Box Set

There really was (and still is) no justice in the world when a show like NewsRadio was perennially ignored so often during the mid and late '90s. I mean seriously, get a comic mind from Canada's The Kids in the Hall (Dave Foley), another from the States Saturday Night Live (Phil Hartman), and yet another from the dark comedy Ben Stiller Show (Andy Dick) and give them some sitcom material to work with, and the result can be nothing but laughs.

What's a boy to do when he is called into work and has to work a graveyard shift and is virtually disallowed to access the internet? Why, watch the first and second seasons of Wings of course, and thoroughly enjoy the wild antics of the folks in an airport on Nantucket Island. You have Joe (Tim Daly, Return to Sender), the uptight anal retentive serious one, along with his younger brother (and general goofball) Brian (Steven Weber, At First Sight). Together they own and operate Sandpiper Air, a sleepy small airline with one plane.

Like it or not, you can't talk about this show without talking about the C.S.I. phenomenon. The extreme popularity of that single show has launched an entire genre of hour-long police investigation shows that are showing up on every network, every night. There are now three different C.S.I. programs on the air, as well as military crime programs, FBI profiler programs... even a mathematical approach to crime solving with Numbers.

The latest show in this trend is The Closer, a TNT ...

Sam: Hey, I recognize you.

Andrew: Oh, did you go to Columbia High?

Sam: No, not from high school, from TV. Didn't you play the retarded quarterback?

Andrew: Yeah.

Sam: Are you really retarded?

Andrew: No.

Sam: Ooh, great job man! I really thought you were retarded. I mean, you're better than that Corky kid and he's actually retarded. If there was a retarded Oscar you would win, hands down, kick his ass!

- G...

I have been rambling on and on about the merits of this outstanding series to friends, family and innocent bystanders for years. I will continue to do so until the final disc of the final season has hit Amazon.com; and probably for quite some time after that. It is a show that is important, culturally relevant, and surprisingly political without becoming annoyingly partisan.

Season Six is something of a bounceback season for the show. In Season Five, the show floundered a bit. While it was still easily one of...

Synopsis

I’m late coming to this series about a fractious family and the funeral home they run. These are the first episodes I’ve ever seen, so I’m not going to pretend I have the faintest idea what’s going on here. All the various plot lines are clearly working to a conclusion, and for the benefit of those who know these characters, some of the things that are dealt with are James Cromwell’s depression and the difficulty in treating it, and the imminent arrival of a baby (which sets up the final epi...

The appearance of Mr. T as B.A. Baracus unfortunately overshadows the rest of this show. Why is that unfortunate? Because Mr. T’s appeal mostly comes from his performance as the show-stealing Clubber Lang from Rocky III, and not from any major importance he had on this series. While people certainly tuned in to see Baracus, they were often disappointed by the back seat he would frequently take to the other stars – disappointed because they wanted to see Clubber Lang on the A-Team, and not the back-seat charact...

Synopsis

Apparently Carlos Mencia is being hyped as the latin version of Dave Chappelle when it comes to the eyes of Comedy Central, as he appears to be the guy who says whatever is on his mind, and is an equal opportunity offender. But as we all know with brussels sprouts, if you try to force something on someone, chances are they’re going to resist it.

To his credit, Mencia (who looks suspiciously like George Lopez) does immediately try to shoot that perception down, or at least make fun of it, ...

Synopsis

I like to consider myself both wild and out. Not knowing a helluva lot about Nick Cannon, other than he seems to be an entertainer that’s heavily produced to appear in movies and release the occasional rap/R&B album, kinda like a taller version of Bow Wow, with a little bit more emotional depth and a lot less charisma. The kind of guy that the ladies (that what I like to call them) take a fancy to, without knowing…what he’s famous for.

I wasn’t too surprised to see that MTV would give him...

Synopsis

Laurel and Hardy’s career highs were all at Hal Roach Studios, and these three films are from their Fox period, in the twilight of their filmography. It is hard to call any of these classics, but there is still some very worthwhile comedy.

Best of the bunch is Jitterbugs (1943), where are duo hook up with con man Robert Bailey, and decide to pull a sting on the grifters who robbed Vivian Blaine’s mother of her savings. As is the case with the other two films, the trademarked...