I've recently discovered the fun of printing out my own pictures and making my own packaging. It ain't perfect, but it's fun, and I can pick the images I think are the coolest. (Sometimes, movies will have cooler artwork for foreign releases, so you can just print that out and slip it over the official artwork.)
Shout's packaging is generic, but I like they at least focus on the team out of suit. That's a rarity, the Japanese DVDs don't even always do that. I know Shout does it to avoid confusion with the Power Rangers DVDs, to show that these are the foreign originals, but that doesn't matter when it still ends up focusing on the cast rather than just the suits.
Poor design is not a defect; it's laziness. And while normally I would support this school of thought, to not support a company when it is actively giving this fandom attention makes you sound like an ungrateful jerk. Do you have any idea how long the western toku fanbase has been around? On top of that we adult fans only started getting any sort of attention about 4-5 years ago. Unlike larger fandoms, we do not have the luxury to just reject something because the presentation fucking sucks. This isn't star wars where these businesses can expect good sales. We need to take every chance we can get to show them that there is a market for these products!
I mean ****, man; we don't even have the kind of luxury the bronies do! At least their merchandise is just in the girls section at (INSERT STORE HERE). So while yes, the packaging for these dvds have been lackluster to say the least, that's no reason to not support the translating/distributing work being done. I'm a graphic design student, I get it; these dvds are mildly painful to look at and the hierarchy is fucked to hell. But If we don't show out support now, then say "goodbye" to us getting any new subs over here for a long time! And if it really bothers you that much than design your own inserts and disk art; that's what I plan on doing.
These are the kinds of opportunities some older fans have been waiting for since the 90's; and some earlier than that! Maybe these dvds aren't ideal in terms of artwork, but if you can't see the bigger picture at play then I don't know what else anyone can tell you to make you understand.
In the era of torrents and streaming, yes, id rather be an ungrateful jerk than letting a lazy company get away with my money. This isnt the 90's anymore, i dont need to buy dubbed vhs tapes on a flea market for a few chapters of Liveman, so I dont understand why I should put 60 bucks of my money on a box full of data I alreayd own in a poorly presentation. Sure, its a small fandom and we need the maximum support we can get, but if they think they can sell crappy ****, theyll keep doing it.
In the era of having phisical stuff as a luxury, I choose my luxury **** to look great. I know im a jerk, but in the end im just a consumer. I dont buy Bandai of America buffed muscled toys as well, for similar reasons. Its the only way I can deliver my message: voting with my money.
It really sucks because its my fucking favourite series :/