"Make Room For Daddy" DVD Set Review
02-20-05, 08:30 AM
What a RIPOFF!!!
I'm referring to the "Complete 5th Season", starring Danny Thomas and Marjorie Lord, with the following copyrights:
sfm Entertainment
2004 Danny Thomas Productions
MMIV Questar, Inc.
Whichever sleazy company above is responsible for this release, they gave us the *severely* edited *syndicated* versions of these episodes that have run on cable!
From my experience, the typical full length version of a 50's - mid-60's TV series' episode would be anywhere from about 24 1/2 min. to 26 min. I timed (by stopwatch) about 8 episodes on this DVD set and all of them ranged from about 20:30 - 20:55 in length (including beginning & ending credits!).
Naturally, there is NO mention anywhere on the box that these are the *edited* versions. In fact, to further mislead the buyer, they put a statement on the back cover saying:
"...available for the first time in this exclusive collection authorized by the Danny Thomas family."
If this is true, I'm also holding "the Danny Thomas family" partly responsible for this abortion! However, another statement says that Questar has the exclusive rights to *distribute* this series (and) that the series is actually "owned and operated by Danny Thomas Productions." SO, maybe Danny Thomas Productions is 100% responsible for this crap.
It just goes to show you that unless a TV series is released by (or) in association with either:
1) the original network it aired on (or) the company that currently owns that network.....or
2) the freelance production company that made the series
...you'll be taking a risk in getting what you expect.
This is really shameful and inexcusable. I sure didn't think I was going to have to worry about getting the UN-edited episodes of a TV series, as long as they were being released "by season".
I do realize, though, that if a TV show is NOT released "by season", you really don't know what you're going to get. Not only could it be severely edited, but, it might even be a 3rd or 4th generation copy!
Speaking of which, to add insult to injury, they did NOT use the "Make Room For Daddy" film masters when transferring to DVD. There are MANY speckles and spots throughout the video and the overall clarity looks to be 3rd generation at best!
Three other annoying aspects of this set are:
1) The audio is noticeably HISSY, even without trying to listen for it!
2) After each and EVERY episode, there is a full screen text graphic of Questar's mailing address - quite cheesy wouldn't you say?
3) ONLY the first episode on each disc has the beginning credits and music - all other episodes start abruptly with no intro what-so-ever.
I'll be buying quite a few TV series on DVD, so, if anyone knows of other ripoffs such as this one....PLEASE post.
Thanks,
Bill
P.S.: I almost forgot to warn you about another TV series released by Questar. It's the Complete 2nd Season of "The Joey Bishop Show".
I didn't buy this set, but, it has the same "style" artwork and packaging as "Make Room For Daddy", so I'll bet any amount of money that those episodes are the edited / syndicated, low quality versions also.
(NOTE: To be fair, after I posted this review here, I was reading another DVD forum and the Joey Bishop episodes *might* not be cut (edited), but I haven't read a 100% verification of this. It was said, however, that the picture quality was hit and miss, implying mostly miss! SO, I still stand stedfast behind my "Bottom Line" comment below.)
Bottom Line:
I wouldn't buy ANY releases from ANY of the 3 companies I listed at the top of this post because as far as I'm concerned, they ALL had a hand in this ripoff due to sheer GREED!
Last edited by seasearyder; 02-22-05 at 02:58 AM.
03-09-05, 08:51 PM
