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The Simpsons - The Complete First Season

The Simpsons - The Complete First Season

List Price: $39.98
Your Price: $29.99
Product Info Reviews

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Rating: 4 stars
Summary: SIMPSONS' 1ST SEASON CHEAPER THAN GODFATHER SET
Review: If you don't want to spring for the fabulous Godfather set on DVD, there's another peculiar and dysfunctional American family showcased in "THE SIMPSONS - THE COMPLETE FIRST SEASON".

Matt Groening's depraved, desperately sane and almost human creations are featured in 13 episodes. The somewhat rough animation and the evolving character designs are a little removed from the smoother style of later episodes. Groening's (and other producers') commentary is engaging.

There's a never before seen version of "Some Enchanted Evening" episode and Albert Brooks's hilarious audio outtakes from "Life on the Fast Lane." You can also hear Homer speak French and other dubbed languages. Weird and wonderful all the way.

Rating: 3 stars
Summary: Great episodes, little to no extras...
Review: There is an overwhelming good to this DVD set that outweighs the one complaint. So to amend the stars you see above. Having the Simpsons First Season on DVD is five stars. The extras are one star. The DVD quality (picutre/sound/etc) is about three stars. That makes the set worth about three stars.

These are some funny Simpsons episodes. What really sets The Simpsons apart from many long lived series is how close to the mark those first episodes came to the refined product a decade later.

It's hard to believe that even in the first, abbreviated season, you'd find episodes that are classics. I won't review the episodes themselves. If you like The Simpsons, you will enjoy these episodes. If you are a Simpsons nut, you will not be able to live without them.

What I will review here are the extras. This is for the discriminating buyer that buys DVDs to learn more about their favorite movies and shows.

You won't learn much.

There is a somewhat informative, if short, 'documentary' of sorts on how the first season came to be on the 'extras' disc (Disc 3). That really turned out to be the best extra.

The running commentary for each episode turns out to be extremely lacking. Of all the DVDs I own, this quite possibly might be the worst commentary. Each episode's commentary is provided by a mix of people. Sometimes you'll hear from the episode's director, writer, or Matt Groening himself. But it always seems to be two or three people.

In any case, episode after episode, you'll find that the "commenters" are too busy watching the show to tell you anything useful about it.

There are long silences followed by bursts of laughter when punchlines are delivered on screen. It's almost as if they're simply gathering to watch these episodes for the first time in many years. There are small nuggets of information, but it is hard to sift through the silence and laughter to find them. When you expect to hear the inspiration for a joke or character, you only hear them chuckling.

This isn't really a knock on the talented people who produced the show, but more on the people who produced the DVD. Perhaps they needed a way to let the commenters know that viewers would want "behind-the-scenes" insight.

Even the "unaired outtake" requires some induction to figure out what is going on. The "commenters" groan over the poor quality of this unaired material. However, they don't spend any time at all telling us what went wrong, who did it, and how they worked around it to produce what finally went to air. Instead we hear more silence, more groaning, and more exclamation (limited to a few words or less) about how bad it is.

If you just want the Simpsons classics to watch again, get this without delay. Don't even think about the extras, they are nonexistent.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: It's evolution baby..
Review: It's really nice to see the simpsons develop from stupid to super cool in this series. The developments in the characters alone are worth the price..
However it would be nice if I could watch the entire series without going to the main screen over and over and over again.
There should be a button that just played them all through... Like in robotech..

Rating: 3 stars
Summary: Did I miss something?
Review: I've been a fan since the shorts on the Tracy Uhlman show, and I love the fact that I can call up a high quality episode from Season 1 at will, BUT . . . the menu is horrible. The DVD features, overall, are horrible. It's a pain to navigate, and the reason it's a pain isn't because it's filled with menu-animation or something, which at least would have been interesting. It's just poorly organized.

Plus, (and if this is my oversight, someone help me out here) there's no way to tell which episodes are on which disk unless you memorize them. I have to load a disk, get to the menu, then find out if the ep I want is on that disk or not. Around episode 7, 8, 9, I forget where disk 1 ends and disk 2 begins. Is there something on the box? The disks themselves? Did I get a misprinted disk?

Fox had years and years to put together these DVDs. It should have come up with more carefully planned and creative work. The shows themselves are timeless classics. They deserved better.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Simply Awesome
Review: I am a 30something Simpson fan (Closet?). I hesitated buying this because I didnt know if I really needed it in my collection. However, I am amazed at how excellent this collection is. I havent seen many of these episodes in long time. When I travel, this set always comes with me. The people around me in the airport lines appreciate it too :o)

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Wow! These guys have come a long way!
Review: I agree with all of the glowing reviews I read regarding this DVD. I've only become a serious Simpsons fan in the past few years so there was still a lot that I'd missed in the history of the characters and the storyline in general. Seeing the entire first season helped to put that all into perspective. What struck me most about this was how different the show is now compared to the original season. It took a couple of seasons for the true colors of each of the characters to finally show through. For instance, the original Homer seems much more prone to lashing out in an almost violent way whereas he is now much more likely to show dopey frustration. Also, small things struck me like Cheif Wiggums has black hair in the first season whereas he now has blue hair. Any Simpsons fan worth their salt has to have this DVD.

Rating: 3 stars
Summary: It's Ok, but...
Review: Honestly, the show hadn't really gotten that good at this point. It was cute, had some funny moments, but wasn't nearly as brilliant, satiric or FUNNY as we know it can be. Wait for season 3 and then things get very itneresting.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: The best TV-to-DVD show ever!
Review: The simpsons kick ...! This dvd is awesome because they show the episodes crystal clear and they show the cut out scenes. Now I can't wait for season 2 which I hear is due out around christmas. I hope they come out with dvds just like the simpsons season 1 for my other favorite tv shows, Dragonball Z, Dragonball, Futurama, South Park, Samurai Jack, and the original Mobile Suit Gundam.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Just fabulous
Review: It is so great to be able to see these episodes again in their entirety, un-edited unlike the syndicated versions.

I am looking forward to the second season.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: A Pretty Good Start To The Longest Running Cartoon Show!
Review: I am a huge Simpsons fan! The special features are very good! The picture has been cleaned up greatly, and the audio has been remastered in 5.1 surround! While the episodes from the first season weren't very good and the voice artists sound terrible, There are quite a few laughs and in the end, your craving more Simpsons! I do wish that Matt Groening would have added the shorts that were made before the first season, but maybe he has plans to release those as another DVD set! I can't wait until Season 2 is out!


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