History VanillaEdition / Film

* Whenever the studios start supporting a new home video format, they tend to give movies' releases on it the most bonus features, with releases on older formats having little to no extras by comparison. Justified in cases when the older mediums don't have enough memory for a ton of bonus features. Inverted for most Ultra HD UsefulNotes/BluRay releases; the UHD disc usually contains fewer extras than the 1080p disc or the 4K digital copy.

** Fox released a bare-bones, zero-features DVD/Blu-ray release of ''Film/{{Avatar}}'' for [[GreenAesop Earth Day]] (April 2010), followed by a 'special edition' in 4Q 2010, and then a 3D LimitedSpecialCollectorsUltimateEdition. Part of their justification for the Vanilla Edition was that with ''Avatar'' being so amazing visually, they wanted to use '''ALL''' the available space on the Blu-ray (and on DVD) to avoid compromising on quality in the basic edition (the collector's editions were three disks). Cameron once joked that he had an unwritten contract with Fox where "any time one of [his] movies makes more than a billion dollars we leave [[UsefulNotes/UserOperationProhibitFlag all the crap trailers off]]. I can't stand them any more than you can."

* Warner Bros. and Fox, among other companies, are known for releasing alternate "rental" editions of their movies which lack bonus features and come with [[UsefulNotes/UserOperationProhibitFlag long previews you can't skip]]. For one example, the Blockbuster rental copy of ''Film/CopOut'' just has "play movie" and "language selection" The only way you can tell them apart is if the cover says "Rental" or "Rental Exclusive".

* Disney seems to have little appreciation for non-franchise titles, as many of them are stuck on bare-bones DVD with nothing in regards to extras, and the few titles that ''do'' get a Blu-ray release get transfers that are decent at best. A noteworthy example of this is ''Literature/TheJoyLuckClub'', where all of its home video releases are zilch for extras. Even the Blu-ray, which has a surprisingly good transfer, lacks anything beyond a French and Spanish audio track (and the Spanish track is in stereo, to boot). Mind you, this film would go on to be inducted into the UsefulNotes/NationalFilmRegistry, and stars future Disney Legend Creator/MingNaWen in her first of many gigs for the Mouse House. You'd expect Disney to give it much more respect.

* Creator/{{Disney}} releases Blu-ray Discs of some of their least marketable live-action movies exclusively through the Disney Movie Club. They don't usually include any bonus features; sometimes even a title that contained extras on [=LaserDisc=] or DVD loses all of them on Blu-ray. Animated DMC Exclusive Blu-ray Discs also contain no bonus features, unless the movie either belongs to the Disney Animated Canon[[note]]except for ''WesternAnimation/SaludosAmigos'' and ''WesternAnimation/TheThreeCaballeros'', which the DMC sells as a barebones 2-Movie Collection[[/note]], or previously received a wide BD release with extras.

* The 2008 edition of ''WesternAnimation/JonahAVeggieTalesMovie'' is basically a reprint of disc one of the 2003 2-disc collector's edition of the film, which only contains the film, the commentaries, and the Spanish dub.

* When the Creator/TwentiethCenturyFox-produced Creator/RodgersAndHammerstein movie adaptations first came to DVD, only ''Theatre/TheSoundOfMusic'' received a two-disc set. The other four had to settle for non-anamorphic [=DVDs=] with only a few bonus features. To make matters worse, the UK DVD of Theatre/{{Oklahoma}} from this line is in PanAndScan. Eventually, Fox re-released all five of them with remastered picture and more extras.

* The file name for the single-disc [=DVD=] release of ''Film/{{Transformers}}'' (2007) is allegedly named "Transformers_Vanilla".

* The DVD of ''Film/{{Tank}}'' may be the most Vanilla on this list. It doesn't have ''anything'' but the movie. No menu, no scene selections, no alternate languages, nothing. The movie plays and that's all.

** When Disney licensed the rights to Second Sight in 2014 for a Blu-ray release, it got a ''far better'' transfer from the original camera negative, and actually boasts plenty of extras such as deleted scenes and some behind-the-scenes featurettes. Too bad there's only a region B release currently available, [[NoExportForYou and is unplayable on other different region-coded players]]. North American fans still have to deal with Disney's DVD release for the moment.

* Both 1-disc and 2-disc editions of ''Tous à l'Ouest: Une aventure de ComicBook/LuckyLuke'' (''Lucky Luke: Go West'') were released in Canada, but while both editions included an English language option for the main film, the features came in French only with no subtitles.

* If a franchise's box set relegates
most of the bonus features to a separate disc from any of the movies, it often results in the movies boasting little to no extras when sold individually.

** Strangely, some MGM-owned movies (such as ''Film/TheGraduate'', ''Film/TheTerminator'', and ''Film/ThePrincessBride'') have received home video re-releases with ''less'' bonus material than previous editions!
*** The Bond 50 DVD contains all the Franchise/JamesBond movies from ''Film/DrNo'' to ''Film/QuantumOfSolace'', but lost 21 bonus discs included with the Ultimate Collector's Set (which also only goes up to ''Film/CasinoRoyale2006'', and arranges the movies out of chronological order to boot). Potentially justified as MGM released the Bond 50 DVD in conjunction with a jam-packed Blu-ray set that bears the same name, and also dominated the marketing materials.

* The Franchise/DisneyAnimatedCanon began falling into this as of TheNewTwenties, beginning with ''WesternAnimation/FrozenII''; all menus are now no longer cinematic and contain just animated backdrops, and the scene indexes are now unnamed, like all non-Disney releases as of TheNewTens. This thankfully didn't affect Pixar however.
* As of the middle of TheNewTens, beginning with ''WesternAnimation/InsideOut'', Pixar's home media menus took a more bland approach and contained a simple animated backdrop with musical score amongst additional menus with no music which share nearly the same design.

* Zig-zagged with ''WesternAnimation/AGoofyMovie''. The North American 2000 release was full-screen and some bonus features (including a ''WesternAnimation/GoofTroop'' episode without its opening sequence, a trivia game, a storybook, an episode of Disneyland anthology series from 1955 focusing on Goofy, the fullscreen trailer and the "Disney's Mambo No. 5" music video), while the 1999 European release despite not having any bonus features (like many Disney movies released by Warner Home Video at the time) features the movie in its original widescreen ratio and seven additional language tracks besides the original English (depending on country those were German, Spanish (Spain), Swedish, Norwegian, Danish, Finnish and Portuguese (European) or French, Italian, Dutch, Polish, Czech, Hungarian and Hebrew).

* The American home video release of ''WesternAnimation/PlaymobilTheMovie'' not only came out only on DVD, but has no bonus features whatsoever.

* Creator/{{Universal}}'s 4-pack releases have to be a record in vanilla-ness. Four [[BoxOfficeBomb flop films]] in one package (one example: ''Film/McHalesNavy'', ''Film/TheAdventuresOfRockyAndBullwinkle'', ''Film/JosieAndThePussycats'', and ''Film/{{Thunderbirds}}'') -- not, as you might expect, two flipper discs with one movie on each side (as Warner Bros. have done; this allowed for reusing of feature-laden releases) -- instead, you get ''two movies stuffed onto one disc each''. All you get is a basic menu allowing you to pick which movie you want to watch. There isn't even a chapter selection screen.
** They did a similar thing with their trilogy of Canada-exclusive "Movies on the Go" packs, released in 2006 and intended for family travel viewing (one had more kid-skewing movies such as ''Film/{{Casper}}'' and ''Film/TheLittleRascals'', and two were aimed at older kids and included such movies as ''Film/TheMummy1999'', ''Film/JosieAndThePussycats2001'', and ''Film/BringItOn''). These ones ''did'' have flipper discs, but with the ''same'' two movies on each side, one with the English versions, and one with the French dubs.

* ''WesternAnimation/CArs1'' launched a new era of home entertainment for Creator/{{Pixar}}. Each of the preceding movies got 2-disc Collector's Edition [=DVDs=] with hours of bonus features. By contrast, ''Cars'' got a DVD containing nothing more than three shorts, some deleted scenes, and a short interview with the director as bonus features. Nearly every Pixar movie onward received similarly lightweight platters on DVD. Fans would have to buy the Blu-ray discs for more comprehensive extras. Eventually, ''Cars 2'' became Pixar's first movie to come to 3-D Blu-ray. As a result, both the DVD ''and'' the Blu-ray received paltry selections of bonus features, with consumers having to buy the 3D version to get all the extras! Fortunately, ''WesternAnimation/{{Brave}}'' and ''WesternAnimation/FindingNemo'' each have 2D and 3D Blu-rays with identical or nearly-identical amounts of extras, giving this trend a quick death.

** A notable example of the opposite was the international releases of ''WesternAnimation/TheIncredibles'', which have a single disc with only a small fraction of the features available on the North American and Japanese releases.

* Around the late 2010s, Universal began to rerelease every movie in Creator/DreamWorks' back catalogue, reprinting already-existing Blu-rays and giving all their films from ''WesternAnimation/{{Antz}}'' to ''WesternAnimation/FlushedAway'', which hadn't been put on the format before, this treatment. While relatively nice-looking visually and stocked up well on bonus features, having most of them brought over from the original [=DVD=]s, these Blu-ray releases suffer from generic cover art and the same basic template being used for the menus, with a random shot picked either from the movie or stock art as a backdrop.

* ''WesternAnimation/{{Cars}}'' launched a new era of home entertainment for Creator/{{Pixar}}. Each of the preceding movies got 2-disc Collector's Edition [=DVDs=] with hours of bonus features. By contrast, ''Cars'' got a DVD containing nothing more than three shorts, some deleted scenes, and a short interview with the director as bonus features. Nearly every Pixar movie onward received similarly lightweight platters on DVD. Fans would have to buy the Blu-ray discs for more comprehensive extras. Eventually, ''Cars 2'' became Pixar's first movie to come to 3-D Blu-ray. As a result, both the DVD ''and'' the Blu-ray received paltry selections of bonus features, with consumers having to buy the 3D version to get all the extras! Fortunately, ''WesternAnimation/{{Brave}}'' and ''WesternAnimation/FindingNemo'' each have 2D and 3D Blu-rays with identical or nearly-identical amounts of extras, giving this trend a quick death.

* The DVD release of the direct-to-VHS movie ''WesternAnimation/BabyHuey's Great Easter Adventure'' has a menu with only two options: to play the movie, or to play the short film that was featured at the end of the VHS release.

* The standard DVD of ''WesternAnimation/HortonHearsAWho2008'' only has trailers different on each side, a commentary from the directors and the ''Franchise/IceAge'' short "Surviving Sid". The DVD bundled with the digital copy has special features, while the Blu-Ray has all that plus the option to watch the movie with a Who.

* The Disney Movie Club DVD of ''WesternAnimation/Dougs1stMovie'' had a pretty bad case. Not only did the DVD leave out any bonus features (Including the one on the video release back in 1999) and had picture quality similar to the VHS release, but Disney decided to use the Creator/ToonDisney edit with commercial fade-outs and sped-up credits instead of the original master!

* Around the late 2010s, Universal began to rerelease every movie in Creator/DreamWorks' back catalogue, reprinting already-existing Blu-rays and giving all their films from WesternAnimation/{{Antz}} to WesternAnimation/FlushedAway, which hadn't been put on the format before, this treatment. While relatively nice-looking visually and stocked up well on bonus features, having most of them brought over from the original [=DVD=]s, these Blu-ray releases suffer from generic cover art and the same basic template being used for the menus, with a random shot picked either from the movie or stock art as a backdrop.

* The original Blu-ray release of ''Film/TotalRecall1990'' Blu-ray edition is almost completely bare bones and completely devoid of Arnold Schwarzenegger's infamous commentary track.

* The ''WesternAnimation/HortonHearsAWho2008'' DVD only has trailers different on each side and a commentary from the directors. The DVD bundled with the digital copy has special features.

* The Disney Movie Club DVD of ''WesternAnimation/Dougs1stMovie'' had a pretty bad case. Not only did the DVD leave out any bonus features (Including the one of the video release back in 1999) and had picture quality similar to the VHS release, but Disney decided to use the Creator/ToonDisney edit with commercial fade-outs and sped-up credits instead of the original master!

** Warner Bros. was notorious for treating most of its catalog titles this way for the first few years of the format. While some of them were revisited later with more elaborate editions, others never have been. A good example of this is 1981's ''Film/{{Arthur 1981}}'', which never received a widescreen DVD release in region 1, even though the poorly-regarded sequel did (a widescreen DVD eventually was released in region 2). While the 2011 Blu-ray disc finally offers up the film in its proper aspect ratio, it's still vanilla otherwise, sharing disc space with said sequel. Likewise, ''Film/TrueStories'' got a PanAndScan DVD release in 1999, and eventually got a widescreen Blu-ray LimitedSpecialCollectorsUltimateEdition (and DVD reissue) via Creator/TheCriterionCollection nearly ''twenty'' years later.

** A notable example of the opposite was the UK release of ''WesternAnimation/TheIncredibles'', which had a single disc with only a small fraction of the features the US got.
*** Made worse by a bit of (possibly) unintentional VeryFalseAdvertising. The UK's ''WesternAnimation/{{Tangled}}'' Blu-ray and DVD features a trailer for ''The Incredibles'''s Blu-ray, but uses the same trailer the US got, showing the American "2-Disc Blu-ray + DVD + Digital Copy" cover and bragging that it contains a ton of bonus features when actually the UK Blu-ray contains even less features than the original DVD release.

** When Disney licensed the rights to Second Sight in 2014 for a Blu-ray release, it got a ''far better'' transfer from the original camera negative, and actually boasts plenty of extras such as deleted scenes and some behind-the-scenes featurettes. Too bad said release only came out in Region B, [[NoExportForYou and is unplayable outside said region]]. North American fans still have to deal with Disney's DVD release for the moment.

* Around the late 2010s, Universal began to rerelease every movie in Creator/DreamWorks' back catalogue, reprinting already-existing Blu-rays and giving all their films from WesternAnimation/{{Antz}} to WesternAnimation/FlushedAway, which hadn't been put on the format before, this treatment. While relatively nice-looking visually and stocked up well on bonus features, having most of them brought over from the original [=DVD=]s, these Blu-ray releases suffer from generic cover art and the same basic template being used for the menus, with a random shot either picked from the movie or stock art as a backdrop.