The season 1 DVD is fine, but there are a number of episodes in the seasons 2 to 5 sets that I question whether they are complete or not. Running times of several episodes are shorter than normal. I'm pretty sure that The Mod Party, Meet My Masters Mother, and Here Comes Bootsie Nightingale are not complete episodes. I suspect there are other episodes that also have brief scenes deleted. If anyone is aware of other edits in the episodes, please post your information.

From a trusted source: there were problems with the originals from the get-go. The originals of one or two episodes had been damaged or lost, so they had to use the syndicated copies (which are already edited before the stations get them and edit them even further). In some of the first runs with Bootsie Nightingale, there are damaged sections. (Mine is one of those, but since that is not one of my favorite episodes, I haven't replaced that set.)

In the Bootsie Nightingale episode, at one point there is a quick cut to Tony's office. That portion of the episode is probably where something is edited. In Ride Em Astronaut, towards the end of the episode there's an odd fade out so I suspect something may have been edited there. My Master The Pirate has an odd fade out/fade in section also.

In Meet My Masters Mother, the part where Jeannie bangs on the drum to wake up Tony's mom is cut, that is a strange edit I wonder if Sony cut that on purpose. The Mod Party has a similar, strange edit.

In the seasons 2 to 5 DVD's, there are about 6 to 8 episodes in each of those sets that run shorter than the normal time. I suspect that most of those episodes are edited, a few may be complete and just run a little short of normal.

For a classic series like this, it's too bad if the episodes weren't in great shape when the series was being prepped for DVD. Bewitched didn't seem to have any problems at all, except for maybe a couple episodes in the 3rd season DVD I think all of those episodes are complete.

...three episodes- one in season one, and two in season two- were remastered from master copies that have most of the original music scores missing from those episodes. Sony's solution was to either "loop" whatever remaining music was featured in those episodes, or create new music cues (which sound somewhat synthesized). I've seen them in syndicated/cable versions, and I know they're the same on DVD.

When the series was initially distributed in syndication in 1970, Screen Gems/Columbia sent 16mm prints of each episode to local stations- and they were uncut episodes. Any editing for time and additional commercials was up to the local station's film editor. I've seen WPIX-TV's {Channel 11, New York} 16mm prints from 1970 through 1982. Sometimes, they just removed entire sections from certain episodes, lasting about three minutes...especially in season one episodes.

For instance, they removed the entire scene where Dr. Bellows questions Tony about what happened on the island in "The Lady in the Bottle" (the scene literally jumped from Tony leaving the island, to Tony and Melissa entering his house after leaving the base); the scene where Tony scolds Jeannie for making him fail his medical test in "Anybody Here Seen Jeannie?" (the second half of the episode started when Jeannie was hiding in Dr. Bellows' office); the entire sequence where Tony first boards P.J. Ferguson's yacht "The Nina" after he traps Jeannie in the vacuum cleaner, including Roger's unsuccessful attempt to woo a girl with two cigarettes in his mouth, and Ferguson cornering Tony's commanding officer, Gen. Fletcher, to talk him into allowing Tony to join them on a trip to Nassau (again, the scene jumped from Tony leaving the house, to him returning home to find Mrs. Flaherty, the cleaning woman, at work); I could list more, but you get the idea.

"Pre-edited" syndicated episodes [on videotape] began when the DFS Program Exchange took over distribution in 1984 (and WOR-TV got the rights to it on a "barter" basis)- "SuperStation WTBS", however, continued showing their slightly edited 16mm prints nationally until 1987.

:tv:

I didn't know that three episodes have music alterations, that's interesting.

Although I'm not happy with some edited shows in the seasons 2 to 5 DVD, I'm glad at least that the 1st season shows came out uncut. The 1st season is my favorite, when the series went to color episodes some of those shows are too goofy and silly for my taste, especially seasons 3, 4, and 5.

..."Russian Roulette", "One Of Our Bottles Is Missing", and "My Poor Master, the Civilian", 'retro'. And some of the closing credits in later second season episodes feature the closing themes of seasons four/five instead of the original season two orchestration...very sloppy on Sony's part!

Seasons three through five are mostly "silly" and "goofy" because Sidney Sheldon wasn't around to write more episodes; James Henerson became the series' head writer in 1968, and he was more slapstick-oriented than Sidney was. You can tell which episodes are Sheldon's [even if he used one of his three aliases in writing them].

:tv:

Thanks for the information, TV Knowledge. It's too bad Sidney relinquished some of the writing duties, I guess at the time he was busy with other projects. Some of those Jeannie episodes in the later seasons also have strange endings, it looks like there should be more to the story but they ran out of time and it went unfinished.

TV Knowledge, aside from the ones previously mentioned, are you aware of any other scene edits on the DVD's?