Home :: DVD :: Television :: General  

A&E Home Video
BBC
Classic TV
Discovery Channel
Fox TV
General

HBO
History Channel
Miniseries
MTV
National Geographic
Nickelodeon
PBS
Star Trek
TV Series
WGBH Boston
The Dick Van Dyke Show - Season Two (5 Disc Box Set)

The Dick Van Dyke Show - Season Two (5 Disc Box Set)

List Price: $69.99
Your Price: $62.99
Product Info Reviews

<< 1 2 >>

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Warning: Portions of some episodes are distorted.
Review: Although it looks like digital distortion, Image Entertainment blames the periodic distortion on "warped film" and claims that there's nothing they can do about it.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Warning: Portions of some episodes are distorted.
Review: Although it looks like digital distortion, Image Entertainment blames the periodic distortion on "warped film" and claims that there's nothing they can do about it.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Info on the extras
Review: Extras are planned for this release though not currently listed above. In addition to being uncut for the first time since their original broadcast (up to three whole minutes per episode being restored), the extras include:

* Interview Segments with Carl Reiner, Dick Van Dyke and Mary Tyler Moore
* "Mary Tyler Moore Remembers 'Bank Book 6565696'"
* Joy Commercials
* "The Cast Remembers Jerry Paris"
* "Rose Marie and Morey Amsterdam Remember Buddy and Sally"
* 1963-1964 Emmy Awards Footage featuring David Jansen, the cast of The Beverly Hillbillies, Fred MacMurray and more!
* "The Making of 'It May Look like a Walnut!'"
* "Stump the Stars" Program Excerpt with the Dick Van Dyke Cast
* Carl Reiner and Dick Van Dyke Commentaries for 2 Episodes
* Rose Marie, Ann Gilbert and Larry Matthews Commentaries
* Still Galleries and Cast Bios

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Hidden Cigarette Ads!
Review: Great series! We watch them as a family all the time.
Bonus!!!!!!!!!
Look for the hidden Kent cigarette adds on some episode menus. From the "opening credits" menu choice, click left to see Dick's head glow. Excellent old adds and public service announcements. Not all episodes include this hidden feature, but the ones there are a blast!

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: 2nd-Season Episode Guide! A Top-Flight Van Dyke Campaign!
Review: Here's a complete Episode Guide for Season Two of "The Dick Van Dyke Show" (33 programs on five DVDs).

This episode list reflects the order in which the programs are presented within this DVD collection, arranged in sequence by "Production Date" (the date of filming the show), which does not always necessarily match the "Air Date" chronology.

The original CBS-TV "Air Dates" are listed in parenthesis:

---------------------------------------------------

THE DICK VAN DYKE SHOW -- SEASON #2 (1962-1963):

31. Never Name A Duck (First Aired: 9/26/1962)
32. The Two Faces Of Rob (10/3/1962)
33. Bank Book 6565696 (10/17/1962)
34. The Attempted Marriage (10/10/1962)
35. Hustling The Hustler (10/24/1962)
36. What's In A Middle Name? (11/7/1962)
37. My Husband Is Not A Drunk (10/31/1962)
38. Like A Sister (11/14/1962)
39. The Night The Roof Fell In (11/21/1962)
40. The Secret Life Of Buddy And Sally (11/28/1962)
41. A Bird In The Head Hurts (12/5/1962)
42. Gesundheit, Darling (12/12/1962)
43. A Man's Teeth Are Not His Own (12/19/1962)
44. Somebody Has To Play Cleopatra (12/26/1962)
45. The Cat Burglar (1/2/1963)
46. The Foul-Weather Girl (1/9/1963)
47. Will You Two Be My Wife? (1/16/1963)
48. Ray Murdock's X-Ray (1/23/1963)
49. I Was A Teenage Head Writer (1/30/1963)
50. My Husband Is A Check-Grabber (2/13/1963)
51. It May Look Like A Walnut (2/6/1963)
52. Don't Trip Over That Mountain (2/20/1963)
53. Give Me Your Walls! (2/27/1963)
54. The Sam Pomerantz Scandals (3/6/1963)
55. I'm No Henry Walden! (3/27/1963)
56. The Square Triangle (3/20/1963)
57. Racy Tracy Rattigan (4/3/1963)
58. Divorce (4/10/1963)
59. It's A Shame She Married Me (4/17/1963)
60. A Surprise Surprise Is A Surprise (4/24/1963)
61. Jilting The Jilter (5/1/1963)
62. When A Bowling Pin Talks, Listen (5/8/1963)
63. All About Eavesdropping (10/23/1963)

---------------------------------------------------------------

This 2nd-Season DVD set offers up many more memorable Van Dyke Show moments, including some of my all-time faves -- "The Night The Roof Fell In", "It May Look Like A Walnut" (featuring series' executive Danny Thomas as "Kolac" from "Twilo"), "The Two Faces Of Rob", "A Man's Teeth Are Not His Own", and "Ray Murdock's X-Ray".

There's also "All About Eavesdropping" (which was actually an episode aired during Season Three, but filmed at the end of the show's Season 2 production cycle). "Eavesdropping" contains the most hysterically-funny game of charades you'll ever hope to see! ("On the street where you live???") LOL!!

Video quality is super on these discs. And there's a large amount of supplemental extras here as well, including interviews, commercials, audio commentaries, Emmy clips, galleries of photographs, a featurette, some "Easter Eggs" to hunt down, and a terrific half-hour bonus game-show program, featuring the Van Dyke Show cast. And more! It's a great TV-on-DVD set, that is for CERTAIN!

Van Dyke Show Trivia and Assorted Useless (But Fun!) Facts ......

>> Executive Producer Sheldon Leonard saved the Van Dyke series from the scrap pile after it was initially going to be cancelled after just the first season. Mr. Leonard's persistence, and his belief that the show was an as-yet-untapped comedy goldmine, enabled him to convince the show's sponsor (Procter & Gamble) to foot the bill for a second season. (Well, at least partially anyway. P&G picked up a portion of the 2nd-year tab, with "Kent Cigarettes" assuming the remainder of the sponsorship duties.)

>> Ever notice the TWO differing addresses for the Petrie's New Rochelle, N.Y., home? Sometimes the address of the house is said to be "148 Bonnie Meadow Road"; and at other times the number changes to "448".

>> The actor (Dabbs Greer) who portrays the Chaplain that performs Rob & Laura's marriage ceremony (through a gauze mask! LOL!) also pops up in other Van Dyke episodes as well. Greer has been in just about every vintage TV show you could think of -- including "The Fugitive", "Bonanza", "The Andy Griffith Show", "Gomer Pyle", "Perry Mason", "The F.B.I.", "Gunsmoke", "Mannix", "The Brady Bunch", "Barnaby Jones", "Empty Nest", and another of Mr. Van Dyke's series, "Diagnosis Murder". Over 200 guest appearances in total! .... I've always liked Dabbs in everything I've seen him in. And the Van Dyke series is no exception. He's a small riot in Season Five's "Fifty-Two, Forty-Five or Work", in which Dabbs plays the manager of the "TV Rectifier Tube" company that employs Rob in a flashback episode.

>> There's a bit of a writing blunder in Episode 59 ("It's A Shame She Married Me"). During the episode, Rob specifically tells Sally (almost at a shouting level in fact) that he is "Not gonna tell" his wife Laura about an upcoming party given by an ex-flame of Laura's. But that very evening Sally decides to call Laura on the phone to ask what she will be wearing to this function -- a function that she KNOWS Rob didn't want his wife to know anything about! Doesn't add up. Especially when you consider what kind of nice person Sally Rogers really is. She would NEVER have made that call behind Rob's back. It's a good episode nonetheless (like just about ALL Van Dyke episodes). ;)

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Can't believe how I am enjoying this
Review: I have the first two seasons of the original DVD on DVD and they are both excellent. The copies are crisp, the features are fun, etc. What makes them so great is the show itself, though. Dick Van Dyke, Carl Reiner and Mary Tyler Moore should get credit for creating the sitcom because even if they weren't the first, they were (and still are) the best.

I can't wait for the sets for seasons 3-5.

Now, if only someone would release full seasons of "The Andy Griffith Show", the two best shows ever would be available!

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: TVs 2nd Best Show Gets Top Treatment
Review: I have the first two seasons of the original DVD on DVD and they are both excellent. The copies are crisp, the features are fun, etc. What makes them so great is the show itself, though. Dick Van Dyke, Carl Reiner and Mary Tyler Moore should get credit for creating the sitcom because even if they weren't the first, they were (and still are) the best.

I can't wait for the sets for seasons 3-5.

Now, if only someone would release full seasons of "The Andy Griffith Show", the two best shows ever would be available!

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: a new price
Review: I just thought all of you would like to know that samsclub.com is selling seasons one through three for only $39.99 each!

Rating: 1 stars
Summary: Missing Disc's....DISC 5
Review: I ordered season's one and two, and season two was missing disc 5. They sent me another one, and it was missing disc 5 as well! No one is able/willing to help with this problem. I would hesitate to order season two, knowing there is a disc missing and Amazon is unwilling to replace it.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: The Ottoman Collection
Review: These terrific DVDs are enhanced by vintage clips -- promos and commercials with the stars; a half-hour cast guest spot on "Stump the Stars"; Carl Reiner and company gleefully receiving some of their 15 Emmys. Hidden features show the cast selling cigarettes for Kent, a loyal sponsor.

Stars of the time such as Joey Bishop, Lucille Ball, Sebastian Cabot, Bob Crane and Jane Wyatt pop up, making the sets delightful time capsules.

Dick Van Dyke and Reiner do leisurely commentaries on a handful of key episodes, spending a lot of time on what happened to the cast and crew -- especially who is "still with us," and who is not. They swap a few great stories, and have vivid memories of making the episodes. "Stan Laurel should have sued me," Van Dyke says as he watches himself do a bit. "If only life could be so simple," Reiner sighs as one plot unfolds.

Co-star Rose Marie, ex-child actor Larry Mathews and "neighbor" Ann Morgan Guilbert chat over a few other shows. In one case, Rose Marie plows ahead with a hilarious story long after the episode has ended.

While the audio commentaries are new, other recollections come via footage from what must have been a terrific 1994 TV special about the show. Executive producer Sheldon Leonard and "human joke machine" Morey Amsterdam, both of whom have since passed away, have their say in these clips.

Images and sound are surprisingly good. The restored video has decent contrasts over a pleasing gray scale, with minor wear surfacing here and there. The look falls comfortably between flat and silvery. The 2.0 mono ably conveys dialog, canned laughter and Earle Hagan's bouncy theme music.

The first DVD set includes "Head of the Family," Reiner's flat, almost surreal 1960 pilot for the show, in which he played the lead against a different cast. No network was buying. "The reason Carl Reiner's show failed was Carl Reiner," hot-handed producer Leonard recalled in 1994.

The world-famous ottoman pratfall appears on season 1's cover, in one of those almost 3-D moving photos. Trivia comes in segments called "Ottoman Trippers."


<< 1 2 >>

© 2004, ReviewFocus or its affiliates