HTF DVD REVIEW: Tales of the Gold Monkey The Complete Series (1 Viewer)

[Worth]

Originally Posted by Douglas Monce

The first one that I remember seeing where it was obvious that post production had been done on video was Matlock. The titles were a dead give away.

Even at the time, I remember there was something "off" about the titles of Remington Steele in its third or fourth season - which would have been about '85-'86.


Aside from something like Star Trek, which relied heavily on optical effects, I wonder how much money was really saved by switching to video post.


It's too bad that so many shows made between the mid-80s and late 90s may never look as good as they could.

 

[Douglas Monce]

Originally Posted by Worth




Even at the time, I remember there was something "off" about the titles of Remington Steele in its third or fourth season - which would have been about '85-'86.


Aside from something like Star Trek, which relied heavily on optical effects, I wonder how much money was really saved by switching to video post.


It's too bad that so many shows made between the mid-80s and late 90s may never look as good as they could.

I didn't watch Remington Steele much after the first or second season, so I wouldn't have been hip to that.


Well when you consider lab work, negative cutting, color timing, printing and then the fact that the print would have been transferred to video anyway for broadcast, that would add up over 24 episodes a year. My guess is it saved even the average show a fairly big chunk of change in their weekly budget. But it wasn't just money but time that was saved. Huge amounts of time. On a weekly TV show, time is everything.


But in the long run somewhat short sighted.


Doug

 

[Craig Beam]

Do the episodes include the pre-title sequence preview montages? You know, the 30-seconds of quick clips from the episode, right before the theme song kicks in? They were NOT included in The Greatest American Hero DVDs, which still bums me out. Anyone?

 

[Timothy E]

Originally Posted by Craig Beam
Do the episodes include the pre-title sequence preview montages? You know, the 30-seconds of quick clips from the episode, right before the theme song kicks in? They were NOT included in The Greatest American Hero DVDs, which still bums me out. Anyone?

Yes, the pre-credits teasers are included at the beginning of each episode.

 

[Gary OS]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Craig Beam

Do the episodes include the pre-title sequence preview montages? You know, the 30-seconds of quick clips from the episode, right before the theme song kicks in? They were NOT included in The Greatest American Hero DVDs, which still bums me out. Anyone?

I too was bummed about those missing teasers on the GAH dvds. My older alternate source set I bought years ago had those and they were really great. Glad to know they are on this set.


Gary "now that it was mentioned, I do remember hearing at the time that the pilot was the most expensive ever filmed up to that time" O.

 

[Jonathan_Clarke]

SO glad to hear the quality of the show holds up.


"Raiders of the Lost Ark" was my favorite movie when I was a kid (still is) and I was glued to this show every week. I assumed this would be like the original "Battlestar Galactica", nowhere near as good as my memories. Reading this review is tempting me to take this set off my Netflix queue and put it on my Amazon wish list.

 

[Craig Beam]

Originally Posted by Timothy E /forum/thread/301185/htf-dvd-review-tales-of-the-gold-monkey-the-complete-series#post_3699221

 

[Douglas Monce]

Originally Posted by Jonathan_Clarke

SO glad to hear the quality of the show holds up.


"Raiders of the Lost Ark" was my favorite movie when I was a kid (still is) and I was glued to this show every week. I assumed this would be like the original "Battlestar Galactica", nowhere near as good as my memories. Reading this review is tempting me to take this set off my Netflix queue and put it on my Amazon wish list.

I have to say that I'm liking this show better as an adult than I did as a teenager. I think as a teenager I was a little disappointed that there wasn't as much action as I was hoping for. As an adult I'm finding that the characters and the ongoing intrigue are far more interesting. If they had done Raiders of the Lost Ark on a weekly basis, it would have gotten old really fast.


Doug

 

[Jeff*H]

I've been waiting for this one to come to DVD for a long, long time (so that I can retire my DVD-R transfers from the USA run). So I picked this set up a few days ago from Amazon, and watched the pilot and 1st episode tonight, with the following observations:

• The A/V quality of the pilot (particularly the audio) is marginal compared to the episodes that follow, which have a sharper picture and clearer, crisper audio
• The pilot runs 1:29:01, and even despite PAL speedup, seems pretty short, so I'm wondering what material may have been cut from the show, and why. The individual episodes seem to run about :47, almost :48, which leads me to believe the double-length pilot should have come in around 1:35 for a show of this era (again, taking PAL speedup into consideration).
• I did notice the song in the bar replaced during the pilot episode (with a very close soundalike), but in the series' 1st regular episode that followed, they included the song "The Lady is a Tramp" in the bar scene (Sarah sings it in the bar)
• The menus feature the normal (no PAL speedup) version of the theme music, most likely because the menus had to be re-authored for NTSC format (?)

All in all, I'm happy with this set so far, despite a few minor flaws (the PAL issue, less-than-stellar A/V quality on the pilot). If I had to compare the audio/video quality of the prints to other Universal shows on DVD, I would say it's better quality than Emergency! (except for season 6), not quite as nice-looking as Magnum, P.I., and probably most comparable to Rockford Files. Ultimately, I'm thrilled that Fabulous Films took the initiative and effort to get this wonderful show released (with an assist from Shout! Factory), and I'm even more thrilled that they took the extra effort to put some nice bonus features on the set, which I've only just started to dive into (the highlights are the collectible booklet and the 30-minute-plus documentary). Thank you very much!

 

[Jeff Willis]

^^


Jeff,


Thanks for the info!

The episode run times of .47-.48 indicate PAL masters or time-compression, assuming that they're not edited episodes.


Has anyone compared their off-air copies to the studio release to check for episode scene edits?

 

[Douglas Monce]

Originally Posted by Jeff*H

I've been waiting for this one to come to DVD for a long, long time (so that I can retire my DVD-R transfers from the USA run). So I picked this set up a few days ago from Amazon, and watched the pilot and 1st episode tonight, with the following observations:

• The A/V quality of the pilot (particularly the audio) is marginal compared to the episodes that follow, which have a sharper picture and clearer, crisper audio
• The pilot runs 1:29:01, and even despite PAL speedup, seems pretty short, so I'm wondering what material may have been cut from the show, and why. The individual episodes seem to run about :47, almost :48, which leads me to believe the double-length pilot should have come in around 1:35 for a show of this era (again, taking PAL speedup into consideration).
• I did notice the song in the bar replaced during the pilot episode (with a very close soundalike), but in the series' 1st regular episode that followed, they included the song "Hello, Dolly" in the bar scene (Sarah sings it in the bar)
• The menus feature the normal (no PAL speedup) version of the theme music, most likely because the menus had to be re-authored for NTSC format (?)

All in all, I'm happy with this set so far, despite a few minor flaws (the PAL issue, less-than-stellar A/V quality on the pilot). If I had to compare the audio/video quality of the prints to other Universal shows on DVD, I would say it's better quality than Emergency! (except for season 6), not quite as nice-looking as Magnum, P.I., and probably most comparable to Rockford Files. Ultimately, I'm thrilled that Fabulous Films took the initiative and effort to get this wonderful show released (with an assist from Shout! Factory), and I'm even more thrilled that they took the extra effort to put some nice bonus features on the set, which I've only just started to dive into (the highlights are the collectible booklet and the 30-minute-plus documentary). Thank you very much!

Most TV movies of that time that were intended for a 2 hour time slot, were 90min with half an hour of commercials. So the pilot seems to be just about right as far as the running time goes. I'm not sure what that says about the Pal speed up. I had the pilot on tape for years from the original 82 broadcast and watched it many times, so I'm very familiar with it. There doesn't seem to be anything missing.


Magnum P.I. episodes from 1982 run about 48mins. So again the regular episodes seem to be about the right running time for a tv show of that time. With Pal speed up you would expect them to be around 45mins or less. Again not sure if they stretched out the running time digitally but for got to pitch down the audio or what happened here.


Have you had the chance to compare the new release with your old DVDs from U.S. broadcast to check the pitch of the audio?


Doug

 

[Jeff*H]

I checked the DVDs against my old recordings, and it appears that the PAL speedup is the reason for the shorter run times on the DVD set: DVD pilot is 1:29:01/old recording is 1:32:49. The 1st episode after the pilot, "Shanghaied", is about 47:29/old recording is 49:23.

The PAL speedup is very noticeable to me in the opening credits with the higher pitch of the music (especially since the normal pitch is featured on the menus); I was also attuned to this issue very closely with the R2 Six Million Dollar Man discs, in comparing those DVDs to my off-air recordings as well. It's a minor annoyance for anyone that picks up on this issue, but it will pass pretty quickly as you watch more of the episodes. The dialogue doesn't sound like the actors are on helium to me or anything, as sometimes does happen with bad time compression, which doesn't appear to be taking place here.


Again, it's a great set from what I've experienced so far. If I had to grade it, I'd give it a B-plus.

 

[Jeff Willis]

Originally Posted by Jeff*H
I checked the DVDs against my old recordings, and it appears that the PAL speedup is the reason for the shorter run times on the DVD set: DVD pilot is 1:29:01/old recording is 1:32:49. The 1st episode after the pilot, "Shanghaied", is about 47:29/old recording is 49:23.

The PAL speedup is very noticeable to me in the opening credits with the higher pitch of the music (especially since the normal pitch is featured on the menus); I was also attuned to this issue very closely with the R2 Six Million Dollar Man discs, in comparing those DVDs to my off-air recordings as well. It's a minor annoyance for anyone that picks up on this issue, but it will pass pretty quickly as you watch more of the episodes. The dialogue doesn't sound like the actors are on helium to me or anything, as sometimes does happen with bad time compression, which doesn't appear to be taking place here.


Again, it's a great set from what I've experienced so far. If I had to grade it, I'd give it a B-plus.

Thanks for the info!


I own several PAL sets and my experience is the same as yours; I notice the speed-up with some of my opening/closing theme spots, but none in the main episodes. I've also played PAL discs for several friends and none of them have detected a difference between PAL & NTSC DVD's. I think that some of the issue may be related to how much the listener is familiar with a certain show, but that's just my .02 .


Has anyone checked the music edit comparisons with the episodes excluding the Pilot?

 

[Jeff*H]

Originally Posted by Jeff Willis






Has anyone checked the music edit comparisons with the episodes excluding the Pilot?

Still working my way through the set, but so far I've noticed nothing beyond the pilot (which had a VERY close soundalike substituted. The "Shanghaied" episode has the song "Lady is a Tramp" still intact, sung in the bar.

 

[Jeff Willis]

Originally Posted by Jeff*H
Still working my way through the set, but so far I've noticed nothing beyond the pilot (which had a VERY close soundalike substituted. The "Shanghaied" episode has the song "Lady is a Tramp" still intact, sung in the bar.

Thanks again for the info! It's looking like the R1 set is the one for me.

 

[Tom Brennan]

I picked up this set last week, but haven't had a chance to dive into it yet. Having to deal with PAL speed up on an NTSC release is annoying, but thankfully a lot of people don't seem to notice outside of the opening theme. Is there any method to correct speed up on our own? Probably a complicated thing...


Is the making of documentary pal sourced as well?

 

[Mark Collins]

I cannot detect any problems. Jeff you asked how I was enjoying the show. Great I am glad I made the investment.

 

[Douglas Monce]

Originally Posted by Tom Brennan

I picked up this set last week, but haven't had a chance to dive into it yet. Having to deal with PAL speed up on an NTSC release is annoying, but thankfully a lot of people don't seem to notice outside of the opening theme. Is there any method to correct speed up on our own? Probably a complicated thing...


Is the making of documentary pal sourced as well?

If it were still in PAL format, it could be put into some editing software and stretched out to its correct running time along with bringing the sound back down to its correct pitch. All of the original frames exist in the PAL version. However the conversion back to NTSC means that some frames are actually overlaps of others, and those two original frames no longer exist by themselves. If you do a freeze frame, and advance one frame at a time you'll see what I mean. You could still stretch it out, but the overlap frames would be come more obvious and very annoying.


Doug

 

[Tom Brennan]

Thanks for the info Doug.


So basically I would need the PAL set to attempt any kind of correction. I'm amazed that we are still left with the speed up issue, it kind of annoys me.

 

[Douglas Monce]

Originally Posted by Tom Brennan

Thanks for the info Doug.


So basically I would need the PAL set to attempt any kind of correction. I'm amazed that we are still left with the speed up issue, it kind of annoys me.

It annoys me also and I had actually thought about spending some time to correct all 22 episodes, until I saw that it wasn't possible with the NTSC version. It would be possible with the PAL set however.


Doug