Author Topic: Anybody see the I LOVE LUCY Christmas Special? In Color?  (Read 205 times)

Offline Gomer Says Hey

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Anybody see the I LOVE LUCY Christmas Special? In Color?
« on: February 06, 2014, 08:54:16 pm »
I did, and I have to say, my overall feelings were mixed about the entire experience.

For starters, this was, admittedly, the first time I had ever seen the Christmas special, so that was something new to me, and for the most part, I liked the special as a whole - true to fashion, it kept with the tradition of what made I LOVE LUCY so... well, Lucy: you have Lucy, Ricky, Fred, and Ethel decorating the Ricardos' apartment for Christmas, with Lucy constantly asking Fred to cut off a branch that makes the tree look crooked, or off balance, to the point Fred ends up whacking up the entire tree... I saw that coming, yet, it was still funny (at least Fred managed to get another tree at the last second). Everybody reminiscingin the form of flashbacks brought back a few favorite moments from the show's history, such as Lucy breaking the news to Ricky about being pregnant, and later everyone rehearsing to take her to the hospital, only to panic when she's actually ready. I also like the twist ending, with all four dressed as Santa... but there's a fifth person wearing a Santa suit who ends up disappearing before we're given seasons greetings.

Afterwards, we were also treated to the classic episode, "Lucy's Italian Movie".

Both were colorized, but... eh... when you digitally colorize something that was originally black-and-white, the results are pretty mediocre; I remember when the first two seasons of BEWITCHED, and the first season of I DREAM OF JEANNIE were released on DVD, they were offered in original black-and-white, and colored editions... I got the original black-and-whites. One thing that bothers me is skintones always look unnaturally orange... what is that all about? Both the Christmas special and "Lucy's Italian Movie" looked kind of lazily done, for the most part. In both, you can tell certain things in the scene were left uncolored; in the former, the Christmas lights were colored when unplugged, but lost color when plugged in... and they didn't even bother coloring the flashback clips; in the latter, the grapes Lucy was stomping looked unnaturally neon purple, yet when she got into the fight with the other grape stomper, the stains on her clothing were bright blue... what sense does that make?

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Offline Barney Fife

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I didn't get to see it,but I heard that CBS was thinking of colorizing some more of their black and white Christmas specials.
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Offline Gomer Says Hey

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I noticed during the commercials for the special, they were advertising the special being on DVD, "In color for kids of all ages to enjoy". Yeah, God forbid we should expose today's kids to anything in black-and-white, that might be boring for them!

Offline Barney Fife

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That's too bad.I really like black & white.Sometimes I'll even turn the color off on my TV just to say what modern shows would look like in it.
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Offline Gomer Says Hey

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I've done that before, but not necessarily with modern shows.

I understand the first couple of seasons of Rocky and Bullwinkle were broadcasted (not produced) in black-and-white, so sometimes I would turn off the color when watching those to see what they might have been like in b&w.