By: Erin
Posted: October 28th, 2024
Last Updated: February 7th, 2026
Introduction | 1- 20 | 21 – 40 | 41 – 60 | 61 – 70 | 71 – 90 | 91 – 110 | 111 – 130 | 131 – 150 | 151 – 163 | Extras | Conclusion
This article is under construction! This message will be removed when the article is deemed complete.
Conclusion
I’m writing this section of the article on February 7th, 2026. The introduction to this article was written in October of 2024. The early pages were written around that time, and then mid-2025 I went back to this article and wrote the middle pages, and now here I am, the last four-or-so pages finally coming out two years later. I came into this article like a house on fire and I sputtered out, trying to figure out what I really wanted to say with this piece. In the time of writing this, certain movies have become easier to find, and certain movies have only gotten harder. This is not a particularly scientific piece! Nevertheless, I’m going to break down the numbers.
Disc Availability: Original Favorites List
- Easy: 124
- Medium: 19
- Hard: 19
- Impossible: 2…ish
These numbers are not accurate to the modern day and don’t include the Extras. They may have been accurate once-upon-a-time, but the shifting landscape has thrown them all out-of-wack. With that said, I’m surprised at how high the “Easy” number is. There are several movies, both surprising cult classics and genuine popular classics, that are easy enough to find just by browsing an online storefront or by popping into Wal-Mart.
Unfortunately, during the writing of this article, Best Buy decided to completely remove their physical movies section from their store, something that really impacted Mandy and I. Best Buy consistently had new releases not only from major studios like WB but also from boutique labels like Arrow, Shout, or GKIDS. There are movies we got from there that aren’t even brought up in this article, like a gorgeous remaster of Mothra, a special edition of The Wicker Man, or Arrow’s release of Donnie Darko. It was a great way to see what was out there, and often to look at the back of a movie’s box to see if it was worth buying before we got it. These days, even some of the “Easy” movies have heavy asterisks behind their releases or are inconsistently in- and out-of-stock. It’s difficult to buy a movie on Amazon – the way the storefront collects multi-region discs into a single listing clearly confuses customers if the reviews are any indication, and the best way I’ve managed to find if a movie has a release at all is by going directly to Blu-Ray.com, a website that tracks this stuff.
When I first started this article, I thought it would be the “Hard” or “Impossible” movies that would frustrate me the most. Sure, it can be annoying when I have to import something, or when a disc goes out-of-print, or when a great movie like Dead Talent’s Society has no physical release at all, but what I’ve grown to loathe are the asterisk movies. I was constantly fighting my own arbitrary ratings of difficulty when writing this article, because I was constantly running into caveats. Sure, a movie is easy to find, but can you say it’s preserved if the image hasn’t been lovingly restored? What about if a movie can only be played on a specific format that is mostly used by those who are really into movies? Does the PS5 being able to play the UHD format make it more accessible, then? Are boutique companies performing a net good by restoring a movie that would have otherwise been lost, even if it means that they’re producing them in limited quantities and at a high retail price? How much of a deal-breaker is a different color grade? Is it more important that a movie itself is preserved perfectly, or that potentially-hours of supplemental materials are included with it?
I don’t have those answers. That’s where my frustration lies. I’d love if there was a scale that I could stick with and would remain unchanged, but I’m at the mercy of movie companies, rights holders, and disc-pressing factories.
We’re in a strange place when it comes to owning our favorite movies. By this point, we have all of the original list in some regard, even if it means having to make custom bootlegs, and part of why we did all of this in the first place was because it’s genuinely fun to go to thrift stores and find copies of movies we like. It’s a treasure hunt! And when a new version of a movie comes out, like Dogma finally being freed from Weinstein Company Rights Hell, it’s a celebration. We love to collect these movies because we love to share these movies with our friends. We have some friends out-of-state we’d love to visit some time soon, and I’ve been making a mental list of movies I want to pack into a backpack and bring along to show them. I’m proud of our library of movies, and how every single one of them tells a story about us, and how we can share those stories with people we love. But while we do all of this for fun, I can’t help but worry about the preservation aspect. The fact that there are any caveats, any “Impossible” movies, any “Hard” releases at all…that’s a problem.
I grew up watching my brother’s VHS tapes of Trigun, tapes I still own. I’ve told so many stories about each highlighted disc in our collection over the course of this article, and I still have hundreds of stories more. I look at the current streaming landscape and how we live in a world that now, more than ever, is demanding we consume. It’s not a new phenomenon, but I think if there’s one thing that collecting physical media helps me do, it’s reflect on what I’m buying and watching and often choosing to watch again. Sometimes I pass our shelf, see a title I haven’t thought about in a while, and smile as I reminisce about it. When I was a kid I would watch and rewatch Super Mario Bros. or Wayne’s World or The Rise and Fall of ECW, drinking in every detail I could, and it’s the intentionality that I appreciate when it comes to owning these movies in whatever way we can. These are our movies, these are our stories, and we want them preserved so we can experience them, so we can share them, and so people after us can do the same.
It costs a lot to do that. I don’t have the exact numbers, but it’s probably not worth it, for most. But it’s worth it for us. I know most people don’t have 150 favorite movies, some of which are weird exploitation obscurities, but if I could implore you to do one thing, it’s to think of what your favorite movie is.
That’s the first step; it’s amazing how many people just don’t have an answer to that question.
Once you’ve decided your favorite movie, pick up a copy. Hold it close to you, watch it every so often, appreciate the feeling of getting up and putting a disc into the player of your choice, and imbue that release with power. Think about your mindset when you pop it in, knowing it’s going to be there for you. Share it with your friends, tell them why you love it. Hell, tell me. I have a Guestbook.
Above all, keep circulating the tapes.
Because no one else is going to.