iTunes - How to fix TV Shows that won't delete.

Recently, I noticed that I had a couple of free TV shows that I downloaded in iTunes and they kept downloading over and over which then would sync to my iPad.  No matter what I did iTunes would not let me delete them and I was getting very frustrated.  I looked all over the web and could not seem to find a good answer so I figured it out myself.

Here is how you fix it manually.

First, let me tell you that this is on a Windows 7 PC. However, I'm certain the fix is very similar on any computer.  Look at this solution and apply the configuration settings to your setup.

Find out where iTunes is storing your media files.  In my case, a Windows 7 PC had them here.
 
C:\Users\Rick Cable\Music\iTunes\iTunes Media

Next, find the downloads folder

C:\Users\Rick Cable\Music\iTunes\iTunes Media\Downloads

You should see a folder for each download and in my case, each TV Show, and a file named "list.plist".

Since I had already cleaned my files out, I downloaded a free episode of Knights of Mayhem so I can show you real data from the list.plist file.


Here are the contents of the list.plist file.  To fix, delete the temporary folder that was created for the download then open the list.plist file and delete all lines between the <dict> and </dict> tags and then save the file.

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<!DOCTYPE plist PUBLIC "-//Apple//DTD PLIST 1.0//EN" "http://www.apple.com/DTDs/PropertyList-1.0.dtd">
<plist version="1.0">
<dict>
    <key>items</key>
    <array>
        <dict>
            <key>category</key>
            <string>itms</string>
            <key>downloadID</key>
            <string>J16N_V_160003334639723</string>
            <key>dsid</key>
            <integer>299476307</integer>
            <key>id</key>
            <integer>475364041</integer>
            <key>name</key>
            <string>Behind the Scenes / Knights of Mayhem, Season 1 / Knights of Mayhem</string>
        </dict>
    </array>
</dict>
</plist>

That's it.... hope this article helped.