Plex local posters not applying to media

Plex Media Server
21

For A Bridge Too Far, I originally had it named poster.jpg. BigWheel commented that I could try changing it to match the movie file name to see if that helped anything (it didn’t)

I have prefer local metadata disabled at the moment. I’ve tested this poster issue with it enabled and disabled, with the same result. Regarding embedded artwork, I threw A Bridge Too Far’s MKV in mkvtoolnix and didn’t see any embedded artwork, but I’ll admit I haven’t used mkvtoolnix much so could be missing something.

mkvtoolnix
mkvtoolnix433×528 11.6 KB

22

“Run a partial scan when changes are detected” is checked. Synology storage manager shows all 4 drives as healthy.

23

Thanks, poster.jpg should work fine, it’s what I use everywhere and don’t have any problems. Also, no embedded artwork so that’s good to confirm.

I’ll update the thread once I get a minute to review the logs (I’m away from my pc atm and it’s hard on a phone)!

24

Okay… are you sure you are doing a plex dance (all steps) …


Jan 12, 2026 16:32:04.193 [11968] DEBUG - [Req#9a9530] Loaded metadata for A Bridge Too Far (ID 47870) in 86ms
Jan 12, 2026 16:32:04.193 [11968] DEBUG - [Req#9a9530] Doing expensive tags write for 'A Bridge Too Far' because something changed.
Jan 12, 2026 16:32:04.197 [11968] DEBUG - [Req#9a9530] Doing expensive tags write for 'A Bridge Too Far' because something changed.
Jan 12, 2026 16:32:04.201 [11968] DEBUG - [Req#9a9530] Local media already exists (metadata://art/tv.plex.agents.movie_27237bd6c1e10fa8e1f4b886168817756de879c7)
Jan 12, 2026 16:32:04.201 [11968] DEBUG - [Req#9a9530] There was a change for metadata item 47870 (A Bridge Too Far), saving.
Jan 12, 2026 16:32:04.201 [11968] DEBUG - [Req#9a9530] Updating metadata item (save) (A Bridge Too Far) with ID 47870

… reason I ask is because of this above. It appears to be loading existing metadata which looks to me that a clean plex dance has not been completed.

25

Yes, I’m doing all 6 steps listed at that link. After step 3, the movie is removed from the library/recently added list. Then I clean bundles in settings, wait for that to complete, then move the movie folder back and run a new scan.

26

Do you have 2 copies of that movie? This is what PMS sees.

image

This is what you show with MKVToolNix.

image

27

No, just the 1 copy. Mkvtoolnix is grabbing the original file name for some reason at the top.

image
image388×189 4.41 KB

28

Took another look, sorry it was late last night. I can definitely see the the movie being removed …

Jan 12, 2026 16:26:50.408 [19872] DEBUG - [Req#99b43a] Destroying metadata item 47495 (A Bridge Too Far)
...
Jan 12, 2026 16:26:50.658 [19872] DEBUG - [Req#99b43a] About to destroy 1 deleted directories.
Jan 12, 2026 16:26:50.658 [19872] DEBUG - [Req#99b43a] Deleting directory [A Bridge Too Far (1977)] (5467)

… and then its added again, alongside scheduled tasks for the new item so the dance is working …

Jan 12, 2026 16:28:21.209 [1148] INFO - Library section 1 (Movies) will be updated because of a change in "S:\Data\Media\Movies\A Bridge Too Far (1977)"
...
Jan 12, 2026 16:29:14.781 [17548] DEBUG - Scanning Movies using en-US(Plex Movie) with 0 current media items and 1 section locations in the database.
Jan 12, 2026 16:29:14.781 [17548] DEBUG - Performing a scan with 'Plex Movie' (language: en-US virtual: 0).
Jan 12, 2026 16:29:14.781 [17548] DEBUG -   * Scanning S:\Data\Media\Movies\A Bridge Too Far (1977)
...
Jan 12, 2026 16:29:15.292 [21436] DEBUG - Scanner [Plex Movie]: found agent match for file 'S:\Data\Media\Movies\A Bridge Too Far (1977)\A Bridge Too Far (1977) Bluray-1080px264 AC3 [EN].mkv': 'A Bridge Too Far'
Jan 12, 2026 16:29:15.292 [21436] DEBUG - Native Scanner: Executed Agent Match stage in 0.18 sec.
Jan 12, 2026 16:29:15.315 [2808] DEBUG - Skipping hash check, no size match for 8206482113 bytes.
Jan 12, 2026 16:29:15.316 [2808] DEBUG - No match for hash.
Jan 12, 2026 16:29:15.320 [2808] DEBUG - Added new metadata item (A Bridge Too Far) with ID 47870
Jan 12, 2026 16:29:15.321 [18172] DEBUG - [LibraryTimeline] Scanner activity on section 1: 1 added, 0 deleted
...
Jan 12, 2026 16:29:17.834 [17548] DEBUG - Updating directory 'A Bridge Too Far (1977)' (ID 5500) to time 2026-01-11 16:51:17.
Jan 12, 2026 16:29:17.843 [17352] DEBUG - Activity: registered new activity 4c3623ff-9071-4e5c-977e-414d7440a433 - "Updating Metadata"
Jan 12, 2026 16:29:17.846 [17352] DEBUG - Activity: updated activity 4c3623ff-9071-4e5c-977e-414d7440a433 - completed 49.0% - Updating Metadata
Jan 12, 2026 16:29:17.857 [17548] DEBUG - LongRunningJobManager [CreditsDetector]: scheduling job for item 47870, 0 pending.
Jan 12, 2026 16:29:17.862 [15848] DEBUG - [CreditsDetectionManager] Running credits detection for item 47870
Jan 12, 2026 16:29:17.862 [15848] DEBUG - [CreditsDetectionManager] Activity: registered new activity f54bb01a-79ab-4a2e-9467-890120c1ba7d - "Detecting Credits"
Jan 12, 2026 16:29:17.930 [19836] DEBUG - [UltraBlurProcessor] Calculated media file path for path [metadata://art/tv.plex.agents.movie_3ba58aba105fe6a0f03077b7bcc7d78186ee5447]: ["C:\Users\Will_RDP\AppData\Local\Plex Media Server\Metadata\Movies\1\c4bff58fa87d5c389822ef82c07a911fd6c634b.bundle\Contents\_combined\art\tv.plex.agents.movie_3ba58aba105fe6a0f03077b7bcc7d78186ee5447"]
Jan 12, 2026 16:29:17.953 [15848] DEBUG - [CreditsDetectionManager] Activity: updated activity f54bb01a-79ab-4a2e-9467-890120c1ba7d - completed 75.0% - Detecting Credits
Jan 12, 2026 16:29:17.953 [15848] DEBUG - [CreditsDetectionManager] Found matching credits markers from media provider for part id 148402
Jan 12, 2026 16:29:17.954 [15848] DEBUG - [CreditsDetectionManager] Updating part with ID=148402 [S:\Data\Media\Movies\A Bridge Too Far (1977)\A Bridge Too Far (1977) Bluray-1080px264 AC3 [EN].mkv]
Jan 12, 2026 16:29:17.961 [15848] DEBUG - [CreditsDetectionManager] Doing expensive tags write for 'A Bridge Too Far' because something changed.
Jan 12, 2026 16:29:17.966 [15848] DEBUG - [CreditsDetectionManager] Completed credits detection for item 47870 (success: 1, failures: 0)

This all looks normal enough. What I don’t understand is why you say you get a locked=“1” name="thumb” and why its not picking up the poster.jpg.

Could it be a permissions thing, can plex definitely see poster.jpg from your nas mount point ? Complete wild guess but could this thumbs.db be a factor ?

Jan 12, 2026 16:25:08.841 [14268] INFO - Library section 1 (Movies) will be updated because of a change in "S:\Data\Media\Movies\A Bridge Too Far (1977)\Thumbs.db"
Jan 12, 2026 16:25:14.590 [14268] INFO - Library section 1 (Movies) will be updated because of a change in "S:\Data\Media\Movies\A Bridge Too Far (1977)"

I don’t use windows (evil corp) but maybe plex is getting confused with the image stored in this thumb, failing and then reverting back to their cloud. Again, wild guess so feel free to ignore …

Lets see if anyone else has an idea !

29

Looks like there is some 3rd party automated tool making calls to your server.

Are you using Kometa by any chance? If so please remove that from the equation before trying to troubleshoot further.

30

Bet that’s it. It would also explain the lock as that tool has the ability to lock artwork.

31

Yes I use Kometa. I’ll remove it later today and test the posters overnight.

32

I’m curious - for my own knowledge why would you use koneta and local assets ? Surely it would be one or the other or am I missing something ?

33

I haven’t used kometa much… just a couple IMDB collections created. Didn’t know it could mess with posters if I didn’t intentionally set it that way (if it ends up being the cause).

I’ve disabled the kometa container and manually set a bunch of posters using the plex web UI. I’ll check tomorrow and see if anything changes.

34

Seems that kometa or agregarr was the cause. All the posters I set last night are still there this morning.

Thanks for the help. I should have tried disabling those earlier.