Rhoda – Season Two (1975 – 1976/Shout! Factory DVD Set)
Picture: B-
Sound: C+ Extras: D Episodes: B
Valerie Harper was a real star, an actress with a great
personality, acting talent and energy that could have made her a big screen
movie star. It is no surprise that her
character Rhoda Morgenstern was one of the most popular of the 1970s on TV and
that she could take the character from The
Mary Tyler Moore Show and be such a hit in Rhoda, one of the first big spin-offs in all of TV to be built on a
single character. If you don’t know the
whole story, you can read all about it in my coverage of the first season on
DVD at this link:
http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/8440/Rhoda+%E2%80%93+Season+One:+3
Anything from here on in is a spoiler, so start with the
first set and stop reading. Otherwise,
you’ll ruin the show for yourself if you have not had a chance to really enjoy
it.
At this point, Rhoda has married Joe (Dave Grohl) and they
are having a great marriage together despite being so close to her interfering
mother (Nancy Walker) and the usual stress that comes with being
newlyweds. We get 24 more well written
and funny half-hours, including a gem with the great Vivian Vance as a new
neighbor who happens to be a writer for advertising and a show with Tim
Matheson. Even John Ritter shows
up. However, it is the development of
the interrelated characters that continued to make the show a winner and that
is why this Season Two set is so
much fun to have and see these episodes again.
Unlike the first set, the 1.33 X 1 image in this new
collection can still vary from episode to episode, but what was already good
looking film print material is now even better as they have made High
Definition transfers of the shows! No
more disclaimers about flawed tape sources here and my call for HD transfers
has been granted. The Dolby Digital 2.0
Mono also varies, sometimes with some compression, other times with slight
harshness, but when it is clear, it sounds very good for its age. There are no extras this time, but they’ve
got two sets left and should come up with some, including some audio
commentaries perhaps?
- Nicholas Sheffo
