I really wish DVD releases would just stick with a design through a logical stopping point.

I just picked up Saturday Night Live season 4 on sale, and while moving all of my TV show DVD sets to a new shelving unit, I popped it in its rightful place next to Saturday Night Live season 3 … and immediately cursed.

When I had received the set from Amazon I thought something felt “off” about it, and I was right.  Not only is the package of a cheaper material, it’s shorter.  I can understand wanting to save money, but couldn’t you have waited until a more logical changing point like season 6 (no original cast members remained after season 5)?

Other series have done this to me over the years, and it has always been annoying.  You like some uniformity to your sets, you like them to look like they belong together, but then they change up the appearance with no rhyme or reason, and you’re stuck.  The worst case of this was when the X-Files went from their original “fat packs” to the “slim packs” in the later seasons.  They were so radically different that it made them difficult to store together at all, let alone look nice.

So, feel free to change packaging when there is a major shift in the show, like when Simpsons season 1 – 5 had one look, and with season 6 they went on to another design.  That was fine, that made sense, this just seems random, and an obvious grab to save a few cents at the expense of the consumer who pays the same price for each season, and now has a totally random looking shelf.

Think about these things video companies, it will make your customers feel a lot less slighted.

(And, yes, I am aware only season 1 is unwrapped … I’m getting to the others eventually.)