OTHER TECH

Plot: Pixar film about a family of superheroes. Instructions: On Disc 2, allow the Set Up menu to go through its full cycle of animation. Scroll down to the Setup option and hit Enter. Once on the Setup screen, an icon of an Omnidroid will soon appear in the upper right corner. Press your Up arrow to highlight the Omnidroid, then click on Enter. Egg: "You can find a sock puppet version of the film. It's not quite as long as the actual film itself, and the dialogue is somewhat edited, but it's acted out with sock puppets. It makes you wonder about the combined sanity of the people who work at Pixar."

4. The Incredibles: Two-disc collector's edition

Plot: See above. Instructions: On Disc 2, allow the Deleted Scenes menu to go through its full cycle of animation. Have the back arrow button already highlighted. Near the end of the cycle, an icon of an Omnidroid will appear in the upper right corner. Press your Down button quickly. Egg: "There's a deleted scene of Dash, the son, playing a prank on his teacher. In the finished film, we only see the teacher complaining about Dash and showing still photos of what he did. This scene actually shows the entire gag."

3. Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone, special widescreen edition

Plot: A young boy enrolls in a school for wizards. Instructions: On Disc 2, go to Diagon Alley and pick the key, go get your money at Gringotts bank, then go buy your wand. It'll take you three tries to get your wand. Next, go to the main screen and go to the Classrooms area. Go to Transfiguration but don't click Enter on it. Just highlight and push the Down arrow. Two owls will appear below the torch. Highlight the owls and click Enter twice. The torch fire will turn off and you will be told that you have entered the third floor corridor. Now you'll need to answer some questions. The answer to the first is "the flute." The next choice involves keys; pick the key in the center. At Snape's potions, choose the gold colored liquid in the round bottle. Once you select it, you'll see the Mirror of Erised with the stone in it. Select the stone. Egg: "This is the only way to get to the deleted scenes, and that's why they don't have any Easter eggs on the other Harry Potter films. I think what happened was, people were getting a little ticked off."

2. The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers special extended DVD edition

Plot: Second installment in director Peter Jackson's fantasy trilogy Instructions: On disc 1, go to the chapter menu, and find Chapter 30. From there, hit the Down arrow once, then press the Enter button. Egg: "They've included Gollum's acceptance speech from the MTV Movie Awards. It's funny beyond all belief. Half of it has to be bleeped out. Andy Sirkus, who does the voice of Gollum, is accepting the award for best CGI Character. Golum rushes in and grabs the award out of his hand and starts cussing up a storm. He's going off on Peter Jackson and then starts in about Dobby, the house elf from Harry Potter, being gay."

1. The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring Special Extended DVD Edition

Plot: First installment in the trilogy Instructions: On disc 1, highlight chapter 27 in the Scene Selection menu. Arrow down once. Egg: "This is another MTV Movie Awards skit. It's Jack Black playing a hobbit and Sarah Michelle Gellar playing an elf. The two of them have been spliced into the Council of Elrond scene. This is when they're deciding what to do with the ring. In the skit, all the hobbits went out on a drinking binge the night before, and Jack Black had the One Ring put into a Prince Albert piercing. It's the funniest thing on earth. It comes with introduction from Peter Jackson. Most people don't realize what a sick sense of humor Jackson has, so it only makes sense that he decided to put these in as the Easter eggs on his films." P.S. Easter eggs exclusive to Blu-Ray are still fairly rare. Many of the hi-def releases do come with eggs (The Simpsons Movie, Dan In Real Life, and the upcoming X-Files: I Want to Believe, for example), but more often than not, they're the same hidden features available on regular DVD. As the Blu-Ray market grows, expect to see more exclusives.