Easy Money

When DVDs first became popular, I thought it rather pretentious how people had a tendency to mention that they owned, or had even seen, a given movie "On DVD!". I did not see what the big deal was, possibly because I had no DVD player of my own for a very long time. I honestly could not tell the difference between DVD and VHS, and to be honest, the apparent snobbery of DVD player owners left such a bitter taste in my mouth that I had no desire to own one.

In the subsequent years, however, as more and more people began purchasing those new-fangled disc players to replace their aging tape machines, I started to not only notice the myriad improvements that DVD had over VHS, I realized I could actually tell the difference. And now in a Winston/Big Brother way either. Here's what I mean...

I own some movies on VHS and have watched them dozens of times. Jurassic Park, Terminator 2, Alien, Aliens, Alien 3...heck, even the original Star Wars trilogy. And for years they have served me just fine. But as I slowly replace these tapes with their new circular counterparts, I realize just how much better the DVD format is.

So what's the point? Most of you already know that DVDs are better than VHS tapes. Well, tonight I sat down to watch Terminator 2 on DVD, having purchased it a few months ago in the $5 bin at Wal-Mart.

Oh. My.

Talk about a moment of clarity, man. Or, rather, twenty-four moments of clarity every second. I'm hearing things I never heard. I'm seeing details I never knew were there. It's like watching an entirely new movie. Seriously, it was that cool. And to all those people I used to think were snobs, well, maybe they were right all along. Now if only I could get my hands on my brother's sweet Blu-Ray player...