Warning: ALF Season 1 cut!

I thought this was freedom of speech. And it isn't as if you people haven't made any negative backtalk about this here event.

Can anyone on this board explain logically and rationally, Lion's Gate's inexcusable actions?

Chris, it's not what you say, it's how you say it. There are better ways to phrase your comments. There's constructive remarks, and then there's going off in a way that the person (or company) ignores what you say because of how you say it.

Gord

Kind of OT, but freedom of speech means the freedom to say what you want, not the freedom not to be criticized. I can say what I want, and under freedom of speech, I cannot be stopped or put in jail for saying what I want. But other people, exercising their rights, can tell me to shut up. Or they can ask me to leave. Or whatever. That's all part of rights and freedoms.

Back on-topic, this truly stinks and has transformed a DVD set I was considering buying (ALF was surprisingly witty, and many of its people went on to do The Simpsons, including writers Al Jean and Mike Reiss and composer Alf Clausen) into a must-not-buy.

I'm trying to figure why Lion's Gate would do something so rude. The money they use in producing the dvd can be made up in sales.

They gave us an excuse... not an explanation.

Freedom of speech has its limits -- when you start threatening to do violence, you're crossing over from free speech into criminality. There is no call for that kind of language.

Can I logically & rationally explain their actions? Sure. They are trying to make a profit. That's what every company does; that's the purpose of their existence. There is nothing inherently evil about that. So, when faced with the options of using the existing materials, or spending tens-to-hundreds-of thousands of dollars to restore the the original materials, they chose not to spend the money. They probably thought that no one would care all that much about it. Or, there was miscommunication--it's possible that the decision was made without all of the information permeating to all of the appropriate levels of the companies involved.

I'm not saying that they accidentally used the wrong masters, like A&E did with the first go at the Nero Wolfe dvd. Just that they didn't really understand what they were doing, or what a backlash it would create. They've only done a handful of tv-on-dvd titles, and don't yet have the experience to understand what their customers require. Maybe all of the returns, griping, and bad reviews will create some changes.

Gord, does this mean you will put the original story back on TVSHOWSONDVD.COM?? Some of the site's visitors who aren't aware of this thread may still be waiting for a "better" explanation (which doesn't look like is going to happen).

IMHO everyone going to your site should be aware of what's going on.

The easy way to address this is to involve some of the fanbase during the conceptual development phase of the sets. All these shows have some sort of fan club, or some website run by a fan somewhere. All they have to do is put out a few feelers to find out what the fans want in these sets. Obviously, fans will ask for the moon and you can't always give it to them, but things like "unedited, original episodes" and "broadcast order" should be important and obvious feedback.

Piss off the fanbase, and you lose most of your sales. Why anyone would do this purposely is beyond me, but it seems to happen all the time. Why? Because no one asks the fanbase what they want, or what their reaction would be to this decision or that.

If you ask, "what if we use the syndicated episodes instead of original broadcast episodes," and the flamethrowers come out, then you've learned an important piece of information. Use it.

Obviously, in this case, LGE thought they could just port over the syndicated masters of an assumed-to-be mostly forgotten 1980's sitcom and hopefully sell enough copies to make a few bucks. Instead, they ran face-first into a buzzsaw. I doubt they counted on such a rabid fanbase to still be in existence nearly 20 years later. Had they done the tiniest bit of research on the fanbase, they would have known better.

I'd like to try and get ahold of Paul Fusco and see if he's aware what versions of the episodes were used on the set. Lions Gate suggests that he knows, but I'm not sure if I believe that.

I guess fans were screwed no matter what - nice-looking syndication prints, or poorer broadcast prints. I don't know what the lesser evil is. Companies that license the material for release are often under tighter budgets since they have to pay the original rights holder as well as put the set together. I think it's doubtful Lions Gate could have released nice-looking versions of the broadcast episodes since they wouldn't have the money in the budget to restore the material.

Let's face it, ALF was never going to be a huge seller on DVD, but Lions Gate seems to have killed future sets by releasing a poor set the first time.

Gord

I have a very strong opinion that complete prints, no matter the condition, are always the lesser evil. Part of this is personal preference: the major reason I buy shows on DVD is to get them free of syndication cuts, which often remove excellent material and screw up pacing and structure. (Even "throwaway" bits contribute to the pacing of an episode.) The other is more general: DVD is becoming the form in which older shows are "preserved"; a series on DVD is sort of in its definitive form for years to come. (Not forever, but certainly for quite some time that's where people will look when they want to get to know a series.) Therefore the episodes should be preserved in their original form, as broadcast, not as chopped up for extra commercials in syndication. The superior quality of a syndication print can't begin to make up for the blow to the show's integrity caused by syndication cutting. And while there's some excuse for cutting in syndication (commercials, commercials) there's none at all on DVD.

That's just a personal opinion, of course, but I suspect others feel similarly.

I would agree with Jaime. Uncut releases, even if poorer picture quality, over better looking cut releases.

What is the point though of having them on DVD over VHS if the picture quality isn't there?


Paul

You see why I think Lion's Gate is stupid? I mean, utterly stupid?

Because an entire season of something like Buffy would require 11 video tapes, as opposed to 6 small discs.

This makes the price high. TV shows are big sellers on DVD because you can finally have a whole season for an affordable price.

VHS does take up more room than DVD, but I want the best picture quality possible, especially with releases from over the last twenty five years.

While I am disappointed they cut these episodes up, I would be just as disappointed if they just threw these episodes on DVD complete without doing any work on it. A big part of the reason you get a DVD instead of VHS is for the visual experience. I am not a diehard fan of Alf who watched each episodes a million times and I doubt most people in this thread are. Most casual fans of a TV show have no idea what has been cut having not watched this show in over a decade.

Paul

Here are just some of thoughts on the ALF fiasco:

1. Even if the uncut broadcast prints didn't look as good as the syndication prints, how bad is "not as good" quality? In other words, if they had used the uncut prints, would they be *that* poor in quality? Unless the video masters have started to deteriorate or have been damaged, I can't imagine that those video masters look worse than an off-air VHS tape made in the 80's of the show.

2. I haven't seen the Canadian "ALF Files" DVD, but I've read comments that suggest A) That DVD does not have edited episodes and B) The video quality is as good or better than the Lions Gate Season 1 boxed set. So something strange is going on there.

3. I do think that if Lions Gate had released the inferior quality prints of the show, people would have just been complaining about that instead, although of course not nearly as strongly. And if Lions Gate had answered emails about the iffy video quality of the DVD set by saying that the alternative was to use better looking but edited prints, people would have just complained that Lions Gate should have just spent more money on remastering, etc. Lions Gate would counter that then the cost of the set would have gone up for consumers. Then again, consumers would probably be willing to pay a few more bucks to get uncut and good looking episodes. I'm not saying Lions Gate is or would be right on any of this at all, but this sort of thing does give them room to try the "damed if we do, damned if we don't" excuse.

4. I think in some (relatively rare) cases, there is something to be said for a release being "better than nothing." If ultimately there was and is absolutely ZERO chance that Lions Gate could or would have released the season set with the uncut episodes either because they weren't given the source materials or were too cheap or lazy to do so, if there was/is ZERO chance they would have done the set the right way, perhaps the set they released is better than nothing. Sure, hardcore ALF fans might have VHS copies of the whole series. But there are many fans of the show who just haven't seen it in years, don't have VHS copies of the show, and would be happy with the current DVD set and/or wouldn't even notice the syndication cuts. I watched ALF way back when, but I haven't seen it in years and apart from maybe a few old videotapes stored away here and there, I don't have the shows on VHS taped off the air. I probably would not have noticed the syndication cuts simply because I haven't seen the show in so long. I'd really like to see the show again, so now I have no idea what to do. The set is really cheap and if I watched it I probably wouldn't be able to tell you what was cut out of the episodes. Yet, I'm 100% behind doing these sets right. I've seen every episode of "The Simpsons" a million times. I always notice the syndication cuts on TV airings, and would probably not buy the seasons sets of the show if they used the edited versions. In any event, if Lions Gate actually could have been peruaded or somehow been made to do the set right in the first place, I can see a point in arguing against the set. If, however, they never would have done it right and otherwise would not have even released the set, this set is "better than nothing." And I would say the same thing goes for boycotting the set. If boycotting the set actually would help to change anything, I think I would be for it in most cases. If, however, all boycotting the set ends up doing is souring Lions Gate on the idea of any more ALF releases, obviously boycotting would not be desirable. Also obvious is the fact that we would and will never know whether Lions Gate would have done the set right under any circumstances (we know they probably could have, but not whether they would have), and we also may never know whether boycotting helped. I suppose if they fix the problems, then boycotting may have worked!

5. The biggest tragedy of all about this debacle may end up being that Lions Gate will just cancel releasing any more ALF DVD's because of it just being a hassle and/or the low sales and high rates of returns on Season 1.

6. Chances of Lions Gate or any company ever actually recalling and reissuing a whole season set of a show, ALF Season One or otherwise: Pretty close to zero.

7. Chances of Lions Gate fixing this problem with Season 2 of ALF: I'd say pretty fair, if they release anymore seasons.

8. Chances that it will bug fans forever if they have every other season of ALF uncut but Season 1 in cut form: Very high, and understandably so.

(thinking) Chris L, Chris L, Chris L, I know that name. Chris - Aren't you that guy that was so offensive on a thread about MASH that you had to apologise to us?

It's a shame you never learned from that experience. Politeness is a virtue. Be careful how you choose to use your free speech or else people will use their freedom of thought to dismiss you as an irrational nut and pay no attention to you.

Yelling "Get with it" to people at Lions Gate is not going to come across as reasonable. Threatening violence is not a appropriate response to an edited DVD, and if you really think it is, then you've got bigger problems than edited episodes of ALF. Loking through your history of posts, this seems to be a fairly regular pattern - a frightening amount of anger expressed quite frequently over relatively minor problems.

I mean, how would you like it if I said something along the lines of:
Chris is UTTERLY STUPID. It's people like him that make you think.. "I need to buy a gun."
It's really not nice, it's not helpful, it does not contribute to the nice environment that we enjoy at the HTF. SO don't say it.

I'm not claiming to be perfect - there have been times when I have said things here in the HTF in an emotional way that I perhaps would have reconsidered had I stopped to think about it. But hopefully, for me, it's an exception. For you, it seems to be the rule.

Suffice it to say that I am very seriously considering making you the first person I add to my ignore list. I don't want to do it - when I first heard of the Ignore list, I actually promised myself I would not use it, as I would not want to miss any valuable contributions to a discussion. But, if all you are capable of is anger and bile expressed in an unreasonable manner, then I would be confident that I would not miss much by ignoring you.

I agree. It kills me to watch the Golden Girls on lifetime because the cuts are so jarring. Plus I have seen these episodes so many times that I can usually tell what is cut and sometimes it does affect the plot. Also the cut bits are usually very funny. The DVD release of this show better be unct!

Of course when a company is faced with the choice between faded broadcast prints and better syndication prints, what they're supposed to do is take the syndication prints and edit in the missing scenes from the broadcast prints (which means that some scenes look better than others, but at least everything's there). I'm pretty sure this has been done in some other cases, and of course with old movies, "lost" scenes are often spliced in from other sources.

If Lion's Gate was not willing to put in the work/expense of editing in the missing scenes, then they should have either dropped the idea until such time as the show could be done right, or they should have used the broadcast prints. Because with a bad print, you can sort of imagine what it should look like -- but with an incomplete print, you can't use your imagination to conjure up the scenes that are not there.

Someone else mentioned that Lions Gate is new in the TV on DVD buisness. I didn't think about this option. But, a question. Have they released any other shows on DVD that have syndicated cuts besides Alf?

As I stated before, they where going to do the same with Turtles, untill I started a fan campaign to change their mind. Wether or not that had any effect, I'll never know, but they DID eventually wind up releasing the nucut eps because the writer of the series stuck up for fans saying they'd be in an uproar if they didn't.

Apparently Lions Gate never learned their lesson from that matter..because they did it again with Alf, and we ARE in an uproar.

Hey Gord, is it possible to find someone at lions gate willing to setup a voice mail for fans of TV shows they own? When word comes down that they once again plan to use edited sets for a show they own, fans can call in and politley complain and Lions Gate can do it right the first time with all the feedback they got before the set is even released..

Just an idea..

good points towards chris by matthew.


chris, criticism is fine as long as you can make it constructive.

destructive criticism is never a good thing.

we know that lions gate is making a bad decision witth this release.
so instead of calling them a bunch of dummies continually, we need to figure out how to get these released the right way.

That was me. I did a search over at TVShowsOnDVD and it came up with these shows . The only one I own is Dead Zone, which is stellar. But that one clearly has a huge amount of involvement from the show's producers. So, my impression is that unless Lion's Gate has someone from the show working on the release, in a position of authority, they make bad decisions and don't have quality control.

Does anyone know why I used the vulgar slang "Utterly Stupid"?

I'm not saying I'm right in saying it, and apparently that opinion has been expressed by a number of you, and for that I am sorry. But, the fact remains that the edited episode exist on DVD. And apparently Lion's Gate doesn't care.

Any person in their right frame of mind would've thought... "okay, we're going to bring ALF to DVD... we're going to go get the unsyndicated versions and release them to DVD."

It's elementary thinking people. I'm not trying to sound like Archie Bunker on this, but apprently by the reaction of many people, I do.

Ever heard of the term "the customer's always right"?

Gord, I wish you well if you decide to try and get ahold of Fusco through one set of means or another to try and find out his thoughts on the subject. I'd really be curious to find out once and for all where he stands on this issue and if he even knew this was how the set was going to be released before hand.


Ok, the rest of this post deals with my thoughts on the free speech issue, so if you don't care stop reading...

now


Mara, that was a perfectly logical reason you put forth here. The point that I want to make is that for certain people, because they don't like the reason for the decision they dismiss it as not being logical. I personally don't like the reasoning behind what they did, and I wish they had gone the other way, complete episodes is most important to me on DVD, but I don't start ranting and raving and calling them stupid or illogical. It is possible for people to make decisions that we don't like based on logic and reasoning, and that's why I was pleased when Mara did in fact come up with a logical reason.

On freedom of speech, this just can't come up without me wanting to touch on it from years of debate. As Gord said, I may have the ability to write an email to Lions Gate and rip them to shreds and cuss up and down and what have you, but it will be filed in to the virtual trash can before it is read to its conclusion. You want to affect change but it is hard to affect change when everyone dismisses you as a ranting juvinile or psycho or whatever. Using a bunch of swear words exclamation points or tough talk isn't going to make the company think you're any more serious than a polite letter.
Freedom of speech is not limitless, I can not say things that may put other people in harms way, which is why I do not have the right to walk in to a crowded movie theater and yell fire, simply because I think it would be a funny prank. Its like the old saying, I can stand around swinging my fist in the air, and nobody can stop me, but my freedom to swing my fist ends at your nose. The same is also true of speech. Vulgar rants have the same impact as not speaking at all.

MatthewLouwrens makes some good points in his post, in general terms not just specifically for one person. I hate to pick on Chris, but I remember his first few posts regarding how Columbia was a messed up company for how they handeled All in the Family, not doing things like buying ad time for it during the superbowl. He was so convinced that Columbia was screwing up for how they handled it, and not marketing it better until some rough estimations were given as to how well these shows generally sell...then it was a different story and all of a sudden Columbia wasn't as stupid. The point is that often this type of ranting talk comes about as a result of going with your emotions, and every now and again it is expressed before one knows the full story. After one hears the full story, again you may not like the full story but still ranting and being vulgar and stuff like that isn't the best way to handle it.

Hey, hey, hey.... Lion's Gate is a lot worse than Columbia TriStar... they released syndicated cuts of a tv show that is adored still today by millions of fans.

First I find myself discussing about ALF and now I find myself trying to defend myself for people who apparently would dismiss any action done by a production compnay because they obviously "have enough wisdom and sage advice to know what they're doing"

The most intelligent of people can be ignorant.

I was talking to a person the other day about the third season of All in the Family. Guess what he said?

"I didn't even know the first season was out on DVD."

Advertising reaches a wider audience.

Chris, you fail to understand that these companies only have so much money to spend on advertising. They could triple their advertising budget, but that wouldn't mean that they would triple their sales. Reaching a wider audience doesn't mean that you're going to increase sales.

I'd love to find some way to create a "TV-DVD" simulation. You'd be given a budget for the project and have to allocate funds for clearing music, mastering, menus, special features and advertising. At the end it would spit out the number of sets sold. Obviously it would be difficult to do, but I'm sure it would open people's eyes up to the reality of TV-on-DVD.

Chris, let me ask you a question: How much advertising have you seen for "Sanford and Son"? would you say it's equal to "All in the Family"? Maybe greater, or less?

Gord

The success of Sanford and Son exceeding that of the success of All in the Family stuns me. First off, Sanford and Son was never as popular as All in the Family. It lasted for only 5 seasons, am I right?

And most of TV-DVDs today do not have special features, so I guess I just saved some money on that budget there in that "TV-DVD" simulator there, didn't I Gord?

I don't know where to find out the sales of a show Gord, and sometimes companies don't care about the sales of a show. Look at the Dick Van Dyke Show. All 5 seasons were released rather quickly.

As I've said before, smaller companies are happier with selling fewer copies. They can afford to release smaller sets and make less money on them. Selling 30,000 sets might make Image happy, but the bigger companies need to sell more. You find rare examples of certain release patterns and try and portray that as the rule, not the exception.

Saying that most TV-DVDs don't contain extras is wrong. I don't know why you have such a pessimistic attitude towards TV-DVDs. Please do some research before you spew out incorrect facts.

If you accept that "Sanford and Son" outsells "All in the Family," then you must also accept that the ratings of a show when it was on the air doesn't always translate into sales on DVD. This is why a hit during broadcast can become a failure on DVD, and a less-popular broadcast show can bring in big numbers on DVD. The most popular TV-DVD set this year is "Chapelle's Show: Season 1." That show isn't anywhere close to being one of the most popular shows in the ratings. I expect that the popularity of "Seinfeld" will translate into strong sales of the DVD set.

Chris, I keep trying to educate you because I have hopes that one day your posts won't be as negative as they are today. You'll have more knowledge of the industry and how it's run so your posts will come from a more informed position.

Gord

Firstly, you people keep mentioning Alf "prints". There's no prints. It wasn't a filmed show, it was videotaped. Prints refers to film. The show was most likely shot and mastered on 1-inch videotape, the common format at that time. Also a dead format. At some point the tapes were remastered for syndication to Beta SP, which is when the cuts were made. I'm sure that these are the tapes Lion's Gate used.
Secondly, I spoke with someone who knows Paul Fusco and he knew all about the release and what tapes were being used as he was involved with the release. This was no ambush that was sprung on him. He had as much to do with this as anyone.
Bottom line is this. 99% of the people out there are morons. They don't know from cut, uncut, whatever. You don't believe me, go ask people that are not on this board. The general public. Ask them if they even know that syndicated reruns are edited. Also, don't ever be under the impression that these companies care about anything other than how much money they can make on a product. These shows mean no more to them than if they were selling horse manure. On a show that will sell tens of thousands of copies, a handful of complainers on a board like this doesn't amount to much in their eyes.

Corporate thinking:

Cost of transfering from original tapes: $5,000
Lost sales due to using wrong tapes: $1,000

Profit made by using what's available: $4,000

Mark's comments about the bottom line are generally true of the marketing departments of some of these DVD companies. The people who actually do the production and assemble the contents of DVDs usually care much more about the shows. They often are fans or know what fans want. Unfortunately, as we have seen, the marketing people at many of these companies that continually release subpar DVDs usually get their way, not the production folks. And at some smaller companies, the marketing and production people are the same.

Well, it's easy for me, Casey - I work for a dvd distributor, so I'm used to seeing it from both sides. I can understand how a decision like this was made because I've been on the sidelines for similar situations. But both the professional & the fan-girl sides of my brain agree that this was a bad, bad choice. And I think the production company is as much to blame as Lion's Gate--they should have made the cost of restoration an issue at the contractual stage of the deal. They should have been willing to take a hit in the short-term profit in exchange for the long-term value of restoration. I'm really curious to hear more from the Fusco side of things.