The physical market’s starting to remind me of the Laserdisc days, where there’s a solid but small enthusiast market, token support from major studios, boutique labels doing really nice but expensive special editions, and you have to be willing to import some stuff because it only comes out in Germany, Japan or wherever.
It has downsides (price, availability) but also upsides, as you’re seeing labels like Criterion and Arrow able to get major studio releases again, which they couldn’t when the studios could print money with repeated DVD special editions.
I’d also say the standards for video transfers have gone up because the remasters aren’t being done under studio mandates to scrub all the grain because everything must look like a modern digital production. I’m regularly blown away by how good cheap 80s shit looks on 4K Blu-ray.
