Year:  2007
Genre:  Documentary, TV series, History 
Country:  United States
Language:  English
Voices:  Tom Hanks, Samuel L. Jackson, Oliver Platt, Adam Arkin,  Josh Lucas, Keith David
Director:  Ken Burns
Run time:  14 hours
DVD distributor:  Paramount Home Entertainment

     At the outset of The War, Ken Burns says that the story of America’s involvement in the second world war is way too big to tell in one documentary.  That kind of gave me pause.  This is Ken Burns talking here.  The same Ken Burns who went into staggering detail telling the entire story of the civil war over the course of more than ten hours.  Who spent more than eighteen hours poring over the minutiae of baseball in one of the greatest documentaries ever filmed.  And with fourteen hours of documentary filming, he can’t tell the entire story of America’s four-year involvement in the second world war?  C’mon Ken Burns, I expect better of you!

     Now, that being said, he IS probably right.  And there IS an awful lot of information crammed into The War.  America was fighting on MANY fronts in the second world war, against the Germans in Europe and Africa, and against the Japanese all over the Pacific.  Burns focuses on four small American towns in the film, following the soldiers who left from those towns to serve their countries in various battlefields.   It’s a fascinating look at life in America during war time, and it’s something I haven’t seen before in a World War II documentary.  After all, we know that the Americans got into the war with Pearl Harbour, and that they ended the war with the atomic bomb in Nagasaki, but it’s what happened in between that’s absolutely fascinating.  And there’s no one better to tell that story than Ken Burns.  The War is available on Blu-Ray May 15^th.  And like I have said about every other monumental documentary Ken Burns has ever done, go pick it up!

Years:  1980
Genre:  TV series, Drama
Country:  United States
Language:  English
Starring:  Robert Urich, Phyllis Davis, Bart Braverman, Greg Morris, Will Sampson, Tony Curtis
Guest stars:  Erin Gray, Jill St. John, Priscilla Barnes
Eye candy:  All kinds.  Strippers, showgirls, hookers, everyone is apparently hot in Vegas. 
Creator:  Michael Mann
Run time:  9 hours, 51 minutes
DVD distributor:  Paramount Home Entertainment

     The Robert Urich series Vega$ comes back to DVD May 8^th from Paramount Home Entertainment, as they release season three volume one.  As always, the show presents the Vegas of the 70s as an endless parade of hot showgirls and brainless thugs and neon lights.  Which is awesome.  And as always, Dan Tanna gets his man and gets the girls and gets the job done fifty minutes at a time.

     There is one notable exception though.  The first episode of Season Three of Vega$ does not take place in Vegas.  Which is a little disappointing because the Vegas locales are the best part of the show.  Instead, the third season starts off with a two-part episode set almost entirely in Hawaii. 

     It’s a ridiculous premise, where Tanna gets kidnapped and shipped to Hawaii in a box.  When he gets out of the box, some mysterious gangster scientists try to convince him to kill his friend Philip Roth, played by the great Tony Curtis.  Then he escapes, gets recaptured, and they try to brainwash him instead.  The two-parter to kick off Season Three is easily the worst episode of Vega$ I have ever seen.

     Thankfully, after that clunker, it’s back to Vegas and showgirls and good old detective work.  Which is all Vega$ should ever have tried to be. 

     I think one of my favourite things about Vega$ is how UNmemorable each episode actually is.  And I don’t mean just for me, the viewer.  I mean for the characters themselves.  There’s an episode on this volume where Dan Tanna is dating a woman at the beginning.  Then Dan shoots a cat burglar, feels guilty about it, and spends the whole episode investigating his own shooting.  at the end of the episode, he finally gets to spend some time with his girl!

     Then the following episode arrives, and it’s a whole new girl.  As though the last one never existed at all.  But this time – Tanna’s in love!  Even after discovering that Priscilla Barnes lives a secret life as a highly-paid call girl, he STILL loves her.  And only then, of course, does she decide to quit the life.  Which makes little sense if you think about it – but it’s best not to think.  Because of course she will be murdered before the episode is over.  After all, they need to bring in a new girl for the next episode, and love is all complicated.

     One of those girls was Erin Gray, who later gained a measure of fame on TV shows like Silver Spoons and a nerd following with Buck Rogers in the 25th Century.  I mention her only because she is in Ottawa this coming weekend with ComiCon.  Not exactly a reason to buy Season Three Volume One of Vega$, but a reason to attend ComiCon, anyway.

Years:  1992, 1993
Genre:  TV series, Comedy
Country:  United States
Language:  English
Starring:  Bob Newhart, Carlene Watkins, Cynthia Stevenson, Jere Burns
Guest appearances:  Lisa Kudrow, Betty White, Dick Martin, Tom Poston  
DVD distributor:  Paramount Home Entertainment

     Did you know that after Newhart, Bob Newhart had another show, cleverly named Bob?  It’s true, he did – I just saw it!  It ran in 1993 for 33 episodes, all of which are on the Complete Series DVD out April 10th from Paramount Home Entertainment.

      Newhart plays Bob McKay, a cartoonist who works on a comic book called Mad Dog.  He has a wife and a daughter and a bunch of very. Quirky. Co-workers.  Now, I LOVE Newhart.  And I think Bob Newhart is one of the funniest people of all time.  But watching him in Bob is like watching Terrell Owens struggling to make the cut in the Indoor Football League.  It’s depressing. 

     See, this is how it works.  Bob will make a long speech about how his daughter is the calmest, most rational human being he has ever known and that nothing can make her freak out.  And THEN, the elevator door opens right behind him, where his daughter is FREAKING OUT!  Which makes his previous speech hilarious because of its proximity to Trisha’s meltdown!

     And that’s it.  Some of the Newhart gang make appearances here and there.  A very young Lisa Kudrow guest stars as a very boring girl very reminiscent of Phoebe on Friends.  And the omnipresent Betty White shows up for the second season as Bob’s boss.  Actually, a whole new cast shows up around Bob Newhart for the second season.  It just didn’t help.  Maybe replacing all the writers would have worked much better than replacing all the actors.  Cause Bob, sadly, for all 33 episodes, really and truly sucked.

     P.S. Here’s a great way to tell that a series is dated, from the pre-internet days. When it has a title that is clearly not google-conscious. In order to get any information at all about Bob, the series starring Bob Newhart about the comic book and then the greeting card company from the early 90s, you pretty much have to type ALL of that in google, and then it’s still the ninth search result.  If only they had seen google coming!  If only they had seen their cancellation coming!

Years:  1979, 1980
Genre:  TV series, Comedy
Country:  United States
Language:  English
Starring:  Penny Marshall, Cindy Williams, Michael McKean, David L. Lander
Guest appearances:  Henry Winkler, Ron Howard
DVD distributor:  Paramount Home Entertainment

     Happy Days was famous for many things, one of which being the phrase “jumping the shark”.  A 1977 episode where Fonzie jumped over a shark in the water on skis was the definitive moment in the series, where it became abundantly clear that they were out of ideas and that the show would suck forever more.  Now.  The fifth season of Laverne & Shirley comes to DVD April 10^th from Paramount Home Entertainment.  It opens with a special feature, a Happy Days crossover episode where Fonzie and Richie have to marry Laverne and Shirley at the point of a farmer’s shotgun.

     See, the Happy Days episode is one big, long, tired farmer’s daughter joke.  Fonzie and Richie have disguised themselves in one of those two-person cow costumes where Fonzie is the head and Richie is the ass.  They sneak onto a farm in the cow costume so they can have sex with two super hot daughters whose father is a gun wielding homicidal maniac.  And they get busted and Laverne and Shirley have to get them out of their predicament.  Now, by the time this crossover episode aired, it had been two full years since Happy Days had jumped the shark.  This crossover episode with the farmer’s daughter and the cow might be the moment they took Laverne and Shirley down with them.

     From then on, throughout the fifth season, Laverne and Shirley is a series of dream sequences, talent shows, joining the army, flashbacks and every other cliché that was already tired in 1979.  They were simply out of ideas, and the decline appears to be as abrupt and precipitous as that of their parent show Happy Days.  It might be worth picking up though, if you have a morbid curiosity about the sudden decline of a decent show, and to see the exact moment where Laverne and Shirley “married the cow”.

Years:  1965, 1971  
Genre:  TV series, Comedy
Country:  United States
Language:  English
Starring:  Bob Crane, Richard Dawson, Werner Klemperer, John Banner
DVD distributor:  Paramount Home Entertainment

     Until I got the Fan Favorites DVD from Paramount Home Entertainment, out March 6^th, I had never seen an episode of Hogan’s Heroes.  I always thought it was a sort of comedic army show, like Sgt. Bilko, and that everyone would be sort of cartoonish.

     And I was (sort of) right.  Everyone IS sort of cartoonish, except for Hogan himself.  Ben Crane played Hogan as a serious, faintly bemused prisoner of war in the centre of a bonkers world.  HE is pretty well normal.  Colonel Klink is a cartoon, the pompous, vain and stupid overseer of the Nazi war camp.  Even more of a cartoon is Sgt. Schulz, the totally moronic captain of the guard who has very little to offer outside his catchphrase, “I see nothing!”

     What really surprised me, though, is that (at least in the eight episodes chosen for this DVD) the prisoners were actually DOING stuff.  Smuggling a high value spy out of the country.  Helping distract the German high command on the eve of the D-Day invasion.  And in one episode, they actually KILL a whole bunch of Nazis themselves when they replace their fake ammunition with live stuff for their war games.

     At its heart though, Hogan’s Heroes is really another cartoonish war sitcom, showcasing the hilarious side of being captured and kept prisoner by the Nazis.  And after all, if you can`t laugh about a camp set up by Nazis, then what CAN you find funny!

Years:  1955, 1956  
Genre:  TV series, Comedy
Country:  United States
Language:  English
Starring:  Jackie Gleason, Audrey Meadows, Art Carney, Joyce Randolph
DVD distributor:  Paramount Home Entertainment

     I have seen only a handful of episodes of The Honeymooners in my life.  You know, when it comes on TV in reruns and I happen across it.  And I’m pretty sure that the only five episodes I have ever seen are included on the Honeymooners Fan Favorites DVD out March 6^th from Paramount Home Entertainment. 

     There’s one where Ralph Kramden and Ed Norton share a TV set and hilarity ensues.  Another where Ralph finds a suitcase full of money on the bus, the one where Norton keeps sleepwalking, a show where Ralph and Ed make an infomercial to sell a do-it-all kitchen gadget, and the one where Ralph goes on a game show and embarrasses himself.  Now, apparently, the fans who voted for their favorite episodes on facebook have seen all the same episodes I have.  In fact, I’m starting to think that there ARE only eight or ten episodes that show up in re-runs.

     It’s neat though to see Ralph Kramden’s progression from the beginning of the show to a few episodes after the beginning of the show.  At first, he threatens Alice with a punch that will send her right to the moon.  By the end, he’s just using hand gestures to show her how quickly she will get there.  What a character arc he had, that Kramden!

Years:  1972, 1973, 1974 
Genre:  TV series, Comedy
Country:  United States
Language:  English
Starring:  Jack Klugman, Tony Randall, Betty White
DVD distributor:  Paramount Home Entertainment

     I love the old Odd Couple TV show.  It’s a little dated now, since we’ve seen so many TV shows based on the same basic premise since then.  Frasier and Two and a Half Men and countless other shows owe a big debt to Tony Randall and Jack Klugman.  Their chemistry was fantastic, and it’s showcased admirably in the new DVD from Paramount Home Entertainment, The Odd Couple Fan Favorites, out March 6th.

     There are eight great episodes on the best-of DVD, my favorite being the one where Oscar and Felix team up to go on the game show Password.  Which I guess was pretty big in the 70s.  The show was hosted by Alan Ludden, who guest stars on the episode with his wife at the time, Betty White. 

     What I found hilarious was that they made fun of Betty White’s age.  Her AGE!  Haha, she’s an old woman!  Remember, this episode was from 1972!  That’s right, Betty White was hilariously old FORTY years ago.  Ah, some things never change!

     There are some other guest appearances on the disc, including Bubba Smith who was playing for the Raiders at the time.  The best thing about the Fan Favorites DVD set though, is that at eight episodes, it is all the Odd Couple that you need.

Years:  1987, 1989
Genre:  TV series, Action
Country:  United States
Language:  English
Starring:  Richard Dean Anderson, Dana Elcar, Michael Des Barres
DVD distributor:  Paramount Home Entertainment

     MacGyver remains one of my favorite shows of all time.  Not so much because of the quality of the show which, in retrospect, was seriously deficient.  For me, it’s more of a nostalgia thing, from the days when I was a little kid and didn’t know any better and thought MacGyver was the coolest guy I could even imagine.

     So the Fan Favorites DVD of MacGyver, out March 6^th from Paramount Home Entertainment, was exciting for me.  No Cuba Gooding Jr., no Teri Hatcher, no Mayim Bialik, three of the most famous recurring actors on the series.  But three of the five episodes are some of my best childhood memories, like the one where MacGyver and his grandfather get trapped in the Phoenix foundation by international terrorists. 

     The only episodes I didn’t really like are the Legend of the Holy Rose episodes, a two-part show where MacGyver is essentially re-imagined as Indiana Jones.  Even when I was six, that was a little too silly for me.  But the highlights of this best-of set have to be the episodes that involve MacGyver’s unkillable nemesis, Murdoc. 

     There’s an episode where Murdoc is chasing MacGyver through the mountains and appears to fall to his death.  But of course he lives, somehow.  And the greatest episode of them all, the utterly silly, totally bonkers episode where MacGyver and Murdoc team up to save Murdoc’s sister from this shadowy, evil and totally insane assassin’s club. 

     They have to crawl through a supposedly unbeatable obstacle course where they are shot at with automatic weapons and left to die.  It’s staggeringly cheesy, utterly implausible and totally awesome.  It’s MacGyver.

Years:  1974, 1975
Genre:  TV series, Comedy
Country:  United States
Language:  English
Starring:  Henry Winkler, Ron Howard, Tom Bosley, Marion Ross, Erin Moran, Anson Williams, Donny Most
DVD distributor:  Paramount Home Entertainment

     I was really hoping that the Happy Days Fan Favorites DVD, out March 6^th from Paramount Home Entertainment, would include the jumping the shark episode.  But it doesn’t.  One of the most iconic moments in television history, and just because it was STUPID, and it RUINED THE SHOW, they left it off the best of list.

     Then again, there was an awful lot of stuff left off that list.  Like, the final eight seasons of the show.  All eight episodes are from the first two seasons, when Fonzie was a secondary character and Ralph Malph and Potsie had a lot of screen time. 

     The first episode on the disc is the first ever episode of the show, where Richie Cunningham gets a date with a girl who has the reputation of putting out.  But then she doesn’t.  There’s a Hallowe’en episode involving a party at a haunted house, and a Christmas episode where Fonzie pretends he’s going to his aunt’s house out of town but the Cunninghams know he is going to be alone and conspire to get him over to their house for Christmas dinner.

     This is all fine, they’re good episodes and I like Happy Days, but are these really the fan favorites?  The pilot, the Hallowe’en episode, the Christmas episode?  It feels like this is a best-of chosen by a focus group rather than actual fans.  Maybe that’s because the fan poll was taken on facebook, and there are only nine people on all of facebook who actually remember the original run of Happy Days.

Years:  1982, 1983, 1986, 1987, 1992
Genre:  TV series, Comedy
Country:  United States
Language:  English
Starring:  Ted Danson, Shelley Long, Woody Harrelson, Rhea Perlman, George Wendt, John Ratzenberger, Kirstie Alley, Kelsey Grammer, Bebe Neuwirth, Nicholas Colasanto
DVD distributor:  Paramount Home Entertainment

                So, there’s a facebook poll to choose the episodes of Cheers that are the “Fan Favorites”.  And fans vote, and the eight top episodes are put onto a DVD called Fan Favorites, out March 6^th from Paramount Home Entertainment.  Eight episodes of Cheers (well, nine if you count the two-part episode about Woody and Kelly’s wedding).  And there is only ONE episode with Rebecca Howe. 

                I guess fans really liked Shelley Long as Diane, much more than Kirstie Alley as Rebecca.  I get that, I much preferred Diane too.  What’s funny here though, is that while there is just one episode with Rebecca in it, there are TWO that centre around Frasier’s relationship with Lilith.  The one where she and Frasier get together after a TV appearance together, and the one where they move in with each other and invite Sam and Diane over for dinner.  Then there’s the pilot episode, the Thanksgiving episode at Carla’s house, the one where Sam fixes Diane up on a date with a murderer, and the one where Harry the con man helps Coach get back some money that was scammed from him.

                It’s all great, of course, because Cheers is great.  But TWO episodes about Lilith, who was a tertiary character at best, and only one featuring Rebecca, who was on the show for more than half its run?  Take that, Kirstie Alley!  Facebook doesn’t like YOU at all!

Year:  2011
Genre:  Kids, Cartoon, TV series
Country:  United States
Language:  English
Starring:  Tom McGrath, Jeff Glen Bennett, John DiMaggio, Danny Jacobs, James Patrick Stewart, Andy Richter, Mary Scheer, Tara Strong, Nicole Sullivan
Director:  Bret Haaland
DVD distributor:  Paramount Home Entertainment

     There’s another Penguins of Madagascar DVD coming out February 14th, from Paramount Home Entertainment, this one called Operation Get Ducky.  See, there’s this egg that Marlene finds, and she brings it to the penguins because they’re birds and ought to know what to do with it.  Apparently, these aren’t the penguins from March of the Penguins, where the males nurture the eggs until they hatch.

     No, these are the Madagascar penguins, who somehow manage to train the egg to be a super-commando before it hatches into a little computer animated baby duck.  The second episode is also about the duck, who comes back to the zoo as a fully-formed little ninja baby, and decides to beat up everyone in the place.  Including the elephants.  Because that’s what you would do, if you were a ninja commando duckling. 

     Of course, after that, the theme of the duck disappears entirely so the DVD can be filled out with six more episodes that have nothing to do with a vicious little duckling.  King Julien gets introduced to April Fool’s Day, Marlene goes outside the zoo for a while and becomes a feral otter, the crocodile comes to live in the penguins’ enclosure for a time, and some hornets keep showing up and threatening to sting everyone’s face. 

     Penguins of Madagascar is as entertaining as ever, and Operation Get Ducky is pretty much the same as every other DVD they’ve put out.  A few tangentially related episodes and a bunch of filler.  The way I figure it, you either like it or you don’t.  And nothing says Happy Valentine’s Day like the gift of a children’s animated DVD!

Year:  2011
Genre:  Comedy, Cartoon, TV series
Country:  United States
Language:  English
Creator:  Mike Judge
DVD distributor:  Paramount Home Entertainment

     Beavis And Butthead Volume Four hits DVD February 21^st from Paramount Home Entertainment.  I’ve always thought the funniest thing about Beavis and Butthead was their commentary on music videos.  But today, there are precious few music videos for them to skewer.  You can watch MTV for an entire day now, and see no music videos at all.

     But then, MTV has an awful lot of shows.  And if there was one reason to bring back Beavis and Butthead (and I will say that I am still not sure there WAS any good reason to bring them back), it’s Jersey Shore.  Oh, sure, it’s funny when they watch Teen Cribs or True Life, or comment on 16 and Pregnant.  But it’s Jersey Shore that really brings out the comic genius in Beavis and Butthead. 

     Even the seemingly innocuous clips from the show, like J-Wow talking about how cool it is that she gets to make pizza in Florence Italy, become absolutely hilarious when seen through the eyes of two high school losers.  Sure, there are still some music videos.  Apparently, MTV still does that.  Sometimes. 

     And there are of course Beavis and Butthead episodes, with plots and everything, like the one where the boys discover that they still get paid while taking bathroom breaks so they spend their entire shift in the bathroom.  But the only really funny stuff comes from Jersey Shore.

     It makes me wish, in a way, the Beavis and Butthead revival had happened a few years earlier, during the time of The Hills and A Shot At Love With Tila Tequila.  The thing is, they don’t watch Jersey Shore every episode.  Sometimes they watch The Ultimate Fighter instead.  Which is fine, but not nearly as good.  So I don’t know if I would recommend sitting through the entire two disc collection.  I can get just as much of a belly laugh from the reality show commentary on The Soup.

Year:  1989
Genre:  TV series, Drama
Country:  United States
Languages:  English
Starring:  Tom Bosley, Tracy Nelson, Mary Wickes 
Guest stars:  Leslie Nielsen, several other familiar faces whose names are…less familiar
DVD distributor:  Paramount Home Entertainment
DVD extras:  Not much of anything

     The Father Dowling Mysteries was a short-lived TV crime drama from the late 80s and early 90s.  The first season comes to DVD February 7th from Paramount Home Entertainment, I assume the other two will follow shortly and then we will all forget about the program for the rest of our lives.

     The show starred Tom Bosley (famous as Howard Cunningham on Happy Days) and Tracy Nelson (famous because her father was Ricky Nelson and her brothers were Gunnar and Matthew of the band Nelson).  Bosley was Father Dowling, a Catholic priest who became embroiled in all kinds of murder mysteries for one reason or another.  Some were plausible – a dying man seeks sanctuary in the church.  Some were not – evil twin.  Yeah.  Evil twin.

     Nelson was his faithful nun sidekick Sister Stephanie.  Or Steve, most of the time.  Her character is one of the silliest in TV history, and almost every morsel of enjoyment I took out of the Father Dowling Mysteries came courtesy of the totally bonkers nun character. 

     I found it totally hilarious when she beats the local tough-kid gang members in a game of basketball to get them to do something for her.  Or when she defeats pool sharks by sharking them at pool to get information.  She of course can also win a bicycle race, break into a house and a car and a safe if need be, and handle firearms. Oh, she has more talents – but you’ll just have to watch the show!

     Sister Stephanie, you see, was “saved” by Father Dowling once.  How, I’m not sure.  The Saving Of Steve is never really explained.  But we get hints as to her past – she may or may not have been a prostitute, she was definitely a pickpocket and a thief, she grew up in the tough neighbourhood, and was likely a drug addict of some kind.  (The show is about the church – it was a little too sanitized to really go into detail about that sort of thing.)

     At any rate, it’s clear to me that Steve was one of those people whose life was spiralling downhill at such a fast pace that she had two choices – either convert to a religion of some kind, or blow her own head off.  She chose the religion, apparently because it allows her to lie and cheat and steal and do all the things she was already doing – but now it’s in the name of God!

     The first season opens with a two-part episode starring Leslie Nielsen as an elected official embroiled in a murder-adoption-bribery-mafia scandal.  The church and Father Dowling are tangentially involved at best, but that doesn’t stop him from investigating.  By the end of the season, Father Dowling’s evil twin brother has shown up to mastermind a jewelry heist.  And I thought – once you play the “evil twin” card, where can you go from there? But apparently, there are two more seasons that show they managed to go somewhere!

Years:  1972, 1973
Genre:  TV series, Drama
Country:  United States
Languages:  English
Starring:  Mike Connors, Gail Fisher, Robert Reed
Guest stars:  Martin Sheen, Burgess Meredith, Abe Vigoda, William Shatner, Anne Archer, Marion Ross, Robert Reed, Jessica Walter
Theme music composer:  Lalo Schifrin
Run time:  21 hours 18 minutes
DVD distributor:  Paramount Home Entertainment
DVD extras:  Not much of anything
Related reviews:  Mannix Season Two, Mannix Season One, Mannix Season Three, Mannix Season Four, Mannix Season Five

     As you can see from the picture above, very little has changed in the world of Mannix for the sixth season.  The DVD cover of all six have featured basically this exact same picture…a pastel background and Mike Connors looking at me.  Then six bullets.  You know, to reinforce that this is season SIX.  For those who can’t read, but can count.

     The sixth season itself is indistinguishable from the previous five, in that Mannix takes on a series of investigations – from finding a little kid’s stamp collection (which is probably plausible for a private investigator) to going undercover in a mob organization (which probably isn’t).  No matter what case he takes, though, one thing is for certain – Mannix will be shot at.  Even when attempting to recover a stamp collection, he will have shots fired his way.

     So the only thing that will set Season Six apart from other seasons is the guest list, which is highlighted by Martin Sheen, who appears as an amnesiac war veteran being conned into a heist by some nefarious characters.  This episode came just before Sheen became a major star – a year before his star turn in Terrence Malick’s Badlands and eight years before his definitive role in Coppola’s Apocalypse Now. 

     Other stars who appear in the sixth season, like Marion Ross and Jessica Walter, have appeared in previous seasons of Mannix, then there’s William Shatner who used to show up in every single TV series ever created.  And Burgess Meredith and Abe Vigoda.  So…not a stellar guest list this time around. 

     I like Mannix, and I find myself rooting for him not to be shot in most episodes.  And sure, it’s the same thing episode after episode, season after season.  But there’s something to be said for knowing just what you’re gonna get, and liking it.  Which means there’s something to be said for Mannix.

Year:  2011
Genre:  Kids, Cartoon, TV series
Country:  United States
Language:  English
Starring:  Bill Fagerbakke, Carolyn Lawrence, Clancy Brown
Director:  Paul Tibbitt
DVD distributor:  Paramount Home Entertainment

     Another week, another Spongebob DVD release.  On January 3^rd, that DVD is Spongebob’s Frozen Face Off, from Paramount Home Entertainment.  This time, the little yellow square guy sets off on a cross-country race against all the other characters on the show.  For some reason this takes place on sleds, in snowy wintery blizzard conditions.  Are they even trying to pretend they remember this show takes place under water any more?

     I don’t know.  It seems that not only have they forgotten that the Spongebob lives in a pineapple Under The Sea, they have also run out of ideas completely.  Every episode seems to involve Plankton trying to steal the Krabby Patty formula, again.  Even the race through the frozen mountains is an episode involving Plankton stealing the Krabby Patty formula.  This makes me a little sad.  I love Spongebob, and I don’t really want the show to end, but this does sort of feel like the death knell of the series. 

     After all, how many cartoon series have featured a huge cross-country race in their final season?  Scooby-Doo, Popeye, Yogi Bear, and hundreds of others have signaled their upcoming cancelation by pitting all their characters against each other in a no-holds barred race across dangerous terrain, featuring back-stabbing and rampant cheating and other shenanigans.  Hundreds of them.  It may, sadly, be time to say goodbye to Spongebob.

     Until then, of course, Spongebob will be releasing a new DVD twice a month or so.  The only artist more prolific than Neil Young appears to be Spongebob.  If you were a hardcore fan of both, and had to pick up every Neil Young release and re-release and compilation and concert, and you had to pick up every Spongebob DVD as well, you’d go broke.  Then again, if you were a huge fan of BOTH Neil Young and Spongebob, you would more likely be spending all your money on weed.

     I think I’ll keep track of both this year.  Which will release more things on Tuesdays, Neil Young or Spongebob.  So far Spongebob has the lead, with one DVD in one week of 2012.  1-0 Spongebob.  To be continued…