So I have an odd problem. Every single file in my library says it's a show called Tower Prep in any number of 30 seasons. I had no idea what Tower prep is, so I looked it up. It's some Brit-tween drama that's got 4 seasons.
I deleted all the data in my local profile, re-downloaded all the meta data, same thing. My files are all renamed using The ReNamer app so they aren't weird. For instance Battlestar Galactica.S02E13.Epiphanies shows up in the Library as Tower Prep Season 5 Episode 13.
I've uninstalled Plex and reinstalled it (after removing all the stuff in my profile) and tried again, this time it found everything. Hurry success! Until I refreshed the library after ripping some DVDs and all of those now appear as Tower Prep.
I can’t believe that nobody else has this issue. It pisses me off. If Plex doesn’t find an appropriate match, it defaults to tower prep!!! Yes, I know how to properly name shows and movies but occasionally I mistype a filename or folder. Good ole Plex jumps in and names it Tower Prep!! Why can’t it just generically place a “I couldn’t match it” icon there?
If the affected files are m4v / mp4 containers, do this:
Go to
Settings - Server - Agents - Shows - TheTVDB
In there, grab the line ‘Local Media Assets’ with your mouse and drag it downwards, so it ends up being at the bottom of the stack of active agents.
Repeat the same under
Settings - Server - Agents - Shows - TheMovieDatabase
Settings - Server - Agents - Movies - Plex Movie
Settings - Server - Agents - Movies - TheMovieDatabase
Afterwards, ‘Refresh Metadata’ on the affected shows.
I’m seeing this for TV series that are all MKV, all MP4/M4V, or a mix. I’ve tried the suggestion on how to fix it but it did not. Note, this is only happening on a couple of TV series (out of 30 series in that library).
Any other suggestions on fixing it? Worst case will be the ‘dance’, but I have a LOT of TV series/shows…
The media has always followed the naming guidelines, so I do not believe that’s it. The problem is showing up on 5 TV Series out of 50 in that library. BTW, I just noticed this post was originally on Windows server. My PMS is on an iMac. I’ll do some more investigation and report back.
Here’s the drilldown from top-level Plex showing “1 show” for “The Expanse” TV Series. An interesting sidenote is that all 5 TV Series exhibiting this behavior all appear in lowercase within the Plex Top-level. As you drilldown into the TV Series, the name and information appear fine. It’s only at the top-level that it all boils down to “1 show”. The top-level picture shows that “expanse” and “goliath” have the problem, and both are in lowercase. The last picture shows the full folder/filename for Season 1 Episode 1 of “The Expanse”. All TV Series are named similarly (I use FileBot with a custom format that fits the Plex naming). I have not done the Plex dance yet for this issue.
I now checked and you’re right that they’re collections (nicely done). But what’s wrong is that I never created those collections. I have created other collections for movies, but NEVER for TV Series. Why would these show up in as collections???
Check the embedded meta tags of your files. I think they contain expanse in the ‘Album’ meta tag. That is what creates the collection when they get ingested into Plex.
I checked every file (all 3 seasons) using Subler. The first 2 seasons are all MP4 and the 3rd season is all MKV. There was no embedded metadata on any of them except for one MKV file. And that one file only had a title tag, quite long, but not just “expanse”. Is there a way to tell within Plex which files within a collection have that metadata tag? If not within Plex, is there a better tool than Subler to see other metadata (that Subler would not show).
Ok. Thanks for figuring out the Collections part of the problem. I’ll see if I can figure out some more before simply deleting it… maybe it’ll help someone else.
