Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

Let me give you guys the real deal. This is the best release to date of one of the best TV series of all time. The episodes have been re-scanned in HD from the original film sources and the results are mostly amazing. Episodes from the early seasons are especially stunning. The difference between this set and any of the earlier DVD releases is night and day. If picture quality is your primary concern, and you have an interest in owning all nine seasons of the show, stop reading now and buy this set (or wait for it to go on sale, then buy this set). If you care about the presentation of the physical box set or the creative/historical integrity of the new HD transfer, things get more complicated. While the episodes have been scanned from film sources, the CGI effects in many episodes were originally made on video— meaning no high-resolution master exists of some effects shots. To bring these shots into the HD era, the team behind this box set had to re-create them. I don't know what methods were used but the results are mostly good— however, they're not identical to the original shots and you can tell in a side-by-side comparison. Sometimes they look too neat or crisp, but that might just be because we're used to seeing them in low-resolution on fuzzy formats... which were fitting for mysterious images of the unidentified and unexplained. Long-time fans will immediately notice that the on-screen text titles look vaguely different as well, for the same reasons. Even the main "The X-Files" title at the beginning of each episode has been redone, and to my eyes doesn't look as mysterious as it used to. These changes just remind us from time to time that we're watching a new interpretation rather than the same show we watched in the 90s, and it feels a little funny. Another significant change is the first four seasons are now in a 16:9 format to fill your HDTV, possible because the original film was shot with consideration for an eventual 16:9 release. However, this doesn't necessarily mean these earlier seasons were *intended* to be seen in 16:9. Cinematography purists will balk at the empty space around the edges of some shots, particularly on the left side of the screen. Reframing is also an issue— some vertical space has been lost (along with details that were originally onscreen) in favor of expanded horizontal space (and details that were previously offscreen). These issues mean this set is completely unacceptable as a *preservation* of the series as it originally aired. Is it improved? Possibly. But is it a true restoration of the source material? No. That may never be possible given the limitations of the original computer effects, but it would have been nice to at least have the option of buying new HD transfers of early seasons in their original 4:3 framing. The box set itself is adequate but not a five-star effort. You get all nine seasons the same as they would be if you bought them individually, plus an attractive box to hold them in. The presentation of the discs is pretty lazy. Each disc is labeled generically with a season and disc number. To see which episodes are on each disc, you need to remove the first disc from the case and peer at an index printed on the inside of the case's paper cover art. The Blu-Ray menus are similarly bare-bones. This presentation isn't worse than many other series sets on the market, but it is a clear step down from the early DVD releases of The X-Files, which were absolute works of art, especially the original "collector's editions." Warts and all, this is probably a must-have for enthusiastic X-Files fans or people getting into the series for the first time (as long as they don't forget the movies, which are oddly not included in this set). Fans who are in no particular hurry to revisit the series might be better off waiting for a more later edition that might include the 2016 "event series," a more satisfying approach to the disc and menu presentation, and maybe even a preservation of the early seasons in a 4:3 ratio.