To Netflix or not to Netflix?

We heard from a few different sources that you can now watch movies via Netflix using your Wii. Very cool! Then again....

We decided it was time to get the basic Netflix account since we've recently rented a couple of movies each month from Comcast OnDemand. We love this feature - new movies right when we want them - but we're not crazy about the $4.99 - $6.99 per movie price tag. With Netflix, we get 1 DVD at a time as many as we can get and return in a month and this GREAT new Wii feature which is like the OnDemand we were using except that just about everything available came out the year I was born. Seriously, there was pretty much nothing available through the Wii option that we were interested in watching.

That's OK. We still get our DVD in the mail. So, the other night, we popped our DVD of the TV series "Mad Men" in to the player and happily watched until someone needed a potty break. That's when we realized that not only did we not have the remote (we noticed this earlier) but that we could not pause, fast forward, rewind, move to the next chapter, nothing without the remote. GREAT!

We forged on and watched 3 episodes back-to-back, not wanting to have to sit through the first one or two the next time.

Tonight, we decided to watch an episode. We searched again for the remote. Nothing. We then spent about half an hour trying to program our universal remote to work with the player. This involved google and serious button pushing with codes and all. Nothing.

Wait! We have another DVD player in our garage sale pile somewhere! 10 minutes later Chris arrived from the garage victorious with the 2nd player. But wait.... where's the remote? Missing. Can we operate this one without a remote? No. Can we program this one? (After 1/2 hour of trying) No.

Plan C: A trip to Walmart to get a new cheapo DVD player - this time I got one that you can operate without a remote (just in case) although we have NO plans of losing this remote.


Ahhhhhh. Ice cream in hand, feet on the coffee table, let's watch Mad Men! Wait.. did we watch all the episodes on this disc? YOU HAVE GOT TO BE KIDDING ME!

Plan D: Check the Wii to see if by chance the next disc is available online. The first Wii remote is dead. The 2nd is installed in the rifle. I'm sick of wasting time, just give me the gun. OK - Mad Men is not available.


Summary: Prior to signing up for Netflix, be sure to evaluate if you will be taking a step backwards in technology. If so, abort the mission and pay the extra few bucks a month for your readily available OnDemand movies.