Some movies not showing up in Emby- Round 2

[ServerNoob005 2]

Good evening,

This is my first time on the forum, as an experimenting plex user, so I apologize if a fail to observe any rules. I have tried to search the forums and be diligent as to not waste any time, and I will try to be direct and detailed.

In short, I am experiencing the exact same issue as this old post below.

The three films giving me an issue are as follows below. I originally thought maybe it was an encode error as these 3 actually give an issue in windows media player, but I know that's not the case. They work in in Plex, and in the case of Redline, if you give it the year 2010, emby will misidentify it as Redline (2007) and the mkv will run without issue in emby (attached image).

1. Maquia When the Promised Flower Blooms (2018).mkv
2. Patema Inverted (2013).mkv
3. Redline (2009).mkv

My setup:

1. Folders are setup plex style which seems to work fine at least for the movies themselves in her emby (still need to sort out my issues with specials and extras but that's its on thing) Don't think its the issue.
2. My mounted nas is running as jbod and no current discs errors.

I have tried the following:

1. As I said if you name it Redline (2010) it will appear. If you logically use "identify" to fix it, it will vanish once you perform the fix and return to the inoperable folder position.
2. I've removed the movies from the folder, scanned the folder in emby, and then readded them, to no avail.
3. I've made a new folder called test add that as a new library, again to no avail.

I do admit I have not attempted to modify whatever this excel table that was mentioned in the old post, but I would rather not if I don't have to, much like that user, but if it's the only way, please direct me to a guide.

Any guidance would me be much appreciated. I quite like emby, but this issue in particular is very bothersome to say the least as now I am worried about what it is missing. 

 

[Abobader 3464]

Hello ServerNoob005,

** This is an auto reply **

Please wait for someone from staff support or our members to reply to you.

It's recommended to provide more info, as it explain in this thread:

Thank you.

Emby Team

[Neminem 1518]

Maquia When the Promised Flower Blooms (2018)

If its this movie

Maquia: When the Promised Flower Blooms (2018) — The Movie Database (TMDB)

Try adding tmdbid to folder name, that should eliminate most of the guess work Emby does.

/Maquia When the Promised Flower Blooms (2018) {TmdbId-476292}/Maquia When the Promised Flower Blooms (2018).mkv

If that works try doing the same to the others.

Movie Naming | Emby Documentation

[pwhodges 2012]

For me Maquia is identified with the date 2018; Redline is identified with the date 2009 (though it then shows 2010); Patema is identified without any date.  But then all my folders and naming follows Emby's preferred convention.

I am using TMDB for these movies, as I've found no benefit in using any of the specific anime metadata providers.

Paul

Edited July 13, 2025 by pwhodges

[Luke 42078]

Quote

• As I said if you name it Redline (2010) it will appear. If you logically use "identify" to fix it, it will vanish once you perform the fix and return to the inoperable folder position.
•  

Hi, I don't quite follow this. Can you please show screenshot examples to demonstrate what you mean? Thanks.

[ServerNoob005 2]

Hey @Luke Thanks for your patience. Sure thing.
To restate it.

1. Emby can find the movie and play the movie if it misidentifies it.
2. If I fix it, it only shows up in folders and its empty.

So:
If I call the movie folder "Redline (2010)" it will find the movie. It will misidentify it as a 2007 live action film, but it will run the mkv I provided.
 

 

So to fix it, I hit the tree dot, go to identify, select the correct match, press okay to overwrite, and....

Poof. It's gone in the Movies section. If you go to folders, however, you can find it...it's just empty:

Hope that clears it up, and sorry if this is too many images-- just trying to being thorough is all.

Edited July 14, 2025 by ServerNoob005

[pwhodges 2012]

Since I have no problems with any of these films, what I'd be interested to see is details of your folder structure and file naming, and what metadata providers you have selected and in what order.

Paul

[brothom 177]

@ServerNoob005hi there! 

Renaming your folder causes Emby to not be able to "find" the original media so it's "poof gone".

Also I can't seem to be able to find any media named "Redline" from 2010 in either themoviedb or thetvdb.

Judging from your image, the Redline you wanted to find is the one from 2009: 
The movie db: https://www.themoviedb.org/movie/71883
The tv db: https://thetvdb.com/movies/redline

Both sources say Redline is from 2009. So changing your folder name to "Redline (2009)" and going to Dashboard -> Emby Server -> Library and running "Scan Library Files", should result in the correct movie being matched. 

Using the wrong year for media causes most media servers (not just Emby) to not be able to match the correct media or sometimes match completely wrong media. 

Always adhere to the naming conventions to prevent mess ups like these:
https://emby.media/support/articles/Movie-Naming.html
https://emby.media/support/articles/TV-Naming.html

Manually adjusting the ID is a bandaid in my opinion because moving the folder at any later time and not using .nfo files (local files) to store the data, will cause this exact same issue later.

[ServerNoob005 2]

Good Morning @brothom,

I’m afraid I am at work so I must be brief. I am trying not to be too wordy in my posts, but I didn’t make it clear that I am l aware of the year. Redline is in fact a 2009 film— you are right.

I guess didn’t state entirely what happened. I originally had the folder and mkv as 2010 and then scanned the library. It was able to display the mkv, albeit misidentified as Redline (2007).Then I can hit identify, and it causes the folder error.

So I tried again. Since I saw the year was wrong, I renamed the folder and mkv with 2009, rescanned the library and got the same folder error. Likewise this doesn’t really solve the Maquia and Patema issue where I do believe I got the year right.

When I get the chance, I need to recheck the above to ensure my words are true, and if I get the same results, I will try adding the id to the folder as well, and I will update @pwhodgesas well, regarding my structure and providers.

Thanks for the help folks, and sorry I missed the above clarifying details. I’ll let you know what I find.

 

Edited July 14, 2025 by ServerNoob005

[Happy2Play 9780]

33 minutes ago, brothom said:

Also I can't seem to be able to find any media named "Redline" from 2010 in either themoviedb or thetvdb.

Well there is a caveat to this from the api perspective as release year can be different in many countries.  So technically it can be 2009/2010/2011/2021/2024

Redline (2009) - Release Dates — The Movie Database (TMDB)

per search 2024

redline — The Movie Database (TMDB)

So specific structure and naming along with server log is needed to see what query was sent to provider.

But in this case Redline (2010) provides two movies so Emby will always get it wrong here.

redline 2010— The Movie Database (TMDB)

 

This issue has come up before and is sort of a defect on TMDB api.

[brothom 177]

52 minutes ago, Happy2Play said:

Well there is a caveat to this from the api perspective as release year can be different in many countries.  So technically it can be 2009/2010/2011/2021/2024

Redline (2009) - Release Dates — The Movie Database (TMDB)

This issue has come up before and is sort of a defect on TMDB api.

 

I would like to disagree. TMDB probably has a rule to have at least one "main" release year and in this case that's 2010. Regardless of any localised release date. In your example it might be the case that countries that didn't have a release of "The Thing" from 1982, will get a re-release in 2026 which in turn makes that the main release for that country.

This same goes the TVDB and is probably a good thing because otherwise there can't be any standardisation from an API or search perspective. If the API's would work as you suggest, we would probably never be able to find any movies release around new-years because one date would be in December and the other in January.

[Happy2Play 9780]

7 minutes ago, brothom said:

I would like to disagree. TMDB probably has a rule to have at least one "main" release year and in this case that's 2010. Regardless of any localised release date. In your example it might be the case that countries that didn't have a release of "The Thing" from 1982, will get a re-release in 2026 which in turn makes that the main release for that country.

This same goes the TVDB and is probably a good thing because otherwise there can't be any standardisation from an API or search perspective. If the API's would work as you suggest, we would probably never be able to find any movies release around new-years because one date would be in December and the other in January.

It works the the same way as I showed in web query above.  So Emby will take the first result in the query returned from the api so the Redline (2010) example will always be wrong.

The api query

{
  "page": 1,
  "results": [
    {
      "adult": false,
      "backdrop_path": "/5QV9uotDRFbeik7tkCcKo96yvWt.jpg",
      "genre_ids": [28, 53],
      "id": 16392,
      "original_language": "en",
      "original_title": "Redline",
      "overview": "A gorgeous young automobile fanatic--and front to the hottest unsigned band on the West coast--finds herself caught up in illegal drag-racing competitions organized by exotic car fanatics",
      "popularity": 1.4517,
      "poster_path": "/lE1XfidwJml7lNGi0D4KlB8uQFY.jpg",
      "release_date": "2007-04-13",
      "title": "Redline",
      "video": false,
      "vote_average": 5,
      "vote_count": 153
    },
    {
      "adult": false,
      "backdrop_path": "/cftD8o34P6N8zTwySfaaMnaNkTT.jpg",
      "genre_ids": [16, 28, 878],
      "id": 71883,
      "original_language": "ja",
      "original_title": "レッドライン",
      "overview": "A daredevil driver is determined to compete in Redline, the most popular race in the galaxy. The race only occurs every five years, but in order to participate he must overcome the mafia, the government and even love.",
      "popularity": 2.0215,
      "poster_path": "/yUkH0y9OsY7J08Dvfzi1P0di559.jpg",
      "release_date": "2009-08-14",
      "title": "Redline",
      "video": false,
      "vote_average": 7.52,
      "vote_count": 501
    }
  ],
  "total_pages": 1,
  "total_results": 2
}

Now querying Redline 2024 will provide the correct result.  Along with Redline 2009.

{
  "page": 1,
  "results": [
    {
      "adult": false,
      "backdrop_path": "/cftD8o34P6N8zTwySfaaMnaNkTT.jpg",
      "genre_ids": [16, 28, 878],
      "id": 71883,
      "original_language": "ja",
      "original_title": "レッドライン",
      "overview": "A daredevil driver is determined to compete in Redline, the most popular race in the galaxy. The race only occurs every five years, but in order to participate he must overcome the mafia, the government and even love.",
      "popularity": 2.0215,
      "poster_path": "/yUkH0y9OsY7J08Dvfzi1P0di559.jpg",
      "release_date": "2009-08-14",
      "title": "Redline",
      "video": false,
      "vote_average": 7.52,
      "vote_count": 501
    }
  ],
  "total_pages": 1,
  "total_results": 1
}

 

But in the end it is best to use the year provide on the website for best results but there are many cases where IMDB/TMDB/TVDB can have different release years for any content.  So there can never be one method that works for everything.

I guess technically there can be it requires manual work of already knowing the provider id.  Redline (2010) {tmdbid=71883}

[brothom 177]

37 minutes ago, Happy2Play said:

But in the end it is best to use the year provide on the website for best results but there are many cases where IMDB/TMDB/TVDB can have different release years for any content.  So there can never be one method that works for everything.

I guess technically there can be it requires manual work of already knowing the provider id.  Redline (2010) {tmdbid=71883}

Absolutely. These are basically autonomous systems and it's our job to use them as intended. Even if that can cause some confusing situations sometimes. That's when we can manually identify via Emby or via the tag in the file / folder.

I'm still wondering about the other media entries OP was talking, I'd like to know if those cases were the same as Redline's.

[Neminem 1518]

Well I don't know how this went ?

Never got a reply.

And I still don't see who op's folder structure is.

Edited July 14, 2025 by Neminem

[pwhodges 2012]

Another slight complication (at least with Redline) is that the databases can change their data.  This clearly happened with Redline on TMDB, because my metadata, which came from there at some time in the past, displayed the year as 2010 (although I'd specified 2009); but when I refreshed the metadata a few minutes ago, this was updated to 2009.

Paul

[Neminem 1518]

upstream issues

Not Emby  

[pwhodges 2012]

As I said...

Paul

[ServerNoob005 2]

Good Evening Friends,

Sorry for the long wait. 10 hr workdays with long commutes and all that jazz. So to answer each of you whom I have neglected at this time:

@NeminemI copied this is exactly as you listed it, and it did not succeed. It still only appears in folders empty.

Maquia When the Promised Flower Blooms (2018) {TmdbId-476292}/Maquia When the Promised Flower Blooms (2018).mkv

Also tried it with Redline to no success.

Redline (2009) {TmdbId-71883}/Redline (2009).mkv
 

@pwhodges Are you referring to the metadata downloader on the library? It's just the default, I think.

And to both of you my folder structure is this. As stated before it's a jbod NAS. I would like to think my structure is simple and well...stupid, and should follow Emby's guide just fine: Movie Naming | Emby Documentation

mnt
--home-media
----anime_movies
------Drifting Home (2022)
------Flavors of Youth (2018)
------Redline (2009) {tmdbId-71883}
--------Redline (2009).mkv
--------poster.png
----anime_tv_series
----movies
----music
----tv_series

Let me know what you think. I'm hoping I'm just being thick somehow and isn't something complicated. Thanks as always.

[pwhodges 2012]

And the path you have added to the anime_movies library is /mnt/home-media/anime_movies - yes?  If so, that looks fine, and I'm wondering what we're missing...

Paul

[brothom 177]

@ServerNoob005I just tried reproducing your issue doing the following:

Created /Media/Movies/Redline (2009)/Redline (2009).mkv
This working flawless and Emby immediately matched the correct media

I even tried this:

Created /Media/Movies/Foofoo Barbar {tmdbid=71883}/Foofoo Barbar {tmdbid=71883}.mkv
I'm impressed because even this works. 

I noticed your tmdbId also contains some uppercase characters and contains curcly brackets when you're using the square bracket format.

Could you recheck using this EXACT formatting:
/Redline (2009) {tmdbid=71883}/Redline (2009) {tmdbid=71883}.mkv

[Luke 42078]

@ServerNoob005has this helped?

[ServerNoob005 2]

Good evening @Luke

In short: …no.
In full: I have yet to try the most recent post by @brothom I will update once I have, likely in a few hours. Thus far, none of the suggestions have bared fruit unfortunately. I’ve given each one a respectful try I think. Honestly, I’m rather baffled how something so relatively simple can prove to be so difficult to crack. Like pwhodge’s said— I really don’t know what I missing at this point. I haven’t really played much with the setting so the system should be and borderline default settings. Why my emby server hates these 3 movies in particular remains unclear. If brothom’s naming suggestion fails, which I honestly expect it will, then I am going to be out of ideas, sadly. Already tried putting these 3 movies into their own library, etc, and I don’t think unmounting and remounting in Linux is going to do anything either. =[

[ServerNoob005 2]

Good evening.

@brothom @LukeAs I feared, it did not succeed.

Even tried moving it to the normal generic "movies" folder on the off chance that would make a difference, and it gives the same result as below.

I really don't know what to say at this point. It simply doesn't seem to care about the folder or mkv name at all.

 

Unfortunately, I can't reasonably guess what has caused this as I said, I have hardly touched the settings. It doesn't matter how many times IU rescan the library- The result is always the same.

I open to any further suggestions of where I should look next...

[brothom 177]

@ServerNoob005in this screenshot you have an extra "." in your file name. Also; doesn't this mean your "REAL" filename is "Redline (2009) {tmdbid=71883}..mkv.mkv"?

Usually extensions are hidden and need to be "unhidden" manually by adding them to the "known extension" list.

1. Check the REAL filenames

Your formatting comes close but I believe it doesn't actually match. You can confirm the filename using Powershell:

1. Open Powershell
2. Using `cd` and go to the correct drive and folder. For Example in my case:

   cd 'E:\Media\Movies\Redline (2009) {tmdbid=71883}\'

   Use the quotes above because the folder and filename contain spaces and special characters.

3. When navigated to the folder, you can use the `ls` command and you should see something like this:

   PS E:\Media\Movies\Redline (2009) {tmdbid=71883}> ls
   
   
       Directory: E:\Media\Movies\Redline (2009) {tmdbid=71883}
   
   
   Mode                 LastWriteTime         Length Name
   ----                 -------------         ------ ----
   -a----         17-7-2025     08:17              0 Redline (2009) {tmdbid=71883}.mkv

 

That's how the file should look.

If this is all the same, use the scan library method again to validate the item's existence. In my case I didn't even need to do that and the item popped up after a few seconds: 

2. Validate Naming Convention

Please also be sure your movies are DIRECTLY inside your library folder. 

If your "Movie library" has the following path: "C:\Media\Awesome Films". You should put films only directly inside: "C:\Media\Awesome Films\Redline (2009)".

Don't do things like: "C:\Media\Awesome Films\anime_movies\Redline (2009)" because that doesn't fit the naming convention.
Your parent folders also contain special characters, that might also cause issues. 

3. Recreate a working scenario

The best test in your case would be to create the following: "\\Network\Synology_1\Movies\Redline (2009)\Redline (2009).mkv" and create a new library in Emby configured to use "\\Network\Synology_1\Movies". 

This above example should absolutely work because it basically mirrors my working case.
If it does not; something else is wrongly configured and the issue probably also lies somewhere else.

 

[Happy2Play 9780]

10 hours ago, ServerNoob005 said:

Good evening.

@brothom @LukeAs I feared, it did not succeed.

Even tried moving it to the normal generic "movies" folder on the off chance that would make a difference, and it gives the same result as below.

I really don't know what to say at this point. It simply doesn't seem to care about the folder or mkv name at all.

 

Unfortunately, I can't reasonably guess what has caused this as I said, I have hardly touched the settings. It doesn't matter how many times IU rescan the library- The result is always the same.

I open to any further suggestions of where I should look next...

And the server log for this scenario?

Can only guess server not talking to TMDB.