Is the b&w era of TV on DVD slowly coming to an end? (3 Viewers)

[Flashgear]

Thanks Peter, I'll check out that link...I do see your rationale in regard to some similarities between Yancy Derringer and the later Wild, Wild West...that hadn't occurred to me as the similarities to Maverick were so obvious...sharing in common the writers Coles Trapnell and Richard Sale, and being in coincidental production with Maverick's season 2, albeit at different studios...I think Yancy Derringer is every bit the equal of the best of Maverick, which in my opinion, is very high praise indeed...the Christmas episode is very good as you say...and I was very, very surprised at the strong storyline continuity, pretty unusual to this degree in '50s and even '60s TV...you do come to love the recurring characters like Jody (Richard Devon), Coco Lasalle (Beverly Garland), The Jailer (Larry Blake), Colorado Charlie (Kelly Thordsen), Goldy (Patricia Blair), Miss Mandarin (Lisa Lu)...and Desilu provided a high standard of production values in set design, FX and stock footage used is impressive...and the stunts! You wonder how Jock Mahoney stood up to the abuse, although it's obvious the guy was an athlete and talented stuntman to begin with...why they allowed him to do all that while carrying the show as the lead is beyond me...but that was a different world back then, not ruled by lawyers as we are now...I noticed that stuntman Hal Needham worked on the show and appeared as a uncredited extra in several episodes...I've checked a number of fight scenes and other stunts via freeze frame and slow-mo, and I cannot detect any substitutions for Ironman Jock Mahoney in those sequences...like yourself, Bob, Lou, Matt and others, I wish it had run at least another season...Bob mentioned that Mahoney, Desilu and CBS couldn't come to terms for season 2...I think if they had, Yancy Derringer would have had to move to another night, as Real McCoys was a top 10 show, sometimes top 5, and the growing scandal surrounding the rigged game show Twenty-One and Charles Van Doren's notoriety and ruination must have drawn eyeballs to that show also...big news in 1958...

 

[BobO'Link]

With Walmart *selling out* regularly, both online and in store, of their exclusive westerns from Shout!/Timeless you'd think other studios would take notice and try to get some of these older programs we all seem to be asking for into distribution.

I read on this forum this morning that WM had S2 of Death Valley Days in store for $12 (it was $13 here) so I went by just before noon and got a copy at the only local store with stock. I checked a few minutes ago (~ 5 hours later) and they are now sold out - both in store (anywhere within 100 miles) and online. S1 has been in/out of stock several times in the past few weeks. I finally caught it in stock at a time when I could order a copy. If these weren't selling out online I'd say the primary reason locally for them selling out so quickly is the area - Mid-South, which seems tailor made for these 50s/60s westerns and family shows.

It really makes me curious about the actual number of copies they're selling.

I'm constantly amazed at what we're getting from Timeless considering most of us thought them being purchased by Shout! meant the end of the brand and those seemingly more niche titles they offer.

 

[LouA]

With Walmart *selling out* regularly, both online and in store, of their exclusive westerns from Shout!/Timeless you'd think other studios would take notice and try to get some of these older programs we all seem to be asking for into distribution.

I read on this forum this morning that WM had S2 of Death Valley Days in store for $12 (it was $13 here) so I went by just before noon and got a copy at the only local store with stock. I checked a few minutes ago (~ 5 hours later) and they are now sold out - both in store (anywhere within 100 miles) and online. S1 has been in/out of stock several times in the past few weeks. I finally caught it in stock at a time when I could order a copy. If these weren't selling out online I'd say the primary reason locally for them selling out so quickly is the area - Mid-South, which seems tailor made for these 50s/60s westerns and family shows.

It really makes me curious about the actual number of copies they're selling.

I'm constantly amazed at what we're getting from Timeless considering most of us thought them being purchased by Shout! meant the end of the brand and those seemingly more niche titles they offer.

I don't think these Timeless /Walmart titles sell a real lot , so it's important to buy these DVD sets if you like a show . For $12-15 you really can't go wrong on shows like the Loner , Custer , My Friend Flicka, or Death Valley Days . Remember , not too long ago Timeless / Walmarts gave us the complete Tombstone Territory . They seem to be activeagain , so let's hope it continues, and let's support these releases and maybe we'll see more things like Tombstone .

 

[ChrisALM]

When I picked up the Death Valley Days Season 2 set at my local Walmart, there were 4 copies left after I bought my copy. I looked for other Timeless sets and the only ones there were The Loner (3 copies) and Custer (4 copies).

It's hard to know how well these are selling, but we have had a nice little stretch of releases and I hope they continue.

 

[Darby67]

I'm picking up my copy of Shout's Daniel Boone Season One: Collector's Edition today at Walmart (Site to Store)...finally!

 

[maskedmala]

I think we can change the title to: The b&w era of TV on DVD is really dead.

Fortunately we can see many episodes of vintage TV series on YouTube (far from being good quality recording but...), adventures series like: Adventures in Paradise, Hong Kong, San Francisco Beat, I Led 3 Lives, The Man Called X, Adventures of the Falcon and also some sitcoms like: Broadside, The Bill Dana Show, The Adventures of Hiram Holliday, I Married Joan and many more.

Being realistic, there's no interest in releasing 50's and early 60's TV shows from companies.

 

[Frank Soyke]

Sad but true. So much great stuff still out there. Damn shame... And you can add the late 60s and 70s to the list of stuff that is pretty much dead now too.

 

[Jack P]

But for that unfinished business with "Burke's Law" I could be more accepting of this development (along with "Alfred Hitchcock Presents")

 

[Gary OS]

But for season sets of The Adventures of Ozzie & Harriet (preferably all fourteen seasons), I'd feel a lot better too, Jack. By far my holy grail of unreleased TV shows.

Gary "so sad to see the question in the thread title now become a statement of fact" O.

 

[Jack P]

It was a good run while it lasted. Considering how the MOST optimum time for shows of that era would have been if DVD technology had been available in the 1980s, that we got as high a volume from this era as we did (and until very recently there have been a higher volume of shorter-run B/W titles than say, short-run 1970s shows. That's starting to change but for a long time it was not so) is itself remarkable.

A few random things may still trickle out, but I am for the most part content with what I have to watch and if I have to settle for some subpar transfers on YT to sample a few other titles, so be it. I've had to do that many times when it comes to discovering radio shows of the 40s (where sometimes only poor edited copies of a title are all that exist), and often when I get a vintage sports broadcast it won't be "uncut" or the most pristine sound and video. So long as I have enough TV from the overall mid-50s to early 80s period to let me shut out today's garbage with no regrets, that's more than enough.

 

[Regulus]

So long as I have enough TV from the overall mid-50s to early 80s period to let me shut out today's garbage with no regrets, that's more than enough.

Ditto here. Just wait till Friday. It will be the tenth anniversary of the incident that led me to no longer watch "Appointment TV".

 

[FanCollector]

OK...I give up. What aired 9/30/06?

 

[jcroy]

OK...I give up. What aired 9/30/06?

On Saturday 30, September 2006, there wasn't much on during primetime.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2006–07_United_States_network_television_schedule

- 48 Hours Mystery
- Saturday Night Football
- Dateline Saturday Night
- COPS
- America's Most Wanted
- (reruns) ....

 

[jcroy]

On Friday 29, September 2006 primetime:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2006–07_United_States_network_television_schedule

- Numb3rs
- Law & Order
- 20/20
- Ghost Whisperer
- Men In Trees
- Close To Home
- (reruns) + reality shows ...

 

[phenri]

B&W TV is as close to being dead as ever before. I think WB will sneak in a few more, like season 2 of the Eleventh Hour and Colt .45. If Shout! does not release any more of the Defenders, then they are most likely finished as well. Sad times are here.

 

[Neil Brock]

The last black and white shows aired during the 1965-66 season, which is now 50 years ago. So basically we are talking about series that people who would remember them are at least 60 or more years old. Not exactly the prime market for sales of this nature. Excepting the extreme minority of the handful of people who enjoy TV shows that are before their time (and don't go by a forum such as this), there is just not enough of a buying market to sustain these releases anymore. The above poster is right in that Warner will still throw us a few more titles over time, but anything else, if it was going to come out, would have already.

 

[Pathfiner]

so if you apply that logic to music then we should expect ALL music made before 1965-66 to be deleted at once and never re-issued...as obviously there's no worthwhile cost effective market for anything that old outside a few people of that age group - yes ?

while the same applies re old works of art too....

if everything is seen purely in a monetary returns angle only NOTHING would ever be done, as it could never be guaranteed to prove 'cost effective'

 

[BobO'Link]

^Yes, but most pre-1965 music *has* been "deleted." Just try to find some playing somewhere (other than my house/car). There are a *few* from certain artists which get semi-regular use in select movies but it's pretty rare. What's left is mostly "best of 19xx" type releases. Without doing any research on the subject I'd say the largest bulk of music resales of older material comes from product released from ~1968-1980 and even *that* is generally from a very select and rather small, compared to the output of those years, group of artists.

Think about it... When's the last time you heard any of these on the radio?

Early Bob Dylan
Early Beatles
Early Rolling Stones
Elvis Presley
Marvin Gay
Ray Charles
The Temptations
The Supremes
Cream
The Righteous Brothers
The Byrds
Tommy James and the Shondells
CCR
Early Pink Floyd
Early David Bowie
Simon & Garfunkel
Aretha Franklin
The Mamas & The Papas
Jefferson Airplane (well... other than "White Rabbit")
The Moody Blues
King Crimson (OK... so they never got any AM play but did get respectable FM airings)
Emerson, Lake and Palmer
Uriah Heep
Blue Oyster Cult

And many, many more...

Sure, you can purchase albums of all of these but just how many people under the age of ~30 actually know anything by them or could name any of their songs? I'd bet most have never purchased anything released before ~1980 if not more like ~1990.

 

[Jack P]

Never mind those musicians. What about those who favor the era of the "Great American Songbook?" and the "Make Believe Ballroom" sound that WNEW Radio in New York used to be the home of in the 1980s? Or the "beautiful music" easy listening formats? And unless you live in a major city like New York with a tax-funded station like WQXR, good luck looking for a classical station.

 

[BobO'Link]

^Exactly. The older it is the harder it is to find anywhere but at home. My music library, like my video library, goes back to the beginnings of recorded music with lots of genres. I don't even think the local college station airs "easy listening" or classical any longer (I quit keeping up with their format changes when I graduated college and was no longer employed at the station - I programmed most of the classical music while I was there). I don't think I've *ever* heard material from the "Great American Songbook" era on the radio. Where I grew up it was either country or pop with little else from which to choose. I got my exposure to those works from watching classic films from that era. Of course that meant what I heard was fairly limited - just like with today's films and the music they include.

It's no different with older TVonDVD and movies as well. I have a mid-20 year old co-worker who's seen only a handful of films made before 1980 and formerly avoided any BW film. That changed when I started loaning her certain films from my library insisting she give them a chance. I made a believer and she no longer avoids BW or "old" films because they're "old" or in BW. I'm sure she's seen *some* "classic" 60s BW TV but we've just never discussed that much.