I didn't see any other mention in DVDTalk about this...

On another site someone said that Sony Pictures now have the distribution rights to Shawn Ryan's The Shield and the seasons were being rereleased all in 16x9!

True enough, i went to DVDEmpire and they have a separate SKU for them, checked the back cover scan, and YES they are 16x9 now. Apparently when Season 6 is released, it'll be widescreen as well.

If my info's right, the show is filmed widescreen but cropped for standard (3x2) television as Ryan's preference.

I'm absolutely all for a director's preference, but this news honestly has me considering getting the new sets...

Do we know for sure that the 4:3 ones are cropped and not the 16:9 ones?

not sure I understand your question?


I may look around tonight at Best Buy and Circuit City to see if these are out there and may buy 1 season. If I do, i'll post screenshot comparisons here...

I'll wait and see if these actually end up being 16x9 - a packaging specs error seems more likely to me...

no luck finding these at my local Best Buy or Circuit City

I always thought The Shield (at least according to a commentary on the first season dvd) was shot on 16mm making 1.33:1 the original ratio.

The European releases were always in 16:9 and they do show more on the sides - so the 1.33:1 releases are cropped and not the 16:9 ones.

But the creator of the show has said that he prefers the 1.33:1 ratio because he wants the show to look like a documentary.

So it's a Buffy Season 4-7/Dark Angel scenario where the original aspect ratio is 16:9 but the intended ratio is 1.33:1.

We could drag The Last Emperor or Apocalypse Now into this discussion to make it really interesting.

we need a dvd talk review of this...

The new sets times are quite shorter than the original dvd sets. Im going to wait to buy them til I find out what Sony removed to make the time shorter.

Costco had seasons 2, 4, and 5 in 16x9 tonight when I was there. I didn't see any copies of 1 and 3 though.

If you want to see how much better the show looks in 16x9 check out the deleted scenes on the first season's set, which are in widescreen.

Double-dipping the first five seasons might be a waste of money, though. Any chance of blu-ray editions showing up in the next couple of years?

Looks like these are gonna have the same box artwork as the old editions (?) but will include "minisodes" from other (lesser) TV shows; 'The Jeffersons', 'Fantasy Island', 'Dilbert', 'VIP', "TJ Hooker', 'Married With Children', "Diff'rent Strokes', etc.

If that don't win "stupidest idea ever" award, I don't know what will.

And I ain't re-buying these until I'm sure there's no PAL speedup.

Hmmmm. Slim sets are nice due to space, but I had no interest in flipping my old ones for the new ones. Hmmmm need a review.

So, how is wanting this show to be 16:9 when the creator has directly stated that the show is intended to be 4:3 any different than people buying "fullscreen" DVD's? Am I missing something here?

No.

Very interesting.

I thought that these were just repackaged releases. I wonder if the pictures are significantly better/worse.

Again, if you have the old season 1, watch the deleted scenes. The image quality in just those is considerably better.

Agreed. I had not watched them before, but the frame is opened up more, and not as grainy. Doesn't look like the Shield Ive watched for years, but it looks nice.

I wouldn't say that. The OAR is what it was framed for and originally presented as. Just because they protected for 16:9 doesn't mean it's the OAR. It just means you get extra dead space on the side to fill up your 16:9 screen. As someone else pointed out, it's the same thing as having a matted widescreen movie presented full frame.

What was the price?

I'm going to be pretty upset with Sony if season 6 is only released in this incorrect widescreen format. The show is not meant to be shown like this, and it's borderline offensive (and, sadly, not terribly surprising coming from this awful studio) that they'd take matters into their own hands to make these more "consumer friendly" after Fox has done such a great job on the DVDs for the past five seasons.

Agree 100%

The Shield is not meant to be crisp and clean picture. It's supposed to be grainy, documentary type feel too it.

I don't know why any real fan of this show would want it in widescreen.

I wants to fills up my screens, y'all!!!

I knew this was going to happen. As soon as I saw the news on TSoD, I said 16 X 9. And that is a mistake. The show has to be in your face and you don't get that with widescreen. If they do s6 this way, I will not buy it.