End Of An Era: Best Buy Is Removing All Physical Media Movies From Stores

SOURCE - The consumer-electronics retailer will phase out sales of DVDs and Blu-ray discs both in-store and online in early 2024, according to industry sources familiar with the company’s plans. Best Buy made the initial decision to end DVD sales nine months ago, according to one source.

Best Buy confirmed Friday that it is ending sales of DVDs. “To state the obvious, the way we watch movies and TV shows is much different today than it was decades ago,” a Best Buy spokesperson said in a statement to Variety. “Making this change gives us more space and opportunity to bring customers new and innovative tech for them to explore, discover and enjoy.”

That was from an article a few months ago but the tweet is from this weekend. Best Buy has now gotten rid of all physical media movies. I'm pretty upset about this news. I used to like to get movies from Best Buy. A lot of time, they'd have good deals and if you go back a few years, they had a damn fine collection too.

I love owning Blu-Rays and physical media. I'm sure a lot of that is tied to when I was born. Growing up in the 1980's and 90's, it was awesome going to the store and buying a new record/tape/CD or a new movie. They even had a store called Suncoast Motion Picture Company in malls and all they would do is sell movies. It was a fucking great place. It felt and still makes feels good buying a new movie. I love the idea that I now have it forever (or until the technology becomes obsolete. But honestly, I'm old enough now where I'm committed to having a blu-ray in my possession the rest of my life. My family can just throw this shit out when I die.)

SOURCE - Considering It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia’s characters are purposefully some of the most problematic figures on television, some of their satirically horrible acts were too much for Hulu to keep on their services, leading five It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia missing episodes to be removed:

• Season 4, Episode 3, "America's Next Top Paddy's Billboard Model Contest" 
• Season 6, Episode 9, "Dee Reynolds: Shaping America's Youth" 
• Season 8, Episode 2, "The Gang Recycles Their Trash" 
• Season 9, Episode 9, "The Gang Makes Lethal Weapon 6" 
• Season 14, Episode 3, "Dee Day"

This is why physical media is so important. We can't let giant media companies determine years later what is and isn't acceptable. One of the first sets I bought was The Sopranos complete series. It's my favorite show of all-time and I can't say with any conviction that some of those episodes won't be removed or edited in 20 years. I want the series as the creators intended. I feel editing or removing episodes of a show or movie is equivalent to painting clothes on a historic Da Vinci or Monet. Fucking with art is a form of censorship.

I've been buying a new Criterion Collection every week for the past couple of months. What Criterion does is takes classic films from all eras and re-masters them while including all sorts of special features. It's like going to a great film class each week. I also just like having those movies available whenever I want to watch them. I have them in my movie shelf (I like to call it my movie library. Please don't make fun of me) and it makes me happy.

I must admit I'm somewhat of a hypocrite about all of this. I did get rid of all my CD's a few years ago. I do still buy records but between space and just ease of use, I stream music almost exclusively now. But who's to say these awful media companies won't censor music? If you had told me a few years ago that Hulu would be pulling episodes of It's Always Sunny, I wouldn't have believed it.

No matter what we are at the mercy of these giant companies. We're also at the mercy of audiences becoming more and more sensitive. Maybe there is a giant shift in a few years and people rebel against content getting softer and softer. I hope so but I really have no idea. The only thing we can really control is how we consume this media. With stores like Best Buy not selling physical media, these media corporations continue to tighten their grasp of our balls.