Where to find the Plex formatted show name in TVDB?

Plex Media Server
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Server Version#: 4.52.1
Player Version#: 4.52.1

Hi all. I don’t see where in TVDB I can find the show name that Plex needs to see to recognize a show. For example, I just uploaded the original Twilight Zone. I found through online searching that the show names needs to be “The Twilight Zone (1959)” but I don’t see that anywhere on TVDB. Now I’m trying to upload the original “The Brady Bunch” but Plex isn’t recognizing it. I assume it needs the right date after the show name but I can’t find this anywhere in TVDB.

Thx!

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Doesn’t look like that…
If you search the title, TheTVDb.com will show the actual name as well as available aliases. So far I haven’t found the aliases on the actual show homepage.

Matches for “The Twilight Zone” are:

https://www.thetvdb.com/search?menu[type]=TV&query=the%20twilight%20zone

Edit:
First aired information can be misleading and don’t always match when the 1st episode of the show first aired. For the first iteration of “The Twilight Zone”, it seems TheTVDb.com lists a special that aired in 1955 while the 1st actual episode aired in 1959. That’s a bit misleading if you want to include the show’s year in your folder structure / file names.

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unless it is explicitly in the name use the start date of the show. unfortunately afaict TVDB does not add it as a separate field these days and instead uses the date of the earliest episode.

In the case of the Twilight Zone The Twilight Zone - TheTVDB.com the S01E01 was in 1959 but they have a special from 1955. so you would use The Twilight Zone (1955)

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Which is interestingly only s00e07, while the preceding specials are starting from 1958.
Someone definitely had their fun with that record :wink:

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yeah. another weird show now is Cobra Kai which started in 2018 but TVDB has the original Karate Kid movie as a special so it lists the show as starting in 1984

1 Like
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Thanks folks. That works for the original Twilight Zone but applying that same method to the original “The Brady Bunch” I would think I would use “The Brady Bunch (1969)” but Plex doesn’t recognize it.
https://thetvdb.com/search?query=brady+bunch

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How exactly is the TVDB set up in the server agent settings? It seems to work fine for me. If you are using mp4s and local media is at top then they could have bad embedded metadata that is making things wrong

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I seem to have it set up that way. I’m using .mkv files.

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does it list it as an option if you do a fix match?

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So, when I did a “match” with TVDB is resulted in “no match”. When I switched it to moviedatabase it did work. Is it ok to switch databases? Can I use any database I want for any show?

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a new show will always use default database but yes you can fix match with a different one.

(I’m not sure this will work with the new “Plex TV Series” beta agent we are working on but works fine with the current TVDB and TheMovieDB agents.)

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Good to know. Thanks for your help BigWheel and tom80H.

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