Rating: Summary: savings? Review: I have just purchased my fifth and final set, with over $400.00 invested now, and then I see this product at Wal-Mart at an everyday low price of $48.23. I thoght Amazon was more competitive than that. Major, major RIP-OFF!!!
Rating: Summary: The most outstanding television series from my childhood Review: I have spent $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$'s on Twilight Zone videos from Columbia House. And I will happily buy all five 'Collection' series after viewing this first collection. Too see these episodes all in pristine condition, with the little extras, is a thrill.
Even the Art Carney episode shot on video tape is enhanced to the point of perfection. The video copy from Columbia House was poor, and left me not interested in seeing it again. This restored copy brings not only the image to a silken pristine level, but elevates the story, which on viewing it again, deserves the treatment given here.
As a child, 'Twilight Zone,' 'The Outer Limits' (which has also been beautifully restored and packaged), and 'One Step Beyond' captivated my young mind. But it was the whole presentation of 'Twilight Zone' that intellectually stimulated my very young mind. I was glued to the television in the early sixties and find myself equally entranced forty years later. The high quality of the storylines pass the test of time.
Not only do the quality of the storylines bring 'Twilight Zone' to an unmatched level, but the actors chosen, bring an integrity and credibilty often lacking on television. Here fantasy meets reality in the stark nakedness of human frailties and private demons that seep from all our psyches. We're all unmasked a little in each show. We're all a little unnerved by the truth revealed about this thing called 'Man' and 'Humanity.'
Life does not leave much television time for us. But when I do have the time to relax and enjoy television or dvd's, I want it to be not only entertaining, but engaging and time well spent. And 'Twilight Zone' is the perfect collection to fill that bill. I highly recommend this collection.
Rating: Summary: Walmart does have it cheap!!! Review: I just wanted to let l. Irish know that t. hord was correct. I went to my local WM and paid 42.44 for volume 1. The forest whitaker JUNK was, i believe, 48 something. Probably reduced in light of the definitive versions coming out by season, 1959 already out at amazon. Oh well, all of us dopes that paid 200 - 500 for all 5 can now put them on ebay before they're worth nothing and put the money towards the definitive versions.
Rating: Summary: wonderful show, terrible DVD production Review: I've been a big fan of TZ since it was rerun when I was a little kid and I was ecstatic when I heard they were releasing the entire series on DVD. I bought the first two box sets and was quite dismayed by the quality of the release. The shows are well mastered, but there is very very little extras added in, the menus are very poorly designed, and (most annoying, esp. for a "complete" set of releases) the episodes aren't even in any sensible order (why not chronological? Ugh!) This is the first series of DVD's I've decided not to collect all of and I'll be selling mine used. :^(
Rating: Summary: Twilight Zone - One Of My Favorite Shows Review: If you buy one of these TZ Box Sets, you might as well buy the other four. Each set has nine volumes (sans the documentary Rod Serling - Submitted For Your Approval). My favorite episodes deal with Time Travel (No Time Like The Past, Back There, Walking Distance, Static, The Seventh Is Made Up Of Phantoms), Old Age (Kick The Can, Nothing In The Dark, The Trade-Ins, One For The Angels), The Civil War (The Passerby, An Occurrance At Owl Creek Bridge, Still Valley), and Paranoia (The Monsters Are Due On Maple Street, The Shelter, 4:00). My other favorites are the four by Jack Klugman (A Passage For Trumpet, A Game Of Pool, In Praise Of Pip, Death Ship) and Burgess Meredith (Time Enough At Last, Mr Dingle Mr Strong, The Obsolete Man, Printer's Devil). If you are new to the show, watch these episodes first. They are the creme de la creme of the show.The series is excellent. However, it's deliberate attempts at humor are often misfires (The Whole Truth, The Bewitching Pool, I Dream Of Genie). The episode A Short Drink From A Certain Fountain is the "Spock's Brain" on the series, meaning it's the worst. The ending is bad; what were they thinking??? No wonder it didn't make the syndication package. The Sound Quality varies from each DVD. Some have two channel mono while others have HIFI mono. Closed Captioned doesn't work for any of the DVD's. There's usually only 3 or 4 episodes per DVD, unlike other Box Sets that fit 8 per DVD, thus lowering the price. This is a minor beef, because the show is worth the money. You will also notice that 3 episodes (Where Is Everybody, The Encounter, The Eye Of The Beholder) appear twice if you buy all five. Again, a minor beef since The Encounter is the only one of the three to be exactly the same on both separate DVD's. These Box Sets are now a bargain compared to when each volume is sold separately. I never tire of watching the episodes and reading the notes. I also recommend Rod Serling's Submitted For Your Approval. It gives insight to Rod Serling and his creation as told by friends, relatives and co-workers.
Rating: Summary: TZ in chronological order!! Review: In response to some of the other reviews, it has happened...yes you can get the TZ collection in chronological order - all 156 episodes. I just ordered it and absolutely love the set. I found the set for sale at mediaracer.com. It's a great price, plus the special features discs have some very cool hidden easter eggs! I won't ruin it for ya, but it's something you should definitely look into, if you love TZ as much as I do.
Rating: Summary: In response to Timothy Ward's review... Review: Just would like TW to know that the DVD at Walmart for 40 some dollars is the newer version hosted by Forest Whitaker - NOT the originals from Rod Serling! You get what you pay for!
Rating: Summary: What's not to like about your own Twilight Zone Marathon? Review: No more waiting for special occasions to see a Twilight Zone marathon; now I can watch them any time I like. My only complaint is that the cost keeps going higher and higher. I bought Collection 1 for $75 and now they are $90. I have only two of the collection because of the cost. Oh well..
Rating: Summary: Please make complete season's ! Review: Ok TZ is one of my all time favorite shows but I would'nt buy this set for one thing the episodes are not in chronologcal order nor are they organized by season. I would much rather own The Twilight Zone season one than a random best of. Also I think that viacom could spend a little more time and package episodes differantly. A whole season could easily fit on three or four discs. Personally I think the ninety dollars that you pay is based on the weight of the package. I think that a good box set should cost somewhere between thirty to fifty dollars but not much more!
Rating: Summary: "Submitted for Your Consideration" Review: Once, a psychologist asked me who was the adult who had
the most positive influence over me as a child. I answered,
immediately, Rod Serling. His response was, "no, I mean
someone real." So, whoever this self-appointed arbiter of
reality was, I've only that memory of him, (he seems
unreal to me now) I guess we come to the crux of the
problem. Reality vs. fantasy. And which is which. As well
as the nature of "realists" who see, and see nothing.
This complete DVD collection is just about the greatest
thing on earth for me. If you were a lonely kid during its
first run, if you were solemn, contemplative, with no one to
ever understand you, and one Friday night, the first episode
of a TV series called "The Twilight Zone" asked "Where is
Everybody?" you probably were as enthralled as I was.
Somebody was actually speaking for me. Somebody
actually knew!
I never missed an episode. Rod Serling knew this corner of
the world. He made it personal. As did Richard Matheson,
Montgomery Pittman and Charles Beaumont (and the
writers, especially Jerry Sohl, who worked on some of his
scripts, due to Beaumont's health tragedy.) Writers became
heroes to me because of this series. I was scared by the
stories, many of them, saddened by most of them, wept
often at certain episodes.
"The Twilight Zone" gave me egress to paperbacks at the
local drug store. I might never have looked before. School
was books and books were not for me. Until that fifth
dimension entered my bones and never left. To have the
complete DVD set of the series, and yes, the hour ones
were quite good as the half hour episodes, is to give me the
autumn the series first started, and all the seasons
thereafter, compact, beautifully made, crisp pictures and
lovely sound.
And Rod Serling. Image and voice. Heart and mind.
Though many people liked the series and still do, there is a
certain "entertainment" value to it that may never be gotten
through for some. See, enjoy, forget. Not consider the
meanings and philosophies. Maybe we wouldn't be in such
messes all the time if more considered what they saw and
heard in the series.
The writers, the actors, the directors--these were my
family. How I wanted Martin Sloane's father (the great
Frank Overton) to be mine; how I ached for the father
(Jack Klugman--a life long fanship started here) of Pip to
be reunited with his son. How I learned about words from
the series. And how I learned about myself and other
people. It was school for me. The days of literal school
were a progression of litanies taken in and basic rudiments
remembered. But "The Twilight Zone" taught me. It still
teaches. How could anyone not see "The Monsters Are
Due On Maple Street" and not be aware of the things
happening around them, right this second, is beyond me.
It was more than entertainment. It was some rather
wonderful practitioners of alchemy who were creating
what my world was beginning to be. "I Sing the Body
Electric!" introduced me to Ray Bradbury. Thank you
forever for that, Rod. And to Richard Matheson and
Charles Beaumont too. And the joyous day I found at a
supermarket the Bantam Books collection "More Stories
from the Twilight Zone." I almost died I was so happy. So
of course I hunted down the first collection and the third
and everything I could find, see and read by Rod Serling. I
kept those stories in my head all week long, waiting for
Friday night, the best night there ever was.
Rod taught me lots of people are lonely, are
misunderstood, and maybe it's not wrong to be like that.
He had such a love for human beings. He saw grace and
dignity and humor and compassion and vast worlds inside
others that most people don't. His script dialogue, his
written stories and novellas, were so poetic, so poignant,
so perfectly aligned. He used real words, complex words,
intricate sentences, ideas of potency, not short cuts, not
plot advancers alone. He used elegant expressions I was
never taught in school. I would pretend at night doing my
homework, that I was him, using that wonderful
commanding clipped voice of his, telling me how to get
through this latest math project, and not incidentally
inducting me into "The Twilight Zone" too. I wrote him
fan letters, like a zillion other kids did, and he graciously
sent me a kind note every single time, like he did all the
zillion others. And my hanging from the ceiling feeling of
joy of hearing from him.
I wanted to stop at Willoughby too. I wanted to "slow
down to a walk" so "a man could live his life full measure."
The series taught me things were more complex than I had
thought. And that melancholy and horror can go hand in
hand and leave a kid pretty baffled by that. But such fun
exploring the yarn of the human heart and mind and needs
and wants. That 16 mm. shrine, that trumpet player who
got a second chance from Gabriel (John Anderson--these
were gods to me, and are still), the plane lost in time, the
dinosaurs feasting there on the lush land of what was to be
Manhattan millions of years later, Ed Wynn as the old man
who cheated Death (Murray Hamilton) until Death played
the ultimate dirty trick.
All of it, real, fresh, and the command of the English
language Rod had, (listen to his words, see how many of
them you have never heard in TV shows or movies or
many books even, the literateness of them, the astuteness
of them, that get down deep, the plaintive longing
gloriously lingering sentient sentences impossible to
forget)how well read he was, how thoughtful and
contemplative, the sheer shivery terror of Matheson's night
call collect, the tilted horror of the devil himself in the
monastery in the Beaumont story, the glorious
grandmother who would live forever and would never die
or go away like real ones do, all of it taken such great care
with on DVD. Done with respect, with the highest
technology. It is impossible the series could have ever
looked or sounded better than this.
Snowy TV pictures back then are for nostalgia. "The
Twilight Zone" is for nostalgia, and for thought, and
imagination, and wisdom and the not inconsiderable ability
to make the man writing this review still on occasion say to
himself, "for dreams, Barbara Jean, for the ones that come
true," and "it's to weep." All too often "it's to weep."
Here are the dreams. There in your hands. Even the
packaging is magnificent. Watch and contemplate the
memories made real, and true to Rod's calling, time made
timeless. You did fine, Rod, you did just fine. Oh, how I
hope you know it now. And from a kid from a long time
ago, please accept this from me to you, with love.
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