Lou Grant listing! (1 Viewer)

[Flashgear]

It will be a dreadful reality if the most celebrated episodes of season five are the most compromised (going by Emmy Nominations and if derived only from Academy screener video copies)...the great episodes "Hometown", "Ghosts" and "Blacklist"...nominated for score, cinematography and writing in 1982...just as some of the best in season four were murdered by Fox...the acclaimed and Emmy nominated "Strike" and "Stroke" for instance...and that's apart from some episodes being complete but timesped? What a dog's breakfast...
Still, much thanks and love for Shout Factory.

 

[Neil Brock]

When possible, it would be great if a list could be compiled as to which shows in the series are compromised.

 

[Harry-N]

I just got my set and ran each disc through my computer's DVD drive. Here are the results:

Time Teaser Title (notes)
46:11 NT Wedding (lesser print, motion artifacts)
46:19 NT Execution
46:38 NT Reckless
45:39 NT Hometown (lesser print)
48:59 T Risk

46:32 NT Double-cross (lesser print, motion artifacts)
46:21 NT Drifters (lesser print, motion artifacts)
45:52 NT Friends (clean)
49:03 T Jazz
45:47 NT Ghosts (lesser print, motion artifacts)

48:59 T Cameras
44:57 NT Review (lesser print, motion artifacts)
49:05 T Immigrants
46:43 NT Hunger (lesser print, motion artifacts)
49:05 T Recovery

46:15 NT Obituary (lesser print, motion artifacts)
49:01 T Blacklist
47:51 NT Law (lesser print)
46:13 NT Fireworks (lesser print, motion artifacts)
49:03 T Unthinkable

49:06 T Suspect
46:35 NT Beachhead (lesser print)
46:12 NT Victims (lesser print, motion artifacts)
46:08 NT Charlie (lesser print, motion artifacts)

The eight episodes with Teasers are all clean-looking network prints. They all clock in at around 49 minutes and a few seconds. That's in keeping with network practices in the early 80s.

The ten shorter episodes with "motion artifacts" to me look like they might be time-sped, perhaps syndication prints. There are a couple that are a little longer that don't seem to have motion artifacts. One is clean-looking, a few are lesser looking prints, but still very good.

This is just an early perusal. I have no idea if anything is missing other than the teasers. For what it's worth, I have a vague memory of some LOU GRANT episodes airing on CBS without teasers in order to make room for an extra promo or newsbreaks or something like that.

 

[Harry-N]

Oh yeah, the "multiple sources" screen appears randomly, sometimes in front of compromised episodes but not always. It also is NOT included in the timing of the episode.

 

[Dave Lawrence]

It also is NOT included in the timing of the episode.

Interesting. Prior to my post yesterday, I went back a couple of times for each of the 4 shows on Disc 1 that began with the message just to make sure, since I hadn't expected the message to be included in the timing. On my player, the time starts with the message and continues with the opening credits. I'd expected the time to re-start, as sometimes happens with such pre-episode messages, but it didn't.

It's only 4 seconds on episodes with run times that are short by minutes (due to edits, time speeding, or a combination of both), so it's no cause for concern. I just don't want anyone thinking I was misrepresenting something or making things up. Maybe my machine did something strange and didn't count a couple of the seconds within the actual episode.

 

[Harry-N]

I went by what VLC reported on my computer. When an episode was selected from the menu, the counter went to zero and sat there for the full four seconds, not moving until the actual video of the episode began.

 

[Flashgear]

Thank you Harry N. and Dave for your detailed assessment of the final season's presentation...the negligence of a major studio in preserving and safeguarding an acclaimed and important series like Lou Grant is unconscionable and infuriating...TV shows that last aired in 1952 are in better shape than this one from 1982...the folks at Shout Factory must have been driven half mad trying to finish this on DVD...I'll know for myself later this week...

 

[MatthewA]

How do they manage to save every season except this one? Something's fishy about that. Literally everything they had on season 5 just disappeared into thin air? Even considering the circumstances behind the show's ending when it ended, that still doesn't explain it. This is borderline criminal.

I hope that's not an explanation for why certain other shows of the same era are MIA on DVD. On the other hand, it does show how far Shout! will go to get stuff out when the chips are really down. That means a lot.

 

[Neil Brock]

Does anyone know which, if any episodes, were of dubious run times on the first four sets?

 

[LeoA]

How do they manage to save every season except this one? Something's fishy about that. Literally everything they had on season 5 just disappeared into thin air?

I imagine nothing probably is lost. They just don't know where it is due to their poor archival practices.

 

[rjd0309]

I imagine nothing probably is lost. They just don't know where it is due to their poor archival practices.

 

[MatthewA]

I imagine nothing probably is lost. They just don't know where it is due to their poor archival practices.

I hope so. Now you've got me worried about the archival status of St. Elsewhere.

For the most part, Disney's archival practice is good. It's getting stuff out there in a manner that is both timely and does it justice in technical terms that is another matter. Maybe the good habits of one will rub off on the other.

 

[Rick Thompson]

It's amazing to me that a show such as Lou Grant could have gotten the treatment it has. Apparently the MTM library went through several ownerships over the years, but how could anyone who paid good money for it be so cavalier about an asset? Lord only knows the lengths Shout went through to compile and stitch these episodes together. No wonder it took so long to release the season. Shout has earned a ton of respect and goodwill from me on this one.

 

[MatthewA]

What makes it so scary and odd is that it seems to be this one season alone and the disappearance seems to have taken place while Fox has owned it. News Corporation bought MTM from International Family Entertainment (Pat Robertson's company) in 1998; they bought it from TVS around 1992; Mary Tyler Moore sold it to them in 1988.

When was the last time this show was in TV reruns?

 

[Neil Brock]

Asking again, are there any episodes from the first 4 seasons which are not complete and uncut on the DVD sets?

 

[Brian Himes]

I do believe that there were a few episodes starting with season 3 that were slightly edited. If my memory serves there are only a total of 2-3 episodes in all (not 2-3 per season) from seasons 3 and 4 that were edited. I'd have to go back and double check but that seems correct.

 

[Flashgear]

Asking again, are there any episodes from the first 4 seasons which are not complete and uncut on the DVD sets?

It seems that only season one of Lou Grant is problem free...as best as I can determine, there are about 8 episodes from seasons 2, 3 and 4 that are compromised. Some washed out syndicated sources cut by about 2:30 or 2:45, and others appear complete from better film sources, but time sped by the usual 4%.

The normal run times for these episodes should be about 48:55 to 49:07 if they include the usual 30 second teaser intro...and of course, all the compromised episodes lack the 30 second teaser, as well as whatever cuts were chopped out from the syndicated sources used for some of these 8 transfers...

Season 2 : "Schools" 46:43 (appears complete but time sped).

Season 2 : "Home" 46:33 (complete but time sped).

Season 3 : "Expose" 46:33 (complete but time sped).

Season 3 : "Indians" 44:42 (definitely cut, and the big outlier in run times. I wonder what necessitated this radical editing? Something political, perhaps?).

Season 4 : "Catch" 46:33 (seems to be complete, but time sped by the usual 4%).

Season 4 : "Venice" 46:33 (complete but time sped).

Season 4 : "Strike" 46:20 (Butchered. Syndicated edits and from inferior film source. Fuzzy and washed out color).

Season 4 : "Stroke" 46:20 (Butchered. Syndicated edits and from inferior film source. Fuzzy and washed out color).

And of course, season 5 is the aforementioned dog's breakfast...

 

[MatthewA]

And of course, season 5 is the aforementioned dog's breakfast...

In that case, the alternative really was no breakfast at all.

 

[Harry-N]

I've finally managed to actually *watch* an episode, and started with the first one, "Wedding". For the life of me, I didn't remember Billie Newman getting married, but then again, this was 37 years ago.

The main video in the episode is what looks like a lesser-quality syndication print, but there are a few points where it looks as if the compilers of this set utilized maybe a VHS recording of some scenes that had been edited out. Starting at about 10 minutes in, several short scenes of Billie and her fiance at her apartment, and one of Lou calling his estranged daughter who's in town, and the video takes on a smeary-picture look, similar to what one would see on a VHS tape. The sound level increases a bit, but is always clearly understandable. This section runs for about three minutes.

Later on, a few lines seem to have the same effect, where for that portion, it looks like a VHS tape, and the sound level changes.

This has the effect of being both depressing and affirming at the same time. It's depressing that the masters for these episodes are either lost or damaged, but affirming that Shout! did their very best to reconstruct these episodes. No wonder it took them a whole extra year to put this together for us.

Three cheers for Shout! for doing their very best, and several thumbs down for the yahoos that were responsible for the masters.

 

[Brian Himes]

[QUOTE="Harry-N, post: 4598396, member: 305854"This has the effect of being both depressing and affirming at the same time. It's depressing that the masters for these episodes are either lost or damaged, but affirming that Shout! did their very best to reconstruct these episodes. No wonder it took them a whole extra year to put this together for us.[/QUOTE]

I had the same feeling as I was watching the set. Not to throw mud in Shout Factory's eye, but I wish that they had done the same thing with season 1 of Rhoda. Pushed the release date back and took more time to either find complete master tapes or reconstructed the episodes into more complete network versions.

I am very glad Shout went the extra mile to present Lou Grant's final season in as complete as possible. I very much enjoyed the entire series.