"The Andy Griffith Show: Complete First Season" -- A Personal Review - Page 2

Ah yes. I have not noticed that artifact. I have a Panasonic RP-91 DVD player hooked up to Tosh 65h80.

I will look closer at it again.

Peace,

DM

If you can't see it on your setup, consider yourself lucky! Don't go looking for it.

For me it's a case by case basis. If it's something I really want, like the Avengers or TDVDS, I can look past it. In my case, I rely on subtitles to understand the words more than to hear them. While a hearing aid can boost volume to acceptable levels it can't restore intelligibility to sounds that sometimes seem to run together. I suppose as I get older it'll be more of an issue than it is now.

For something that I'm on the fence about, like the upcoming re-re-reissued Twilight Zone set, the lack of captions/subtitles is a major "con" in the decision to purchase.

I read recently that captioning is considered to be one of the most "in demand" (and consequently higher paying) professions. With America aging and younger people blowing their eardrums out listening to loud music that's really not a surprise.

In Andy's case, it sounds like there might be some defective batches of discs out there. I'll post a note in the studio feedback forum to see if anyone from Paramount can shed any light on this.

Steve

Yes David, the episodes affected by that defect look like that when played normally, all the way through. Since the interlacing only shows on areas where movement is occuring, it doesn't look that extreme at all times, but it is always there to some degree. It looks even worse on the computer, pretty much unwatchable. The rest of the set doesn't look like this.

He nearly shot his fool foot off before I assured him I watched the episode on Christmas Eve.

Well I've been a TAGS fan for years and can share a good wealth of background knowledge on this I've picked up over the years. You're both RIGHT and wrong. In the original opening credits Eleanor Donahue WAS credited and I think it was on-screen as well. However this practice of having names was not always followed. I have about 10 episodes of TAGS that came from original broadcast prints and several of them do NOT have any names, they just have the voiceovers. How all this mess came about goes something like this:

When the series was still running it went into re-runs with new credits that said "Andy of Mayberry" so those watching didn't mix new shows up with the re-runs. Back in the late 1980's and early '90's Viacom remastered TAGS on videotape for syndication, "chopping" out 3-4 minutes of footage to add room for commercials. When this was done it has been rumored that they just "slapped" the credits for one episode on an entire season, at least at the beginning. I've never heard of a firm explanation for this, but I"m betting some of the original opening credits were "lost" when the Andy of Mayberry re-runs were created.

Up until a year or so ago WFMY-TV (Greensboro) aired what I believe was the most complete version of TAGS available over the air. They signed on before the "syndication package" era so they received a full library of films, all 249 episodes. Rather than buy Viacom's new & improved "cut" video set they simply transferred their films to broadcast videotape themselves, then made their own edits. A person there once told me that Viacom hadn't handled the original negatives very well and that a great deal had been "lost".

As many of you know TV Land runs different than most channels in that they get uncut "master" tapes of shows from the distributors, then do their own "editing" to produce the version they air on their station. When they picked up TAGS in 2000 Viacom struck new 35mm prints for them & Columbia House to use. I've always maintained that they "reconstructed" the opening credits for these since the typestyle looked too "clean" and computer like for me.

My guess is that is what you're seeing on these DVDs.. I'll take a look tomorrow & see though, I didn't pay it any attention

Well, he's not going to get his way, so don't worry about it.

He needs to be able to handle inconsistencies.

"I Love Lucy" fans have known for years that Ethel had three different middle names at three different times: Roberta, Louise and Mae. It's just something you have to learn to live with.

About Barney being Andy's cousin, which was only mentioned in Barney's first episode -- it helps to explain why Andy hired, and put up with, such a bumbling deputy.

However, he can't be Andy's first cousin on his father's side; otherwise Aunt Bee would be his aunt, too, and they never even implied she was (it's irrelevant that he called her "Aunt Bee;" almost everyone did.)

So he's Andy's cousin on his mother's side, which means either that Andy's mother's maiden name was Fife, or that Andy's mother had a sister who married a man named Fife.

I need to get a life.

Well all I can say, is that they'd better go back on Bewitched and digitally make sure it's the same actor for Darren throughout the entire series. And while they're at it, they should better fix The Godfather. DeNiro needs to replace all those scenes where they have Brando, cause it's just inconsistent with Part 2. And while we're at it, how about fixing all those Bond films. I mean Bond in Live & Let Die looks nothing like Bond in From Russia With Love or Goldeneye. The inconsistencies are just pathetic.

And they might as well remove Oliver from the last few episodes of the Brady Bunch! Hmm. I think even the purists might go along with that one!

Though, to be honest, I myself don't blame Oliver as much as the show simply being in decline at that point.

Yeah, lets get rid of Oliver.

And speaking of the Brady Bunch, that attic apparently grew taller since in an early season it was only 3 feet tall and Greg couldn't put a room up there, that's why he ended up in the den. So I guess Mike did some reno and they never told us.

And the Huxtable family had only four children but a fifth oldest child magically appeared.

And children from other tv shows disappeared without the family even noticing. Chuck from Happy Days, Judy from Family Matters, a couple of Torkelson children, Lucy's kids, Doris Day's kids. It's scary to think about where those children all went.

And then there were those odd children that grew five years while the other people only aged one year. Growing Pains, Fresh Prince and Family Ties all had these twilight zone events. Or maybe it's Children of the Corn.

We won't even think about the plastic surgery that Becky Conner must have gone through and then went through again. Or the fact that Aunt Vivian from Fresh Prince shrunk several inches. Or that Joey Tribiani's sisters have had first name changes.

Yeah, all these things have got to be fixed. They're really bugging me.

Leave It to Beaver fooled around with Wally and Beaver's ages the last year of the series.

The fifth season, Beaver was in sixth grade. The next year, he was in eighth grade, and graduating elementary school when Wally graduated high school.

Now, we know Beaver didn't skip a grade because he was smart. If anything, it's a miracle he wasn't held back a few years.

But Wally shouldn't have been graduating from high school that year, anyway -- the year before he was a senior in high school, and the sixth season he still was!

Again, Wally would be the last guy to flunk and be held back. So, they kept him there so the show could go on without him going off to college.

And I repeat -- I better get a life, and soon!

Don't forget to eliminate "Chuck" from the Cunningham clan!

No, no, no! You don't eliminate him, you digitally add him to all the later seasons.

My mistake!

Well David VP, if the TAGS scheduling info you quote from a fan at the DVDTalk website is correct, I'll be happy. I can definitely live with that type of output for the show!!

Gary "at least it looks like Paramount is committed to getting TAGS out in somewhat of a fast-tracked way - and that is great news" O.

It is a 5 disc set. It comes in 2 double thin paks and one single. The discs are single sided.

The sponsor spots are great. I never knew Post Toasties were so goo-ood.

My review of the set will be up next week, but there is nothing to be concerned about with this set. Paramount has done another great job.