Personally waiting for GBP 14.99 on these two so maybe not my place to post comments as I don't have either in front of me. Oh, well, I will anyway . . .
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
This is dark but no surprise there . . . surely? . . . and I can think of several dark steels that look just fine and have sold out in spite of this (handicap).
The outside artwork always looked a bit meh but the inside and disc art looks really nice to my eyes and it's great to see David Bowie on the front of his first U.K. steelbook considering the few films he made that have actually had a BD release (only 3 that I can recall but of course there may be others) let alone a SB release.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Looking at pics of others in the current Mondo X line-up this may be at the very bottom of the pile exterior artwork-wise when compared to the others (the majority of which look stunning) but by the law of averages they can't all be out of the top drawer and I'd say that TOTAL RECALL and NIGHTCRAWLER don't look a million times better.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Regarding darker images on the steelbook when compared to the original print: I believe this has something to do with the metallic nature of the steelbook which can dampen an already dark/muted print and a lot of detail can get lost in the process.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Regarding future Zavvi / Mondo X steelbooks: I feel that it would be a mistake to stop here (at Nos.013 & 016) - we need the gaps to be filled for the purpose of a complete numbered collection as we didn't start at the beginning.
In fact we need them ALL here in the U.K. - from No. 001 right through to the end.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Clearly something amiss qualitycontrol-wise at the Mondo factory if out of the few that have been received there have been damage issues and I'm sure everyone paying top dollar for these would expect nothing less than to have their steels checked for damages before dispatch and I'll bet these damages were not caused in transit