Note that I did not say the worst packaging or the best packaging. I'm asking what packaging were you most disappointed in and most pleasantly surprised with after you received it in the mail/opened it.

Most Disappointing

Dances With Wolves SE - This packaging looked so good in the pictures but once you get it, you quickly discover that it is just an amaray with a very flimsy paper cover with a "latch" that should tear off within a few uses.

Runner Up - Total Recall SE (looked cool...on paper)

Most Pleasant Surprise

Tombstone Vista
Band of Brothers

(Both very classy and better than I expected)

I'm not really into judging how they pakage up dvds. it could come wrapped in newspaper for all I care....as long as the disc contains a film I need.

Most Disappointing: Panic Room

Most Pleasant: T2:UE

Most Pleasant

Criterion:
Monterey Pop Festival (great presentation)

Most Annoying:

Artisan:
Ramboy Trilogy (heavy awkward metal case)

Most disappointing

JoJo's Bizarre Adventure with Artbox - For $15 extra just for the box, it's the most overpriced low quality filmsy box ever.



Most Pleasant Surprise

Friend: Ultimate Edition(Korean) - Took a chance on foreign film because I heard lot of good things about this. 2-disc DVD case that had its own slipcase with great looking booklet. And all of that was enclosed in a great metal case that had actor's images inside. The best packaging

Most Pleasant Surprise:
Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas CC
Futurama: Season 1 (R1)
Brazil CC
Toy Story UTB
any of the Disney Treasures collection

Most Disappointing:
E.T.
anything WB puts out (not including SEs)

I have to agree with this one. It looks really nice wrapped up, but is really flimsy on the inside (plus the glue already came off mine so it's half falling apart). At least the actual disks are in a nice, reliable keep case.

I really don't care too much about packaging, except that I don't like how a lot of it makes the DVD harder to get too, but this packaging looked really nice wrapped up, and really crappy unwrapped.

Most Disappointing: E.T.

Most Pleasant Surprise: Futurama Season 1

Most disappointing:
Signs-I expected a cool two-disc set or at least the usual nice Vista Series case.
Panic Room-I still don't get this. Horrible.


Pleasant suprises:
Sixth Sense-Vista Series
Pearl Harbor-Vista Series
Windtalkers-3 disc
Family Guy-I loves the slim cases
Hell, all of the Vista Series besides Signs.

I'm sure there's more, I just can't think of any right now. I must be tired...

Most disappointing:

Memento Limited: Come on, this has to be the hardest DVD ever to remove.

The Bourne Identity: The two snap tabs are stupid since it's a Keepcase to begin with.

aphex944, which Bourne Identity are you talking about?

I am always disappointed by Anchor Bay's box sets - they use the flimsiest card stock, more like thick paper, way too weak to actually hold a bunch of keepcases. And I also say BOO to Panic Room.

You must do alot of shopping at BBV .

Actually I used to be the same way until the Vista Series came out. These were some really classy packages and I loved them all (until Signs as mentioned above). I then began to notice and appreciate good classy packaging.

If I had my way though, all DVDs would come in the Book type packaging like 60th Anniversary Pearl Harbor, Bridge on the River Kwai LE and the first Lawrence of Arabia. My collection would look so much nicer and look more like a library rather than the mish-mash of tins, snappers, amarays, digi-paks, and odd-balls of all shapes and sizes.

Disney gets both my votes.

Most pleasant surprise to me was the first Disney Tin I opened. I didn't know what was inside the tin. Turned out to be a very classy double keepcase. The artwork looked like it was designed for a collector rather than for the kiddies.

Most disappointing was their decision to change the packaging for the Platinum Series.

Most disappointing: One's packaged in 'snapper' cases

Most Pleasant Suprise: Herzog-Kinski set (great multicoloured slimline cases which are concealed quite nicely within a box where the top slides on and off)

The most disappointing was probably the Total Recall tin. That thing was so ugly. The most pleasant surprise would probably be the Battle Royale LE Tin. I ordered this during the Amazon misprice and didn't look at the specs, so I was just expecting a regular case. I was very pleasantly surprised when I saw the sleek tin.

The godfather packaging disapointed me the indivudal covers are too thin and the box insn't as durable as you think it looks.

Yes, hopefully we all can agree that content is king.

Great packaging? No ideas.

Poor Packaging?

Number 1 (with a bullet) is Eraserhead. Sure David Lynch wants to do something creative, something different. However, the point is to do something creative that people actually like.

His packaging must be the most unused package around as most people take the disc out and keep it out.

That certainly doesn't apply in my instance..whilst i agree the content is by far the most important aspect it wasn't exactly cheap enough for me to not take advantage of the packaging.
It's not the easiest thing to keep due to it's shape etc i grant you and my initial worries of causing excessive scratching to the disc upon constant removal and insertion, due to the nature of how it is held within the box, have been overcome by inserting a small plastic sleeve which fits inside and slides in and out

This would be my choice, as well. I'll never understand why MGM gave a fancy digipak and 3-disc treatment to a fairly crappy movie like Windtalkers and shafted Dances with a cheap paper slipcover and shoved the movie onto a flipper instead of multiple discs.

Most surprisingly nice package was Memento: LE. I never had any problems getting the discs out, and the design of the set is absolute top-notch. So many little touches make it cool just to admire.

Most Disappointing: anything that comes in a snapper.

Most Pleasant Surprise: The Monkees box set. The retro turntable box and the picture sleeve disc jackets are just really cool.

--Maureen

most disappointing:

grease
panic room

most pleasant:

adaptation

Disappointing

E.T.
The Godfather DVD Collection
Close Encounters of the Third Kind
Memento

Pleasant surprise

Toy Story UTB
Adaptation Superbit
Futurama Volume One
Band of Brothers

Most Pleasant Surprise:

Buffy Seasons 4-6, Angel Seasons 1-3 (Region 2) - I love the classy book design for the packaging. I know a lot of folks have complained about it being difficult to remove the discs and that they can get scratched fairly easily, but I've never had any problems so far(knock on wood). Plus they take up very little shelf space which is always a plus.

Brazil Criterion Collection - I remember being surprised when I received this in the mail that they'd gone to all that trouble for one movie. I just dig how the outer slipcase has the bright blue color scheme that dominates the fantasy sequences, and the three keepcases inside are all dark and murky like the reality of the film.

The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring Extended Edition - Very classy packaging. Similar to The Godfather set, but without the cheap thin covers for the discs themselves. This is the kind of DVD that harkens back to the days of laserdiscs. A box set devoted to a single film.


Most Disappointing:

Memento Limited Edition - I'd probably watch this movie more often if it didn't take me an hour to get the discs out. Much like the menu design for this DVD, Sony figured it would be a neat homage to the film the first time we saw it, but didn't stop to think about every single time after that and how pissed off we'd all get.

Basic Instinct Unrated Limited Edition - It seemed cool when I first got it, and the red ink pen shaped like an ice pick was a nice touch. But the DVD falls out of the case way too easily and they didn't bother putting the title on the side which looks awkward when it sits on the shelf. Then again, with packaging as unique as this, it's not too hard to figure out which one it is.

Disappointing:

The Godfather Collection
Basic Instinct Unrated
Panic Room
Signs
E.T.
Rambo Trilogy

I expected a nice digipak for the 2-disk Minority Report release. Was disappointed when it was just a damn Amaray and not even a nice booklet.

Pearl Harbor Vista was a disappointment too. Although it's an amazing package and they've done everything just right, they stuffed up on one thing. I really hate the envelopes that the disks are stored in! It's really hard to get the disks out and the paper envelopes do nothing to protect the disk from scratching (in fact, they encourage scratching). Boo Vista!