Cannot get one TV show to re-appear in Plex after some tag shenanigans

Plex Media Server
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Server Version#: 1.20.1.3252

I lost access to Puddletag so I tried tagging some files using Easytag… I didn’t realize the default behavior of Easytag included copying the files. This resulted in the files being duplicated into a duplicate set of folders below the original. So this:

/TV Shows/South Park/Season 01/

turned into this:

/TV Shows/South Park/Season 01/
/TV Shows/South Park/Season 01/Season 01/

Two copies of each episode nested in a new folder.

As soon as they were saved, they disappeared from my server list.

I have done everything I can think of to get them to reappear:
Removed the nested folders.
Removed/replace ALL the folders.
Scanned the files.
Refreshed the metadata.
Emptied the trash and scanned again.
Repeat all the above two-three times.

Still nothing. Any ideas how to fix this? Even after so-called emptying the trash, there are still references to some of the South Park episodes in the metadata like this:

f/71e7e791920333c99371906f3de48d09e68cd2c.bundle/Contents/com.plexapp.agents.localmedia/seasons/1/episodes/3.xml: South Park.S01E03.Volcano

It appears like their are 4 entries per episode in various places in the plex data.

I’m considering manually searching and removing all references to South Park but I’d hate to trash my entire library.

Also, just because someone will ask, the files are named like all my other TV Shows:

South Park - s01e08 - Starvin’ Marvin.mp4

and tagged with Title, Album, Year, Track and Genre.

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Clean Bundles before trying to scan it in again.

3

Never heard of that function…

…looking

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In troubleshooting section of server settings

5

To correct metadata problems do the dance: The Plex Dance ™

6

I’m sorry if you misunderstood my post: I did the Plex Dance 3 times. That’s why I posted this.

I did the “Clean Bundles” and ran the database optimizer for good measure. Trying again now…

7

this isn’t the correct order to do things. Clean bundles is part of the dance

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Well, none of that worked.

On a hunch and thinking the tags - or whatever else Easytag did - might be the problem, I re-encoded one episode using Handbrake and keeping the tags in the output file, and when I moved it back to the server folder it appeared almost immediately.

I’d rather not spend more hours trying to figure out exactly what the differences are right now, but I’ll keep a couple “bad” files for later research.

So not really sure if the tag was the problem or maybe Easytag did something else to the files. Either way at least I have a solution. Not optimal as re-encoding all of them will take time, but Handbrake does batches so not that big of a deal. I can batch them directly into the target folders.

How long has “Clean Bundles” been a thing? I’ve been using Plex for about 6 years so must have been an addition to the program at one point?

I’ve never done that before and didn’t know it was even there. I’ve never had to do more than move the files off the server, rescan and refresh, then move them back. Always worked for me in the past, but full disclosure: only with Music files. I’ve not had this problem with a TV Show before now.

Regardless, thanks for the suggestions and quick responses.

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