Disclaimer

Opinions expressed on this blog are solely those of the author, David C. Matthews (unless otherwise indicated). Images used are copyrighted by their respective owners, and appear under the "fair use" provisions of the copyright laws.

Monday, July 11, 2011

Episode reviews - what order?

So now that I know that the episodes on Warner Archive's Herculoids DVD are presented in production order, I'm giving some thought about how to present my episode reviews.

I'm considering re-ordering the reviews to match the DVD order (which would, for example, make the first episode I reviewed, "The Beaked People", the fifth episode.) This would mean going back and editing the posts to remove the broadcast dates from the reviews already published, and going forward with reviews in DVD order regardless of broadcast order.

I could continue with broadcast order, but I'm coming to think that the listing I've been using (found in the Wikipedia article is inaccurate. While that listing doesn't show which episodes were shown together in the same half-hour show, it's easy to see which ones were shown together: odd-numbered episodes were the first episode in the show (and do not have prologues), while even-numbered episodes were the second feature of each half-hour (and do include prologues). However, episode #33 is listed as "The Antidote" which I know has a prologue and therefore could not be the first episode of the half-hour; this calls the accuracy of the rest of the list into question.

And I have doubts about the reliability of the episode list at The Big Cartoon DataBase because they list "The Raiders (sic) Apes" as the second episode of the premiere show on Sept. 9, 1967 instead of "The Raiders" as Wikipedia lists it. Basically, the positions of "The Raiders" and The Raider Apes" were switched, as were the positions of "The Lost Dorgyte" and "Destroyer Ants" (within the same half-hour show), and "The Antidote" and "Attack from Space" (also within the same half-hour, although the BCDB might have the correct order, with "Attack from Space" (no prologue) being the first episode of the show).

The Wikipedia and BCDB listings do agree in most of the entries, though, which is better than I can say for some fan sites I've seen, some of which list "The Mutoids" as the first broadcast episode (both Wikipedia and BCDB list it as the first episode of the final half-hour show!).

This is important to me because I want to present accurate information; ultimately I'd like to see this blog become the "go-to" site for information and general Herculoids geekery :) (This is why I present the episode reviews with a straightforward synopsis of the episode, and save the opinions I have about the episode for the commentary section.)

...okay. I've decided. I'm using a combination of the Wikipedia and BCDB listings, resolving any conflicts as I can, until I can get my hands on an authoritative list of the broadcast order (complete with dates) of the original shows. So the next episode review will be "The Spider Man", posted whenever I can get it done.

(EDIT: And, as a compromise, I've added a list to the sidebar there on the right of the episodes as they appear on the Warner Archives DVD. When I finish a review for an episode, I'll add a live link to the title in the list.)

No comments:

Post a Comment