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S2, S3 *and* S4 in 2003?

J

Joseph DeMartino

Moderator
A fellow from London posted what he says is the Warner Bros. preliminary schedule for next year's video releases in the U.K. The full list is at The DVD File's Software Forum if you're interested. I'll just post the important stuff here. /forums/images/graemlins/wink.gif

The list starts with January, but only goes as far as November 2003 for some reason. You'll see why this is important in a minute. /forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif Naturally I scanned it for mentions of B5.

May DVD - Retail Babylon 5 Series 2

(Remember that "series" is a Britishism for what Americans would call a "season") OK, no surprise here. Even when JMS mentioned that April was the tenative R1 release date I assumed that he meant the end of the month, because that would put the release 6 months ahead of the November S3 release, and that's the pattern the studios have followed for this kind of thing. (X-Files ships in May and November each year, for instance.) So I skipped down to November. No B5. I went back to May and scanned down the list, slowly. This is what I saw:

September DVD - Retail Babylon 5 series 3

Wait a second, that's two months early. That only puts four months between releases. And it means that S4 could be released in late December 2003. Not April 2004. Which in turn means that S5 (and possibly the TV movies) could be out in the spring of 2004 instead of two full years from now. /forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif

I wish the list had included their December releases. This is going to bug me.

Now mind you none of this is confirmed. This is a post from some guy who says he's in London, and says he has access to this list. I don't spend enough time on the DVD File Forum to have any sense of this guy. (I only found his post because somebody mentioned it on The Home Theater Forum.) Even if he and the list are both totally legitimate, people at video companies make mistakes and plans change.

But I have a feeling this may be accurate information. And that feeling is only partially based on the fact that I predicted that something like this might happen. /forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif Now we'll have to wait and see if I'm going to be proven right.

Still, it is a hopeful sign, and could indicate that Warner Bros. is at long last seeing the profit potential in its redheaded step-child. /forums/images/graemlins/wink.gif

Regards,

Joe
 
If the information is based on the official Warner Brothers list extracts will appear in TN Zone, probably Issue #158 or #159. The section of the magazine is called "In The Shops".
 
If the information is based on the official Warner Brothers list extracts will appear in TN Zone, probably Issue #158 or #159. The section of the magazine is called "In The Shops".
Click to expand...

Is it reliable?
 
Is it reliable?
Click to expand...

Sometimes. /forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif This past spring they listed The Legend of the Rangers as a summer 2002 DVD release, then moved it to fall, then quietly changed it to "TBA - 2003" All during that time no other DVD publication or web site in the U.K. reported anything of the kind, and no one ever produced any documentation from Warner Bros. to support what they said.

So I wouldn't necessarily consider them confirmation, even if they publish the same information.

Regards,

Joe
 
Remember that "series" is a Britishism for what Americans would call a "season
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i should be offended for Mocking the use of our language . we did invent it you know /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif
 
You mean, like how the Hollywood (I forget the producer's name) "improved" "Man About the House" into "Three's Company"? Or from "Brighton Belles" into "Golden Girls"? Then there was that Bea Arthur tripe that was a rip-off of "Fawlty Towers".

Generally, I'm of the opinion that the Brits get it right the first time: Lift (elevator), Underground (subway) for example. But I can't wrap my head around "boot" for "a car's storage space in back".

imho.

Back to topic: Thanks, Joe for the heads-up, whether it pans out or not. (Guess which way I'm hoping for, just like the rest of us! <big grin>)

LordRemy
 
Was it Bertrand Russell who said "We are two people, divided by a common language." Or something like that.
Benjamin Franklin was responsible for many of the differences between British and American english. He wanted to differentiate the two, and was responsible for things like dropping the u from colour, and similar words. Guess we can't blame him for the series/season thing, since TV came long after him. So what do the Brits call what we call a series in the US?
 
Right. As has often been the case, the Brits invented something and we improved upon it
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Removing about 75% of the words from our language and changing all words ending in 'ise' to 'ize' is not really an improvement IMBO (In My British Opinion) /forums/images/graemlins/tongue.gif
 
Elric, they just had to make it easier for themselves! /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif

"Now, let's see... our children can't spell. What shall we do? Well, we'll make nouns and verbs spelt the same for one, less confusion. How can people remember two spellings!!"

Antony goes to practise his sarcasm.
 
"Spelt" is not a word, at least in the way you're using it here.

And you British think you're so hot language-wise. /forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif
 
Channe... little ego adjustment?

You first say it's not a word, and that we're meant to be hot language wise (such sarcasm). Then, faced with proof that it is a word, you say that it's not a word in America in defense of that. Your point?

That doesn't mean it's not a word, and it is a word in America. If it's not a word, then what is it? You just don't use it obviously.

It's a word, so I shall use it.
 
I do have a pathetic little ego problem. I admit this. It's part of what makes me so endearing. /forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif
 
Was it Bertrand Russell who said "We are two people, divided by a common language."
Click to expand...

Nope, Bernard Shaw. And Oscar Wilde had a similar line, around the same time. ("We and the Americans have almost everything in college. Except for language, of course.")

And it was Noah Webster, not Franklin, who really got the whole "American English" thing going with this dictionary, which formalized the spelling changes he found most useful.

I thought most of the TV series mentioned above sucked on both sides of the Atlantic, so I hardly think we spoiled any of them. And no one, in either country, was going to be able to replicate Fawlty Towers for two reasons: 1) John Cleese is unique. 2) It took him and Connie Booth two years to write six of the damned things. Of course they're all gems, he was able to devote more time to each of those half hours than most writers get to spend on a feature film. Any attempt to do the show without Cleese was doomed from the start - no matter which country it was set in. On the other hand he was able to sell the rights to the format to American producers four or five times before anyone finally got a version of the show on the air, so he did very well out of it all, which is a good thing. /forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif

And Norman Lear managed to do pretty well with All in the Family and Sanford and Son.

Regards,

Joe
 
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