Sitcom and Other TV Show DVD Reviews http://www.sitcomsonline.com en-us DVD Entertainment TV Copyright 1999-2009 SitcomsOnline.com 'Tis the season for your favorite sitcom characters to celebrate Christmas! And why not have them celebrate together? That is exactly what we get in the Shout! Factory DVD release of Merry Sitcom!, a single disc release that contains Christmas episodes of seven different series from the 1950s and 1960s, including Father Knows Best, The Donna Reed Show, McHale's Navy, Bewitched, That Girl, The Flying Nun, and Window on Main Street! It's a classic holiday Christmas on one DVD! Release Date: November 3rd - Shout! Factory. http://www.sitcomsonline.com/merrysitcomdvdreview.html Mon, 02 Nov 2009 03:45:00 GMT Michael J. Fox is back as Deputy Mayor Mike Flaherty, the damage-controlling spin wizard to New York City's favorite blundering boss man - Mayor Randall Winston (Barry Bostwick, "Rocky Horror Picture Show"). Season Three spells reelection time, and that means business in the Mayor's office - complete with assasination plots, supermodels, teenage girl muggers, ex-girlfriends and a city full of problems. In the midst of it all, there are enough distractions and obstacles to make business nearly impossible for Mike and his crew (Richard Kind, "Mad About You"; Alan Ruck, "Ferris Bueller's Day Off"; Michael Boatman, "Arliss"; Connie Britton, "Friday Night Lights"; Alexander Chaplin, Victoria Dillard, and Jennifer Esposito, "Samantha Who"). Led by Michael J. Fox, Spin City exemplified a perfectly connected cast with all the chemistry and comedic pacing that made the show one of the best and most groundbreaking comedies of its time. Release Date: November 3rd - Shout! Factory. http://www.sitcomsonline.com/spincityseason3dvdreview.html Mon, 02 Nov 2009 03:31:00 GMT In the fifth season of the Emmy-winning hit show Mary and her hilariously eccentric friends at WJM-TV weather a few storms, sometimes literally. If her life isn’t challenging enough, Mary takes a crack at producing the news, and even has a brush with the law! Laughs are the lead story when a consultant turns the newsroom on its ear. Lou becomes Mary’s neighbor, and Ted starts a rumor that he and Mary are dating. Featuring some of television’s most memorable characters and story lines, this inimitable series is wonderful to see again. For those of you unfamiliar with the show - the show stars Mary Tyler Moore (wow, The Mary Tyler Moore Show stars Mary Tyler Moore (who would have guessed??) as Mary Richards, an associate producer at WJM-TV in Minneapolis. A lot of the show centers on the absolute nuthouse that IS the WJM newsroom. Mary’s boss, Lou Grant (played by the one and only Edward Asner), is a rather grumpy guy but occasionally does soften a bit. Also at WJM is Ted Baxter (Ted Knight), the self-absorbed and...well...dumb senior news anchor at WJM. Also in the newsroom is Murray Slaughter (Gavin MacLeod), a WJM news writer, as well as Sue Ann Nivens (Betty White), the...uh...nuts former host of The Happy Homemaker Show and current WJM staffer. Away from the newsroom you’ll find (Cloris Leachman). Rhoda, Mary’s best friend for the first four seasons, was spun off into her own series this year. Release Date: October 6th - Fox Home Entertainment. http://www.sitcomsonline.com/themarytylermooreshowseason5dvdreview.html Thu, 29 Oct 2009 04:32:00 GMT Before the Internet, before reality TV, no one saw what television *could* be more humorously and with more vision than Garry Shandling. In 1986, Garry Shandling was poised to become a permanent guest host on Johnny Carson’s The Tonight Show. Instead, he took a chance on an offer from fledgling cable network Showtime to create his own television series. No questions asked. A surreal look at the daily life of a young single man who is a comedian, It’s Garry Shandling’s Show was not a typical sitcom. Shandling would break the fourth wall to include the studio audience (starting about 10 seconds into episode #1) and the viewers at home in on the actual making of the show. Experimenting with the sitcom form meant inviting the audience onto the set, playing with the passage of time (IE: Suddenly stating that “It’s now two weeks later”), and generally exploding the genre and making art of the debris. As a fan of series who generally disregard the fourth wall (Boston Legal being one of my most favorite modern shows to do this) it’s interesting to see the concept of a non-traditional comedy set within the framework nearly required for any comedy of it’s day. Teaming up with Alan Zweibel, a former writer for Saturday Night Live, Shandling “put on a fourth grade play” every week for four seasons. With a crew of talented young writers whose later credits include Seinfeld and The Simpsons, television history was made. From its unforgettable theme song to its closing credits, It’s Garry Shandling’s Show was award-winning mind-bending television for four seasons, and its influence is clearly seen in the best TV comedies through the decades to follow. Release Date: October 20th - Shout! Factory. http://www.sitcomsonline.com/itsgarryshandlingsshowthecompleteseriesdvdreview.html Thu, 15 Oct 2009 06:17:00 GMT Eight months ago we got the sixth season on DVD now we are back with our Girlfriends on DVD, as the seventh season is now available on DVD for the first time from CBS DVD with all 21 episodes on a 3-disc set. Life, love, and comedy collide again in this African American version of Sex and the City! Girlfriends stars Tracee Ellis Ross as Joan, Golden Brooks as Maya, Persia White as Lynn, and Reggie Hayes as William. This is the first season without Jill Marie Jones (Toni) as a regular, as she left the cast after season six. Release Date: October 13th - CBS DVD. http://www.sitcomsonline.com/girlfriendsseason7dvdreview.html Mon, 12 Oct 2009 04:18:00 GMT It’s time to spend one last season with the Bundys! The Complete Eleventh Season of Married... With Children brings the final 24 episodes of the long-running sitcom that helped build the fledgling Fox TV network. After quite a few temporary cast shakeups and additions in the earlier seasons, the series gets back to the Bundys and the D’Arcys as they try to make it through life being married, and in the case of the Bundys, with children. The series was not quite the powerful series it had previously been, however. At the beginning of the eleventh season, the series moved from the Sunday night lineup where it had been a mainstay to the Saturday night lineup... where it ended up staying for a whole month before moving back to Sunday nights (though in the Fox 7:30 death slot). By the eleventh season, the series had finally fully evolved from being an almost realistic portrayal of a dysfunctional family to a cartoonish series that focused on outlandish problems with very unfortunate results. Still, this evolution helped to make the series, at times, funnier than it had ever been, and made it stand out from other series on the air at the time. So you will only come to this conclusion: it is time for a few last laughs from one of the first truly dysfunctional families of television. Release Date: October 13th - Sony Pictures Home Entertainment. http://www.sitcomsonline.com/marriedwithchildrenseason11dvdreview.html Mon, 12 Oct 2009 03:47:00 GMT Spies, spies, everywhere spies, and they might not get a whole lot done if one of them is Maxwell Smart! Season Four of the spy-spoof series Get Smart brings 26 more episodes of hilarity to DVD on a four disc set. In the fourth season, some changes are happening, particularly with a little bit of matrimonial bliss possibly occurring in the future between Max and Agent 99. This is not the first time that these episodes have been presented on DVD, but it is the first time that they have made it to DVD in an affordable retail release. The retail release differs from the previous release in that it has fewer special features, but at a much lower retail price. Release Date: October 6th - HBO Home Video. http://www.sitcomsonline.com/getsmartseason4-hbohomevideodvdreview.html Thu, 08 Oct 2009 03:34:00 GMT Hey, Wilbur... the first season of our show is now on DVD! The famous Mister Ed, the talking horse, makes his way back onto DVD for the first time since the previous releases from MGM Home Entertainment have gone out of print. Now, Shout! Factory presents The Complete First Season, a four-disc set containing the first 26 episodes of “the famous Mister Ed.” The series had a simple premise: Wilbur and Carol move to a home that has a barn in the backyard. But there is a lot more in that barn than anybody could ever anticipate. There’s a horse in there. A talking horse. It’s the “famous Mister Ed!” Premiering in January 1961, Mister Ed was one of the few successful sitcoms of the “golden era” of television to air without being on a network. It was one of the first successful syndicated series. In fact, it was so successful that a few months later, CBS decided to pick it up for the remaining five seasons. The first season, of course, is where it all started. Release Date: October 6th - Shout! Factory. http://www.sitcomsonline.com/misteredseason1dvdreview.html Mon, 05 Oct 2009 03:24:00 GMT We’ve all heard of identical twins, but identical cousins? Is it really possible? When you are teenage cousins such as Patty and Cathy Lane, it is! The Patty Duke Show finally makes it onto DVD in a six-disc DVD set featuring the entire first season of the girls that laughed alike, walked alike, and times even talked alike. Cathy is the reserved and worldly cousin that has seen it all, and Patty is the one that has seen it all from Brooklyn Heights and is more of the bouncy American teenager. Both, of course, are played by the star of the series, Patty Duke. The series ran from 1963 to 1966, and the first 36 (of a total of 104) episodes are presented in The Complete First Season. Release Date: September 29th - Shout! Factory. http://www.sitcomsonline.com/thepattydukeshowseason1dvdreview.html Tue, 29 Sep 2009 17:21:00 GMT The Simpsons returns to DVD once again with The Twelfth Season! The animated sitcom that has demonstrated staying power on the FOX Sunday night lineup over the past two decades comes back for another season on DVD, presenting all 21 episodes of the 2000-2001 season on a four disc DVD set. This season pushes us even further into the early 2000s era of the series and is the first season of the series to air entirely in the 2000s. While some say that the series had a slip in quality in this era, others will disagree and say that it actually improved in some areas. In this season, the series further immersed itself into modern pop-culture and developed the characters in ways never before seen. Release Date: August 18 - 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment. http://www.sitcomsonline.com/thesimpsonsseason12dvdreview.html Tue, 29 Sep 2009 09:31:00 GMT Re-enjoy the complete third season of the Emmy and Golden Globe Award-winning comedy 30 Rock. The show features show creator Tina Fey as the head writer for an SNL-like TV show. (What a stretch!) She reports to *my* favorite character on the show, network executive Alec Baldwin...er...Jack Donaghy. The actions and interactions surrounding Baldwin’s character are honestly what drew me to the show, given my initial coolness to the show’s technical star (Tina Fey). Liz Lemon and Jack Donaghy aren’t the only inhabitants of this crazy universe, however. Their office has many crazy and insane employees, from the hapless NBC page Kenneth (Jack McBrayer) to the stars of the show that 30 Rock is about -- Tracy Jordan (Tracy Morgan) and Jenna Maroney (Jane Krakowski). I could go down the list naming off the entire on-air cast (there’s a full writing staff portrayed on-air and they’re all wonderful) but I’d be here until Halloween. What you need to know is the end results of this hilarious comedy: topless break-dancing, professional tetherball, geriatric kidnapping, bird murder, sexual espionage, Appalachian witchcraft, patricide, gay lion tattoos and important life lessons learned from sasquatches. Welcome to 30 Rock. Release Date: September 22nd - Universal Studios Home Entertainment. http://www.sitcomsonline.com/30rockseason3dvdreview.html Wed, 23 Sep 2009 06:45:00 GMT Ready to roll once again with the friendly, fun-loving cabbies of the Emmy Award-winning hit sitcom Taxi? Well then buckle up for hilarity because the gang of the Sunshine Cab Company are out to exceed the limits of comedy in this 4th season set! First, Jim (Christopher Lloyd) might not be firing on all cylinders, but his amazing psychic abilities are...then Elaine (Marilu Henner) blows a gasket when she catches Louie (Danny DeVito) spying on her in the garage bathroom...Tony (Tony Danza) meanwhile appears back on the track to boxing fame. Bobby (Jeff Conaway) hits town with some big career news, Alex has outrageous run-ins with both his estranged father and his ex-wife. Meanwhile Latka (Andy Kaufmann) may actually marry Simka (Carol Kane) -- if his suave alter ego Vic Ferrari doesn’t accidentally get in the way. It is 24 episodes of non-stop high-octane hilarity in this three disc set. Release Date: September 22nd - CBS DVD. http://www.sitcomsonline.com/taxiseason4dvdreview.html Tue, 22 Sep 2009 05:22:00 GMT Start spreading the news...Ugly Betty is back on DVD with season three now on DVD from ABC Studios! Catch all 24 episodes from the third season of Ugly Betty on a fun six-disc set. It’s America Ferrera the Emmy and Golden Globe winner at her best and this time in New York, as the show moved production to New York. The series is set in New York, but they shot in L.A. Starting with season three, the series now shoots in New York! Ugly Betty stars America Ferrera as Betty Suarez, Eric Mabius as Daniel Meade, Vanessa Williams as Wilhelmina Slater, Becki Newton as Amanda, Michael Urie as Marc, Tony Plana as Ignacio Suarez, Ana Ortiz as Hilda Suarez, Mark Indelicato as Justin Suarez, Christopher Gorham as Henry, Ashley Jensen as Christina McKinney, with Judith Light as Claire Meade, and Rebecca Romjin as Alexis Meade. Recurring are Daniel Eric Gold as Matt Hartley, Alec Mapa as Suzuki St. Pierre, Sarah Lafleur as Molly, Grant Bowler as Connor Owens, and Ralph Macchio as Archie Rodriguez and Julian De La Celle as DJ. Release Date: September 22nd - ABC Studios. http://www.sitcomsonline.com/uglybettyseason3dvdreview.html Sun, 20 Sep 2009 06:08:00 GMT Is Charlie too old to grow up? In the sixth season of Two and a Half Men, a smart brunette named Chelsea may finally have turned party-boy Charlie into a man. The kind of man who brings you tea when you’re sick, sleeps over at your place, even if he can’t watch ESPN in bed -- or makes the ultimate sacrifice -- nuking the nude photos off his cell phone. And there is a lot more funny that keeps the show the most watched comedy on television -- Jake locks lips with the cute girl next door, the one whose football-star dad is named Mad Dog. Judith prepares for a mid-life baby -- who may end up looking a lot like Alan. And Alan dates his receptionist, and then winds up in bed with...her mother. Life’s a beach in season 6! Release Date: September 1st - Warner Home Video. http://www.sitcomsonline.com/twoandahalfmenseason6dvdreview.html Tue, 15 Sep 2009 01:59:00 GMT The science of funny is back on DVD with a full season of laughs that will test the hilarity hypothesis! Leonard and Sheldon are back for more great adventures with their pals Wolowitz and Raj, with the beautiful Penny joining in on the fun. This hilarious traditional comedy called The Big Bang Theory airs Monday nights on CBS and now you can own the hilarious 23-episode second season on DVD from Warner Home Video! The Big Bang Theory is executive produced by Chuck Lorre (Two and a Half Men, Roseanne) and Bill Prady (Dharma & Greg, Gilmore Girls) and stars two TV kids who are all grown up -- Johnny Galecki, who played Darlene’s boyfriend on "Roseanne," and Kaley Cuoco, who played John Ritter’s daughter on "8 Simple Rules... For Dating My Teenage Daughter.” Jim Parsons (Judging Amy) plays Sheldon. Also on for the geeky ride are Leonard and Sheldon’s two friends Howard Wolowitz (played by Simon Helberg) and Rajnesh Koothrappali (played by Kunal Nayyar). Joining the cast this season as a regular is Sara Gilbert playing Leslie Winkle. Release Date: September 15th - Warner Home Video. http://www.sitcomsonline.com/thebigbangtheoryseason2dvdreview.html Mon, 14 Sep 2009 01:59:00 GMT All hands look out below, there's a change in the satus quo... Christopher Hewitt returns as Mr. Belvedere, the sardonic and sophisticated houskeeper of the Owens household, in one of the most adored sitcoms of all time. When he isn't butting heads with the patriarch George (Bob Uecker) or dodging the machinations of the scheming little Wesley (Brice Beckham), Belvedere takes great pleasure in schooling the Owens family on everything from soup to sarcasm. Season Three hosts a plentiful palette of predicaments when Marsha (Ilene Graff), sill in law school, must represent son Kevin (Rob Stone) in court; Heather (Tracy Wells) dates a thief; and Wesley tries to get Belvedere deported. Despite his impending deportation, Belvedere must prove there is never a mess too big for his mop. Mr. Belvedere ran for six seasons on ABC and has withstood the test of time to emerge as a beacon of '80s culture. Release Date: September 8th - Shout! Factory. http://www.sitcomsonline.com/mrbelvedereseason3dvdreview.html Mon, 14 Sep 2009 03:48:00 GMT We live for moments, and Grey’s Anatomy has many memorable moments and it continues here in season five now on DVD from ABC Studios. All 24 from the explosive fifth season are available in this sensational seven-disc set. Seattle Grace will be welcoming a few new doctors, including Major Owen Hunt. Live for the moment on this DD because you’ll have many! Grey’s Anatomy stars Ellen Pompeo as Meredith Grey, Sandra Oh as Cristina Yang, Katherine Heigl as Isobel Stevens, T.R. Knight as George O’Malley, Justin Chambers as Alex Karev, Chandra Wilson as Miranda Bailey, James Pickens Jr. as Dr. Richard Webber, Eric Dane as Dr. Mark “McSteamy” Sloane, Sara Ramirez as Dr. Callie Torres, Chyler Leigh as Lexie Grey, Brooke Smith as Erica Hahn, with Kevin McKidd as Dr. Owen Hunt, and Patrick Dempsey as Derek “Dr. McDreamy” Shepherd. Recurring are Jessica Capshaw as Dr. Arizona Robbins, Jeffrey Dean Morgan as Denny Duquette, Melissa George as Dr. Sadie Harris, and Mary McDonnell as Dr. Dixon. Release Date: September 15th - ABC Studios. http://www.sitcomsonline.com/greysanatomyseason5dvdreview.html Tue, 08 Sep 2009 04:50:00 GMT From the people who bring you The Office comes Parks and Recreation, the hilarious saga of government employees and local citizens turning a neighborhood hole in the ground into a new public park. Comedy superstar Amy Poehler (Saturday Night Live, Baby Mama) stars as Leslie Knope, an ambitious and hopeful small-town government worker, whose dreams are way bigger than her political talents. Created by Primetime Emmy Award winners Greg Daniels (The Office, King of the Hill, The Simpsons) and Michael Schur (The Office, SNL), and featuring a stellar ensemble cast, Parks and Recreation is "a genuinely funny comedy" (Daniel Carlson, Hollywood Reporter) about bureaucracy, hope and America at the dawn of the Obama age. Release Date: September 8th - Universal Studios Home Entertainment. http://www.sitcomsonline.com/parksandrecreationseason1dvdreview.html Tue, 08 Sep 2009 04:50:00 GMT