Monday, September 30, 2013

The Fugitive: Season Three, Vol. 2



CBS has cut corners again, don't waste your money
The music in Season 3 Volume 2 seems to be a mixed bag. Some episodes are nearly free of the awful Heyes replacement music, while others have much more.

NOT WITH A WHIMPER has quite a bit of Heyes replacement music. I noted soft Heyes cues at 18:00, 25:52, 29:32, and loud Heyes at 18:21, 28:40, 36:10. But I gave up taking notes in Act 4 when my hand started to cramp from jotting down all of the Heyes cues that I heard.

WIFE KILLER is a pleasant surprise. Yes, there are a few Heyes cues, but just a few. Overall, this episode's original music is mostly intact. I wonder if we'll ever get an explanation from CBS as to how one episode can be awash in Heyes, while the next is almost Heyes-free? Go figure.

THIS'LL KILL YOU lands somewhere in the middle. It's about 50% original and 50% Heyes. The more prominent Heyes cues are at 15:29, 29:32, 35:25, 42:15, and the one at 47:07 was so loud that it nearly blasted me out of my chair. Most of the too-loud...

From an original Fugitive fan
This is the first time I've written a review of DVDs for Amazon that I can recall and probably never will again. But I have to express my opinion on the controversy of replacement music for the classic series "The Fugitive".

I've watched this show since it aired in 1963. I've seen all the episodes dozens of times over the years. For those of you who don't care if the music has changed, good for you. You are seeing the best TV show ever broadcast. Enjoy it. The pictures are beautiful and the episodes superbly produced, written, directed and acted. Simply the best.

However, for those of us who watched many times, the "new" music is unacceptable. It's the same as listening to "new" rerecordings of the music of the 50s and 60s that I cherish. It's not what I remember and love and I don't enjoy it. It's that simple. I have pre-ordered all six volumes so far. But for Season Four I will wait till the reviews come in before purchasing any more. I'll just...

GREAT COLLECTION OF EPISODES .... STILL TOO MUCH SUBSTITUTE MUSIC, BUT COULD BE MUCH WORSE .... OVERALL: A RECOMMENDED PURCHASE
"THE FUGITIVE: SEASON THREE, VOLUME TWO" arrived on DVD from CBS/Paramount on December 8, 2009, just six weeks after the first half of Season 3 was released.

This 4-Disc set contains a great selection of episodes from what is (in my opinion) the very best television drama series that ever aired on American TV screens: "The Fugitive", starring David Janssen as falsely-convicted Dr. Richard Kimble and co-starring London-born actor Barry Morse, who seemingly was born to play the part of Kimble's chief adversary, Indiana Police Lieutenant Philip Gerard.

When I first received this volume and started looking over the episode descriptions on the inside cover of the DVD case, I kept saying to myself over and over: "Oh, that's right, THAT great episode is included in this set too! Excellent!" (or something similar to those thoughts anyway).

And while I consider myself to be a (very) big fan of "The Fugitive" and also fairly well-schooled in the episodes and...

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