Hardy Boys SEASON 3 on DVD

[MacGyver]

There are definitely also some scenes removed along with those syndicated cuts- I don't know of specific missing scenes for all the episodes, but I do know there is a scene with Joe tackling a bad guy at an airport at the start of the episode "Game Plan" that is cut from the DVD release. It's possible there may be other such scenes cut as well and that's disappointing. But again- at least something has been released. It's the same situation with the ALF series released in America- syndicated cuts were used and so each episode has a couple of minutes here and there that are cut- you still get the majority of the episode, but for hardcore fans of the show that want every bit of it intact, it's a disappointing situation. I've got the ALF series on DVD and enjoy watching it, but it would still be nice to have the original network versions (though it's been so long since I've seen the show in its original network run that I can't think of any big missing scenes that stick out to me right now.)

[tomswift2002]

Syndicated Cuts probably just removed licensed music. Too bad about the bonus feature though

When studios make syndication tapes, hey edit them for a shorter time period so that stations can air more commercials.

[Judah-Ben-Hur]

I was thinking that once MacGyver pointed that out, maybe I throw out music because it's the one I catch more often.

[unknownninja]

I LOVE Hardy Boys!!!

[tomswift2002]

I was just watching "Game Plan".  It's funny how Monopoly turns up here and then is mentioned in the "Super Sleuths" story 'HB' in 1984.

But out of all the episodes, GP's tape must've been in the worst condition out of them all.  Right at the end I was finding that Frank and Joe's faces were looking really red with streaks of green and blue---it almost looked like a worn out VHS tape.

[MacGyver]

Yeah- that episode did look rather sad, unfortunately (for video quality I mean.) And thank you for specifying that it looked like a worn out VHS tape- I see many people compare a bad quality transfer DVD to that of a VHS tape and that in itself is not entirely accurate, I don't think. A brand new VHS tape (or better yet, Beta tape) has excellent quality. It's only after numerous viewings that it starts to really slide in quality.

[tomswift2002]

Well for most of the episodes I'm finding that it looks like Shout Factory was only able to get either U-Matic 3/4 or S-VHS copies of the episodes---both are broadcast quality, but even for analog broadcast tapes both are at the bottom of the quality ladder (U-Matic was originally launched as a consumer tape format in the late-1960's that didn't take off due to cost; S-VHS came out in 1987).  If the episodes did come from Betacam masters (Betacam came out in 1982, with its upgrade, SP, being released in 1985) then they must've been transferred to Betacam years ago, but I would think that Universal would be charging a lot more for Betacam than either U-Matic or S-VHS.

[MacGyver]

That sounds about the size of it- thanks for the technological details.