Ain't that good news, man, ain't that news

This is a slow week for DVD, even slower than it has been lately, so in lieu of the regular "This Week in DVD" post, I'm gonna share some recent positive developments for TV on DVD lovers. That's right, I'm walking the sunny side of the street this week. Here are some items that make me smile, and I give full credit to TV Shows on DVD for the announcements (Note: It would help the flow of the post if you sang, "Ain't that good news, man, ain't that news," after each item, but I won't require it. I want this to be a blog where the audience feels free to not participate):

ITEM: 1960 World Series Game 7 kinescope found in Bing Crosby's basement, will be aired on MLB Network, then released on DVD
--As a long-suffering Pirates fan, finally some good news! This broadcast was long believed lost, but Der Bingle, a part-owner of the Buccos, had a copy in his wine cellar, of all places. Just one more reason to love ol' Bing. I can't wait to see this. If you're not a baseball person, let me just say this game featured one of the most famous finishes in the sport's history. If you are a baseball fan, hey, what can we do to stop a Phillies-Yankees World Series? Well, we'll talk about that later.

ITEM: Warner Brothers announces upcoming sets of "ER" and "Dallas"
--I I don't collect these series, but I think the fact that WB sees fit to release the 14th seasons of each long-running show in legit, available-at-retail (if you can find 'em) sets is a good thing. I know each studio is different, and even Warners is unlikely to approach anything like 14 seasons of anything at conventional retail now that it has its Archives program, but still, perhaps this inspires some grain of hope for collectors of other long-running series.

ITEM: Timeless Media Group announces upcoming "Soldiers of Fortune" series set
--I've never seen this 1955 adventure series, but it sounds worth checking out, and it's not like this is coming to TV Land anytime soon. Bravo to Timeless for putting the show together in a reasonably priced package.

ITEM: Obscure sitcom "Angel" coming from Shokus Video
--A descendant of "I Love Lucy" producer Jess Oppenheimer dug up copies of this obscure 1960 sitcom, and Shokus Video will release DVDs of it. I love the notion that, like that 1960 World Series game, there is STILL plenty of rare stuff out there waiting to be discovered and made public. That's the good news. The BAD news is--well, I'm keeping this positive, so never mind that.

Well, OK, maybe just a little bit of negativity. Shokus is issuing these in dreaded "Best of" format, on DVD-R, with 4 episodes per disc at $14.95 a pop. That's not a bad price compared to the other rare stuff Shokus sells, but in this TV-on-DVD era, that pricing model just doesn't quite cut it. Still, kudos to Shokus for putting the show out there in some format.

ITEM: Shout! to release season 4 of "Mr. Ed"
--Good to see the series continues, but...aw, man, here's some of that pesky bad news. It's a Shout Select program. Shout Select, of course, is code for "available directly from Shout" and also "really expensive." My biggest beef with this system is that the sets are not discounted at retail, nor will they ever go on sale, unless maybe Shout feels generous. You'll never see these seasons selling in two-fer packs at Target for 20 bucks--ever--like you did "Green Acres." So if Shout continues THAT series someday, expect to make up for that bargain you may have found on the early seasons by paying full, full price for the rest of the seasons.

Do I sound spoiled? Yeah, maybe. But it irks me when a DVD set is announced with an exorbitant MSRP, people object, and someone chimes in with, "Oh, nobody pays full retail, anyway," not realizing that the higher the MSRP, the higher the price people DO pay. And Shout Select consumers? They DO pay full retail.

But, hey, this is good news in this post! Let's be happy and move on.

ITEM: "Rocky and Bullwinkle" will be completed!
Classic Media is finally finishing the iconic animation series with...uh-oh.

See, there's a complete series set coming out, but collectors who have all 4 seasons and have waited patiently (OK, maybe a lot haven't been so patient) will NOT be able to get season 5 without buying the whole shebang, at least not at first. And we have no guarantee they will release a separate S5 set, apart from David Lambert's assertion that they "do expect it." Of course, this is the same guy who enthusiastically defended Mill Creek's practice of issuing complete series sets of stalled series without individual releases of the missing seasons***, so forgive me if I take that with a grain of salt.

But, hey, this is good news, right? Happy happy joy joy. Now that I start to look back over the contents of this post, I'm kind of bringing myself down a little bit, so I'm going to sign off while I can and repeat the mantra, "Aint that good news, man, ain't that news."

***Lambert makes a good point in this article, but it comes off as a tad too cheerleader-ish for the company. I highly recommend the piece, though, and appreciate the work he did in summarizing this interview with a Mill Creek bigwig.