Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

The Marvel Cinematic Universe Phase I Boxed set is the big promotional release containing all of the (current) canonical movies leading up to the release of Avengers that was captained by Joss Whedon. These are: Iron Man, Iron Man 2, The Incredible Hulk, Thor, Captain America: The First Avenger, and Marvel's The Avengers. This series sets up the first half of Whedon's vision for the Marvel cinematic future, with the Thanos (the purple-skinned bad guy that was finally revealed at the end of the Avengers) being the series' primary antagonist in coming features. (Whedon seems to be leading things up to Marvel's classic Infinity Gauntlet cross-over in the second half.) I'm going to be reviewing the special edition packaging (Each of the individual movies already has a number of great reviews if you haven't seen any of the individual productions). You'll probably note some sour reviews about this particular set being cancelled (which is finally not true). The set was originally slated to release in in 2012 (with an original preorder of summer 2012). Long story short (as far as I can tell) is that the company that designed the original case did so believing that it was intended to be a one-time promotional piece rather than a mass-produced limited edition item. Rather than get caught up in legal troubles over this, Marvel decided to redesign the case and rerelease it. The new case finally delivered in April 2013. The redesigned case is pretty neat with a look that resembles brushed aluminum (its plastic), with a shield decal (that lights up when you hit a button on the top) and a recessed handle. I've seen some complaints about how durable the case seems to be, but I don't have a problem with it. It is light as you would expect, however I never planned to use it as a checked bag in an airport. It feels like it will last perfectly fine as a shelf-piece in your collection if that is what you intend. When you open the case you get a plastic replica tesseract set inside a plastic mount that looks sort of like the one in the movie. The opened case lights up the shield logo and a glow behind the tesseract. The tesseract also comes out and lights up on its own (if you didn't find the card you have to give it a firm smack with the palm of your hand before it lights up). The movies are in simple cardboard sleeves with cool art-deco renditions of the characters involved. There are a total of 7 packages including the following 10 discs: Avengers - Blu-ray, 3D Blu-ray Thor - Blu-ray, 3D Blu-ray Captain America - Blu-ray, 3D Blu-ray Iron Man - Blu-ray Iron Man - 2 Blu-ray Incredible Hulk - Blu-ray S.H.I.E.L.D. Avengers Initiative bonus disc I didn't have all of the movies (I held off when I saw this set was coming out), but if you have the single versions I did you're only going to be missing the digital copies and DVD copies (neither of which I have any need for). If you really like special features, they are at least missing the second (bonus) disc from the Iron Man 2 disc Blu-ray set (one of the few that I did already have). The case also comes with a series of folders filled with fictional bios, and some trinkets from the movies (some of which are fairly detailed replicas from the film--newspaper clippings, sketches, blu-prints, ID-cards, etc.). My personal verdict: You probably already know if you are the intended audience of the briefcase Phase I set. I've got a couple of limited edition movie collectables and in terms of quality I would rank this as being on par with most of them. If you don't have the movies and currently want them, it's honestly not a huge splurge from your entertainment budget. Even if you aren't considering the case, included extras, 3D copies, and special features disc the cost at the time of this writing is $150/6 blu-ray movies = $25 per movie. If you are thinking of purchasing the set for young children I would rethink the expense; I think the durability of the case is just fine, but it most likely wouldn't hold up long to the punishment of young children. Note: (If you're confused by some of the comments to this review) When Marvel withdrew the first version of the set the Amazon page went blank. In order to thank those who had already pre-ordered Amazon offered a free copy of Marvel's The Avengers (Two-Disc Blu-ray/DVD Combo in Blu-ray Packaging) as a "thank you" to many of the earliest preorders (roughly summer of 2012). I think it was handled as well as could be expected by Amazon, so I've got no real complaints there.