[DiMag]

At the moment a metadata information for a TV serial is, all things considered, good for the searial tself and very good for its episodes. However, it is abysmally lacking regarding the its distinct seasons. The omission is serious. Each season has its distinct plot, actors, and perhaps most important of all, ratings. There aren't any ratings for the serial as a whole (at least not on RT and MC) --- only for individual seasons.

Where this omission is clearly unbearable is with anthology-type Tv serials, where each season is a distinct serial with its own universe, plot, timeline and actors.

The only thing that seems to be offered in the way of season-specific metadata is the ability to give each season its own distinct name. So instead of Season 1, Season 2 Season 1 (2019), Season 2 (2022), or Season 1 - The Siege of Troy, Season 2 - Troy's Fall. No distinct plot, no distinct ratings. Clearly, not enough.

Where there can be no complaint is with regard to the artwork. Each season has its own complete, and distinct set.

With regard to actors artwork, there is a mess --- unless the director has kept the crew unchanged among seasons, which is difficult as a matter of project management and naturally never the case in anthology seies.

[Klojum]

I'd suggest you forward your views and requests to those who gather all that information, the metadata providers, and who provide it out to whoever wants the information. The metadata providers will need to upgrade and further more diversify their backend first before metadata receivers like Kodi get all that information in edible chunks. I'm sure there are some TV series that would benefit from a more detailed season description, but not every TV series will require such an in-depth specification.

And what about age/movie/tv-correct thumbnails for actors with long careers whose appearances have changed over the years? People look different in their 20's and in their 60's.

[DiMag]

I'd suggest you forward your views and requests to those who gather all that information, the metadata providers

You are absolutely right, on first order logic, it is not Team Kodi's responsibility to feed data into metadata providers, only to provide scrapers for these data. But on second order logic, it is Team Kodi's responsibility to aggregate user requests for better and more metadata to the providers. Because of clout. What matters to TMDb and RT the view of a single user if there are millions of them? But Team Kodi's view matters, because it is 1 out of only 5 software pieces through which these millions of users access these metadata, and the dominant one at that.

[DiMag]

II'm sure there are some TV series that would benefit from a more detailed season description, but not every TV series will require such an in-depth specification.

I submit you are wrong in that, presenting as evidence the fact that RT and MC rate TV series as seasons not as blocks.

Granted, the requisite information for a season shall always be considerably shorter than that for the whole serial. But this doesn't make it redundant.

[DiMag]

....
And what about age/movie/tv-correct thumbnails for actors with long careers whose appearances have changed over the years? People look different in their 20's and in their 60's.

Dead right. This is another issue. Another petition item.

Although... On second reflection, it not as straightforward as the preceding one. You have legal issues like the right to one's own image, and factual issues like actors' inflated egos.

[Karellen]

I submit you are wrong in that, presenting as evidence the fact that RT and MC rate TV series as seasons not as blocks.

There are no RT or MC scrapers, so it is useless flagging them as your evidence. Check TMDB and TVDB.

Anyway it is not as simple as you make it seem. This requires a major change, starting with the databases to hold the new data, Kodi core to process it, scrapers to scrape it, skins to display it and other addons that make use of the library.
It is a change along the entire development chain of Kodi.
Not saying it can't happen, just saying don't hold your breath. There are not enough developers in Kodi, and I highly doubt any of them would be interested in the feature. It will need to come from the community.

[DiMag]

I submit you are wrong in that, presenting as evidence the fact that RT and MC rate TV series as seasons not as blocks.

There are no RT or MC scrapers, so it is useless flagging them as your evidence. Check TMDB and TVDB.

I know there are no first-order RT/MC scrapers. But almost all media managers scrape RT and MC ratings. And Team Kodi itself has built the best scraper integrating RT and MC ratings. (It is the best because among other things it distinguishes between RT approval ratings, which statistically make no sense, and RT average ratings, which do.)

TMDb and TheTVDb may provide good metadata overall, but as to ratings they are at best second rate. At best. Plus they are both audience-based, which is qualitatively WAY below critics-based as in RT and MC, not to speak of lack of normalization and weighted averages. Moreover, TMDb relies on pitifully low statistical samples.

Anyway I am not making the case that consolidated ratings for the serial as a block are useless. They are not as granular as they should be. In more words, they provide a true and fair view only where there has been no fluctuation in quality between seasons. Once upon a time it appears the producers managed to ensure that. Today, this in plainly no longer the case.

[DiMag]

Anyway it is not as simple as you make it seem. This requires a major change, starting with the databases to hold the new data, Kodi core to process it, scrapers to scrape it, skins to display it and other addons that make use of the library.
It is a change along the entire development chain of Kodi.

Here I cannot assert anything, just exposes my hypotheses:

Database design. How difficult is it to add a property HAS_SEASONS to the tvshows database, considering it already knows of a property HAS_EPISODES? Even if your argument is that remaking the design from SHOW/EPISODES to SHOW/SEASONS/EPISODES is difficult (or too much trouble to be worth), how about a quick & dirty solution where seasons are treated as bastard episodes? Or something like the ingenious solution in place for special episodes, which can appear anywhere you tell them to appear?

GUI exposition. You can already change the season name from a generic Season # to a distinct name. You can already have season-specific artwork beautifying your screen. How difficult is then to show a text info box, given that the view type you are on is a mediainfo viewtype which expects such a text box? 

In conclusion, I think the only issue is the lack of scrapeable metadata.