Consistency is key. Or is it?

I like consistency, especially when it comes to having things that match. In particular, DVD cases. It always really annoyed me that, of all six Star Wars DVDs, only Episode 3 has a bilingual cover and as such, the logo/title on the spine don't match the other cases (fortunately, that should no longer be an issue once I receive the Star Wars Blu-ray box set I've preordered). I've even gone as far as not buying the fourth Shrek movie because I want to buy it on Blu-ray now that I have a Blu-ray player, but I own the first three on DVD. I'm holding out for a sale on the Blu-ray box set so I can get the fourth movie and upgrade the others for cheap at the same time.

But what really has me scratching my head about how to proceed are TV shows. While I do really value consistency, I also value cost-effectiveness. My choice of whether I should buy a show on DVD or online through the iTunes Store is mainly based on cost. While some shows end up being more expensive through iTunes, many are cheaper, assuming I don't find a great sale on the DVDs somewhere.

And therein lies the problem. There are a few shows I've started watching over the past year that I checked out because I found season one on sale for a great price and it looked like an interesting show. Now that I'm getting closer to finishing those seasons, what do I do about season two? It's cheaper to buy the next season on iTunes, even compared to the current sales that are on at the moment. But if I hold on for a few more months, it's possible that an even better sale will come up on the DVDs that's as good as when I bought the first season. Or maybe I'll just end up waiting and waiting for a price point that never appears. So I may as well just buy it from iTunes instead. However, the old “consistency” argument rears its head—it doesn't seem right to own both seasons and not have two boxes on the shelf! It needs to be either all on DVD, or all as digital downloads.

But then again, does it really matter? It's not like those cases on the shelf are anything more than decoration anyway. I simply load all the episodes into my computer and watch them using my AppleTV, and the DVDs just sit there looking pretty unless someone wants to borrow them from me or I find a need to re-rip it for any reason. And when I think about it, there's no real reason for me to even be worrying about such things yet anyway. I still have seven episodes each remaining of both shows in question, and since I've been taking my time watching them I probably won't even be needing the next seasons for a few months anyway... Maybe I'll luck out and stumble across a great sale price in the meantime after all.