The Crow Flies and the Skies Darken

Just returned this week from the San Diego Comic-Con where Mark Dacascos and I had a signing session for the new 5-DVD set of "The Crow: Stairway to Heaven." It would be more accurate to say that Mark had a signing session and I sat with him but he's such pleasant company and a good friend so who's complaining?

I just listened to our audio commentary on the DVD set last night and really thought it came out great (although I must train myself to never say "you know" again).

There are plenty of goodies for Crow fans on this beautifully mastered set released by Arts Alliance in association with TV Guide. One favorite is the show gag reel produced when we were going out of production for our wrap party and needed to laugh because it beat crying. The DVD set also has some show dailies and other extras like the pilot script.

Now for the sad part...

At the same time as the "The Crow" was making such a splash, however, I returned from Comic-Con to find out that the powers-that-be at the DVD division at SONY -- which had told me and confirmed to me several times that the "Dark Skies" DVD set was coming out in October -- have apparently changed their minds. The e-mail I received simply said: "There are no plans at this time to release.  The music costs to clear for home entertainment made this very expensive to consider."

To all of you "Dark Skies" fans who took my word that it was coming out and are now disappointed, all I can say is that I stand at the head of that line. But when the people in charge send you e-mails that confirm specific release dates, that's usually good enough to talk about. I am as let down as you are. Probably more so.

What's funny about this is that in my very first communication with SONY about this, I anticipated the problem and offered to work with the "Dark Skies" music supervisor to identify expensive music and to find substitute tracks. We would have done that gladly. No one even responded to the offer so I assumed they had things well in hand.

Still, one for two ain't bad... I'll let you know if things change (although I will be much more skeptical)... for what it's worth...

Comments

[brendan]

Thought Dark Skies was awesome... A shame to read that it's not to be released on DVD.

[Wayne]

Too bad this did not work out - damn gready music industry!
At the time this was my favorite show and I am sorry I didn't tape it.
For those of us who would kill (OK - not literally) for a copy of this please keep trying - I would love to add this to my collection.

[mik]

is dvd set being released in the uk

[Ted Shatner]

"Did you contact them again and repeat the offer to help with the music clearance hurdles? Your original offer probably got lost in the shuffle from one suit to the other......"

Quantum Leap having many period soundtracks also initially preventing a Region 1 release and it had to have it's original set of music altered to please the RIAA (Really Idiotic And Annoying) - lets hope you can convince them, Mr. Zabel, to do the same with Dark Skies...

[Toby OB]

Sorry to hear about the latest development with 'Dark Skies'. I was looking forward to adding it to the Toobworld DVD library.

Did you contact them again and repeat the offer to help with the music clearance hurdles? Your original offer probably got lost in the shuffle from one suit to the other......

[Ted Shatner]

Those greedy American record companies should all f*** off and die - hopefully we could see a DVD release in the Europe and the UK, since music royalties are not so extortionate and "Dark Skies" was much more of a hit on Channel 4 than on NBC anyway (who deliberately pulled the plug on a potentially successful sci-fi show, like FOX infamously did with FireFly).