Show Them the Shelf: The First Physical Media Roundtable
Our panel of diehards lays out the case for ownership, quality, and showing movies the love they deserve. Zero apologies for loving the shelf.
The case for physical media, ownership, restorations, collector labels, and why loving movies in 2025 means showing them a place on your shelf.
Alright, cinephiles—let’s do this. We’ve heard it for years: Physical media is dead. Just stream it. Why do you need discs cluttering your shelves? And as usual, they’re wrong.
At Mighty Chroma, we don’t just love movies—we celebrate them. We believe in feeling the weight of a box set in your hands, in popping discs into the tray, in shelf space overflowing with the greats, the weirdos, the never-to-be-streamed cult classics.
So we did something special. We reached out to four pros—critics, preservationists, people who live and breathe this stuff—and asked them three burning questions about why discs and box sets still matter in 2025. Here are their passion and expertise, straight up.
This is history: the very first ever Physical Media Roundtable. Let’s get into it.
Meet the Panel
Four experts, plenty hot takes—let’s meet the diehards
Before we dive in, get to know the minds at the table. These are the folks whose shelves are groaning under the weight of silent classics and boutique restorations—and they’ve got opinions to match.
Matt Paprocki
From Rolling Stone to DoBlu: Three Decades in the Disc Trenches
Bill Hunt
Digital Bits Boss and Format War Veteran
Writer, cineologist, futurist, space nerd, and Comic-Con pundit, Bill Hunt is the founding editor of The Digital Bits, a site that’s chronicled every format war and technology leap for nearly three decades. When Bill talks home video, serious fans listen.
Ben Model
Silent Film Accompanist, Lost Cinema Rescuer
One of the world’s leading silent film accompanists—and a full-time champion of lost cinema—Ben Model brings decades of experience, both on the keys and in restoration rooms. If there’s an obscure silent film on disc, Ben and his Undercrank Productions have probably been a part of it.
Sean Kennedy
Podcast Deep Diver and Cult Film Connoisseur
Co-host of The Film Utopia Podcast, Sean Kennedy goes deep on retrospectives, filmographies, and oddball treasures. If it’s cult, classic, or criminally underloved, Sean’s given it a proper deep dive.
Enough introductions—let’s kick off with our first burning question.
What sets physical media apart from digital in 2025—especially when it comes to picture, sound, and the experience you just can’t stream?
The stakes are higher than ever—what keeps discs alive when everyone says “just stream it”? Our panel pulls no punches.
Physical media preserves what streaming can erase—unedited classics like Toy Story 2 and Rocketman in their original form.
Matt Paprocki
Ownership Still Matters
Ownership. Until regulation/legislation catches up to digital marketplaces, ownership will remain in physical media's corner. The A/V benefits are important as well, but having that physical copy is as permanent a legal solution to media ownership we have. Once it's on a disc and in a consumer's hand, it will remain unchanged, unaltered, and available without an expiration date. For now, physical remains king.
Bill Hunt
Disc Quality and Control
Physical media—especially 4K releases—give you more vibrant colors, detailed images, and far less compression than even top-tier streaming. With a disc in your hand, no one can change, delete, or restrict your movie—it’s yours. The packaging looks great, you get more special features, and ultimately, you own it.
I really believe that there is something to be said for the aspect of ceremony and ritual that applies here... That’s an experience streaming simply can’t replicate.
Ben Model
Selection, Ritual, and the Human Touch
Streaming limits what you can actually watch—it's all about licensing windows and availability, which never match up with a fan’s real interests. With discs, there's also the pleasure and ritual: seeing artwork, opening the case, handling the disc, picking a film from your shelf. That’s an experience streaming simply can’t replicate.
Sean Kennedy
Preservation Over Convenience
We know the A/V quality edge, but for me, the big thing is preservation. Physical media keeps films and TV safe from being quietly censored or altered by studios and streamers—something happening more and more. Discs keep the original version alive, even when the digital copy quietly disappears or changes without warning. That’s essential. Just look at Toy Story 2: Disney quietly cut a casting-couch blooper after #MeToo and how Russia censored Rocketman—cutting gay scenes from Elton John’s story under the “gay propaganda” law.
How do packaging, special features, and restorations shape the appeal of physical media—and what recent trends excite you most?
What makes us reach for the shelf? Our experts dig into what sets real collectors apart in 2025.
Multiple cuts of Dawn of the Dead, a phenomenal restoration of The Thing. Streaming can’t touch this.
Sean Kennedy
Special Editions and Multiple Cuts
For me, the packaging, extras, and restoration only really matter if I have a strong connection to the film—like my favorite, The Thing. But I admit, beautiful presentations and releases with multiple versions or cuts (like Second Sight’s Dawn of the Dead) will absolutely get me to buy. That trend—multiple versions in one set—might be the most exciting thing happening right now.
Matt Paprocki
More Than Just Trinkets
As time has gone on and available shelf space has shrunk, big lavish box sets have turned into a detriment. What matters most is on the disc. Studios have learned to treat films right (mostly), restoring them to their original looks with stellar results. Collector labels now put the priority on A/V—easily the best trend today.
What matters most is on the disc. Studios have learned to treat films right (mostly), restoring them to their original looks with stellar results.
Ben Model
Artwork and Restoration
I mainly deal with silent film, so restoration tools getting better every year is huge—you can often see these classics the way audiences did a hundred years ago. Packaging is key too, especially with niche films: quality artwork on a Blu-ray case actually does help inform people what to expect.
Bill Hunt
Better Than Ever
Packaging and special features are great, but with the 4K Ultra HD format, the real benefit is films look and sound better than they ever have—even better than their original theatrical runs. Digital restoration tools and skilled remastering techs make seeing your favorite films feel brand new.
Why is it important for filmmakers and labels to keep making physical editions—and for collectors to keep growing their shelves—as digital keeps taking over?
Why keep buying discs when everything’s digital? The diehards make the case for a physical future.
Arrow’s Shaw Brothers Kung Fu Box Sets and Vinegar Syndrome’s The Keep—physical media is where film stays alive.
Ben Model
Support the Art and Keep It Going
I think all of the above applies here, as well as the fact that there is way way less money to be made with streaming or digital downloads. Royalties are an important means for a filmmaker to feel rewarded for their art and efforts. They may be small when it comes to a Blu-ray release, but they're a fraction of that when it comes to streaming views or downloads/rentals. I think that fans understand this as well, that some bit of their purchase is going to the label or the artist and that their buying physical media tells the distributor yes, please keep doing this.
Matt Paprocki
Real Choices, Real Collections
From the consumer side, it's the right to own the media we purchase. We can lend, buy used, resell, or keep the disc on a shelf—all choices digital does not provide. For the studios, it's really the collector labels doing the heavy lifting: giving lavish editions to films major studios overlook. That's where the excitement is—third-party labels like Arrow, Shout, MVD, and Criterion have more room to get creative, and filmmakers often have more say in the process. Just look at what Arrow has done recently with fully restored Shaw Brothers kung fu films: releases that were unthinkable just a few years ago now get box sets packed with love.
Distributors need to look after their core audience first: pretty packaging helps, but rarity and exclusivity really drive sales. Unavailable cult films, especially ones with a dedicated fan base, are gold.
Sean Kennedy
Don’t Forget Your Core—Or the Completists
Selfishly speaking it’s very important, obviously! But it is quickly becoming a cottage industry. The general audience has moved on, but those of us that are left—like comic or card collectors—are diehards. Distributors need to look after their core audience first: pretty packaging helps, but rarity and exclusivity really drive sales. Unavailable cult films, especially ones with a dedicated fan base, are gold. Just look at releases like Vinegar Syndrome’s The Keep. If labels keep in tune with their consumers and keep the quality up, collectors will keep buying.
Bill Hunt
Physical Discs Preserve Cinema’s Value
I think a great film released on physical media is always going to feel like something special. Digital versions are disposable. They have no real value, no tangible presence in your life. Sales of physical discs have also funded the preservation and restoration of film libraries over the years. You can pass these discs down to family, and they help teach younger viewers to really love and appreciate cinema. Discs are simply a better way to keep film culture alive.
Wrap-up
Our shelf, our rules. Keep fighting the good fight.
Physical media isn’t just about nostalgia—it’s owning your movies, championing artistry, and keeping film history alive on your shelf. It’s having the freedom to choose, lend, resell—actually hold the films you love. That’s a Criterion-level restoration that’ll knock you out, or a weird cult gem you’ll never find on Netflix—this is movie love you actually control, right there on your shelf.
Just look at Criterion’s jaw-dropping restoration of Martin Scorsese’s Raging Bull—black and white that actually makes your jaw drop, detail in every sweaty frame, a transfer you just can’t get anywhere else. That’s what physical media is about: keeping masterpieces like this truly alive, not flattened out by digital dust.
Our first ever Physical Media Roundtable brought in diehards who don’t just collect—they fight for ownership, for uncut classics, for the right to keep movies the way they were meant to be. They promote, review— and restore—movies and releases that matter.
The work keeps the fight alive, the chatter going, and makes sure physical media—and the films we all love—don’t fade away. And as long as collectors keep buying, and preservation keeps beating out the algorithm, physical media is here to stay.
So next time someone says, Just stream it, you know what to do. Show them the shelf. Remind them what real ownership looks like—because movies deserve more than just a scroll. They deserve our touch.
Answers have been edited and condensed for clarity and editorial reasons.
I love movies. My favorites are A Clockwork Orange, Pulp Fiction and The Thin Red Line.
I regularly watch anything from Charlie Chaplin to Michael Bay - and love both! I started Mighty Chroma out of my love for the best way to watch - and listen to! - a high quality movie at home.
I hope you are enjoying your stay! 😀
We ❤️ Physical Media