Consumer's Report

If you have a TiVo and you rent movies, you ought to check out Amazon's Unboxed. You register your TiVo with the service and then you can go to the Amazon web site and pick a movie and then an hour or so later, it's on your TiVo. The default price is $4 (which I haven't paid yet), but they have regular specials for $1, which I still haven't paid, because they give you a $3 credit for signing up. (or at least they did, I don't know if that was a limited offer.) Last night the drill was:

• Lee and Molly pick a movie.
• Lee and Molly do dinner.
• Lee and Molly watch an old Simpsons because the movie wasn't finished downloading yet.
• Lee and Molly watch Hot Fuzz. (which was hilarious. Slow starter, but it picks up. Rated R for language and cartoon violence.)

The downsides are,

• You can't start watching until it's all downloaded, i.e., there's a wait.
• The movie disappears from your TiVo 24 hours after you first start watching.
• There aren't any extras, etc. It's just the movie.