MCA/Universal Home Video

By James Stanley Barr, Kris Starring and Eric Hartman

MCA DISCOVISION

1st Logo
(1977 Testing Phase Only)

Nickname: "Glowing Laserdisc"

Logo: We start out with glowing blue light in the center of the screen. The glowing light shrinks down until it is the size of a small circle embedded in an yellow upside down triangle. The words MCA DISCO-VISION appear on top of that triangle.

What Is This?: This logo was used only in a test pressing of early laserdiscs and never in general release.

SFX/Cheesy Factor: The shrinking of the light in the center of the screen

Music: A drum beat followed by a violin stinger.

Availability: Only used in a 1977 test pressing that was used as a public display by MCA.

Scare Factor: Unknown. The creepy music and the glowing may scare you.

http://www.blamld.com features a video of this particular logo.

2nd Logo
(1978-1981)

Logo: The words DISCOVISION, crawl across the entire screen in a rainbow of colors, and rows of vertical orange lines appear on the screen. The center lines open up in a rainbow of colors to reveal a white "V", with "DISCO" and "ISION" appearing on the left and right sides of the V, respectively, with MCA on the left side of the V, appearing on a blackish background with a large blue-green streak in the middle. The Discovision logo sparkles for a second and then an abrupt cut to black.

Variants:

SFX: The crawling of the DISCOVISION letters, the appearance of the logo, the splitting of the logo, the sparkling of the logo.

Cheesy Factor: Lavishly animated (or possible crude CGI) animation. DiscoVision was MCA's baby (at the time.)

Music: A flute tune accompanied by a lavishly orchestrated theme.

Availability: Seen on every DiscoVision release from 1978 to 1981. MCA closed DiscoVision in 1981.

Scare Factor: Low. A good logo to be exact.

MCA VIDEODISC
(1981-1983)

What is this?: After the somewhat abrupt failure of MCA's DiscoVision system, a new videodisc label arose from the ashes known as MCA Videodisc, which lasted until 1983 when the "MCA Home Video" moniker was applied to both VHS and disc releases.

Logo: On a black screen, the words "A PRESENTATION OF" zoom out in the 1980 MCA font in yellow before dissolving in the center. Following that are streaks of rainbow color that zoom out to the middle of the screen and flash to form...

MCA
VIDEODISC

...all in the MCA logo font. More rainbow streaks of light shoot out of the words and then settle back in.

SFX/Cheesy Factor: 80's computer effects.

Music: A synth drone that culminates in a dreamy siren-like sound, ending with some synth bass notes to fade.

Availability: Seen on all MCA videodisc releases from 1981 to 1983.

Scare Factor: High, the dark nature of the logo, abruptness and slyly creepy synth music make this a bad logo.

MCA VIDEOCASSETTE, INC.
(1980-1984)

Logo: On a black background, The MCA logo appears in the center of the screen colored in blue. The words "VIDEOCASSETTE INC." surround the MCA logo in white, looking like the CBS/FOX logo.

Variant: Black and White movies featured this logo in Black and White.

SFX: The appearance of VIDEOCASSETTE INC.

Cheesy Factor: The logo looked cheap. MCA was heavily invested in laserdisc at the time.

Music: None.

Availability: Seen on every release from 1980 to 1984.

Scare Factor: Median. The appearance of the logo may scare you.

MCA HOME VIDEO
1st Logo
(1983-84)

Nickname: "The Silver MCA"

Logo: On this still logo, we find a silver/chrome MCA Home Video logo. This logo has the usual MCA logo (with the C and A connected) and the word "HOME VIDEO" (in a sleek, smaller font that has the same width as MCA) in a box that resembles a videotape (but MCA overlaps this box on the top, making it "cut open"). All of this takes place on an oatmeal gray background.

SFX/Cheesy Factor: None, it's a still logo

Music: None

Availability: Quite a hard to find logo, "The Deer Hunter" is the only known video to have this logo.

Scare Factor: None

2nd Logo
(1984-1990)

Logo: On a CGI starry background, the MCA Home Video logo zooms in slowly, like the Universal Globe at the time. The logo fades out to the starry background for a second, and then an entire fade to black.

Variant: Some later releases featured an announcement asking the viewer to stay tuned for previews of future releases that faded out shortly before the logo's appearance.

SFX: The stars, the zooming in on the logo.

Music: None.

Availability: Seen on every MCA release of the period.

Scare Factor: Low. A good logo to be exact.

MCA/UNIVERSAL HOME VIDEO
(1990-1997)

Logo: On a black background, we see the following text all centered:

MCA (in silver in their usual font)
UNIVERSAL (in gold, exactly like movie logo of the era)
(Horizontal Line)
HOME VIDEO (in silver, spaced out and centered)

The text shines and soon afterwards, a globe (showing only the Americas) fades in the center. A starfield fades in behind everything else, then the text shines again.

Variant: Universal releases by Goodtimes Home Video feature this logo with a "LICENSED BY" logo that wraps around the globe, followed by the Goodtimes logo.

SFX: The slow appearances of the Globe and space and the sparkling of the logo.

Music: None

Availability: Seen on every Universal release from 1990-97. Most MCA/Universal copies are still in-print.

Scare Factor: Low. A good logo to be exact.

UNIVERSAL STUDIOS HOME VIDEO
(1997-)

Logo: No real logo, just the current Universal globe with full orchestration.