CBS Fan Favorites TV Series Singles: Cheers/Frazier/Happy Days/Hogan’s Heroes/The Honeymooners/MacGyver/The Odd Couple (DVDs)

 

Picture: C+ (MacGyver: C)     Sound: C+     Extras: D     Episodes: C+ (MacGyver/Cheers: C)

 

 

CBS Home Entertainment has been aggressively issuing great seasonal sets of all their big hit TV shows over the years and this includes heavy doses of classic TV.  With so many solid volumes out, they have decided to issue sampler DVD singles dubbed Fan Favorites with eight half hours each (MacGyver gets five since it is the only hour-long TV show here) and they include shows we have covered before save one.

 

We have amazingly never covered Cheers and as for Frazier, we only covered the Tenth Season at this link:

 

http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/6318/Frasier+%E2%80%93+The+Complete

 

Not a big fan of either show, Cheers helped NBC to make a comeback and it is arguable that its spin-off was the better show, especially since Frazier did not go bad after a few years.  The Cheers set includes its pilot show.  These are good crash course singles, but diehard fans will want the whole series.

 

Happy Days had the luxury of coming out with its original licensed music on DVD when CBS issued the First Season which we covered here:

 

http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/1346/Happy+Days+-+Season+One+(CBS+D

 

The first five shows are from that first set and remaining three from the Second Season set we missed, but is also available on CBS DVD.  Music has sadly been changed on some of the First Season shows.  By the sophomore season, Richie’s brother Chuck (played by no less than two actors) was gone and the show found a formula they wanted to settle on.  In the long term, this made it a huge hit, especially as it drifted towards centering on the Fonzie character, but some of those show’s prints might not be as originally broadcast.  The transfers are also a bit weaker.

 

Hogan’s Heroes has been a particularly good-looking, successful DVD release for CBS and the episodes here come from the sets we covered, which is all but one of the following six seasons:

 

One

http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/1962/Hogan%27s+Heroes+-+The+Complete

 

Two

http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/2782/Hogan%27s+Heroes+-+The+Complete

 

Three

http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/3768/Hogan%27s+Heroes+-+The+Complete

 

Four

http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/4503/Hogan%E2%80%99s+Heroes+%E2%8

 

Sixth/Final

http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/5706/Hogan%E2%80%99s+Heroes+%E2%8

 

 

The show remains controversial, but I think it was done in the best spirit possible as I have explained in my reviews and some really good work is here, as can be seen on this single, but this is useful for those to see the show and judge for themselves if they are offended or not.

 

The Honeymooners disc offers eight half-hours from the filmed in 35mm Original 39 episodes set we covered at this link:

 

http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/497/Honeymooners

 

The full set is great and this sampler cannot go wrong since all these shows are strong like the rest of the series.  This is likely the last release of the show until CBS does a Blu-ray set, which I cannot wait for them to announce.

 

 

MacGyver includes shows from the two complete season sets we covered before:

 

One

http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/1797/MacGyver+-+Complete+First+Season

 

Four
http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/3124/MacGyver+-+Complete+Fourth+Season

 

Not a fan of the show, but this sampler will help those unfamiliar judge for themselves.

 

 

The Odd Couple is a show we have covered in its great entirety at the following links for all five seasons:

 

One

http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/5412/The+Odd+Couple+%E2%80%93+The

 

Two

http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/5904/The+Odd+Couple+%E2%80%93+The

 

Three/Four

http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/7359/The+Odd+Couple+%E2%80%93+The

 

Fifth/Final

http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/8022/The+Odd+Couple+%E2%80%93+The

 

Second only to The Honeymooners, this is the best show on the list and is a fine sampler worth your time if you have not seen the show.  I would still start with the first full season set if you really want to enjoy the show to the full.

 

The 1.33 X 1 image on all the sets look good fir the format, though most prints look so good that Blu-rays seem to be an increasing possibility, though MacGyver is softer since the filmed 35mm show was finished on low definition analog videotape.  The lossy Dolby Digital 2.0 sound on all the DVDs are fine with all the shows decent monophonic, save the simple stereo on Cheers, MacGyver and Frazier.  There are no extras and no play all options in any of the menus.

 

 

-   Nicholas Sheffo