that’s what it was! compression. i was going to say “adding a limiter” but went with normalizing instead. but i do enjoy dynamics, don’t get me wrong. at 3 pm, when i don’t have to worry about idiots banging on my door (which has happened) i crank it up and just let it ride, and let the sound envelope me. but at night, it’s another issue. (i bought Tron: Legacy this weekend, and in DTS-MA 7.1 it was pretty insane how much i was owning the volume remote. i had already seen it, so i knew what was going on. but the wife hadn’t yet, so i was trying to make sure she heard the dialogue and could follow, and not getting us evicted.)
basically just a tongue in cheek rant, but it would be cool if the players or receivers had a built in filter for that if you so chose, depending on your environment. just flip the switch.