I was wondering about this idly the other day and was idly curious as to what others think. I don't feel as though a DVD offers me value for money if it doesn't have some extras on it.

I'd also be interested in hearing which DVDs you've bought/watched which you thought were the best/worst value for money as far as extras were concerned.

LabRat

I voted for other. If I buy a DVD, I buy it because of the movie itself. I don't care if there are extra's or not. Mostly I discover them when I put the DVD in my player

And the only extra's I really watch then, are: Deleted scenes and bloopers

I like extras And I checked all of the ticky boxes...

I can't answer the poll because it insists for an answer to Q2 but I answered Q1 negatively and therefore have no answer for Q2.

For the record, however, I couldn't care less whether a DVD has extras or not.

Yvonne

I voted yes, definitely! I really enjoy the extras, and I will buy the version that has extras rather than the stripped down version.

I freely admit that I spent MONTHS of my life watching every single extra on every DVD of the Lord of the Rings extended editions. Fabulous. I've also really enjoyed the extras from the two Pirates of the Caribbean movies (esp the commentaries, they were hilarious), and The Incredibles has so much great stuff hidden on it that my kids and I spend two solid weeks (evenings, an hour each night), watching all the extras and finding all the easter eggs (to be fair, it was snowing all during those two weeks, and outside was not a pleasant place. Don't want you to think that I'm raising couch potatoes).

Winged Migration had a making of feature that was ALMOST better than the movie itself, and the movie had such great scenery that it is a regularly watched feature at our home, especially after a hard/stressful week. So beautiful, and such wonderful work was put into this movie.

I do have to admit that there have been some movies that have disappointing extras, but the movie itself was good, so I'm not upset about the money. I just really do appreciate good extras. It shows that the film makers really cared about their movie, and put a lot of time into the film and carried over that same passion into the DVD. Best one for that? The Incredibles, which if you think is a kids movie only shows that you haven't watched it.

There, Labby, I've recommended some movies for you!

mmouse

I tried to vote 'other', but because I wouldn't answer question two, the poll won't let me register my vote.

The short answer is, I don't really care about extras, but whether I'll watch anything -- and what I'll bother watching -- depends on the DVD. I don't have any hard and fast rules.

Having said that, of those DVDs that I have bought / rented / watched, I can probably count on one hand the number of extra features I've bothered to look at.

So... I wouldn't buy or not buy a DVD on the basis of the extras provided. (I'd pay far more attention to price!)

However, I don't have a policy of not watching 'extra' stuff. In fact, when I saw Whale Rider, I was so taken by the story, I had to watch the extras, just to find out more.

If I bother watching anything, it is most likely to be cinema trailers or deleted scenes. I usually don't bother with director's commentaries or any of the behind the scenes stuff. I don't really like to know how things were done, because that takes away some of the magic for me. Knowing about blue screens and CGI in theory is one thing; actually seeing how they are applied to a particular scene is quite another.

What I would really like to see on DVDs, rather than all this 'making of...' stuff, etc, is more foreign language soundtracks, not just subtitles. I want my DVDs to be in Spanish or French, not just in English. (All praise for the TV series, Alien Nation, which I ordered from the US, which is in both English and Spanish. )

Chris

I think like most people my response has to be that it depends on the DVD. I rarely buy with the extras in mind - and got the one-disk version of Superman Returns because it was half the price of the two-disk set - but sometimes find them interesting if they don't add hugely to the price. Director commentaries are often very interesting, ditto cut scenes and bloopers; I'm generally less interested in the other types of extras. But it's very variable - for example, the commentary on My Super Ex-Girlfriend is pretty boring, the commentary on Mystery Men is immense fun.

The extras would not be the reason to buy or not buy a particular DVD, but I'm generally disappointed if there aren't any.

I have a fondness for the 'how they did the special effects' sort of extras. I seldom listen to commentary and don't check out any music videos if I don't care for the song.

The main fun with DVD extras is seeing some stuff you haven't seen before, but they are usually only interesting for one viewing.

Tank (who actually has more concert DVDs than he does movie DVDs)

It really depends for me. If I like a movie enough to want to own it, I couldn't care less what else is on the DVD, I'll buy it anyway.

However, in some cases, I will pick an edition of the movie which has extras instead of the standard edition - like I did with LoTR, for instance.

And in some cases, if there are really cool extras on the disc, it might convince me to buy a movie that I was either not going to buy right away or that I had second thoughts about getting in the first place... I have a few like that - which I have on VHS for instance, that I wasn't going to buy on DVD for a while, but the extras on the disc made it worth spending the money to get a copy of it.

My husband and I normally don't buy a whole lot of DVDs. Since I work at a library, I'm able to check out new releases as they come out, so buying them isn't a priority when I can get them for free at the library. And, admittedly, we normally forget about watching the extras anyway. Oops? The only time I think about watching the extras is if I really liked the movie and I want to learn more about it.

I will almost always opt for a version of a movie with bonus materials. If there's a choice of a one-disk versus two-disk version, I'll get the two-disk version. Although I don't have a huge amount of time to watch the extras, I'd like to have the option. My favorite part of the extras are usually the deleted scenes.

ooh I just love extra's. They are maybe not the reason I buy a dvd but still I'm a little dissapointed when there aren't any extras on the dvd (just as I was when I saw that the 4th season of LnC didn't had any )And then I really like hmm... the deleted scenes and interviews and ooh the bloopes !!