Last year, I wrote about how NBC and DirecTV combined forces to keep the great Friday Night Lights on the air.
It was an experiment, to be sure, and at the time I was worried that the numbers might be hurt because people would either wait for the DVD and/or bittorrent the DirecTV episodes while ignoring the NBC broadcasts.
While I think that people did both, the numbers were strong enough that the showed got renewed not for one, but two more seasons. Awesome! And with the DVD of the third season coming out in May, there was time to watch all three seasons all over again before the next one started on DirectTV.
Which, BTW, would be worth it, because the third season was a complete rebound, washing away the taste of some of the more dubious things that went on in the second season. If you were a fan of Friday Night Lights, everything looked great.
For about a week, that is. Despite the fact that they’ll take DirecTV’s money to produce the show and our money for the DVDs, NBC obviously hates Friday Night Lights. Or more accurately, it hates the fans of Friday Night Lights. Why do I say that? According to a recent TV Shows on DVD post the third season DVD is going to contain bastardized, shorter versions of the episodes.
Here is what TV Shows on DVD is reporting:
We’ve found out, directly from the studio, that the Friday Night Lights – The 3rd Season DVD release will actually contain the NBC edits of the 13 episodes. Furthermore, we’ve also learned that the music on these discs won’t be exactly what was originally broadcast; some portions of the music will be changed for the home video release.
C’mon! Really, NBC?
This is bullshit, and it makes no sense whatsoever, except in the context of having total and utter contempt for the fans of the show. While the music cuts are a bit of a problem — especially since they choose such great, apropos songs to fit the scenes — they’re also not that surprising in this age of greed-oriented music licensing.
What baffles me, though, are the truncated, edited NBC versions of the episodes going down on the DVD as the final canonical versions. How does that work? Do these people not understand that fans consider the DVD the final word on a show? Apparently not. Whatever the reasons for this decision, by treating the DVD as the syndicated version of the show, it comes out as NBC punishing the very people who love it.
People like me. As a very vocal fan of Friday Night Lights, who has talked it up over and over again, I can only take this decision as NBC saying “fuck you” directly to me. Apparently, from NBC’s standpoint, my money isn’t worth the full, proper versions of each episode.
As we say over and over again here at ‘Loper HQ, if the content providers are going to treat content consumers as if we are beneath contempt,then consumers are going elsewhere for their content.
Look. I love this show, which is easily the best non-sci-fi drama anywhere on TV. Despite watching all of the broadcast episodes, I still went out and bought the DVDs of the first two seasons (yes, even the second season), because I knew that we’d be watching them again.
So naturally, I was planning to buy the third season of Friday Night Lights on DVD. Now I’m not. It’s really that simple. I’ll wait until it comes out properly, or I’ll figure something else out that will deny NBC the revenue that they would have otherwise received from me.
Because unless they decide to release a version of the season with the proper episodes, they don’t deserve it.
This is all kinds of wrong on so many levels. This had better be sorted out by the time I get around to watching it. Studios that do this have no argument against piracy. None. A boycott is needed.
WTH? Why would they make such a stupid move? I’ve been psyched about getting the season 3 DVDs, in multiple quantities, but this has me seriously reconsidering. I’d really hate to cancel my pre-orders, so I hope this gets resolved before the sets are manufactured. I’ll do almost anything to support the series, short of being blatantly insulted by idiot marketing decisions.
Yes, I’m not even sure if I’ll have the dvd imported now. With shipping included, it’s a lot of money to fork out for the non-extended versions.
I bought the season pass on I-Tunes and the music is often different. Which is annoying because they pick really fabulous music. I’ve bought at least $50 or $60 worth of music on I-Tunes solely because I heard it on FNL.
Oh come on.
Fans are sooooo annoying!
If you’d just all go away, think of the billions Paramount could have saved by NEVER doing Star Trek after the NBC run!
Hey ! Can anyone send me any contact information for NBC to write to them about the DVD and try to tell them to keep Zach Gilford and Taylor Kitsch around for season 4 and 5.
The music is probably a licensing issue. They’re probably doing something more economical given a DVD sales figure estimate. No idea on the edits though, weird.
I don’t know that’s all NBC’s fault. Most of the blame could probably go to DirecTV for wanting to keep the extended episodes exclusive to them, which is still baffling, but I guess understandable.
It just sucks, but I guess that’s what we have to live with. We should be thankful we are even getting DVDs AND two more seasons. FNL has defied all odds.