Think of iTunes more of a "warehouse club".
Film studios/distributors send their movies/TV shows there.
iTunes distributes them to its paying customers.
iTunes has no say on the content or order of what it is sent....its only job is to distribute it properly.
Content is the sole responsibility of the distributor of that content.
As far as episodes of TV shows are concerned, there is no "set format" other than those in which the next episode is a continuation of the previous. IE:The Prisoner, this series has a defined order. Other shows, such as Star Trek, each episode (other then "The Menagerie" a 2-parter) is self-contained. Their digital versions seem to follow the order they were originally aired while the blu-ray discs follow production order. Since all the digital distributors of Star Trek episodes (CBS,Amazon,iTunes,Hulu) follow this same order, I can only surmise that the series is distributed to all parties this way, and either are not allowed or permitted to edit it in any way.
A customer does have the freedom, if they so desire....to watch a series in any order they want...per episode. So, in essence if you know the production order (google it!) select individual episodes and watch it in this manner.
It would be nice if iTunes included a "playlist" option, like they do with music, for their TV shows, and included this on ATV. That way you could create your "own" order if you don't want to watch a series in the order given to you.
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