Dave Dribin asked on Mastodon:

How can I watch Dr. Horrible in the year 2025? The iTunes link is 404 and I don't see it on any streaming service. The Blu-ray is $70 from a scalper. Halp!

I was initially skeptical that no streaming service included this pioneering internet-first musical as part of their programming, but yup, it’s been (effectively) disappeared: ReelGood reports zero streaming options, while JustWatch claims it’s available for streaming on Amazon Prime, but the provided link fails. It’s available for purchase on Amazon Prime for $23.99, but that’s an additional cost—not part of their core streaming offerings.

The “Download on iTunes / Watch Instantly” link from the official Dr. Horrible website fails too, as Dribin notes.

It’s not even on the Internet Archive.

Even the soundtrack has gone missing from Apple Music. All that remains to suggest it ever existed are a handful of ghost playlists—all of which now give a pitiful “This song is currently unavailable” alert when you try to play them.

Curiously, the soundtrack remains available in the iTunes Store, the $0.99-a-song marketplace that was the precursor to Apple Music (so old it still uses Times New Roman for its popup menu).

You can also buy it on disc, but as Dribin alludes to, the price is way out of whack. $70 for a Blu-ray is highway robbery. The least expensive (DVD) option is about $25. I paid $8.99 in 2011; even accounting for inflation, it should still be under $13. As much as I love this musical, I’m not sure it’s $25 worth of love.

(Nope, even as I said it, it felt wrong. I’d totally buy it today at $25. I’m glad I don’t have to, though!)

The one place the musical is freely available is YouTube, in its original three-act structure. I encourage you to watch them now, while you still can!

• Act 1
• Act 2
• Act 3

If you’re unfamiliar with the musical, I described it in my now-defunct personal blog as—

a wonderfully cheesy musical sendup of a wannabe super-villain and his arch-nemesis, with a beautiful woman and accompanying love story for good measure.

It’s one of my favorites—sweet, arch, and funny. It stars Neil Patrick Harris, Nathan Fillion, and Felicia Day, and was written by Joss Whedon^[1], his brothers Zack and Jed, and Maurissa Tancharoen.

(If you know Once More, With Feeling—s6e7 of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, the musical episode—you’ll recognize several musical Whedonisms, including Delightfully Dense Plot-Advancing Lyrics, Split-Screen Songs by the Strongest Singers, Simultaneous Interwoven Singing, and the Sweet and Tender Ingenue Song. He really does have a style. Very Finishing the Hat.)

Thanks to Dribin’s question, I’ve now watched the show twice—and listened to the soundtrack separately. It still holds up more than 15 years later.

It’s a shame an internet-first musical is no longer easily available on the internet. Online permanence is an illusion.

Perhaps someone with a digitized copy should upload it to the Internet Archive for preservation.