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Are the older Columbia Tristar Three Stooges DVDs worth getting? (1 Viewer)

Tory

-The Snappy Sneezer- -Red Huck-
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I've been wanting to get into the Stooges for a while. I have been exploring other comic teams from before and around the same era of the Stooges and I am loving them even though some I did not care for much before due to TV colorized versions. I am aware of the current travesty of double dipping, number of shorts dropping and the color horror. Given these circumstances are the older DVDs of any quality and urgency of getting due to perhaps going out of prints for more new lesser versions? These are the 12 before this I believe:

- Three Stooges, The: All the World's a Stooge
- Three Stooges, The: Nutty but Nice
- Three Stooges, The: Stop, Look and Laugh
- Three Stooges, The: Cops and Robbers
- Three Stooges, The: Spook Louder
- Three Stooges, The: Curly Classics
- Three Stooges, The: Dizzy Doctors
- Three Stooges, The: GI Stooge
- Three Stooges, The: Healthy, Wealthy, and Dumb
- Three Stooges, The: Merry Mavericks
- Three Stooges, The: Outlaws Is Coming, The
- Three Stooges, The: Three Smart Saps

Are these worth getting or is there a chance of something better/worse coming? How about importing, if you know. This would be a regional question I guess but it is not the main focus of the topic and of similar nature. I have the U.K. Laurel & Hardy 21 disc boxset. Although they do have colorized vesions on the discs, they did put everything out without doubledipping, except for a few regional alternate versions and a significant edit made back in the day and the original version. If the Stooges get a similar treatment there I would be interested, here too, but it would have to be a comlete box for me to dare to get it with the color and at a cheapish but reasonable price.

Also, if you have any of them, could you give a quick review, or point out certain key shorts that are gems.
 

Ryan Wishton

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Lets see.

I wouldnt buy them. I own the recent two only because I really like some of the episodes and some remastering was done on them. I am holding out incase better sets come out. It's also not an absolute must have for me either. You may be different.

I think they are overpriced as well. This should have been released in seasons or box sets for example. I am sure we will see the beginning to end remastered in box sets some day. Columbia is just milking it for all it's worth.

I used to own them on VHS in the Early-Mid 90's after they released remastered episodes.

Guess what? The DVD's dont even use these. I had episodes that looked better on VHS than they did on DVD.

The truth is you are the only one who can decide this for yourself. Do you just adore the episodes? Something you will watch more than once? Will it be something that will bring you a few hours of joy every so often?

If so, it might be worth it for you to buy even some of them. It just depends on how much you really want them. Will it make you really mad if they release these again in better form? It could take several years, but it most likely will happen.

It sounds like you do want them already, but your looking for approval. You dont need approval. It's your money. If you really like the episodes and can live with some mediocre transfers (none are horrible or unwatchable by any means), then take the plunge.

If your having second thoughts, cant afford it, or will have to go into any form of debt to buy them, then I would say hold out.
 

Tory

-The Snappy Sneezer- -Red Huck-
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I can get them all, the 12 listed, for about 100 dollars, I can afford this, but I'm just wondering if it is worth the money. I'm not looking for approval per see, I'm just wondering about the quality of these and if there is anything better out there, will be something better out there or never will be something better out there. Sometimes I do worry if things get darker down the road pertaining to the release of certain things, this may be the last chance to get them, or get them right, more or less. Certain trends pertaining to certain classic properties just keep getting worse and worse. While there is a market for Three Stooges, they do not see it quite as it should be in my opinion and may one day believe there is no or too little a market. Then we are just stuck with public domain copies of things, which would be of a greater decline. If Hallmark sees Laurel & Hardy as something to dump in the ocean, other parties may one day feel the same about the Stooges and even if things never get that drastic, they could feel that it isn't worth the effort to release anything of substantial importance and that which last was made available to the public may be just that, the last. They do not seem to take these things seriously; they see them as a faded joke and not art, not worth protecting and not worth dispersing to the public neither for entertainment nor for prosperity. This may not be the situation here but I do fear this.
 

Mark Zimmer

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The first volumes, Curly Classics and All the World's a Stooge, have fairly poor transfers of beaten-up prints. Recently Columbia rereleased some of these in substantially improved versions (in their infamous colorized editions). The quality has more or less steadily improved since then. I've reviewed many of them at digitallyObsessed:


http://www.digitallyobsessed.com/pow...oges&schoice=1

(watch for wrap).

If you're a Stooge lover, you'll want to own them, but I'd expect we'll see more rereleases of the early crappy versions. That's too bad because there's still a third of the Curly films unreleased, as well as over half of the Shemps, and of course all of the fake Shemp and Joe Besser and Joe DeRita shorts.

In any event, $100 for all 12 is a heck of a price for these. I'd jump on it if I didn't already own them all. If you decide they're not good enough you can probably turn a profit on them from eBay.
 

Joe Karlosi

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I'm a big Stooges fan and I only bought the first six or seven collections. I just got tired of the poor prints and the high prices. I also didn't like the thematic choices of putting similar stories together.

What I want is a complete Curly, Shemp and Joe Besser collection - PERIOD. I'm a Shemp fan, and I want to see stuff like LOOSE LOOT and GYPPED IN THE PENTHOUSE. I'd also take Besser rarities like FLYING SAUCER DAFFY. If I see anymore typical Curly shorts like AN ACHE IN EVERY STAKE, THREE LITTLE PIGSKINS or MICRO-PHONIES again, I'll poke some puddin'head's eyes out!! :D
 

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