The Fugitive: Season 3 Volume 1 - Page 6

If I were a betting man, I would unfortunately say those sound a lot like Heyes because of their high blasting level.

You think they would have done a better job with the soiund mixing.

This doesnt sound good.  Guess it was too much to hope for.  Sounds like Im out.

It is unquestionable that what EdG posted is replacement music. That means I'm finished with "The Fugitive." In a way, there is a sense of relief. Now that I know CBS ruined the show again, I can concern myself with other things. CBS is a crew of goons. I will never buy anything released by this company again.

Edited by jquirk - 10/26/09 at 10:47am

This makes me absolutely sick.

 

As of this writing, Roy Braverman is officially the man responsible for destroying this show, and he will not be forgiven for it. CBS made the biggest mistake ever in hiring this loser.

 

To CBS: It's UNDERSCORE. There are no licensing issues associated with that type of music. It was a work for hire and was contracted specifically for the show. This reeks of some moron who doesn't know any better thinking there could be a problem where none existed and deciding to take every bit of music out because they were afraid they had no paperwork and someone could sue them later.

 

Bottom line, CBS sucks. The Fugitive is not even remotely worthy of them. MGM should have been the studio to release this show all along and not CBS, because MGM owns United Artists Television, the company that co-produced the show along with Quinn Martin.

I was holding off, but I guess Ill go ahead and make back ups of my alternate copies.  Im sure season 4 will be the same s**t.  Still cant believe this happened with the only show that I ever really wanted to have.  A major dissapointment.

That stinks - even more so because (as others have pointed out), these changes didn't have to be made!  I'll still Netflix these, since I've heard great things about so many Season 3 episodes ("Wife Killer," "Landscape for Running Figures," among others) but won't buy.

The people running CBS are pure, unabridged jackasses. CBS is a joke. They should be sued for false advertising. CBS claims they place classic television on "a pedestal," but in reality they put it in the toilet. What CBS has done to fans of "The Fugitive" is sick and deranged.

I hope CBS loses its NFL contract, loses big time ratings for its current slate of TV series, Letterman leaves for ABC, and that someday the company is forced to close its home video department because of lousy sales.

Hyperbole (pronounced /hʌɪˈpə:rbəli/^[1], from ancient Greek "ὑπερβολή", meaning excess or exaggeration) is a figure of speech in which statements are exaggerated. It may be used to evoke strong feelings or to create a strong impression, but is not meant to be taken literally.

So are we saying that season 3 is 100% Heyes or is like season 2 ?

No it is like season 2.   It is not 100% replacement music.  The familiar Fugitive cues from Rugolo are there.

Yes but is it like season 2 volume 2?

Or season 2 volume 1?

I'm going to hold off saying anything until I have checked out the set. Sure, I'd like to have the original music but some things are never going to happen. I love the show because of the acting of David Janssen first, the stories second, and the mood music of Ruggio third. I'm still going to buy the sets, complaining to CBS will not do any good at all. They are never going to re-issue the series even if they get the rights to all the missing music. I've accepted that fact. I hate it, but CBS could care less what I or anyone else thinks.

That sucks for Fugitive fans, but everyone except the most optimistic knew this was coming months ago. They'd of let word out many weeks ago if they had restored the original underscore to get people like yourselves out there and preordering it for day 1.

Guess I can give up hope on My Three Sons seeing it's underscore restored (Season 2 was transferred to HD fairly recently last time I checked their syndication bible).

Was following this release closely in the hope they'd resolve any potential copyright issues in the hope it could end up also benefiting future My Three Sons releases. But I have no doubt now that if we see a Season 2 release of My Three Sons, it will be as badly butchered as both season 1 releases of My Three Sons and recent Fugitve sets.

It figures that CBS did not alter the ending credits this time to include Mark Heyes' name. I wonder whether if it was even Heyes who provided the lousy synthesizer music this time or somebody else?

Whoever the culprit, he or she wanted no part in taking credit for the atrocious musical contributions this time around. (It still sounds like the same Heyes stuff from before, however). I wonder if Heyes and company were actually proud of their Season Two contributions, and demanded that CBS include their names in the credits? It's funny that nobody is credited for the latest go 'round, even though Season Three includes contributions from synthesizer composers.

And for Harry, more hyperbole:

stink (pronounced stingk) Verb. To emit a strong offensive smell. Noun. 1. A strong offensive smell. 2. CBS.

Well reviews are starting to come in this morning. I saw one at DVD Talk by Paul Mavis: www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/40343/fugitive-season-three-volume-one-the/

Paul has generally acknowledged the music edits but hasn't found them to be the distraction that many others do. His comment on this set is:

"For many DVD collectors, the single most important aspect of this release will be whether or not Paramount has continued substituting original music cues for new synthesizer ones. My answer is...I don't think so. I'm no music expert (as I've stated countless times before - although apparently not enough times to satisfy a few "Fugitive fanatics" out there), but everything seemed to be in order here."

There is another review on DVDVerdict: www.dvdverdict.com/reviews/fugitives3v1.php

The main comment from this review regarding music edits is:

"The audio is fairly good as well, and it seems as if the new soundtrack elements are blended in more evenly than in the previous release. The newly recorded music still sticks out, but it doesn't totally ruin the moment like it used to."

So while it isn't Season 1 by any stretch. Season 3 sounds like it might be more like the replacement Season 2 Volume 1. Until the real experts here get the release we will probably have to wait and see.  If so, I'm still in, but I'm sure this will continue to be a hotly debated topic from both sides.

Paul Mavis has very little clue what he's talking about when it comes to "The Fugitive". Slightly off-topic, but at one point he had the nerve to claim that "Mama's Family always ran for 21 minutes (even on NBC!), failing to mention that each episode of the NBC version originally had Harvey Korman intros as Alistar Quince.

That's why he said:

Brad,

Thanks for the info & links.  Appreciated.  As you said, some of us will need reviews from the guys that know the show well and can identify the approx % of CBS library ques present and how this release compares to the season 1 sets.

From the early info, it sounds like CBS didn't return to the season 1 model.  That's disappointing to me but not unexpected.

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Ditto to everything Jeff and Brad have stated.  I doubt I'll purchase this set, but I may Netflix it just to see for myself how intrusive the subbed music is.  This is such an incredibly subjective issue that it almost comes down to a person by person situation.  Some fans have little problem with the subbed CBS Library music (even though it's utterly unnecessary for it be replaced because the company owns the rights to all that music to begin with), while others of us feel the subbed music is too much a distraction and annoyance. 

And I'm not going to bust Paul Mavis' chops on this one.  He freely admits he's not an expert on the music and he's done too many good reviews for classic TV on DVD for me to throw him under the proverbial bus here.  He's giving his honest assessment and I'll never fault anyone for that.  Heck, for my money Paul Mavis is easily the best reviewer of vintage material on the net.


Gary "I'm dissapointed but in no way am I surprised" O.

Had they used all the original music, I would have ordered this set today just to show some 'financial support' for the change back to the real score. Since there's music replacement, I'll eventually get this set but there's plenty of other things that I will buy before this. I certainly don't blame anyone for passing on it though.

On the topic of replaced music- I haven't seen the show since it was on A&E in the early 1990's so I definitely am not familiar with the show's score. However, I think noticed a total of two or three substitutions in the entire S2V1 set but I probably noticed two or three substitutions in every episode of S2V2. I'm hoping that the substitutions are much less obvious in the S3V1 set.

I have to congratulate CBS/Paramount for single-handedly destroying my interest in TV shows on DVD. If you can't get a truly classic show like the Fugitive in its original form, why even bother?

I just hope that when they made the new transfers, that they made another version with the original music entact for broadcast TV. It would be truly sad to think that the alterations that CBS/Paramount made to the score will stick with the show forever now, with whatever station picks it up and broadcasts the new HD transfers.

Encore Westerns picked up Gunsmoke, Rawhide, Have Gun-Will Travel. It would be great if another Encore channel picked up The Fugitive. But again, if they did, would we get the original score or the same garbage that's on the DVDs? 

     Quote:

Yeah, I think for many of us there was an obvious difference in the amount of subbed music between the replaced Season 2, V.1 versus the Season 2, V.2 dvds.  And yeah, I'd begrudgingly pick up this latest set if it at least fell in line with Season 2, Volume 1. 

Heck, there were a few episodes in that set that had no replacement music at all in it.  In fact, that was what was so maddening about that particular set of dvds - it's like one guy worked on one episode and left all the music in and another completely different "maroon" worked on another episode and subbed music in all over the place where it wasn't necessary.  So the entire process has been absolutely maddening to me.

But Season 2, Volume 2 was just atrocious.  That one I couldn't stomach and I've yet to watch more than a handful of episodes from that set and doubt I ever will.  So you are right, Travis: it's all going to depend on which of those Season 2 volumes this 3rd Season follows suit with.

I just can't wrap my mind around the fact that all of this is so utterly unnecessary and that CBS/Paramount can't get that through their big, fat head!  They own 98% of the stinkin' music in this show and yet they are subbing out huge chunks of it.  What a waste and a travesty.

Oh, one last thing.  I agree with the astute observations by Leo upthread as it concerns another show I was interested in collecting from CBS/P: MY THREE SONS.  They butchered that show's underscore as well, although it never got any press from any of the online sites that should have at least mentioned it (shame on some of you TVonDVD sites for never even doing an editorial on it)!!!  I think that's really dispicable to just ignore such a huge issue.  It's only happend twice and although the FUGITIVE dvds were released first and garnered the most attention, it still should have been explored and discussed and editorialized with MY THREE SONS as well.  Instead, we've never read didly about that at the popular, well-known dvd review sites.  Again, shame on them for that!  Anyhow, I agree with Leo that this development with Season 3 of the Fugitive forces me to be inclined to believe we'll get replacement music with Season 2 of My Three Sons (and I hear that one is in the pipeline).  Geesh, this is digusting to even think about.

I've lost a lot of steam in my dvd collecting because of these issues.  I had begrudgingly learned to live with a few cut episodes here and there, or a less than perfect print here and there, and even a stalled out series here and there.  I was never happy with any of those developments but I had learned to grin and bear it to some degree.  But with my favorite show of all time being gutted of it's soul like THE FUGITIVE has been - I'm just about done.  It's really taken a lot of the fun out of this hobby for me.  And for any yahoos who want to come into this thread and take any of us to task for feeling this way, I ask you just one question: Wouldn't you feel the same if it had happened to your #1 favorite show of all time?  Wouldn't you?


Gary "another sad day in the world of TV on DVD" O.

I also can't emphasize enough how bad the Season 2 releases were. From a purely technical standpoint, accepting the replacement music as a given, the way it was recorded and then mixed in with the pre-existing score was amateurish to the nth degree. They obviously have no quality control at CBS/Paramount, nobody to check and watch what they've produced; otherwise how could these audio mixing errors past muster? Stuff like the jukebox scene in "World's End" or the scenes with the carnival music in "Brass Ring," scenes where the background music is so loud and overpowering you can't even hear the dialogue. And this from the biggest company in the TV on DVD game? It's embarrassing. The whole Fugitive on DVD saga has been a true fiasco and a blackeye to the whole concept of TV on DVD. 

And for me it's pretty much become the last straw--stifling my zest for the hobby of collecting tv on dvd singlehandedly.  Oh, I'll watch out for "Thriller" and a couple other titles here and there, but Paramount has unilaterally killed my enjoyment for collecting shows with how they handled "The Fugitive".  Abandoning "Rawhide" and mucking up "The Untouchables" has only made matters worse.


Agreed, Gary.  It was nice of you to raise this to the fore as I feel he received a bit too much flak over the "Fugitive" music issue in the past.  I can't fault anyone who is able to impart such keen insight where the texture, mythos and very essence of vintage tv shows are concerned.  His reviews are always a delight to read.

 

Amen to what John and Michael have both just written.  Right now I'm really down on the entire hobby.  More so than at any other time in this decade. 


Gary "and yeah, Michael, CBS abandoning Rawhide is another major strike against them in my book" O.

Okay, I just bought the set and will give you my thoughts as I experience it.    There is no replacement in the teaser or Act 1 opening of "Wings Of An Angel" though this is all Rugolo underscore, and no CBS stuff yet.    Right away we're NOT getting our worst case scenario of the original S2-V1.   We just need to play this out and see if the ratio is more indicative of S2 V1 corrected or S2 V2.

And then when a "chase" erupts in that scene where Kimble is shot, once again it sounds more like Heyes though this time the volume level seems less blasting than before.

After the initial Rugolo underscore, it has been non-stop Heyes for about five minutes.    This is not good.