View Full Version : Besides the Sharon Davis segment, were any other segments filmed but never aired?


unsolved88
06-27-2020, 12:52 PM
Basically what it says in the title. Is it possible that there are other segments that were fully filmed but were shelved for legal or other reasons before it could ever be broadcast?

bip05
07-01-2020, 12:59 PM
Basically what it says in the title. Is it possible that there are other segments that were fully filmed but were shelved for legal or other reasons before it could ever be broadcast?

Wait, what? Sharon Davis? Is there a link to a thread about this?

unsolved88
07-01-2020, 02:30 PM
Wait, what? Sharon Davis? Is there a link to a thread about this?

https://unsolvedmysteries.fandom.com/wiki/Sharon_Eugenia_Davis

Zero
07-01-2020, 03:18 PM
Oh wow, I’d love to see this!

Guardian
07-02-2020, 02:30 AM
Robin recently did this case on The Trail Went Cold podcast. I don’t recall off the top of my head what episode number, but it was within the last few months

mozartpc27
07-03-2020, 12:06 AM
According to this (https://www.sitcomsonline.com/boards/showthread.php?t=294376) thread, started by old friend wiseguy88, there was one filmed and ready to go that never aired due to the cancellation of the show that was about a murder that took place not 10 minutes from where I sit as I type this. I still live in my home town.

I know I think as much as there is to know (at least to the public) about the case, but I would pay good money to see it in its original form, I can tell you that, Cosgrove-Meurer, if you are reading this, and c’mon, we know you are.

unsolved88
07-03-2020, 10:21 AM
According to this (https://www.sitcomsonline.com/boards/showthread.php?t=294376) thread, started by old friend wiseguy88, there was one filmed and ready to go that never aired due to the cancellation of the show that was about a murder that took place not 10 minutes from where I sit as I type this. I still live in my home town.

I know I think as much as there is to know (at least to the public) about the case, but I would pay good money to see it in its original form, I can tell you that, Cosgrove-Meurer, if you are reading this, and c’mon, we know you are.

Most of those links are dead, but that is very interesting.

I was born and raised in Easton, PA, not far from Philadelphia. I moved to Florida in 2005. My mom actually lived on the same street for the first 53 years of her life before we moved down here!

I'd really like to see if there are any shelved segments from the show's heyday (seasons 1-5), not mention the presumably countless cases that the show attempted to cover but were never able to produce segments for. Someone in the Netflix thread made a very good point about how technology has enabled the current UM to actually devote a full hour to one case rather than one case-one segment fortmatting. It's much easier with internet and social media to find mountains of info about a case and quickly contact the involved parties. In the 80s and 90s, the only real way you had to contact people was telephone. Answering machines were still considered somewhat new-fangled technology at the time and it was not uncommon for many families not to have one at all, leading to phone tag. Tracking down articles about certain cases — particularly ones that happened decades prior — meant spending hours using a microfiche. And if you couldn't find enough documentation or if someone crucial to the case never got back to you or outright declined, what else could you do but abandon the story completely? And all this for a segment that may have taken less than ten minutes of airtime on NBC!

Maybe I should start a thread for cases that were outright rejected for UM.

mozartpc27
07-03-2020, 12:12 PM
Most of those links are dead, but that is very interesting.

I was born and raised in Easton, PA, not far from Philadelphia. I moved to Florida in 2005. My mom actually lived on the same street for the first 53 years of her life before we moved down here!

I'd really like to see if there are any shelved segments from the show's heyday (seasons 1-5), not mention the presumably countless cases that the show attempted to cover but were never able to produce segments for. Someone in the Netflix thread made a very good point about how technology has enabled the current UM to actually devote a full hour to one case rather than one case-one segment fortmatting. It's much easier with internet and social media to find mountains of info about a case and quickly contact the involved parties. In the 80s and 90s, the only real way you had to contact people was telephone. Answering machines were still considered somewhat new-fangled technology at the time and it was uncommon for many families not to have one at all, leading to phone tag. Tracking down articles about certain cases — particularly ones that happened decades prior — meant spending hours using a microfiche. And if you couldn't find enough documentation or if someone crucial to the case never got back to you or outright declined, what else could you do but abandon the story completely? And all this for a segment that may have taken less than ten minutes of airtime on NBC!

Maybe I should start a thread for cases that were outright rejected for UM.

Funny, but you might have, in this post, stumbled on the reason that the new UM is a little vague on details sometimes, like in the episode about the guy who left a party never to be seen alive again. No names or other information are given about the party hosts. On the one hand, this is not at variance with, say, the Kurt Sova segment, which this new case most closely resembles. On the other hand, it does feel like they are a tad more wary of lawsuits, which may have to do with the ease with which strangers from all over can find specific people with a few clicks of a mouse these days - much less effort than when UM first appeared.

unsolved88
07-03-2020, 01:02 PM
Funny, but you might have, in this post, stumbled on the reason that the new UM is a little vague on details sometimes, like in the episode about the guy who left a party never to be seen alive again. No names or other information are given about the party hosts. On the one hand, this is not at variance with, say, the Kurt Sova segment, which this new case most closely resembles. On the other hand, it does feel like they are a tad more wary of lawsuits, which may have to do with the ease with which strangers from all over can find specific people with a few clicks of a mouse these days - much less effort than when UM first appeared.

Yes, the internet makes certain things easier for the new UM while simultaneously creating new worries from a legal standpoint. Once you put something online — whether it's good, bad, or indifferent — it's there forever. Resources like Wayback Machine can often find such content which is sometimes thought lost forever.

Some people may have online skeletons in the closet (whether directly related to the case at hand or not) that they may wish to remain buried in cyberspace, causing them to either decline the interview or immediately lawyer up. Definitely a far cry from someone thirty years ago simply telling the researcher over the phone "Nope, not interested" and that basically being the end of it. In this age of "doxxing" people, the show probably does have to tread very lightly on certain matters.