Rating: 
Summary: TMBG is my favourite band, but . . .
Review: . . . I think this DVD is just another cog in the TMBG money machine.I bought it having already seen "Birdhouse in Your Soul" and "Dr. Worm" as music videos. Having watched all of them, I can safely say that those are my favourite two, especially the former. The rest of the videos generally fall into one of two categories: - Animation so cheap one wonders if they picked it up in a South American street market.
- Linnell tragically wiggling his fingers at the sky and jumping around in fast motion as Flansburgh stiffly bends at the waist in fast motion. If you're a hard-core fan and determined to pay monetary tribute to the band, you might as well get a t-shirt instead. Or a coaster. Medium-core fans like me had best stick to the albums.
Rating:
Summary: TMBG is my favourite band, but . . .
Review: . . . I think this DVD is just another cog in the TMBG money machine. I bought it having already seen "Birdhouse in Your Soul" and "Dr. Worm" as music videos. Having watched all of them, I can safely say that those are my favourite two, especially the former. The rest of the videos generally fall into one of two categories: - Animation so cheap one wonders if they picked it up in a South American street market.
- Linnell tragically wiggling his fingers at the sky and jumping around in fast motion as Flansburgh stiffly bends at the waist in fast motion. If you're a hard-core fan and determined to pay monetary tribute to the band, you might as well get a t-shirt instead. Or a coaster. Medium-core fans like me had best stick to the albums.
Rating: 
Summary: A really great collection of TMBG music videos!!!
Review: Direct has all the tmbg music videos including never before realesed videos and their latest Dr. Worm!!! Plus as a bonus they include the two videos from Tiny Toons! Watch it, buy it, love it!! They Might Be Giants Rule!!
Rating:
Summary: Brooklyn's Ambassadors of Love
Review: Features all of They Might Be Giants videos from 1987-1998. Does not include the "Boss of Me" video. Also features John Linnell and John Flansburgh's commentary on all videos! In addition, live concert footage is featured. An added bonus is an extended trailer for They Might Be Giants' documentary "Gigantic: A Tale of Two Johns." I'm very much looking forward to this DVD, as this is TMBG's first DVD release ever!
Rating:
Summary: Even if you have the VHS, you need this!
Review: Finally, a music DVD with good extras! The commentary is what makes this DVD for me. Some people seem to not be that crazy about it, but I think it's hilarious. They have a very subtle, dry humor just like on stage which continues to crack me up after several viewings. Such as: "That's not a real gun." "But these are real buildings we had demolished with our big rock budget." I bought the VHS of this a couple years ago, watched it maybe twice, and put it away on my shelf as a nice collector's item. But now with the better picture quality, the bonus audio tracks, the commentary, and more, I can't stop watching it. I wasn't going to buy it on DVD because I didn't know all about the great extras at first. But now I do. And so do you. As for technical problems (like screen flickering black or menus not working well, which someone mentioned) I wonder if maybe it depends on your DVD player. The only thing I've noticed is that when I'm listening to the commentary track, the sound in the video occasionally goes out of sync with the picture (which is incredibly trippy).. but I have a cheap DVD player. So, in short, buy this if you love all things TMBG; I think they did a great job. Let's keep our fingers crossed for a release of "Gigantic" soon.
Rating:
Summary: Even if you have the VHS, you need this!
Review: I admit, I never knew They Might Be Giants had even made music videos. Having learned otherwise, I was eager to pick this up. The DVD is an essential purchase for any fan of the band for the videos alone. Fortunately there's much more to recommend it. The commentary track does take a while to get going but it is a fascinating insight to the Johns. Please note, however, that anyone who is expecting an explanation of the videos and their will be sadly disappointed. Throw in the bonus Tiny Toons videos, audio tracks, live clip and trailer, and this is a bargain. In fact, my only real complaint about the disc is that they didn't include the bonus audio as MP3s or some other transportable format, because I would love to hear them away from my DVD player. But that's a small problem in light of the quality and value of the disc. If you like They and have a DVD player, there is no question that you need to pick this up.
Rating: 
Summary: They are still going...
Review: I admit, I never knew They Might Be Giants had even made music videos. Having learned otherwise, I was eager to pick this up. The DVD is an essential purchase for any fan of the band for the videos alone. Fortunately there's much more to recommend it. The commentary track does take a while to get going but it is a fascinating insight to the Johns. Please note, however, that anyone who is expecting an explanation of the videos and their will be sadly disappointed. Throw in the bonus Tiny Toons videos, audio tracks, live clip and trailer, and this is a bargain. In fact, my only real complaint about the disc is that they didn't include the bonus audio as MP3s or some other transportable format, because I would love to hear them away from my DVD player. But that's a small problem in light of the quality and value of the disc. If you like They and have a DVD player, there is no question that you need to pick this up.
Rating:
Summary: Artists at a very high level
Review: I don't know why I delayed buying this. Perhaps I'd seen the video to "Birdhouse in Your Soul" once too often and was weary of it, but perhaps a few years' break was needed. This is an inspired compilation that shows off this duo's nonstop wit and musical prowess, as well as their foresight in hitching up with the hyper-creative Adam Bernstein, who directed many of these videos.
For the hit, "Istanbul (Not Constantinople)" we get two versions: the original (which still fascinates) and a marvelous one for Tiny Toon Adventures that works equally well in a completely different way. Several of these songs I had somehow missed in their visual incarnations, such as "Doctor Worm" and "Snail Shell," and the nicest thing I can say is that if you've just heard the songs without the images, you're missing out on some highly stimulating work. And many of these don't have big budgets, just tons of imagination. Contemporary video producers could observe and learn from something like "Don't Let's Start," which is minimally done in black-and-white, with the two Johns leaping around the grounds of the 1964 New York World's Fair.
Extras include an entertaining bit of commentary, several audio-only songs (which you won't need if you have all of their recordings) plus a live performance of "Why Does the Sun Shine?" that is an excellent example of this group's peculiar magnetism. Great musicianship, intelligence and humor.
Rating:
Summary: Joy, joy, joy, joy, JOY!!
Review: I'm not that fond of DVDs which collect band videos, because they seem disjointed. However, this DVD works for TMBG because each video (and the songs) are -already- disjointed. And of course the songs are wonderful (you already know...). I'd never seen most of these videos (I'm a little pre-MTV I guess), and it was so much fun to watch these, alone and with the Kid Unit (who is turning into quite the TMBG fan). It seems a little incomplete, though. For the sake of the Kid Unit I was hoping for the cartoon version of Dr. Worm, and mildly disappointed. Also, some information on the total time of the DVD would have been nice on the outside of the package (it runs about 40-45 minutes), and a booklet listing more about the details of the videos would have been nice to see as I watched (directors, locations, etc) rather than having to wait to learn while listening to the 2 John voiceovers. But these are quibbles: more of a recommendation for future DVDs than a genuine complaint about this one. Don't wait to go get it, because you're older than you've ever been, and now you're even older. (Uh, "Older" is not on it, don't mean to mislead you.)
Rating: 
Summary: Great band, great videos, lousy commentary
Review: If TMBG did nothing else in their career, John Flansburgh and John Linnell would be remembered as the shock troops of the alternative movement. Their frenetic video for "Don't Let's Start," shot on a shoestring at the 1964 World's Fair site, effectively broke MTV's de facto ban on independent videos (remember, the music channel was very reluctant to play R.E.M.'s clips and never played any of the Pixies'). "Ana Ng" showed you could film a video without any lip-sync from the band -- which sounds silly today, but was a big deal in 1989, thanks to MTV's byzantine regulations. Of course, the film wouldn't matter if the songs weren't so catchy, but Adam Bernstein and TMBG proved you could make a memorable bit of art with just a couple of bucks, a lesson lost on the music channel today. So enjoy the videos, the songs and the added features. Because the Johns' commentary, frankly, is disappointing. It's difficult to be insightful within a 2:30 to 4 minute timeframe, but Flansburgh and Linnell don't go much further than saying "there's that guy" and "here's where that thing came from." Flansburgh does admit to being difficult on the sets of the early videos, assuming some of Bernstein's decisions were "artistic betrayals," and apologizes on the tracks. The duo also forsake straight commentary on the "Snail Shell" video, singing a song over what could be their weirdest clip ever. The experiment doesn't quite work, but it's interesting nonetheless. Still, the DVD really needed Bernstein or any of the other directors to comment on what was going on: Flansburgh and Linnell were used (and apparently saw themselves) as actors in these pieces, mostly doing as they were told and not adding much to the direction of the video. You need the guy with the pickaxe to explain how he broke ground. One last thing: watch the "Why Does the Sun Shine?" home movie. Considering what happened in Rhode Island this month, you'll cringe watching a guy breathe fire on stage (and cringe even more when one of the Johns says "It's easier to ask for forgiveness than permission" on the commentary track), but the band is incredibly tight, loud and energetic. The next time anyone calls TMBG a nerd band, play that for them. If Flansburgh, Linnell and the Band of Dans are geeks, SR-71 needs to find their pocket protectors.
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