Aug 22, 2009
Usually Viz has its head screwed on bright and tight but they are on the verge of doing something dumb that flies in the face of recent anime dvd history. I was looking on Amazon and saw that the Naruto Shippuden anime series is going to be released in individual volumes instead of box sets. It looks like they will be releasing a dvd containing 4 episodes each month costing $25. So it will take them about a year to put out the first season on approximately 12 volumes. That's a bilking of about $300 for the first season!
Are they insane? No, just greedy. But it's nothing new in the context of Viz's recent behavior. Witness their encroaching higher manga prices that were never justified except by stating that everybody else was charging more, so Viz was just joining the club.
It appears that Viz is blatantly trying to take money from its customers by milking these dvd releases with 4 episodes apiece. I know, this is Naruto, and Viz's behavior will be reinforced with strong sales. But you know what, Viz? I'm not playing this game. I refuse to buy these volumes. If you were going to release box sets, I would have pre-ordered it today. Please don't try to rip me off. You'll be lucky if I even buy the inevitable box sets now. I can do fine with just the manga.
My ideal would be for Shippuden to be released like the uncut Naruto sets with 13 episodes on each. Down the individual volume path lies madness.