All advice, including picks and predictions, is based on individual commentators’ opinions and not that of Minute Media or its related brands. The movie Blu-rays are identical to the previous releases too, except for the fact that the theatrical BDs are all missing the second Blu-ray of bonus content that originally came with each, and the Extended BDs are all missing the two Appendices Blu-rays that came with each.

GiCocu, Dither, MaskTools, and RemoveGrain are all plugins for AviSynth that come packaged in ZIP files. The mix offers tremendous dynamics, from the quiet whisper of the breeze as Gollum leads Frodo and Sam through the Dead Marshes to the absolutely thunderous war drums of Isengard and the screams of berserker Uruk-hai as they swarm Helm’s Deep. Obviously, and like many of you who are enthusiastic fans of these films, I personally own most or all of the above—which collectively take up an entire row on my video library here at The Bits’ HQ. The upshot is that you can present them in three different configurations: The way the box comes, side-by-side, or four cases end to end.Editing master You_Too (the same person who did the color correction on the fantastic Star Wars: Despecialized Edition) wrote an AviSynth script to fix some of the more glaring color issues. These are near reference quality 4K image presentations, and they are absolutely reference quality Dolby Atmos mixes. What makes The Two Towers so refreshing is that director Peter Jackson has made no compromises for his audience. In any case, I much prefer the new Blu-rays to the previous ones—the improvements in contrast, color accuracy, and encoding make a real difference. In fact, the most recent was The Boys, which saw the first two seasons come to disc together around the time of the Season 3 release date on Prime Video.

Jackson captured the story of Bilbo Baggins with 4K digital cameras, and processed the images with state-of-the-art color timing. It's a fairly straightforward box set, rising above others only by sake of its attractive design and individual cases, and there are few frills to speak of. That package too will include Digital Copies, but it will NOT include The Appendices or any of the other previous extras (with the likely exception of the audio commentaries on the regular Blu-rays). What follows is truly epic battle in which the fate of both Middle-earth and the Quest of the Ring-bearer hang in the balance. Obviously, that would take time and money to author and replicate such discs, but it’s a pretty straightforward process.

Its sturdy gold and onyx outer box -- adorned with an image of the One Ring on the front and a simple rune on the back -- is slightly oversized, but no so much that it will cause any problems for cinephiles with limited shelf space.

And soon, new members join Frodo’s group in a true Fellowship tasked with the seemingly impossible goal of destroying the Ring once and for all.It includes little bits of footage we’ve never seen before—unused takes, extended lines of dialogue not in the final films, early cuts of key scenes, and even a few early effects shots.