TV Show not showing up

[ajutras]

Server Version#: 4.56.4
Player Version#: N/A

Hello!

I recently noticed that some of my TV shows were not showing up in the libraries. I’m trying to figure out one specific case that hopefully will make me understand why the other ones don’t show up.

I’m having issue with the tv show FullMetal Alchemist (2003) (鋼の錬金術師 - TheTVDB.com)

Here is what the main folder looks like in my OS:

And within the season 01 folder:

I have other anime series showing up correctly in Plex but just to be sure I double verified that E:\anime shows was added to my library

So I’m at a loss here, the naming of the folders appears solid, at least I didn’t have any issues with that kind of naming scheme in the past. I’m not sure what could be my next step to resolve this issue and be able to see the show in my library.

Thank you for your time.

[BigWheel]

look at your scanner and/or scanner matcher log for errors

[ajutras]

I downloaded the logs for my server, I wasn’t sure which one to take so I took all the log files that had this naming scheme:

• Plex Media Scanner
• Plex Media Scanner Analysis
• Plex Media Scanner Deep Analysis
• Plex Media Scanner Matcher
• Plex Media Server

The logs together are ~68MB so I’m not sure if it’s a good idea to include them in attachment. But I did run the following command against them:

grep -i ‘FullMetal’ *.log > mylog.log

I added the show FullMetal Alchemist a while ago, so it’s not recent, I think it may affect the logs because they say nothing changed so they don’t give me much to go on. The logs are also polluted by the presence of the show FullMetal Alchemist: Brotherhood that do show up correctly in my Plex.

I included the result of the grep as attachment. I’m not sure where to go from there.
mylog.log (60.3 KB)

[tom80H]

That grep wasn’t necessarily helpful.
From what that log snippet shows, it seems Plex is aware of the files. When scanning, Plex notices the folder hasn’t changed and is therefore skipping its content.

Could it be those are mismatched (e.g. mixing Fullmetal Alchemist and Fulmetal Alchemist - Brotherhood)? You can display your library by episodes and filter it by duplicates to identify such mismatches.

[ajutras]

Tom I think you are on to something, I just played the first episode of FullMetal Alchemist: Brotherhood and it actually played the first episode of FullMetal Alchemist.

The season 1 of FullMetal Alchemist: Brotherhood is longer than FullMetal Alchemist, so Plex seems to be offering me FullMetal Alchemist episodes until they run out, then it shows me the correct episodes of FullMetal Alchemist: Brotherhood.

I took the time to set what I thought was a good naming scheme for FullMetal Alchemist: Brotherhood to avoid these kind of issues but I guess something is wrong there? Here is what my FullMetal Alchemist: Brotherhood folder looks like:

And inside season 01:

Should they be named a different way to make sure Plex can make the difference between the two?

[tom80H]

Those names look ok (except maybe for the little extras in your Season 01 folder (season 01 - 1080p 10bit FLAC vs. Season 01).

2 scenarios to deal with this unintended merge of both shows:

Split and manual match via Plex

With both shows having their own top-level folder you should be able to split the show item inside Plex (⋮ > Split Apart). After splitting the two shows you need to identify which is which (e.g. by checking the paths of the associated files from the season/episode level (Edit > Information) – then you can fix the match for the other one (⋮ > Fix Match).

Include show reference in folder structure

You can include the ID of both shows in their top-level folder names, e.g.

anime shows
  Fullmetal Alchemist {tvdb-75579}
    ...

  Fullmetal Alchemist Brotherhood {tvdb-85249}
    ...

From what I remember you can also use square brackets to contain those IDs (if your system doesn’t like the curly ones) – Plex should support the IDs from IMDb or TMDb as well.
It might also help to include the year each show first aired in the folder/file names.

If you go with option 2 you’ll probably need to re-add the shows to your library for the IDs to be recognized. While this is a little extra work it’ll make things easier if you ever have to rebuild your library (or simply want to start over).

[ajutras]

Tom my man you fixed my issue. I did the split, fixed the match on FullMetal Alchemist and voila now both shows are showing up in the library. I thank you very much for your time in helping me debug this

And some feedback for Plex people, in case they read it:

• For my issue, I would have expected that Plex would have showed me that it has 2 versions of the episode that were double matching for both series. That would have been my cue that this was the issue, I don’t think the current UI is doing a good job at highlighting this issue right now.
• The Split Apart command is scary. After clicking it I get a notification if I am sure but it doesn’t even tell me a little bit what it is going to do, and I have no idea if there is a way to go back after doing something like this. I didn’t feel in control at any point.