 for the limited edition set back in the day. A great anime comedy series, one of my favorites.

Brian T

Vinegar Syndrome has some ‘Happy 4/20’ specials from across the labels:
https://vinegarsyndrome.com/collections/4-20-sale-2024

Adam Tyner

Other deals!

42% off of Oscilloscope titles with the code OSALEOSCOPE
https://store.oscilloscope.net/colle...lloscope-films

And Oldies is having a flash sale on Troma titles.
https://www.oldies.com/Troma-Enterta...collection.cfm

SterlingBen

Plugged some holes in my collection with that Troma sale, best prices for those discs I think I have seen

MooMooMooMoo

Ever since Troma bought & destroyed Roan, it's left a very bad taste in my mouth for Torma.

SterlingBen

Troma should always leave a bad taste in your mouth

cinemaman

Roan. man, that brings back memories. I remember when I got one of their early releases, I wrote them a letter as I was surprised that they had no menu and the movie just started. this was the beginning of the DVD era where companies were still exploring what consumers really wanted. Imagine my surprise when Cary Roan personally called me at home to discuss my letter! I couldn't believe it. He made the argument that people want to watch the movie and not animated menus. It is the movie that they paid to see. I still remember the conversation. He was so passionate and proud about his company and told me that his family personally cleaned every frame of every reel that they transferred to DVD. He said nobody was doing this but his family.

An amazing man.

PhantomStranger

Interesting little story from the DVD era. Felt like there were just far more niche DVD labels than we ever got for Blu-ray or 4K

MooMooMooMoo

IHaving viewed the quality of many of there releases, I suspect Mr. Roan was telling you the truth. They were the best PD label in the dvd age.

dex14

Eureka:
MAY 2024 Sale 30% Off
Offer Ends MONDAY 6th May, 12PM (BST) OR While Stocks Last
https://eurekavideo.co.uk/promotions...4-sale-30-off/

cinemaman

some great prices in that Eureka sale, imho. no tax and free shipping, too.

Brian T

Three-day Powerhouse Indicator sale at Diabolik starting tomorrow, May 3 to May 5:
https://diabolikdvd.com/select-indic...ale-5-3-5-6-24