The high ranking for Sex and the City is partly due to HBO's inflated pricing.
Sunday, September 23, 2007
"The" Chappelle's Show?
This New York Times article on TV-on-DVD really doesn't have anything new (I was mildly surprised to find that TV-on-DVD sales are up instead of down; somehow it seemed otherwise, what with all the shows being abandoned in mid-run), but it does offer this chart of the top-selling TV shows on DVD through the end of last year.
The high ranking for Sex and the City is partly due to HBO's inflated pricing.
The high ranking for Sex and the City is partly due to HBO's inflated pricing.
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I'm a bit surprised to see "Friends" is a bigger DVD hit than "Seinfeld," because it was nowhere as good or as well-written a series. I suppose TimeWarner putting Jennifer Aniston on the cover of virtually all its magazines (well, other than Fortune and Sports Illustrated) has something to do with it.
I'm actually surprised to see 'Gilmour Girls' on the list. I mena, I knew it had a rabid fan base, but would've never expected it to translate to some serious moolah.
How much did the Sex and the City DVD sets cost originally? Were they as stupidly inflated as other HBO shows typically are? (meaning $80-100 retail)
Color me surprised at Gilmore's popularity as well.
I don't when the Sex & City season sets went discount, but have been seeing a lot of them on for low prices over the past couple months. 'The Sopranos', on the other hand, talk about inflated...
"I'm a bit surprised to see "Friends" is a bigger DVD hit than "Seinfeld," because it was nowhere as good or as well-written a series."
Not sure it's that surprising. Though Seinfeld may have been a better series, I'd be inclined to argue that Friends was more accessible for a general audience (me, I never cared for Seinfeld and it doesn't make me a bad person). Just my opinion of course.
Friends benefits greatly from having been on DVD significantly longer than Seinfeld. By the time the first season of Seinfeld made it to DVD in November 2004, Friends already had 8 season sets on store shelves.
Also, there have only been 7 Seinfeld sets to date (compared to Friends' 10), and the last one only came out three months ago.
Frankly, I'm surprised Seinfeld has managed to make up that much ground.
Gilmore Girls doesn't surprise me. I live in Mayville, ND, and even I have several friends who own many or all of the seasons.
Sex and the City's accomplishment is still impressive. Its price may have been inflated, but consumers were apparently willing to pay it.
That's one thing about aiming a show at upscale consumers -- they have money.
It also helps that you can't really see it unedited anywhere (as opposed to say, Friends), and it is hard for that show to survive edits.
It's beginning to look like one of my favorites, Cheers, has joined the long list of abandoned series. Season eight came out in July '06, but since then, nothing.
I know how this works: lots of people buy season one of a series, but sales tend to decline with each successive season. Maybe, though, I'm just too anal-retentive to understand it. I mean, how can you possibly live with having season one of a series on your shelf without having to have everything else?!
But a lot of people do that. I read elsewhere on the net that CBS/Paramount was very pleased with the sales of Have Gun, Will Travel season one. Exceeded their expectations. Season two did less well, though, and season three lagged more than sixty percent behind season one sales. So...no more Have Gun.
Some series almost seem set up for failure. Barney Miller is a prime example. Fans of the show wanted it on DVD, but the only set released was its "first season" (13 eps), when the show hadn't quite hit its stride. Couple that with absolutely no extras and a stiff price, and that adds together nicely to equal rock-bottom sales numbers and no additional seasons.
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