As I was looking up some info on Wikipedia today, I noticed it said that Season 1/Vol. 1 was recalled upon its initial release because the background music was missing. I know this to be true because during that episode’s run on Toonami (which I recorded on VHS) & on the DVD set I purchased in 2005, the background music only plays when you switch the audio/language to French or Spanish.
I never knew the original Season 1/Vol. 1 was recalled. I always thought it was a flaw that was somehow intended because it adds a certain eeriness to the introduction of Mumm-Ra. Plus, the Toonami rebroadcast some 8yrs. earlier also had no background music.
So, my questions are:
1) Why does the non-music (English) version exist to begin with?
2) Is the non-music version of The Unholy Alliance considered a collector’s item?
I think it was mostly an editing error . There are some strange happenings in some of the episode in Season 2 as well, when the music somewhat slows down to the point where it’s an obvious error. I think that example you mentioned was one of them - we don’t get it on the UK DVD but they missed out on the game (Season 2) so that was our price to pay.
I don’t think it’s a collectors item, though. Nah. If someone uploaded it on YouTube, it might be a jazzy little thing. But you’ll hardly get folk shilling out for it.
Yeah, it’s definitely just an error. When they recalled it, they sent an envelope along with the new disc so that you could mail the old disc back. I kept my old disc, though, so if it ever does become a collector’s item, I’m in luck!
Interesting that the Toonami broadcast featured the same mistake, though. If that’s true, it casts WB in a slightly less incompetent light.
I don’t recall the Toonami version to have been missing the background music… Interesting.
I also have the WB disc that is missing the music. I didn’t bother getting the “fixed” disc. Your going to sit there and tell me that NO ONE over at WB production noticed the ENTIRE background score was missing!? No… they just didn’t care enough about the product at that point in time. Also they did a horrible job with the audio as a whole. My receiver doesn’t even pick up the L and R speakers, just the center. Makes for watching the series unbearable.
Luckily I found the entire series with the DVD quality image and Dolby Surround audio elsewhere.
I am glad it looks like things have changed however as far as how WB views the Thundercats franchise, what with all the new Thundercats stuff coming our way and everything. I am very optimistic!
Looks like you beat me to it BloodofKings…in our discussion of Motakay’s recordings, I was eventually going to bring up the Season 1 BGM disc error. (which like thezaxfactor, I still have)
Since the soundtrack to that episode was removed, there must already be an existing soundtrack of sorts in Mp3, no?
Yeah, I didn’t think of that until you brought it up actually, but if the background tracks were so easy to apply the new disc, whether it was by cassette tape, CD, mp3..whatever, they must have a reserve master copy of the soundtrack on stash. I’m sure all of that is commonplace with the purchasing of the rights to the series, but its still an interesting tidbit. WB would have you to believe it no longer exists.
I know that not every show is produced the same way. In 2008, when Time Life was in talks of releasing TheReal Ghostbusters DVD collection, many fans (myself included) requested Shuki Levy’s official soundtrack to the series as a part of the bonus material. It’s such an amazing collection & I believe the folks behind it would’ve given us a sndtrk if they could. However, they said they weren’t able to single out the music tracks from the effects because both were simultaneously “sandwiched” together in the production of the series. Thus, we were given the next best thing, the Isolated Music & Effects tracks.
With the ThunderCats series, that doesn’t seem to be the case given the aforementioned recall of Season 1/Vol. 1 disc switch thing. Very interesting indeed, Thunderfan. Thanks for pointing that out.
