Beginning of the end question

[notundercovercop32]

I just bought the (rhino) Beginning of the end dvd and I noticed that during the opening credits the copyright holder is blurred out. Was it blurred during the original airing or was this a rhino edit?

[pablum]

The Shout Factory reissue has the same censor bar over the credits. I would imagine if Rhino did the edit Shout would have had to re-do it and it would have looked different. So it was probably there in the original broadcast of the episode.

[travis]

Anybody still have a broadcast copy to check? I've been curious about this as well (not that it matters too much, since the episode is back in print).

[BJ]

For what it's worth, the DAP copy also has the censoring, but I have no idea where that was sourced from. The company that released "Beginning of the End" ceased to exist almost immediately after its release. It's likely that the censor bar was added by whomever gained the rights after they closed up shop. Here's someone else speculating the same thing.

"Beginning of the End was produced by an infinitesimal production company called AB-PT Pictures Corporation, which only made this and three other movies, though it was originally released by Republic (probably because the film processing had been done at Republic’s parent company, Consolidated Film Industries, and someone at the company probably realized that if they wanted to get paid for developing it they had to ensure that this film got released somewhere!) and has made the rounds of other companies since; on the print MST3K showed there was a copyright notice but the AB-PT name had been blacked out."

moviemagg.blogspot.com/2008/09/beginning-of-end-ab-pt-pictures-1957.html

[Afgncaap5]

Seems likely.

Have the Brains ever censored copyright notices themselves before? I know they've blurred and muted things that would've been too much for their televised rating, but I can't see why the Brains would themselves add in something that credited the developers (unless a company somewhere had a restraining order out that threatened legal action against someone for daring to imply that they had anything to do with these movies.)

[Deleted]

AB-PT also made The Unearthly. I haven't watched the MST episode in a long time (and I don't have it), but someone should check and see if it's the same for that episode.

[notundercovercop32]

Well I'm an idiot. The un-mistied version of beginning is on the same disc and it too has the censor bar.