My Three Sons Australian Release-Did Anyone Buy It? (1 Viewer)

[timk1041]

Did anyone pick up the Australian release Seasons 1-4 of My Three Sons that came out a few months ago? I was wondering if the episodes in this were the same edited ones with the same substituted music cues as the domestic releases.

 

[Tino]

Did anyone pick up the Australian release Seasons 1-4 of My Three Sons that came out a few months ago? I was wondering if the episodes in this were the same edited ones with the same substituted music cues as the domestic releases.

Wrong forum. This should be in the TV on Blu ray and dvd section. I’m sure a mod could move it for you.

https://www.hometheaterforum.com/community/forums/tv-on-dvd-and-blu-ray.74/

 

[timk1041]

Wrong forum. This should be in the TV on Blu ray and dvd section. I’m sure a mod could move it for you.

https://www.hometheaterforum.com/community/forums/tv-on-dvd-and-blu-ray.74/

Sorry. Thank you.

 

[Tino]

Sorry. Thank you.

No worries. You’ll get more responses there.

 

[timk1041]

No worries. You’ll get more responses there.

Thank you again.

 

[Jeff Flugel]

Haven't heard anything further about this release myself, Timothy, but am also curious about it. Hopefully someone who has picked this up will chime in at some point.

The best price for the set appear to be at JB Hi-Fi, but no idea what they would charge for shipping:

https://www.jbhifi.com.au/products/my-three-sons-season-1-4-collection-1961-dvd

There's what appears to be a customer review at the above link which states all four seasons are uncut, but I'd like to hear from more sources to confirm. And, of course, uncut doesn't mean without music substitutions. I'd be surprised if the first two seasons are any different from what was released in Region 1.

The set is about $75 US, including shipping from Australia to Japan. As I only have the first season, I will likely pick this up at some point soon. So far, there is no sign of this set being sold on Deep Discount DVD...where the MOD volume sets are still retailing for around $35 each.

 

[Museum Pieces]

It's $43 to have it shipped to me in the U.S. I was willing to take the plunge and report back on the music, but not if I have to kick out $43 in shipping. Dang. My guess is it has the original music. If that's confirmed, I'm happy to pay whatever it costs.

 

[Jeff Flugel]

The best price for the set appear to be at JB Hi-Fi, but no idea what they would charge for shipping:

https://www.jbhifi.com.au/products/my-three-sons-season-1-4-collection-1961-dvd

The set is about $75 US, including shipping from Australia to Japan. As I only have the first season, I will likely pick this up at some point soon. So far, there is no sign of this set being sold on Deep Discount DVD...where the MOD volume sets are still retailing for around $35 each.

Went ahead and ordered this S1-4 set from the above website. The price had gone up about $15 US for a while, but it dropped back down to $63 AUD, so I pulled the trigger today. Might take a while for it to get to me here in Japan, but once I receive it, I will check through the set thoroughly to let those interested know if there are any differences from the US DVDs.

 

[Mike Frezon]

I look forward to hearing your report, Jeff. I hope you don't get bitten in the butt with the purchase.

My wife Peg has asked me about watching some seasons of My Three Sons so I was quite disappointed when I dug up HTF discussion on various MTS releases and read about the music replacement.

 

[smithbrad]

I look forward to hearing your report, Jeff. I hope you don't get bitten in the butt with the purchase.

My wife Peg has asked me about watching some seasons of My Three Sons so I was quite disappointed when I dug up HTF discussion on various MTS releases and read about the music replacement.

While I had seen the color episodes when growing up, the B/W episodes were brand new to me. We watched the first two seasons from the formal releases and enjoyed them very much. We could not tell of anything odd with the music and the video was excellent. Unless you are very familiar with these early seasons or have a special talent for spotting music substitutions there is a good chance you will enjoy these early seasons just fine. Seasons 3 through 5 supposedly do not have any music substitutions. However, they were not remastered and some episodes have syndicated edits.

 

[Jeff Flugel]

While I had seen the color episodes when growing up, the B/W episodes were brand new to me. We watched the first two seasons from the formal releases and enjoyed them very much. We could not tell of anything odd with the music and the video was excellent. Unless you are very familiar with these early seasons or have a special talent for spotting music substitutions there is a good chance you will enjoy these early seasons just fine. Seasons 3 through 5 supposedly do not have any music substitutions. However, they were not remastered and some episodes have syndicated edits.

Well, Brad, while I certainly agree with you that the show is good enough that the first two seasons are still worth getting on DVD despite the music substitutions, and that a good many people might not notice the changes, I must respectfully disagree with you on how egregiously bad some of the Mark Heyes' replacement music is. It's less offensive on some episodes, certainly, but on others it is painful.

I also had never seen the black-and-white seasons of the show before, but in episodes like S1's "Lady Engineer" or "Lonesome George," to name just two examples, the replacement music is just plain awful. It might have been less noticeable to me if a few of the episodes on disc 1 didn't retain their original scores, but hearing those correct cues made the Heyes' stuff stand out like a sore thumb...especially when there are long scenes of silent comedy with only musical accompaniment, as happens in the two episodes I mentioned above.

Does it ruin the experience of watching the show? No, I agree with you that it doesn't, or shouldn't, not entirely anyway. Those of us who didn't grow up watching these with their proper scores can enjoy this terrific sitcom just fine as is. The show is just so dang good that it can survive this musical mauling, but it does mar the viewing experience just a bit for me. So, while I get your point that one shouldn't throw the baby out with the bathwater, I do think the music replacement situation should be taken into consideration for those that are sensitive to such things.

I'm sure this discussion is probably moot, as the chances of the Australian set being different from what CBS/Paramount offers in the U.S. are not very likely. Where I think the main value might lie in this R4 set is for those that don't yet have any of the first 4 seasons of the show on DVD, or those (like me) who haven't picked up the expensive MOD volume sets for seasons 3 and 4. On that score, this set appears to be a real bargain. And I do hold out some hope that the handful of syndicated, cut episodes on the R1 S3 and 4 sets might possibly be uncut on this R4 set.

 

[Josh Steinberg]

Australian sets sometimes are NTSC and sometimes PAL - do you know what format this one is?

 

[Jeff Flugel]

Australian sets sometimes are NTSC and sometimes PAL - do you know what format this one is?

Josh, the website I ordered from (linked above) indicates PAL, but another user on this forum (dawnshadow) in another My Three Sons thread seemed to be familiar with R4 releases of U.S. shows and thought that there was a good possibility that these might be NTSC, though of course did not claim any certainty. I'll try and identify this when I receive my set, though I'm not sure how to tell unless it's clearly indicated on the box. I won't likely be able to tell by my ears, as I'm not particularly sensitive to PAL speed up like some are.

 

[dawnshadow]

The box lists both PAL and NTSC so I would guess that they’ve used the original Region 4 PAL discs for Season 1 and the rest of the boxset is in NTSC, and direct ports of the Region 1 releases.

 

[Flashgear]

Went ahead and ordered this S1-4 set from the above website. The price had gone up about $15 US for a while, but it dropped back down to $63 AUD, so I pulled the trigger today. Might take a while for it to get to me here in Japan, but once I receive it, I will check through the set thoroughly to let those interested know if there are any differences from the US DVDs.

Thank you Jeff for taking a chance on the R4 set of My Three Sons S1-4, (Madman?)...several of us will be quite interested in your report as to whether the film sources and music, both original and dreaded replacements, differs from the CBS/P and CBS MOD sets...I expect several Amazon Marketplace dealers that I use will stock this new import set later this year...I have the first two seasons of the R1 sets already, but have been put off of buying seasons 3 to 5 in the expensive MOD split-season sets that are available on this side of the far Pacific...

I'm glad that PAL speed-up pitch in audio doesn't aggravate me the way it does others...only with well known voices like Alfred Hitchcock is it more noticeable, who's voice I can clearly hear in my mind, having grown up with this icon over a lifetime...that's the case for me with my R2 Fabulous Films' sets of Alfred Hitchcock Presents season 7 and Alfred Hitchcock Hour seasons 1 to 3...if not corrected by some high-tech method I'm not interested in pursuing, PAL will be reflected thusly in the running time, as it is with the Hitchcock Hour sets coming in at nearly 49 minutes rather than a little over 51 minutes...the effect mimics the few time-sped NTSC R1 sets I have, like Image's old World Vision transfers of Combat! seasons 1 to 4 (Season 5 in color was newly remastered for DVD and thus not time-sped)...and some other vintage shows shown on the old Goodlife channel, like 12 O'clock High, that I have on alternate DVD-R that are complete and unedited but time-sped by 4% for cable broadcast...

The CBS MOD sets are insanely expensive...I paid about $100 Canadian ($75 U.S.) for my two volumes of Ben Casey Season 1...the only other CBS MOD sets I have are the two seasons of the 1957-59 Barbara Eden/Merry Anders/Lisa Gaye sitcom How to Marry a Millionaire...I do mean to pick up the CBS MOD two seasons of The Californians at some point...that CBS MOD program is weird, slow, and too pricey...although I will pay these prices if I must for rare and highly sought programs, there's just a lot of WAC, KL and Criterion Blu-rays calling for my dollars too...I know that what CBS MOD have released thus far is contingent on clearances and existing film transfers on hand...totally dependent on whatever arcane maneuvers have taken place among governing executives prior to the monster corporate re-merger recently...and speculation as to whether the CBS MOD program itself is dead at this point...but someone at CBS cared enough about these old shows that they launched the MOD program...we'll see if the merger and pandemic double whammy have done it in...I'd dearly love to see Ben Casey's full run of 5 seasons to be available...and of course wish that the film transfers for Our Miss Brooks were intact...

Almost above all, I just wish that CBS/P would strike new 35 mm vault film transfers for seasons 2, 3 and 4 of The Defenders (E.G. Marshall, Robert Reed NYC based 1961-65 classic TV drama), ...that would enable Shout! Factory to release the rest of the series on DVD...or failing that, release the whole series themselves, doing justice to the archival holdings of the once proud "Tiffany Network"...dreaming, I know...

 

[Jeff Flugel]

The box lists both PAL and NTSC so I would guess that they’ve used the original Region 4 PAL discs for Season 1 and the rest of the boxset is in NTSC, and direct ports of the Region 1 releases.

Thanks for chiming in on this, Dawn! Sadly, I'm guessing you are correct that these will be direct ports of the R1 releases, with nothing fixed...nevertheless, the price is reasonable for four seasons. I hope to have my copy of this box set in a few weeks...

 

[Jeff Flugel]

Thank you Jeff for taking a chance on the R4 set of My Three Sons S1-4, (Madman?)...several of us will be quite interested in your report as to whether the film sources and music, both original and dreaded replacements, differs from the CBS/P and CBS MOD sets...I expect several Amazon Marketplace dealers that I use will stock this new import set later this year...I have the first two seasons of the R1 sets already, but have been put off of buying seasons 3 to 5 in the expensive MOD split-season sets that are available on this side of the far Pacific...

I'm glad that PAL speed-up pitch in audio doesn't aggravate me the way it does others...only with well known voices like Alfred Hitchcock is it more noticeable, who's voice I can clearly hear in my mind, having grown up with this icon over a lifetime...that's the case for me with my R2 Fabulous Films' sets of Alfred Hitchcock Presents season 7 and Alfred Hitchcock Hour seasons 1 to 3...if not corrected by some high-tech method I'm not interested in pursuing, PAL will be reflected thusly in the running time, as it is with the Hitchcock Hour sets coming in at nearly 49 minutes rather than a little over 51 minutes...the effect mimics the few time-sped NTSC R1 sets I have, like Image's old World Vision transfers of Combat! seasons 1 to 4 (Season 5 in color was newly remastered for DVD and thus not time-sped)...and some other vintage shows shown on the old Goodlife channel, like 12 O'clock High, that I have on alternate DVD-R that are complete and unedited but time-sped by 4% for cable broadcast...

The CBS MOD sets are insanely expensive...I paid about $100 Canadian ($75 U.S.) for my two volumes of Ben Casey Season 1...the only other CBS MOD sets I have are the two seasons of the 1957-59 Barbara Eden/Merry Anders/Lisa Gaye sitcom How to Marry a Millionaire...I do mean to pick up the CBS MOD two seasons of The Californians at some point...that CBS MOD program is weird, slow, and too pricey...although I will pay these prices if I must for rare and highly sought programs, there's just a lot of WAC, KL and Criterion Blu-rays calling for my dollars too...I know that what CBS MOD have released thus far is contingent on clearances and existing film transfers on hand...totally dependent on whatever arcane maneuvers have taken place among governing executives prior to the monster corporate re-merger recently...and speculation as to whether the CBS MOD program itself is dead at this point...but someone at CBS cared enough about these old shows that they launched the MOD program...we'll see if the merger and pandemic double whammy have done it in...I'd dearly love to see Ben Casey's full run of 5 seasons to be available...and of course wish that the film transfers for Our Miss Brooks were intact...

Almost above all, I just wish that CBS/P would strike new 35 mm vault film transfers for seasons 2, 3 and 4 of The Defenders (E.G. Marshall, Robert Reed NYC based 1961-65 classic TV drama), ...that would enable Shout! Factory to release the rest of the series on DVD...or failing that, release the whole series themselves, doing justice to the archival holdings of the once proud "Tiffany Network"...dreaming, I know...

Thanks, Randall...agreed on all of that! I know some people are extremely sensitive to PAL speed-up...thankfully, I am not one of them, so am able to enjoy the many Region 2 discs in my collection, as you do. I can see how speed-up might be an issue when it comes to Hitchcock, with his slow, deep, very distinctive voice. I'm glad that you are nonetheless able to still enjoy those sets, seeing as how no one in Region 1 has seen fit to release them.

Certainly the price for this Aussie My Three Sons set is right...$75 U.S. shipped to Japan. As I only have the R1 S1 set already, I'll be getting seasons 2-4 for $25 apiece...not too shabby, when one considers that each MOD half-season volume from CBS is $34 at Deep Discount...a total of $136 for just those two seasons, not even taking into account the shipping.

 

[smithbrad]

Well, Brad, while I certainly agree with you that the show is good enough that the first two seasons are still worth getting on DVD despite the music substitutions, and that a good many people might not notice the changes, I must respectfully disagree with you on how egregiously bad some of the Mark Heyes' replacement music is. It's less offensive on some episodes, certainly, but on others it is painful.

That's why I added "...or have a special talent for spotting music substitutions." I didn't notice anything, and I knew at the time that there were replacements, but I realize there are those that would. Now, PAL speedup I some times notice and other times not. It depends on how well I know a particular actors voice. In the case of Alfred Hitchcock Hour, AFAIK only available PAL, I had issues because of the number of famous actors that I had to convert mine to remove the speed up. With MTS, if one only has the AUS set, I would think the switch from season one PAL to season two NTSC would be very noticeable due to speed up, unless season one has been pitch corrected. I bought the CBS MOD sets and I'm only interested in the BW seasons, so I'm good. I hope the AUS set works out for those going that direction.

 

[Purple Wig]

Interesting which things we find acceptable and intolerable. Music substitutions are very jarring to me. That said, if something like Harris Against The World were somehow released with substitutions, I’d buy it in a second. (Improbable scenario, I realize) On the other hand, sets taken from older syndication masters don’t trouble me nearly as much as they do others. Prefer a new remaster but if the choice is old masters or no release at all, old masters are fine. The only R2 releases I have are Network’s Man In A Suitcase and a Richard Bradford interview, don’t recall noticing the speed up,

 

[Jeff Flugel]

Well, I finally received the Australian My Three Sons S1-4 set today, and have spent an hour or so looking through the discs. As dawnshadow predicted, this seems to be a direct port over of the exact same discs put out in R1 by CBS/Paramount. Their logo comes up right after the Shock one (that's the Aussie company that released this version).

Seasons 1 and 2 are remastered and complete. The music substitutions are still there on the S1 episodes I checked. I watched an episode on the S2 Vol. 1 set ("2.15 "The Romance of Silver Pines") from this set, and the original music appears to be intact, so I'm assuming that at least some of the episodes on the S2 discs retain their original underscore. This topic was likely discussed elsewhere on the forum back when the R1 S2 volumes 1 and 2 were first released, and others more familiar with the original R1 S2 release can perhaps add more detailed comments on the music issue.

Going off the information kindly provided by member Kasey in another My Three Sons thread about the S3 and 4 CBS MOD releases, the same 5 episodes in each season appear to still be the exact same syndicated and/or cut versions here on the R4 set, as follows:

Season 3:
3.2 "Robbie's Employment Service" 22:27
3.5 "Daughter for a Day" 22:27
3.9 "Chip's Last Fight" 22:27
3.12 "The Beauty Contest" 22:43
3.34 "When I Was Your Age" 22:32

Season 4
4.4 "Dear Robbie" 22:34
4.7 "My Friend Ernie" 23:38
4.8 "The End of You-Know-What" 22:26
4.9 "The Toupee" 22:29
4:17 "Second Chorus" 23:38

The rest all seem to be complete, as best as I can tell, clocking in at around 25 and a half minutes, approximately. Too bad that we still are stuck with cut episodes, but the ratio (5 cut out of 39 for S3, 5 out of 37 for S4) is something I can live with.

Even though the covers on the S3 and S4 DVDs state "Remastered," the transfers are obviously not restored to anywhere near the quality of S1 and 2, with plenty of speckles and scratches, and hissier audio. That said, they are still quite watchable, and, as previously reported for R1, include the original musical underscore. As Dawn mentioned above, S1 is PAL, while S2-4 are NTSC. I only spot-checked S1, so can't comment on any PAL speed-up issue. As I already have the R1 first season already, it's not a big deal for me, but may be an issue for others.

There is one curious thing...the back sides of the discs for S3 and 4 on this Aussie set are silver, not the telltale purple we usually get on burned discs. That leads me to think that these may be replicated pressed discs for these two seasons. Can anyone who has the R1 CBS/Paramount MOD versions confirm whether the discs on those volumes are silver or purple?

The packaging looks identical to Region 1, each season split into two volumes, 8 cases total, each containing 3 discs, for a total of 24 discs. All 8 cases are enclosed in a light cardboard box.

So the bottom line is, no changes or improvements, just exactly what you would get in R1 as far as I can tell (with the possible exception of the R4 using pressed discs for S3 and 4, which again I have yet to corroborate). I'm still quite happy with this set, as it was much cheaper than getting the individual volumes (particularly S3 and 4) in N. America. And for those like Mike who don't yet have any of the DVD sets for this series in their collection, this is the most affordable way to pick them up. For $75 US shipped, I'm happy. Looking forward to working my way through all four seasons.