DJariya

I'm not that surprised that H50 will get a DVD only release for its 4th season. I'm betting the season 3 set was a poor seller due to its high price and since the majority of CBS TV shows get DVD only releases anyways, they probably wanted to save money.

hanshotfirst1138

It's a reasonable theory based on the evidence though, however disquieting.

My Other Self

See post 50 and 51 in this thread.

That's still a placeholder from when the titles were unofficially announced.

PhantomStranger

Amazon placeholders mean nothing except that Amazon will share the data with the studio on how many times it gets viewed or signed up for.

morriscroy

Wonder how much the movie companies are paying amazon for such advanced placeholder data. (Either directly and/or as a quid pro quo).

morriscroy

Wonder if horror (or horror-lite) can also be lumped into the category of viable bluray tv shows. (Such as AHS, Bates Motel, From Dusk Till Dawn, etc ...).

morriscroy

What would be other sweeping changes, besides dumping tv shows and/or outsourcing to third party companies (such as Twilight Time, etc ...)?

morriscroy

Special packaging for SoA complete series set.

http://tvshowsondvd.com/news/Sons-An...tors-Set/20079

PhantomStranger

Television shows were always the most vulnerable content to getting shifted completely towards digital streaming. Most people view it as disposable entertainment and most shows have a limited shelf life with mainstream consumers.

I think we will see more and more licensing deals in the future for physical releases to outside parties.

Jory

Mill Creek to the rescue!

Texan26

Mill Creek also gave up on releasing the rest of "That 70's Show" on blu-ray. They quit after the second season.

Alan Smithee

I was pretty surprised when TV shows on DVD (referred to by many as "TV On DVD", as if that was some sort of super-special technology) became popular in general. Since it was "disposable entertainment" to many, it was odd that so many of them would spend around $30 for box sets of it. There were plenty of current shows that I bought however, rather than enduring them through the unwatchable mess that network TV had become, with logos always onscreen and excessive commercials. Usually just watching one disc's worth of episodes, I avoided what would have been an hour's worth of commercials!

I can see how shows on Netflix would eat into disc sales as long as they stay on there for a while, but prices for buying brand-new episodes on Vudu or Amazon are ridiculous. Most shows there cost $2.99 per episode, and "Season passes" cost $30 and up- if I spend that much on anything, I want it on actual media. (And they STILL can't get the frame rate right on video-based material- I've seen it done on a few apps on my Roku so I know it's possible, but the big players can't seem to do it!)

hanshotfirst1138

For a while when the DVD market was at its peak, I think a lot of it was the novelty value of it: shows you hadn't seen in years which weren't being rerun anywhere were getting releases. Now you can do that with digital, and since it's "disposable" and you'll likely only watch it once, there isn't any reason to own it. Obviously, newer shows have much more reason to be on Blu (having HD masters anyways), but given how few are, it clearly isn't something distributors feel the market justifies.

Surfinhank

I guess I'm one of the last hold-outs: I don't "stream", I don't "Netflix" and I certainly do not "VuDu"!
I'm a die-hard disc buyer. All of the recent DVD only announcements from FOX have been very depressing, but I'll just wind up switching to the DVD sets (for as long as they're offered, anyway).

One small light at the end of the tunnel: there's always international! "The Killing" seasons 2 & 3 are getting released in the UK (they also released "Chicago Fire"). And with recent releases of "Suits", "Battlestar Galactica", "Eureka" and "House" (in full season sets, no less) hopefully more are on the way.

morriscroy

You're not the only one.

Over the last year or so, I haven't streamed much of anything. Presently I don't have Netflix or even any premium cable channels.


Though I've cut back somewhat on buying new dvd season sets, largely due to my huge backlog of unwatched dvd tv season sets which I'm making my way through.

There's many recent shows I want to watch, but have turned down buying any of the dvd (or bluray) sets, due to my unwatched backlog and a lack of time. For example, shows like: In Plain Sight, Rizzoli and Isles, The Good Wife, Supernatural, Scandal, etc .. and later season of NCIS: LA, Bones, CSI, Law & Order SVU, etc ...

Lastdaysofrain

My guess is most new shows, which are shot in HD and probably the easiest and most likely to be released on Blu Ray, don't sell that well because people can easily watch them on Demand or buy them/stream them? maybe?

morriscroy

When I started buying a lot of dvds/blurays in 2011, it was definitely for the novelty value. (Simultaneously also going through a midlife crisis). Prior to 2011, I had very little to no interest in dvd/bluray.

I ended up buying a lot of late-1970's and 1980's shows I use to watch when I younger, such as: The A-Team, Magnum PI, MacGyver, Knight Rider, Miami Vice, Airwolf, Charlie's Angels, Dukes of Hazzard, etc ... as well as many sci-fi/fantasy shows I completely missed during the 1990's and 2000's, such as: Babylon 5, X-Files, Andromeda, the revived Battlestar Galactica, the Stargate franchise, etc ... (I have a large 20-year gap from the late-1980's to the mid-late 2000's, where I was largely clueless and ignorant of then-current television and movies).

After about a year or so of buying so many dvd tv season sets, I came to the realization it was taking a long time to finish watching through these dvd sets. So I pretty much hit the tv on dvd "fatigue phase" by the middle of 2013. No point in buying more tv shows, just to end up collecting dust on my bookshelves.


I wouldn't be surprised if others hit the "fatigue phase" back in the mid/late 2000's, in a similar manner. (ie. Coinciding with the movie companies starting to release tv shows on bluray).

Why So Blu?

Me too, although I hit DVD tv set fatigue years ago, and only have two complete sets of tv shows that I will not part with. Hunter and X-Files. That's it. Outside of that I'll usually watch YV shows and then move on. Nowadays I rarely watch a tv series run more than once and if I must then I stream via Netflix or Amazon. This is just for TV shows. I also hit Blu-ray fatigue in general after this thread first appeared. Changed my life.

http://forum.dvdtalk.com/other-talk/...eanliness.html

morriscroy

I haven't reached a "fatigue phase" yet when it comes to bluray. In my case it is probably more "attrition" than "fatigue".

This may sound strange, but I find that restricting my purchases primarily to bluray, actually controls my ocd compulsive collecting/hoarding habits quite effectively. (I'm mainly into tv shows, and don't have as much interest in movies).

Over the last year or so, I didn't bother buying a then-new tv show if it was not released on bluray starting from the first season. I'll only continue buying the dvd season sets of current tv shows, if I already have some previous seasons and I still follow the show closely. This is the main reason why I haven't bothered buying any season sets of shows I watch semi-regularly like: NCIS, Elementary, Castle, Blue Bloods, Unforgettable, Motive, Bones, etc ... (ie. Avoid jumping onto the "treadmill" altogether from the very beginning).

At the present time with all these self-imposed "mind tricks" on myself, there's only two ongoing tv shows I still buy: "Person of Interest" (bluray) and "House of Lies" (dvd).

Dan

I have a stupid amount of TV shows on DVD. Maybe not as much as some people here, but more than anyone I know personally. I hit the fatigue when HD DVD and Blu-ray hit, so there's a ton of shows where I don't even have all the seasons (24, Dead Zone, Always Sunny, etc.). The only one I stuck with was The Simpsons, and I haven't watched any of those discs in years.

I'm actually working up the confidence to just purge my collection and only keep the stuff I truly care about (Twitch City, Mr. Show, The Wire, for example).

On Blu-ray, I have a handful of TV series. Breaking Bad and Fringe... and I bought Season 1 of The Walking Dead, but won't buy the rest. I'll only bother buying TV shows on Blu-ray if it's a complete series that I already love (Twin Peaks!) and/or isn't available elsewhere. For TV, I'd say Netflix and Hulu+ have been the greatest things (aside from some apps that won't disable the auto-play feature, which I hate) because I can pick up a show two years after I watched an episode, and the service knows which one to play next. Hulu+ commercials don't bother me because it still beats watching network TV shows on day one.

I don't feel like I need to own any TV shows on discs any more (other than the truly special stuff), and if people like us aren't buying them, then the studios are seeing just how little demand there is for them.

I don't know how Netflix's licensing works, but if it's like streaming music, then the rights-holders get ~70% of the total revenue, divided by the number of streams in any given month. TV shows, for that reason, probably get a much higher percentage of streams than movies, so the more the studios push TV on streaming, the better cut they get.

So, if the question is, "Why isn't TV-on-Blu-ray getting any love?" it's because, for the most part, the streaming options are far more convenient and cost efficient for the majority of content out there. It's why MP3 killed CDs. Blu-ray can remain a niche for the collectors/fans, but it's not a mainstream option.

stvn1974

I recently purged the collection and the only TV sets I kept were the three season of Star Trek TOS the five seasons of Fringe and the Firefly set. Kept my Buffy and Angel DVD sets and sold off all of my other TV DVD sets. Will add Twin Peaks on BD on Tuesday. Other than if/when The X-Files gets released on BD I think I am done.

morriscroy

A year ago or so I was tempted to buy the entire Dead Zone series. (It was showing up for less than $9 a pop at Costco at the time). In the end, I turned it down. (I had already hit the fatigue stage by then).

On the other hand, if I had come across it a year or two earlier (ie. during 2011 or 2012), most likely I would have purchased all the Dead Zone season sets.

DJariya

TV is a tough one because if you're up to date with most current shows and watch them weekly as it airs, there is really no incentive to purchase the complete season right away.

Most TV shows just don't have a lot of replay value.

Dan

Yup! I think I have seasons 1-4. I can't remember if there were 5 or 6 total, but I don't have them. It was a show I really loved and ONLY watched on DVD as I couldn't get it on TV locally. I trailed off and never caught up. I think the series is on Netflix now (I watched an episode or two, trying to figure out where I actually left off).

As I said, I really need to purge the collection. I just don't know what to do with the discs. I've looked into taking them to the library, but they'll only take up to 5 at a time (they don't want people like me dumping 100+ titles on them in a day), so that'll take... awhile. It's out of my way, so I wouldn't be dropping discs off every day. Maybe once a week if I was dedicated. It'd still take me over a year to do it. I thought about putting a local ad up to see if anyone wanted to take them off my hands, but I don't want someone coming into my house and seeing all the actually valuable stuff I have.

morriscroy

I agree.

This is the main reason why I haven't bothered (or won't bother) buying many current tv on bluray shows like:

- 24
- Continuum
- Orphan Black
- Falling Skies
- Homeland (season 2 seemed rather lackluster)
- The Blacklist
- The Americans
- Mad Men (seasons 5+ seemed rather boring)
- Bones
- The Following
- Helix
- Under The Dome
- Defiance
- etc ...

Some due to crappy writing (such as Defiance and "Under The Dome"), while others I find have very little to no rewatch value for me (such as watching The Americans, Continuum, Orphan Black, etc ... in day long rerun marathons).