Customer Reviews

Riverboat

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(6)

 

 

This series which we have all longed for to be put on to DVD has a major fault with Discs 2 & 3. The episode BLOWUP is faulty and will not play. Not enough care and attention has been paid to copying these episodes to DVD. Its not only my copy that is faulty, but people I know in the USA and in Australia are finding this DVD susbstandard with faults on this episode. They all need to be recalled and we should be supplied with episodes that play properly in our DVD players. So I advise everyone to steer clear of these DVDs until this fault has been corrected.

Peter

It's great to see all these titles being released by Timeless Media Group, but - if they are all as badly mastered as this set - they needn't have bothered.

I agree the previous comments - skips, pixilations - particularly on Disc Two. Timeless need to get their act together quickly - I would have thought a recall of all dodgy discs a necessary first step.

I bought my discs in March 2008 and had the same problem everybody else did. Lots of pixelation and the second episode on the second disc ("Blow Up") stops half-way through. Timeless Media should be ashamed of themselves.

The quality of the show itself is fine. The source film prints are quite clear, the plots are adequate, and the acting is 1st rate. The show holds up quite well after all these years.

I agree with Peter Williams. It was great to finally see some episodes of this long-forgotten series come out on DVD. BUT...the quality is apalling!! Discs 2 and 3 are full of pixelation problems...and the episode THE BLOWUP (on disc 2) jams...then jumps 6 minutes ahead. The result...a 48 minute episode plays for about 42 minutes...missing a few vital scenes in the middle of the episode. More care in mastering (or manufacturing) is required from Timeless Media before I'll be buying any more of their DVDs.

I disagree with the guy who thinks the more expensive the DVD player the better job it will do. And sorry fella, but some of the players $100 or less will play discs just as good. The more expensive DVD players actually have so many added features that they sometimes will actually cause more disc problems. I own 7 DVD players....two cost of $700.00 and I can say as one with experience that my less expensive machines have less problems with playback. People think just because it costs more money it means it is better. It may have better sound output or provide HDV quality. But as for bad discs like that offered in RIVERBOAT no machine is going to play them properly. I agree...these are poorly recorded. Frankly it looks like someone who has copied them from VHS and were not professionally produced. They were not digitally enhanced in any way. They really look like copies of copies.

There was indeed major problems with the discs in this set,however they have since been all withdrawn by Timeless & the set has new pressings which play fine.

You can now order this box with confidence.

I had the same experience as the previous reviewers. The episodes skip, pixelate and the audio keeps dropping out. It has nothing to do with the DVD player (I have a modern, expensive, state-of-the-art one), this set was just poorly mastered. I was very disappointed considering I bought it for my father who loved this show when it first aired.

I recently ordered the Riverboat anthology with great trepidation having read some of the above reviews. It arrived yesterday, and I am delighted. I have none of the technical problems listed above, and I am playing it on a small portable DVD player that I bought for less than $100. The picture resolution is excellent and so is the sound. I am not sure if the company remastered, but I must rate it as excellent quality. I only wish the full series would be available in the same quality as these 15 episodes.

I disagree with all these previous reviews. I have the Riverboat TV set and it is quite good quality. No skips, jumps or any of the other problems that the other reviews say they are having. However I'm using a good quality high end DVD player not a $100.00 low end players like most people purchase. People are having these problems while trying to play North American discs on modified Region 2 players and while trying to rip the original DVDs. I have now watched this set on 4 different Sony players, 2 Pioneer, 1 Yamaha and a Panasonic DVD unit and all the discs in the set play fine without any problems.

The 44 hour long episodes (all in B&W) of the adventure series "Riverboat" ran from 1959- 1961 on NBC. If you wanted to see a lot of boats in those days your choices were "Tugboat Annie" and "Riverboat".

Set in the 1840's, the title character is "The Enterprise" (a pre-Star Trek version), a 100-foot paddle wheel steamer on the Mississippi River. The Captain is Grey Holden (Darren McGavin) who won the boat in a poker game. Bert Reynolds, fresh off the Florida State University football team, plays the ship's pilot Ben Frazier. Apparently their work together on this series made McGavin and Reynolds lifelong enemies and poor Burt was replaced by Noah Berry (Rockford's dad and Davy Crockett's sidekick) after the first season.

The 15 episodes on this DVD release (which is viewable but not of great quality-but neither was TV reception for many families back then) are a mix of the two seasons and have some notable guest stars. Each episode's title, original air-date, summary, and notable guest star(s) are detailed below.

Season #1

A Race to Cincinnati: 4 October 1959 Three ruthless men try to block the Enterprise's path so a farmer's crop of peaches will spoil and he won't be able to make the last payment on a valuable plot of land (Anne Baxter). The Unwilling: 11 October 1959 Even though Dan Simpson (Eddie Albert) lost his last cargo, he refuses to give up his dream of building a general store in the West. The river pirates that made $20,000 stealing his merchandise the first time are planning to stage another robbery, in spite of Ben Frazer's precautions (Debra Paget). The Fight Back: 18 October 1959 Seeking cargo for his riverboat, Captain Holden docks in the town of Hampton and discovers that Fowler, the town boss, won't allow the farmers to ship their crops. Desperate for work, Holden agrees to host the wedding of a local townsman. When Fowler's brother dies trying to kill the groom, the boss leads a lynch mob against Holden and his ship John Ireland, Joan O'Brien). Escape to Memphis: 25 October 1959 A woman (Jeanne Crain) kills her brutal husband (Claude Akins) in self-defense and flees her plantation, with the husband's ne'er- do-well brother in pursuit. She takes passage on the Enterprise and meets with an unscrupulous man who has stolen a fortune from his wife and wishes an accomplice to help him evade police pursuit. Witness No EvilA Night at Trapper's Landing: 8 November 1959 The U.S. Army plans to commandeer The Enterprise to launch a punitive expedition against the Indians and avenge the loss of Lieutenant Devereaux (Ricardo Montalban) and his men. Frazer tries to convince the army brass that the local Indian agent and his men are the cause of the Indian uprising. The Boy from Pittsburgh: 29 November 1959 Holden agrees to ship a box full of valuable diamonds, not realizing a pickpocket has already switched the box with the real stones for worthless paste. Complicating matters are a beautiful widow and a young stowaway who wants to become a riverboat pilot. The Blowup: 17 January 1960 A woman (Whitney Blake) with a load of unstable, experimental, gunpowder connives to draw Holden and his men into a barroom brawl and then agrees to bail out the entire crew from jail if the captain will agree to ship her volatile cargo to her father's diamond mine. Path of the Eagle: 1 February 1960 A wealthy but inexperience party of pioneers (Dianne Foster) hire Captain Holden to transport them to Independence, Missouri, so they can join a wagon train for California. One of the group's organizers connives with river pirates to hijack the riverboat and rob the party before they can reach their destination. The Fight at New Canal: 22 February 1960 Charged with building an canal that would shorten the river voyage and avoid rapids, Captain Holden runs into murderous opposition from the freight and stagecoach line that hauls cargo and passengers along the proposed route (Jean Allison). Fort Epitaph: 7 March 1960 In the absence of Captain Holden, Captain Brad Turner takes a cargo of military supplies to an outpost on the Little Missouri River - in the middle of Sioux country and must use the cannon he is delivering to disperse an Indian attack. He discovers the once peaceful Indians have been driven to the warpath by the actions of the fort's commander - a martinet who commandeers "The Enterprise" and its crew to fight the Sioux. The Quick Noose: 11 April 1960 Someone has stabbed the son of Judge Wingate in the back with Carney's knife and unless Captain Holden can find the real murderer, Carney will hang for the crime (Nan Leslie).

Season #2

The Two Faces of Grey Holden: 3 October 1960 When a pretty Cajun girl (Suzanne Pleshette) catches Captain Holden's eye, he's naturally interested in a bit of romance, until he learns that the young lady thinks he is her fiancée, who was killed in a riverboat explosion over a year before. Trunk Full of Dreams: 31 October 1960 Captain Holden fishes a pair of actors out of the river and soon the Enterprise is fitting out to become a floating theater (Mary Tyler Moore). Devil in Skirts: 21 November 1960 Knowing Holden is desperate for a cargo, Colonel Ashley offers a profitable load if the Captain of the Enterprise will agree to take along a woman (Gloria Talbott) his son is smitten with. Listen to the Nightingale: 2 January 1961 Desperate for passengers, Holden and Blake agree to transport an opera singer and her musicians (DeForest Kelley) to New Orleans for a share of her concerts' gate receipts.

Then again, what do I know? I'm only a child.