Sony Pictures Home Entertainment Taking Over Disney's Physical Media Production

[Bubbles-11]

here are some significant developments happening within the home video industry of late, developments that I’ve been spending a lot of time investigating and really digging into these past few weeks here at The Digital Bits.

And I can now confidently report that one of them is this:

Disney and Sony have just inked a major deal for Sony Pictures Home Entertainment to take over all of Disney’s physical media production going forward.

This means that Sony will handle and oversee the actual authoring and compression of discs, that they’ll work with the replicators and packaging vendors, and that they’ll oversee the titles as they go out to the distributors and on to retailers.

I first received word of this deal about two weeks ago, apparently within twenty-four hours of the ink drying, and I’ve now confirmed it with multiple independent sources within the industry—people that I trust and have known and worked with for many years.

https://thedigitalbits.com/columns/m...ts/022024-1000

[IndyMLVC]

And how do we theorize this will affect us, if at all?

[jedidarrick]

Sony: “I’m your huckleberry.”

[Legend293]

Hopefully means more mavel and star wars

[Darth Marcus]

I legitimately might cry. Think of all the possibilities. Tombstone, all the Die Hards (yes, even that one), all the Aliens, all the Predators, the Disney Bruckheimer flicks, The Rocketeer, Disney Animation, The Sound of Music, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, The Planet of the Apes flicks, Young Frankenstein, The French Connection, Wall Street, The Last of the Mohicans, and many more on 4K disc with DOLBY VISION.

[captainjoe]

Holy shit this could be the saving grace for Disney titles if Sony calls the shots. Walt Disney Classics vol. 1 anyone?

[Schwartzy]

Actual Quality catalog release inclming? :O

[danman227460]

Originally Posted by IndyMLVC

And how do we theorize this will affect us, if at all?

It depends on what Disney is allowing Sony to do. Is Disney finally going to open its vaults and give Sony carte blanche to choose the titles it wants to release? Or does Disney retain the rights to choose the titles? So it will still be the current trickle drip of releases but now handled by a more competent company.

The former is great news for physical media while the latter is just the status quo but we might get potentially better releases.

[Rzzzz]

Come on Sony, give us all of these on blu!

[Lost-in-time]

Are Sony discs typically region locked?

[GeoffOliver]

No surprise since Mill Creek was already handling a huge chunk of Disney's back catalog of existing OOP discs, especially ones under the Fox brand. I doubt Sony will choose what to release since that's clearly not the case with Mill Creek either.

[MifuneFan]

Disney are still the ones determining what will come out on disc. Sony are just handling the manufacturing and distribution of the discs

[HeavyHitter]

I don't think there could be a better, bigger studio doing this. Handling the compression/authoring side of things is also great.

[RevolverOcelScott]

Inferno (1980) 4K

Don't be cowards

[Ranger517]

Could be huge for stuff like X-Files coming back into print on blu-ray.

Maybe even blu-rays and UHDs of Barbarian, The Empty Man and Hellraiser (2022)

[jimcorenson]

Originally Posted by Lost-in-time

Are Sony discs typically region locked?

No not to my knowledge

Maybe others can confirm it more ?

[4KBluRayForLife]

Holy crap. I have a few questions that I need answered but probably won't be answered for a while:

1. Will Sony use the Disney/Lionsgate curved slipcovers?
2. If not, will the rerelease all of the existing movies with regular square slipcovers?
3. If they do rerelease everything, will they add Dobly Vision and more bass and other things to make them look and sound better?
4. Will they upgrade/release older movies that Disney wouldn't even consider?
5. Will they release Disney+ content on phsyical?

[Member-865437]

Sony puts out top-notch restorations and remasters, so this very well could be a good thing. Only time will tell.

[jimcorenson]

Originally Posted by Ranger517

Could be huge for stuff like X-Files coming back into print on blu-ray.

Maybe even blu-rays and UHDs of Barbarian, The Empty Man and Hellraiser (2022)

Millennium, Buffy and Angel ?

[ben6543]

Just give me Never Cry Wolf on blu ray you cowards.