I have recently started watching the BBC series Spooks (called MI-5 in the US). I’ve noticed that the Internet streaming version that you can get from Netflix are edited from the originals: the versions on the DVD (and I believe the original broadcast as well) are about 58 minutes long, while the streaming version are only a little more than 50 minutes. How nice. :mad: Do they do that to other shows and movies as well, or is it just a quirk of this show?
We were watching “once more with Feeling.” We noticed several lines missing from several of the songs. Very weren’t sure but thought entire scenes were missing. Some of them were integral parts that move the story forward while others were scenes/lines that are referred to in later storylines.
We immediately checked it against the DVD. They cut 7 minutes 30 seconds out. If you were watching it for the first time you would be missing a great deal and could be list as to the importance of scenes in later episodes.
Not only is it terrible that they edited it at all, but the fact that it was butchered with no attention to what was important lines and what maybe wasn’t really pissed me off.
I visited other message boards and apparently they are doing this to many shows, as well as turning wide screen into pan and scan, further butchering the shows we love!
HATE IT
Here in the UK, Netflix has a 50 minute (i.e. full) version of “Once More, with Feeling”.
I think Netflix is showing versions that have been broadcast somewhere and not necessarily the originals. For the new Doctor Who, for example, the versions on Netflix are explicitly the BBC America versions and thus any edits, changes, or even additions made to those versions will be the ones you see on Netflix, as opposed to what was broadcast on the BBC in the UK.
For a lot of shows this isn’t an issue but it does pop up. I doubt Netflix itself is doing the cutting here, someone else is, then offering the cut version to Netflix.
It sounds like you’re getting the TV version of the show and not the DVD or first run version. It could very well be done that way so that die hard fans of the show will buy the DVDs instead of streaming it.
After following the recent SDMB thread on the show, I rewatched a few episodes of The Boondocks on Netflix streaming, and noticed that they were censored (some language bleeped, nudity and middle fingers blurred), unlike the DVD editions I had gotten from Netflix a few years ago.
These things apparently change from time to time, too. I’ve read complaints here about the streaming version of the first episode of Breaking Bad being edited, but when I streamed it last year, the parts that were supposed to be missing (notably the handjob scene) were present.
I tried watching the netflix streaming version of the pilot for Freaks and Geeks, and it’s shorter than the version that’s on the DVDs.
I don’t think the OP is still watching “Spooks.”
This is not a normal case. OMWF originally aired as a longer than an hour episode (it was like an hour and 15 minutes or something). It never aired that way again after the first time. Whedon (or maybe the UPN which aired the show at the time) edited it into a normal hour episode and that was what played on subsequent airings. It looks like Netlfix is playing the edited version. I could have sworn they had the full version at one time because I’m pretty sure I watched it.
I guess my point is that Netflix didn’t edit it; they are just airing the wrong version apparently.
Queer Eye for the Straight Guy is pretty heavily edited on Netflix, too. I miss all the back waxings. 
I just watched all 5 seasons of Friday Night Lights. In the “previously on” scenes before several episodes were things I had never seen before.
I know I didn’t just forget them because I watched several episodes at a time.
Mildly annoying.
We noticed because we are such buffy freaks we have watched it at least 5 times on netflix AND have the DVD. In the past it has been the full version.
That’s why we were so surprised. Actually though our wifi was screwing up or something, but looks like it changed from last time (3months ago) to just the other day.
They should announce they are doing that somewhere!
I watched that episode in January or February and it was NOT edited. I just went back and checked, you’re right, they cut out part of the “I’ve got a Theory” song (among other things, probably, but that was the part I checked).