Wacky Ideas for TV on DVD

Ray_Gootz · 12-03-2003, 12:53 AM

Okay folks here's the deal....I love old Tv shows but i love old Tv commercials too. One of my favorite tapes used to be this one night in 1987 that I recorded everything i watched one night from Ducktales to the News to Alf. It was fantastic. But my favorrite part of the tape was the commercials. face it we hate watching Alias and 24 and wading through commercials but 20 or 30 years form now the commericals will be the funniest thing on the tape. So here's my plan.

You take a se like Good Times or maybe saved by the bell. The set has all the epsidoes uncut. But then one epsiode you have 2 viewing methods. One where you watch it straight through and one mode where you watch it with commericals from 1975. I'm talking 1975 station breaks, news updates, Coke commercials, THE WORKS. Or if it's Saved by the bell then 1992 commercials. Whatever the sohw. I think it would be GREAT to relive the experince of watching Good Times like people did in 1975. Or Cheers in 1984. What do you guys think? Think of it similar to the drive-in experince most cult dvd's try to recreate.

Jesse Skeen · 12-03-2003, 01:53 AM

That's actually why I've been scouring thrift stores, flea markets, Ebay and other weird places for old Beta and VHS tapes- I've found a few interesting ones ranging from 1977 to 1984 (we got our first VCR in '85 right when TV went stereo, and I don't really consider anything after '83 "old") Any tape that looks old I pick up (VHS's are the easiest to tell their age, because their lengths used to be indicated by the letters "VK" instead of "T"- like the equivalent of T-120's used to be called VK-250.) It's been a crap shoot as some turn out to have nothing of value on them, others are heartbreaking to see that whoever taped them clumsily edited out the commercials, but the ones that are complete make it all worthwhile. My main motivation for buying a DVD recorder was to put all these old tapes onto disc so not only can I keep these from deteriorating, but also have easy access to my favorite old commercials by using chapter marks.
There have been a few good classic TV DVD releases with vintage commercials, including the set of the four Ed Sullivan shows that the Beatles appeared on. They're shown almost exactly as they were broadcast, though the absence of any show promos make me think they're not 100% complete. Nancy Sinatra's "Movin' With Nancy" special also has some groovy RC Cola commercials included.
It's really sad to see how low TV has sunk in recent years. I quit watching TV when they decided to keep network logos on the screen all the time; shows used to be shown without a single onscreen intrusion, and the networks were identified with a full-screen animated logo for a few seconds before the second program segment, which made a lot more impact than having it annoyingly stare you in the face through the whole show! The worst thing they would do to a show on the air was put voice-overs over the end credits, but now apparently they don't even run the real end credits at all- they just flash them quickly on half the screen while the other half runs promos for other shows that will be subject to the same vandalism. Ironically, TV is now so painful to watch that the onslaught of DVD releases of current shows makes it the only way to watch them- without the on-screen crap I'd probably be recording lots of current stuff on my DVD recorder, but as it is I haven't even bothered to hook the antenna up to it.

Chris_Morris · 12-03-2003, 05:05 AM

You may be interested in this:

Classic Commercials

but it is a Madacy release. I almost picked it up at Best Buy, but the Madacy quality trend gave me second thoughts.

Chris

MatthewA · 12-03-2003, 09:46 AM

Jesse, your habits are the same as mine. Too bad I've not found as plentiful a bounty as I'd like.

Jeff Reis · 12-03-2003, 09:58 AM

I have the Madacy Classic Commercials set, and while the quality is pretty horrendous at times, it's well worth picking up if you want to see vintage commercials. Almost 4 hours of stuff.

**HTF Ads**

Jim Beaver · 12-03-2003, 10:14 AM

The only commercials I want to see again are the Toilet Duck commercials. Those ruled and I really miss them.

Joshua Clinard · 12-03-2003, 10:28 AM

Those commercials are 50 years old! Why would you care if it's a little grainy?

Dane Marvin · 12-03-2003, 12:03 PM

I always wondered -- and maybe someone can help me out with this one -- if the brands that appear on TV Land "Retromercials" pay for that advertising time. If you recall, they only really show commercials for products that are still in existence (Life Cereal, Shake n' Bake, etc.) so it seems to me like they might be paying for the airtime, albeit at probably a discounted rate.

I wonder if this same principle can be applied to DVDs of classic TV shows. Perhaps a show like "WKRP in Cincinnati" could be released if "Retromercials" were included as a special feature on the disc... and the advertisers paid to have their ads placed there.

And I'll be the first to express this opinion (which is likely to be an upopular one): I wouldn't mind having these retromercials in the middle of the episodes themselves (no more than one commercial break per show) so long as the commercial break was sandwiched by chapter stops. Whatever it takes to get my shows on DVD!

JasonPW · 12-03-2003, 01:21 PM

I love this idea! And I too have tried to spot classic TV releases with original commercials. In addition to the "Ed Sullivan Beatles" and "Movin' With Nancy" release:

-4 volumes of "Howdy Doody" from Image are completely intact, w/commercials, station breaks and promos.

-the "Dick Van Dyke Show" sets have some very interesting commercials featuring the cast in character, plus a complete "Stump the Stars" episode with at least one commercial intact.

Any others?

Doc

Claude North · 12-03-2003, 08:58 PM

They weren't released this way on DVD, but MPI did release a few episodes of DARK SHADOWS complete with the original commericals on VHS. The way the show was produced was by taping it live and actually inserting the commercials into the masters during the taping, so all the episodes still have their original commercials intact!

Once at a DS convention I was present for a marathon screening of episodes with all the original commercials, including an amazing promo for a Tom Jones Christmas special featuring Tom singing "The 12 Days of Christmas" with new lyrics listing all the guest stars and attractions featured on his special.

The volume containing those episodes is volume 54 of the "Collectors Series" and is now available from MPI for only $5.98. (The Tom Jones ad is not on that tape, but the tape does feature a fun ad for Doan's Pills starring Arlene Francis.)