TV Series "Extras" isn't getting scanned

Plex Media Server Metadata & Adding Files
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Hello, I’m new to Plex (used Mede8er for years before moving to Infuse on AppleTV to stream content from my server (through NFS mounts)).

I have over 500 movies and ~50 TV series - a blend of BR rips, DVD rips and Web-DLs. Of the TV series in my collection, only one isn’t getting scanned. The title of the show is “Extras” - https://thetvdb.com/series/extras. Looks like Plex doesn’t recognize it as the name of a TV show. I have Extras as a folder with Extras.S01 and Extras.S02 as subfolders representing the two seasons of that show. How can I get Plex to scan this show?

Thanks.

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Plex ignores sub-directories containing certain keywords; extras is one of them. So, your season folders are likely causing a problem. They should be named “Season 01” and “Season 02” instead of “Extras.S01” and “Extras.S02.” As they are, they will be excluded from the scan.

I tested the following on my server and it was able to match it:

TV Shows/      <--- Library points here, name not important
     Extras (2005)/
          Season 01/
               Extras (2005) - S01E01.mkv

The year in parentheses is optional in most cases. I tested adding “Extras” to my season folder name and the scan removed it from my library.

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Thanks very much, Philip. That worked. A follow up question. Within the Extras (2005) folder, I also had the Extras: The Extra Special Series Finale as a standalone mkv - so two Seasons subfolders and this file. Plex skipped over the file. I created a third subfolder within Extras (2005) as sibling to the Seasons folders and moved the Season Finale mkv into that one, but, still no luck. How do I get this Season Finale scanned in - do I have to list it separately at the top level? Or, in the Movies container/library, since TVDB lists it as a “TV Movie” (see screen shot below). I’d rather keep them all together.

image

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No problem, glad it worked.

Regarding “The Extra Special Series Finale,” that is a special and belongs in the “Season 00” folder as S00E01:

TV Shows/      <--- Library points here, name not important
     Extras (2005)/
          Season 00/
               Extras (2005) - S00E01.mkv

With TV series, TheTVDB, and therefore Plex, categorize specials as episodes of season 0; that is the case here.

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Thanks again, Philip! That was spot on and worked like a charm. A final question. What about Extras (not the show of that name, but, folders with DVD/BR extras that accompany TV shows)? What’s the best way to include them? I have quite a few TV shows that have an Extras folder per season. The Extras folder sometimes contains subfolders for Outtakes, Bloopers, Deleted Scenes, etc.

Since the folder structure and naming isn’t consistent across TV shows, is it even possible to have Plex scan and show these in the library?

Thanks.

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As far as I know, this type of content isn’t directly supported for TV shows (but is for movies). Your best bet is to place it in your Season 00 folder and name the files with S00Eyy values outside of the range of the specials listed on TheTVDB. So, if you had deleted scenes or bloopers for Extras, you might do something like:

TV Shows/      <--- Library points here, name not important
     Extras (2005)/
          Season 00/
               Extras (2005) - S00E100 - Deleted Scene Description.mkv
               Extras (2005) - S00E101 - Blooper Description.mkv

The stuff after the second hyphen is optional and is just for your benefit to identify when viewing the file in the filesystem.

Obviously this won’t be able to pull any metadata from TheTVDB, so you’ll have to manually edit it in Plex.

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How do I deal with more than two folder levels? For instance, here’s my folder structure for Seinfeld.
image

The episodes in each season show up fine, but, I’m not having any luck with the extras that are now in S00. Each of the 3 subfolders within S00 has ~50+ mkv files.

Infuse was a lot more forgiving/accommodating with folder structure and was able to scan files and pull in metadata; occasionally, I’d have to assist with finding the right match, but, it would at least make an effort ;). Of course, Infuse is client-side and so, nowhere near as versatile as Plex. A couple of weeks back, I purchased a lifetime PlexPass subscription and dove in. It’s definitely a change from Infuse and I have a lot to learn. Thank you for helping guide me along and I’m sure I’ll have more questions down the road.

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Plex is fairly strict with regard to its naming guidelines for TV series. You’re not going to have much success with the directory structure above. You can only use the format which I outlined above, which is itself from Plex’s naming guidelines.

So for Seinfeld (and indeed all your series), and similar to the format for Extras, you’d do something like:

TV Shows/      <--- Library points here, name not important
     Seinfeld (1989)/
          Season 01/
               Seinfeld (1989) - S01E01 - The Seinfeld Chronicles.mkv
          Season 02/
               ...
          Season 00/
               ...

And your specials/extras would live in season 0, named using the Show Name - S00Eyy - Description.ext format I describe earlier. If the special or extra exists on TheTVDB, use the episode numbering shown there for it. Otherwise, number it outside the range of the specials they do have. Here’s what TheTVDB has for specials for Seinfeld:

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Thanks, Philip. Really appreciate the guidance. I think I have enough now to run with.

Thanks again! and Happy Holidays!

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