DVD Release Date: April 18, 2006 (Anchor Bay Home Entertainment)
Color/1992-93
MSRP: $39.98
Number of discs: 4
Number of episodes: 22
Total runtime: 552 minutes
Special Features Runtime: 31:16
Audio Tracks: English 2.0
Subtitles: None
Closed Captioned
Special Features:
Interviews with Lawrence Pressman and Kathryn Layng.
Introduction:
When we're all little, we all dream of being
astronauts, firemen- and the largest majority of us
want to be doctors when we grow up. Well, child genius
Douglas "Doogie" Howser managed to do young children
the world over one better. He finished high school in 9
weeks, pulled off a perfect score on the SAT's at 6,
graduated from Princeton at 10, and passed his medical
board exam at 14, making it into full residency at
Eastwood Medical Center in LA by the time of his 16th
birthday. The fourth season of the comedy-drama hybrid
Doogie Howser is now on DVD.
He began as a 16 year old doctor, but now “boy genius”
Doogie Howser (Neil Patrick Harris) is a young man
dealing with the adult dilemmas of self-doubt, sexual
relationships, racial tensions, new roommates, gun
control, child abuse, and beyond. Through it all, his
best friend Vinnie Delpino (Max Casella), his parents
(Belinda Montgomery, James Sikking), and his coworkers
at Eastwood including Dr. Benjamin Canfield (Lawrence
Pressman), Dr. Jack McGwire (Mitchell Anderson),
Raymond Alexander (Markus Redmond) and Nurse Curly
Spaulding (Kathryn Layng).
Memorable Episodes / Notable Guest Stars:
Some shows are able to keep the train going well into
season four--others, not so much. Doogie, in its
last year, kind of hit a level of mediocrity.
Characters, at least in live-action shows, age with
the actors, and you can’t very well have a show about
a child-genius doctor when the actor playing the
doctor, and by extension, the character himself, is
now college-age in real-life. At this point, the
focus genuinely seemed to shift away from the concept
of “Doogie Howser, child prodigy…and more towards your
average issues in a hospital. And as the show has a
specific doctor as its lead, it’s going to be from
their vantage point, with the B-plot usually involving
their away-from-job life. Doogie definitely fell
into this formula this season and some of the episodes
suffered because of it.
The first episode (“There’s a Riot Going On”) of the
season is a classic (yet dated) episode, in which the
1992 L.A. Riots (for those of you unfamiliar with the
LA Riots of that year, do a little research on
Google/Wikipedia about it) leave trauma surgeon Doogie
VERY overwhelmed. It’s told from the vantage point of
Doogie, NOW, reminiscing about when the riots
happened. Although the last episodes of season three
aired after the riots started, production had, if I
remember correctly, already wrapped at that point,
hence the delay. The start of the episode itself
doesn’t clue you in on what’s going on, until the very
last bit before the opening titles, when the kitchen
TV cuts to a 7 Eyewitness News special bulletin
regarding a verdict in the Rodney King case. Anyone
hearing those words with even a minimal grasp of 90s
history knows it’s going to be downhill from there…
The 2nd episode really begins to hammer home the
“Adult Doogie” issue, as Doogie’s mom can’t stop
being, well, a mom even after he dates her boss and
brings her to the house for skinny-dipping. The
next episode continues the serious theme of the show,
when the Howser’s are robbed, and Doogie considers
getting a gun for protection. In the next episode,
Doogie Doesn’t Love Here Anymore…Doogie moves out.
The majority of the rest of the episodes are fairly
self-contained around the random problem of the day.
By this point, the comedy elements that the show
started with were more or less replaced by full-blown
drama with only occasional comedic elements. In the
episode It’s a Tough Job…But Why Does My Father Have
to Do it”, the head of family medicine suddenly drops
dead on the job, leading Doogie’s dad to be asked to
replace him. Meanwhile, Vinnie’s now-divorced dad is
dating a masseuse, and Vinnie can’t adjust. One thing
you’ll notice immediately is that the episodes in
season four are NOT in production order, and as such,
he’s moving in season four, back home in episode five,
and it’s in general just disjoined. The last episode
isn’t even the last episode, yet…well, more on that in
a second. The series finale of the episode can best
be summarized as this: Doogie sees his gift of genius
as more of a curse than a blessing as he seeks
inspiration outside the world of medicine. Despite
being out of order, the finale is actually a proper
goodbye. Doogie leaves the hospital, wanting to not
wind up like other child geniuses he was on the Jenny
Jones show with. The very last computer screen he
types into is FINALLY an upgraded system, after four
years of the old late 80s DOS standard.
List of Guest Stars:
Max Gail (Barney Miller): Doogie Doesn’t Live Here
Anymore
Chelsea Noble (Growing Pains): You’ve Come a Long Way
Babysitter
David Ruprecht (Supermarket Sweep): You’ve Come a Long
Way Babysitter
Jenny Jones: What Makes Doogie Run
I apologize if I missed any, however, I’m going on an
incomplete guide. If I discover any I missed, this
review will be appended.
Packaging:
Packaging is consistent with the rest of the releases
in the series. The front cover art has Doogie,
solo, standing in full doctor attire and stethoscope
around his neck, in front of a purple-tinted x-ray of
the spine and pelvis area. The back cover has the
same x-ray spread across the entire rear of the box,
with a picture of Vinnie and Doogie next to the first
paragraph of text, and a picture of Doogie at a firing
range shooting a gun by the 2nd paragraph/features
list. (Hint #13 you know it’s time for a show to
end: A show about a child prodigy doctor has the
now-adult doctor shooting a gun in a non-hunting
setting)
The two inner slim cases are of a similar construction
as the first three sets. Each slim case holds two
discs. The color theme for this set, if you didn’t
figure it out by the x-ray tinting, is purple, and so
for this set, the discs use various shades of purple
as the coloring for the
same-as-the-first-three-seasons disc art style (large
disc number on the right side, the show logo with
season text written vertically on the left side).
The cover art for slim case 1 is the same picture of
Vinnie and Doogie from the upper back cover, while the
2nd slim case features the same shot of Doogie and the
gun. Behind the Discs (The inner art, I call it) are
various pictures from the seasons, with a white
boarder around each one, in front of the same purple
X-Ray.
Each disc features a background color, text color, and
shadow color. They’re included in the disc-by-disc
breakdown below
Colors expressed in terms of Light/Medium/etc purples,
because unless it’s expressed as an RGB or CMYK value,
I’m BAD with colors.
Slim case 1
Disc 1:
Episodes 1-6. BG: White. Text: Light Purple. Shadow: Medium Purple
Disc 2:
Episodes 7-12: BG: Light Purple. Text: White. Shadow: Medium Purple
Well, I’ve seen it, and now I believe it. A company
managed to use identical menus for EVERY season of a
show released to DVD. All 4 seasons contain identical
menus. Once more, with FEELING (stop me if you’ve
heard THIS part before):
Menus are well done, but the graphical parts of the
menus are still holdovers from the season 1 - and
season 2 AND season 3 sets. I say the graphical
part because, as with season three, season four used a
slightly faster paced and more upbeat version of the
classic Mike Post theme and that IS different from the
first half of the series. But as in all three previous
releases, all visuals in the menu are the same:
various anatomy diagrams and newspaper articles about
Doogie circle around the screen, while the main theme
plays. At the same time, the computer screen in the
background is typing something, though it's impossible
to read what it says with the pictures swirling
around. The Play All, Special Features, and Episodes
buttons are in east to read text on top of a black
translucent background over the bottom left corner of
the background, while the season and disc numbers are
in a similar box in the top-right half of the screen.
The episode selection menu is the same DOS-era word
processor styled list used in previous seasons' sets.
The special features menu features this same DOS word
processor-style list.
You know, I’ve spent three reviews now (Two, Three,
and now Four) complaining about how the menus are
season one rehashes, but it should be noted: I would
MUCH prefer that a company re-use GOOD, and CREATIVE
menu systems such as this than spend an hour in a
graphics program creating one still visual, and have
THAT be the main menu--repetitive and professional
over different but amateurish any day of the week.
Considering the amount I’ve complained about repeating
menus, I thought I’d say something nice about them for
once, to be different. This IS after all probably
the last time I’ll ever be reviewing anything to do
with this series, so I thought I’d get that in while I
could.
Video and Audio Quality:
Video is good, but not great. There is occasionally a
bit of grain and/or some artifacting, particularly on
the second and third discs. Audio is pretty much the
exact same as the first three sets--clear,
well-balanced, no hiss. One chapter stop per
episode, after the opening credits, like some of
Anchor Bay’s other sitcoms (3rd Rock, Three’s
Company). Oh well, better than nothing. Episodes are
not edited the 22:22 episode is just an episode that
ran short. Runtimes below:
Disc 1:
There’s a Riot Going On: 22:50
Look Ma, No Pants: 23:10
Doogie Got a Gun: 23:04
Doogie Doesn’t Live Here Anymore: 23:08
The Patient in Spite of Himself: 23:21
To Err is Human, To Give Up Isn’t a Bad Idea: 23:00
Disc 2:
Doogie Can You Hear Me: 23:20
Nothing Compares 2 U: 22:51
Do the Right Thing…If You Can Figure Out What It Is:
23:14
The Big Sleep…Not: 23:18
Will the Real Dr. Howser Please Stand Up: 22:57
The Mother of All Fishing Trips: 23:32
Disc 3:
Roommate with a View: 22:22
Spell it “M-A-N”: 23:14
It’s a Tough Job…But Why Does My Father Have to Do
it?: 22:53
The Adventures of Sherlock Howser: 23:17
Love Means Constantly Having to Say You’re Sorry:
23:11
You’ve Come a Long Way, Babysitter: 23:21
Disc 4:
Love Makes the World Go ‘Round…or is it Money?: 22:59
Dorky Housecall, M.D.: 22:52
Eleven Angry People…And Vinnie: 23:03
What Makes Doogie Run: 23:04
Special Features:
Special features on the set are sparse, but hey, we're
used to it by now. Two interviews (plus some Anchor
Bay DVD Previews) are on this set. This time, two
interviews to close out the series. Lawrence Pressman
and Kathryn Layne are interviewed. The Pressman
interview runs 13:04. He talks about his friendship
with Steven Bochco, how he wound up on the show, and
the other thoughts you’d expect in these interviews.
He originally read for the senior Dr. Howser, but they
felt that James Sikking was just better, and that he
was better for the role he ultimately got. The
Kathryn Layng interview is more or less the same
just less mentions of Steven Bochco but runs 18:12.
Kathryn still looks pretty much the same 13-14 years
later. Total runtime for features is 31:16.
Final Comments:
[The Public Review of Doogie Howser Season 4]
May 6, 2006 After just over a year, the fun has come
to a close. This show has put out four fairly
consistently entertaining seasons, and I can
definitely say it was a good ride. With this review
over with, it’s time to move on. There will always
be more sets to review, and hopefully, they’ll be
entertaining as well. I can’t say that this was the
best season of the show, but I’ve definitely seen much
worse television. If you haven’t purchased seasons
1-3 yet, I’d definitely rather that people go and buy
them first, as this is not the best season for people
to start with. That said, for anyone out there who
might have been on the bubble about this last season,
go ahead and pick it up. Hopefully we’ll all go away
happier at the end of the day. For those of you who
haven’t invested in the show yet, I personally think
that it’s worth the money. All in all, when asked
for a recommendation for the season, and for the show,
I can only respond by saying: Recommended.
