All right, it's time for this to have a thread, I think, as it doesn't fit so snugly in the Media thread anymore.

I still want to be a little shadow head down in the corner like MST3K.

Regina got to do a commentary for the Alias DVDs. If TAR DVDs ever see the light of day, we've got to have a Miss Alli commentary.

Miss Alli commentary would really be the icing on the cake.

I've signed up all over the place ... just hope we see them soon.

I too love the potential thought of having TAR on DVD. Hopefully it will ba all five seasonds and then the soon to premiere TAR 6. A nice box set would be cool.

Miss Alli, I was just noticing how frequently you've been referencing MST3K -- that's 2 Apprentice recaps, and now this. It must be the Minnesota thing.

I hope they just release each DVD in order by season, none of this skipping around crap, like Survivor.

Extra footage of Phil to see what he does between legs (I just read that and I'm sorry). Relaxing in swim trunks...his lovely sweaters...hmmm. We need these dvds stat.

Miss Alli, we will need your expert commentary on them, too!

I'll take anything I can get. If they go with season 6 first and work backwards, forwards, and sideways, I'll take it. Course my preference would be season by season in order or one big box set.

The bootlegs I've seen (I'll delete this part if you think talking about bootlegs is inappropriate, Miss Alli) have a lot of the Early Show interviews, and I've enjoyed them enough that I'd like to see them as extras on official releases.

Commentaries by the participants would be wonderful, of course.

Discs upon discs of extra footage. There's no way they'd ever be able to include as much of this as I'd like to see (I'd sit through footage of them sleeping), but with all the stuff they have (still have?), there's got to be hours worth of interesting things to see.

The Phil interviews and some of the other Insider clips would probably be nice.

There's got to be a wealth of opportunity for some good "Behind the Scenes" and other featurettes on the logistics of putting together the race. I'd love to see some footage of the pre-race run-throughs for various legs.

Of course, I'd just love the episodes themselves with no bells or whistles.

Not to mention insanely expensive. :)

But I must admit I'd be willing to spend any amount of money for loads of extras.

Ha! Miss Alli as a little MST3K shadow head down in the corner of the screen would be awesome!

I really think that at least the Season 1 DVD's are in the works. Otherwise, that Amazon page wouldn't be there, complete with cast info and everything. It would just give me the "no results - check out these similar items" thing again. I remember a similar thing happened with "Scrubs" - a long time ago, I checked for DVD's on Amazon and it gave me nothing. Now if I search for it, I get the same exact kind of page that now comes up for TAR, and I know for sure that "Scrubs" DVD's are on the way.

So I think this all means that there is at least a solid chance now. Do you guys think so? Or am I just grasping at straws here?

Bells and whistles would be awesome (especially cast and crew commentary, that would be the definition of kick-ass!), but I'd also be on Cloud 9 even if it was just the episodes and nothing else.

Anyway, for easier reference, here's the new Amazon page again. I trust what they say that submitting your e-mail address is also a way of letting the studio know how many people are eagerly awaiting what (I'm assuming and hoping) is something already in the works, so I recommend doing that.

I posted this over in the media thread a few days ago as well, but this site lets you vote and send a short message to the studio. You do have to create a login, however.

When I joined the site a month ago, there wasn't any DVD release/studio information. Now TAR 1-4 have studios attached to them that own the DVD rights.

I would love an extra on the camera/sound crew. I'm sure there are snippets here and there of them taping each other, at least during E/S/M periods. Some behind the scenes inner workings by the editors and how they mold a storyline would be fantastic as well.

I've tried figuring this out all by myself, but I'm getting nowhere with it. So. What's the MST3K reference all about? And should I feel ashamed or completely uncool for not knowing?
Count me in on wanting some Miss Alli commentary. But I'll take anything I can get at this point.

eta Thanks MamaTiger. I feel somehow deprived that I've missed out on this.

MST3K = Mystery Science Theater 3000. Where the appallingly bad movies are shown while the guy and the two little robots down in the corner snark along.

You haven't lived till you've seen Manos, The Hands of Fate. Trust me.

Though after seeing Manos, you might not WANT to live. Man, I used to love that show. Actually, it would be a clever idea to get the actual MST3K guys to do more commentaries, with or without the puppets and all that. Or maybe combine the ideas, and have Alli's shadow there along with Mike/Joel and bots!

"I am Torgo! I take care of the place while the Master is away!"

ObDVD: It would be awesome if they included interviews with editors, as unlikely as that might be. (Hey, there's nothing wrong with going pie-in-the-sky for a DVD that doesn't exist yet.)

Exactly, psuedostudent. Dream big. My fantasy DVD has exactly that sort of extra. For example, a dream commentary for, say, TAR1, Episode 1 would be Brennan, an editor, Miss Alli, and a cameraman. And Rob & Brennan's taxi driver.

Might they do what Survivor did?

Release DVDs of the "most popular" seasons, rather than each season in order? Right now, the complete Season 1 of Survivor is available on DVD, along with the Complete Survivor All-Star. (They also released sort-of highlight DVDs after the first and second seasons)

Would there be a market for every season of TAR on DVD? (Other than contestants about to compete on the show.)

Which were then included on the full season sets anyway, not that it stopped a couple websites from recommending Best and Most Outrageous Moments for people interested in Borneo.

The Real World also is using the strategy of alternately releasing old seasons with ones that have just finished up. However, I really hope, given the comparatively small number of TAR seasons, they just put them out in chronological order.

I think TAR stands on it's own entertainment-wise and is less character-driven than Survivor and Real World, if only because there's more action, so I think there might be a better shot at all of them in a row. But I'm possibly just a wee bit biased.

With a couple of MST3K episodes I bought on DVD, they came with a reusable stick-on group of heads, to put on your television screen to help you watch other things. We could get some Miss Allis and...

As long as we're compiling a wish list for the DVD, I wish for some indication of the time elapsed in performing Detours and Roadblocks. Some of us like to debate "the best team(s) ever" and I've always thought that it was difficult to assess that based on finishes alone.

I realize that they give us limited information while the shows air to keep up suspense, but I'd really love to see more time references in the DVD.

In case Miss Alli is not invited to add commentary to the DVD, I would suggest considering the approach the South Park creators did for the first season of SP after Comedy Central pulled the tracks of the DVD. That is, release a separate CD that the tracks are timed to the DVD 'chapters', such that one can listen to the commentary and watch the DVD still in a Wizard of Oz/Dark Side of the Moon fashion. These could be sold in the TWOP store, and would probably get quite a few sales from the die-hard TAR fans.

(There may be some legal issues regarding how it's packaged and so forth, so someone may have to get CBS to ok some parts of this).

Locusts.
Hurricane, hurricane, hurricane, hurricane.
Red Sox in the World Series.
TAR on DVD.

Apocalypse much?

Seriously, this is marvelous news. What a gold mine of footage to pick from there. ESM segments, missing tasks, Sequesterville. I wonder if they'd use the same editors to put together the extra footage. I think I'll go ask!

Best for me, the timing could not be better. My Christmas list just went from zero to two items: 1. TAR DVD(s), and 2. DVD player. In that order. ("President John Kerry" is on my wish list for Thanksgiving. 'Round here, no holiday is complete without a little begging.)

You forgot volcanos, Parkfield quake, (if you're in Japan) typhoon times ten, and Phil getting a Discovery channel series and a book published. *grin*

Topic? I signed up for the notify list. I don't know what excites me more, 50 additional minutes of Return of the King or the mere possibility of actually getting to see the seasons I missed!

Wishful thinking on my part, I'm sure, but our paper had an article on Wednesday about the increasing popularity of TV shows on DVD. Basically it said, if it's not out yet, it will be. They're making loads of money on these things...loads.

Count me in as a big fan of MST3K and owner of some of the DVD collections (mostly with Joel). With those and SCTV being released, TAR would make me a happy camper indeed.

(annoying, anal voice) Just in case anyone hasn't found it yet, there IS a MST3K thread over here in Sitcoms. (/a.a.v.) We can always use new MSTies there!

And count me in with those who'd love to see a Miss Alli head shadow at the bottom of the screen on the TAR DVD set, whenever it comes out. Who better to continue the Minnesotan in-jokes about Eden Prairie, Circle Pines and the Wisconsin Dells?

Unfortunately, the only appropriate puppet companion I can think of for Miss Alli.......... is Kasperle. Ew.

Mommy, didn't we used to have a poodle?


I've been negligent. I should get back there. I think I posted once. But it's so much more fun to be off-topic here. It makes me feel so naughty! (Anticipating warn level of 99%.)

I think Miss Alli should be one of the robots.

Seriously -- there's so much potential for the TAR DVD's. The quality of the Survivor Season 1 DVD is promising; if there's a TAR DVD (Regardless of season), I have every hope it'll be as thorough & fascinating as the Survivor one. And if they can get Gervase to comment on that, surely they can get Brennan, Kevin, Team Guido, etc., to comment on a TAR1 DVD.

What I would really love, though, obviously, is a Mirna audio track for the TAR5 DVD. And for my life in general. Oh! And there could be a Bowling Mom screaming track!

I'll take anything I can get, as long as they finally do SOMETHING. My fellow TAR fans and I constantly e-mail each other to moan about the crazy things that get dvd'd (The Joe Schmoe Show?!) and still--no TAR. It's a lonely life. . . .

I think all the people raving about it in here is evidence that there is. I, for one, would buy every season. Hopefully they will give us a few months between releases so that I can afford them and have enough time to watch one endlessly before moving on to the next.

There are a TON of shows coming out now. Hopefully TAR won't be too far behind.

I'd LOVE to do a commentary. Kevin jokes sometimes about what a steel trap of a brain I have for remembering everything on the Race. He's actually had reporters call me when he couldn't answer something.

Hey, two silhouetted robot heads are better than one.

I can't believe that the first season of Ellen is on DVD. Not even the coming out season. The first freaking season, when it wasn't even called Ellen. So we have that and no TAR.

I think the robot puppet trifecta would pretty much have to be Miss Alli, Brennan, and Kevin.

[odd sidebar] In a conversation one time with season 3's Ken, he once asked me about something that happened on his race. I was like, "Um, you were there. I just saw it on tv." Hee. I guess like Brennan, i just have one of those minds that remembers all the (unimportant) details. [/odd sidebar]

HA! None of us can stop talking for eight seconds, so that would be rather amusing.

Hear, hear! That would be excellent!

Heh, you guys might not be able to stop talking for eight seconds at a time, but at least you are entertaining while y'all are talking. A running dialogue would actually be a hoot.

Especially if it ran in time with the show, sort of as a Voice Over effect. Then you could get your Snarkiness mixed in with the show.

Brennan? Can't stop talking? I bet you didn't see that coming back in the day.

It hardly matters that your audio commentary would talk over the entire episodes; a lot of us have probably memorized most of the dialogue, anyway. And no matter how much talking you do, we'll still surely be able to hear "LENNY!"

Sue, the customer service bot at the cbs.com store, says she knows of no plans for a TAR DVD, but it's a great idea. This is, verbatim, what she said two years ago.

Of course, we know how crappy that website has been before: maybe she's actually reading webpage info that IS two years old? Please? Pretty Please?

Oh, and BTW: Any TAR DVD that has commentary from the above three in MST3K format would certainly require the talents of the Guidos as the Mad Scientists. Who better to torment everyone?

Personally, I'd like to see Amander or Chris as commentators. They may not have been on the show that long, but by gosh they were entertaining (and still are!)

CBS would have to post a huge disclaimer in giant letters if those two did commentary. It would be fun to have X-rated for adults only commentary on a family show.

I wonder why TPTB would NOT be rushing to put out DVDs now....

I agree completely that TPTB should be working on getting a DVD out stat. However, I would like to suggest something else (I'm not sure this is the right place, but what the hell). Since we know they will want to take a break in the spring from filming, after having done TAR 5,6 & 7 in a row, but will not want to lose momentum in the summer, why don't they show TAR Classic (otherwise know as the first race) again this summer? Imagine the marketing line of: See the original that started the two-time emmy winning show. What do people think?

Ok, will does anyone have Survivor DVDs? and if so, what are they like? Is there extra footage? Comments by producers, camera guys etc? behind the scenes stuff? I figure CBS is likely to do what they've done before, but I don't have a good idea of what that is... anyone care to share with the group?

On my wish list: an accurate time line ( 36 hour pit stops etc), a little bit about sequesterville, the roadblock & detours that get edited out, and a sample interview with a sound and camera crew.

And, it would be really great if TPTB included an extra video showing one of the prominent racing teams from each season re-visiting some of the places they raced through. Imagine the possibilities - we might see Guido re-enact Departuregate-gate (complete with diagrams) in Tunis, take a walking tour of The Cha's favorite shops and eateries in Hong Kong, or visit all of the places that stopped selling Diet Coke after FloZach came through town. ;")

The Survivor DVDs don't add much more beyond the show. The first one (Season 1) has only a couple episodes with commentary, while All-Stars has a set of 4 episodes commentary with the 4 ousted players during those. (the rather poor snark that the last four, Rupert, Jenna, Rob and Amber, have on the last one is at least somewhat entertaining). There's hardly any extras, certainly nothing like several people above have suggested for the TAR DVDs (like timelines, money flow situations, etc.)

Not that TAR DVDs would be different; Survivor doesn't have that much minutia that would be called for, compared to what we eagle-eyed posters look for in each show. There could be more, but I wouldn't wait with baited breath.

"Baited breath"-- sounds more like Fear Factor than Survivor or TAR! Although I guess it could apply to eating a baby octopus in Korea. I've made TAR fans of several people and I know they'd purchase DVD sets if for no other reason than to stop having to listen to me rave about prior seasons. I send them all to amazon.com to sign themselves up for word of a possible release and "vote" for the DVDs to be released.

They've been pimping the "two-time Emmy Winning" logo all over NFL football as previews for the show. I'm almost afraid that the cover of the DVD will be Phil holding two Emmys.

Still, if they're going to give this season that much promotion, it would make sense to release the DVDs of previous seasons and promote them during TAR6, and then have a TAR6 one as soon as that season finishes.

While "extras" would be great, color me happy if they just slap the episodes on a DVD and sell it to me at any exhorbitant price they want.

To be fair, I also have the first season of Apprentice on DVD, and it's rather low on extra features too. (The cover, when you open it, has a tinny little speaker of the Hair going "You're fired", but the actual DVDs lack many detailed extras as well -- plus they couldn't reuse 'Money Money Money' but some fake rip-off due to licensing rights for the credits). I don't know about any other reality TV series.

Part of me wants the DVDs out now, just burnt and wrapped into a package. But TAR is pretty much the caliber of all reality TV with it's Emmy wins, and I would much rather wait a few months/years more for CBS and the TAR staff to put together an excellent package to celebrate that fact (and from what we've seen so far, many of this years contenders (Survivor, Idol, and Apprentice) are not doing that great that next year already looks like a shoe-in just going off TAR5) than to have the DVDs in my hands today.

However, even for TV shows, some of these box sets are really lacking in extras. To put as much as has been discussed previously for a possible TAR box would be well above 90% of the TV DVD releases out there. If we compare this to, say, the CSI box sets (also put out by CBS video), those are rather feature-less as well. I really don't see CBS doing that much special for TAR if it's not doing it for the also-award-winning CSI.

Which is completely fine with me Masem. I'd just love to have good quality DVDs, instead of VHS tapes recorded on my crappy VCR, with all the commercials taken out. I don't have TAR 1 or 2, I've never even seen TAR1.

All the extras previously mentioned would be lovely to have, but if CBS decided to do just a straight "here are the episodes" DVD, I would still buy every season.

First of all, major word on wanting the DVDs, like, now, and on Miss Alli needed for the commentary.

But while I was at work, I thought about the order in which the seasons might be released. To me, it seems like there's 3 options

1. Like most TV on DVD, in season order. That seems to be a highly logical and the most popular order.
2. Like Survivor, the first season first, then the most recent, then ?
3. The new idea that came to me. The recent promos have been touting the 2 Emmy wins. So it would seem to be logical to release the 2 Emmy winning seasons (TARs 3 & 4) first.