Mad About You - The Complete Third Season

 

Picture: C     Sound: C+     Extras: D     Episodes: B-

 

 

Though not a big fan of the sitcom since the 1980s, a few had a certain amount of humor, class and intelligence that did not insult the audience, but most of those few bombed.  The Paul Reiser/Helen Hunt series Mad About You was a hit and their chemistry alone made that success make sense.  Reiser (who played Paul) was a producer and went out of his way to make the show good.  All that hard work paid off because it was not only a hit, it holds up well, as this new Complete Third Season DVD set reminds us.

 

Living together in a nice apartment building populated with interesting neighbors, they only add to the somewhat dysfunctional cast including John Pankow as “Ira,” Paul’s cousin/oaf Ira, Ann Ramsay as Jamie’s scatterbrained older sister Fran, Richard Kind as Fran’s equally shaky husband Mark and many more including Judy Geeson as Maggie Conway.  This set offers all 24 half-hour shows from the 1994 – 1995 including:

 

Escape From New York

Home

Till Death Do Us Part

When I'm Sixty-Four

Legacy

Pandora's Box

The Ride Home

Giblets For Murray

Once More, With Feeling

The City

Our Fifteen Minutes

How To Fall In Love

Mad About You (two parts)

Just Our Dog

The Alan Brady Show

Mad Without You

Purseona

Two Tickets To Paradise

Money Changes Everything

Cake Fear

My Boyfriend's Back

Up in Smoke (two parts)

 

 

Some shows with couples that work well together ruin themselves later in desperation marry off the characters, but this show was built on the premise that they would eventually do so and it happens to be in this third season that they do.  It gives the chance for the show to develop their love relationship and friendship before the marriage and does not pull a Rhoda in examining the pitfalls of divorce.

 

Instead, it examines the situation with comedy and a surprising undertone of maturity and seriousness.  It helps that the leads are so likable.  Guest stars this season include Eric Stoltz, Lyle Lovett, Vito Scotti, Brent Spiner, Jon Polito, Gates McFadden, Cyndi Lauper as Marianne and Carl Reiner as Alan Brady.  Needless to say the show had come into its own.  Sure, some of the situations are simple, but it is fun enough and surprisingly rewatchable.

 

The 1.33 X 1 image is said to be transferred from the original film prints in High Definition, but these look unusually soft throughout all the episodes.  Maybe someone got carried away with the downtrading of the transfers, but aliasing errors are all around and detail is an issue all the time.  Color is not bad.  The Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo has no surrounds, but is nice and clean.  There are no extras.

 

 

-   Nicholas Sheffo