Back to the Awesome

Now let me regress into a mass of nostalgia for one of my favorite film series of all time.

Enter: Back to the Future. The first film was made before I was born, and the other two when I was young. I don't think I've ever met anyone who dislikes the first two films, and the third can be forgiven and enjoyed just because it features the same characters and continuity as its predecessors. Although Back to the Future is long gone (hopefully Hollywood doesn't want to clumsily reanimate its corpse), the catch phrases extracted from it are alive and well among myself and my friends. If I made a reference to hoverboards not working on water when they lack power, you'd better get it.

Anyway, although I already own the original DVD release from 2005, I'm eyeing the February 10, 2009 release of an updated and enhanced copy on DVD and Blu-Ray like a hawk. Why, exactly? Well, not only is the quality upped (Blu-Ray, mmm), but the discs contain something that isn't on the old discs.

Now, for those of you who have never visited Universal Studios, you missed out. The Back to the Future ride opened in 1991, and featured a trip in a (now mass-produced) DeLorean time machine chasing down everybody's favorite prankster, Biff Tannen. The 1955 hooligan managed to sneak into Doc Brown's lab and swipe one of the DeLoreans, and he leads you on a wild goose chase while throwing early nineties insults like "butthead" at you. The gist of the ride is a large screen that you watch while the DeLorean you sit in rocks back and forth, simulating motion. Highlights include almost dying in a volcano and being briefly eaten by a T-rex.

Yes, you've guessed it. The updated DVD release includes the video from this awesome ride. The ride itself was closed down in both the Hollywood and Orlando locations last year, so this is a nice bit of nostalgia that I'd like to own, eventually at least. Kind of sucks to have to pay for the same thing twice to do it, though.