TMS season 4 was announced for this year by Disney executives at D23 last year so that’s why members seem so anxious. It isn’t that we’re merely impatient.
Fall is the busiest time for season sets here in the US. There’s lots of competition from new releases of active programs and they all pour out on the market at once so it would be strange for the Muppets to come out in the third quarter. Also, pre-orders are usually announced at least 3 months before release date. Sure, it's not New Year's yet, but it's becoming less and less likely that this season will come out in 2010 as planned.
This time around might not be a rights issue either. Word is that many Muppet things have been delayed for next year's Muppet movie push. I didn't think season 4 would be part of that, but maybe so. If that's the plan, then it could be another year before season 4 comes out.
It’s really anyone’s guess, but I think the folk in this thread have acted responsibly by inquiring at the source. What’s wrong with that? It's not about patience, we're inquiring about the announcement made by BV Home Video. There should have been some sort of nibble by now.
Plus, patience is being able to wait a REASONABLE amount of time. Remember when the Fraggle DVD's first came out we had almost a year in advance knowledge of exactly when they came out, a long list of special features, and everything else to expect. It's August... even if this were to come out on Dec 31st, we would have known it by now... and when you say "expect season 4 in 2010" you should at LEAST have a rough estimate of when to expect it. What quarter is it going to come out at least, not even what month.
Now, we've waited over 2 years for the last volume, and if it was some sort of grand plan to hold over a season for a massive relaunch, it wasn't a very good one for fans. There are, again, 2 more seasons, Muppets Tonight, rereleases of movies in Super special editions (like Disney hasn't done that before), and prospects of smaller, single disk releases that could very well hype the movie back up. Why, even a complete series release after all 5 seasons have been released with a special extra disk.
If they're holding out for the film to start shooting, that's one thing. We get a nice bonus feature behind the scenes sneak peak. Even if we have to wait for them to make a teaser. But they could at LEAST tell us that. Last time, we had someone that had access to someone on the inside who told us every single detail, especially bonus features they couldn't get the rights to. Now, we're just sitting on our thumbs waiting for news that doesn't arrive fast enough.
If they indeed hold this over a third year for the movie, that's beyond annoying and frustrating. Again, season 5, Muppets Tonight. They'd work just as good.
And above all, if there's some garbage about retail, I agree that Fall's a busy time... but the problem is, again, The Real House Hos of Wherever City, Gordon Ramsey screams at people in a British accent, and Food Network's Celebrity Chef goes around and eats things at Restaurants vol 98. They're FAR too much oversaturization there. No wonder why no one buys DVD's anymore. The new shiny garbage has to sit at the top of the pile and beloved classics that are getting a big time movie have to wait for shelf space.
That said, if there is some annoying rights glitch somewhere, forget the song. Forget the episode. Just release the thing already.