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Bewitched Season 2 (1 Viewer)

Ethan Riley

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And I only want ONE lousy extra for season 3. Just one. It's the brief intro to each episode in which Liz appeared saying, "Hi! This is Elizabeth Montgomery. Stay tuned to Bewitched. Next! In culla!" (Her pronounciation, not mine!)
 

JohnMor

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I would love to see them re-instated as well. Although Liz herself didn't begin doing them until the 5th season. The 3rd & 4th seasons used just stills that said "Bewitched in Color." Liz did one that played in the 5th & 6th seasons, a different one for the 7th season, and a different one for the 8th season. I'd love to see them all again, even just as extras as you said. And also, the "Bewitched - Back in a Moment" tag cartoon with a twitching Samantha as well. Well, we can hope and dream... and maybe we'll be pleasantly surprised!
 

David*P

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I'd like to think that dreaming and hoping as hard as we can will spark something in the cosmos and then in Sony's heads to make us BW fans REALLY happy!

So because I have been working two jobs (up until very recently) I haven't had a chance to give my review of BW s.2 on DVD. I'll break down in categories...

The Episodes
First of all, watching this second season has been AWESOME!!! These episodes are some of the finest work done by the cast and crew on BW.

Anyway, kudos to Sony for including those two remake episodes. I really didn't think they would, but they pulled through in a pinch. You can tell that they didn't have very good originals to go from for the scenes filmed during the second season as the sound is quite different than the rest of the episodes which were filmed in the first season. And the picture isn't as clear, but the very fact that they were included supercedes those minor imperfections.

I did notice on the colorized sets that the coloring this season is not as good as it was for the first season. It gave me the impression that the colorists were in a hurry and didn't really fine tune it. To me, it seems like almost all the characters looks sunburned. So it's good to have the original b&w released as well. I'm glad that this season is the last of the b&ws so that we don't have to worry about more colorized episodes.

I saw very few examples of dust and the other imperfections that come along with film that is this age so that was also pleasing.

The sound on all the episodes is excellent as well (with the exceptions I mentioned above).

The Packaging
The overall package design is quite good in the fact that it evokes the magic of the series and the opening credits. I like that overall hue was changed from the blue to purple and can only surmize from this that subsequent seasons will each have their own color. The choice of cast photos though is puzzling and shows that whoever is designing these packages is not familiar with the series at all, as anyone who is knows that the characters looks changed practically every season. The picture of Samantha that is on the cover would've went PERFECTLY on the first season box as it is from a promo still from Ep. #10: "Just One Happy Family". Endora's photo is also a promo from the first season. I'm not too sure about the season Durweed's photo comes from because he's one of the characters that looks the same in all seasons, well when the same actor is playing him, anyway.

The thin cases which hold the discs are even MORE puzzling than the outside box in regards to picture choices.

Discs 1 & 2's case goes in the right direction by having a second season Samantha picture (it's from Ep. #58: "The Dancing Bear") but then we are treated to a sixth season photo of Serena (from Ep. #192: "Serena Stops the Show") and a fourth season photo of Uncle Arthur (from Ep. #138: "The No Harm Charm"). Yes, their characters are in this second season, but s.2 Serena looks nothing like her later incarnations. And as far as Uncle Arthur goes, they missed out on the PERFECT promo shot from this episode to include on the cover.



It's a much better picture over all as 1) Arthur is actually smiling, 2) since this is our introduction to Arthur, you may as well use a photo from the first scene we seem him in and 3) it just makes me laugh seeing his head sitting there on the platter!:D

Disc's 3&4's case has first season photos for Samantha and Endora and I believe a s.2 Aunt Clara shot so that's all right.

Disc 5's case features Larry, Durweed and Samantha. I'm not sure from what Season Larry is from cause he's like Durweed, pretty much looks the same in every season. I will say though that Durweed's is from a fifth season promo still, I'm almost 98% positive, though I can't find the exact photo right now that I'm thinking it came from. Samantha's is from Season One and should've been used on the cover of the Season One packaging.

My biggest complaint about these disc cases is the lack of episode dates given with the episode descriptions not to mention how the episodes are numbered from 1 - 38 rather than the ACTUAL episode numbers from 37 - 74. I don't think it makes any sense to number them any other way than by their actual episode numbers. But on a good note, the episode descriptions are very good and accurate.

The Discs
Again, I like the overall designs of the discs, especially that each disc has only one character featured on it. And it looks like they tried to highlight a character that shows up on a particular disc, for instance, Uncle Arthur is on disc one because his episode "The Joker is a Card" is on that disc. And the same goes for Serena being on disc two for her episode "And Then There Were Three". But again, just like the cases, totally random photos of the characters were chosen, rather than S.2 specific photos.

Arthur's is the same unsmiling photo that is on the case. Serena's is the MOST baffling as it comes from that character's LAST episode EVER on the series in S.8's "Serena's Youth Pill"!!! Samantha's photo is from S.6 #183: "You're So Agreeable". I believe Durweed's is actually from S.2 and Endora's is from S.3.

They really should've given one disc to Gladys Kravitz as played by Alice Pearce considering this is her last season.

Now the placement of episodes is discs is really mind-boggling....this season has the most episodes out of any season of BW, two more than the first season which was released on four discs. So when I heard that there would be five discs to house this season I was thinking, "Oh goodie! They can spread them out more so that there won't be compression issues." Instead they put nine episodes on each of the first four discs and just TWO episodes on the last!!! Well, they included the featurette and the previews on that, but still. If they were going to do five they should've done it like 8-8-8-7-7...or even better, released a SIX disc set and went 7-7-6-6-6-6. I mean, they all ready have three cases, where each case can hold two discs, so why not?

The Menus & Disc Play
I LOVE the animated menus! Well, on the colorized set anway. The b&w set just pops up with the picture of Samantha and Durwood all ready at the stove. These animated menus are the same ones used on the s.1 set but originally they were used on the Japanese DVD release and I was so hoping they would be used here in the US. They capture the essence of the opening credits very well, but also are specific to the DVDs, and very retro feeling. You have your choice of "Play All" (very nice!), "Episode Selection" or on the colorized sets, "Languages". A new addition to the S.2 sets is that the theme music plays in the background of the main menu on the colorized sets. And it plays on loop, which gets really irritating after awhile, if you happen to not be close to the remote control to turn it off.

Anyway, when you select any of the options which are located in the black smoke from the pan on the stove, the smoke cloud grows bigger and takes you to your new destination, depending on what you chose. If you chose "Episode Selections" the new menu features a screen grab framed and hanging on the walls with the episode title beneath it. The great thing is that Sony has included chapter stops within each episode so that you can skip directly to the point just after where the commercial breaks would've been. On this set, as opposed to s.1, they did place the chapter stop after the opening cartoon right at the beginning of the new episode scene, rather than just before the "Written By" and "Directed By" credits, which I rather liked seeing, but it's all right because then you can just jump right into the episodes themselves.

I do think there is one extra stop on the b&w sets placed just before the opening cartoon starts, which is weird but not big deal really (considering the Munsters s.2 doesn't have ANY stops, and is quite irritating).

Another minor irritation is the first time you play an episode on any of the discs you have to sit through the FBI warning and all, and you are NOT able to skip through that, but I guess I can see why.

The Extras
On Disc 5 there are two extra options to select from the main menu. The first is for the 'special' (I use that term lightly) feature called "Bewitched, Bothered, and Be-bloopered." It's a collection of the on air flubs and mistakes (like continuity) and such from S.2. I was totally NOT impressed with this feature as most of the bloopers they site aren't even bloopers i.e. Durwood's building having 20+ floors when seen from the outside yet in one episode the elevator only goes to the 15th floor. There are lots of buildings I've seen where there are separate elevators that you have to ride to reach the higher floors. Plus I just think, this space could've been used for the original cast commercials or examples of the original sponsor openings at least! Now THOSE really would've been 'special' features.

The other option as far as extras go are the previews for other Sony DVDs such as the Bewitched movie, the Partridge Family, Classic Comedies and Classic Urban TV Series and, the best of all, I DREAM OF JEANNIE on DVD!!!! It shows a preview for s.1 of IDOJ and says at the end "On DVD Now" but that isn't true, yet anyway. But I take it to mean that any time now.

In Summary
Like I said in the beginning, these s.2 episodes are some of the finest of the series. The first episode where Aunt Clara changes Durweed into a chimp is hysterical, especially where Endora's concerned ("Come on, precious, try it on!" and "Don't stay and sulk in your room, David. Come down and Mother Endora will comb you!")....the episode where Durwood believes HE is pregnant is spectacularly brilliant as it was so ahead of it's time and DY gives such a wonderful performance...the birth of Tabatha is touching as Endora and Durwood let down their guard for a moment and rejoice in the birth. And EM gets to break out of the nice Samantha role and play her sexy vamp cousin Serena, who as the series goes on goes so far from who Samantha is that it really is amazing that just one person plays both roles.

If you haven't bought at least ONE of the sets, whether colorized or beauteous ORIGINAL b&w, you need to quit reading and get thee to a DVD store (or website at least!). BW will forever be a prime example of what the medium of TV should be used for and that is to entertain us with superb acting while taking us away from the world for a bit with magic, that not only comes from the special effects but from the actors themselves. Elizabeth Montgomery, Dick York and Agnes Moorehead and just three examples from this series of human beings who are magical in real life as well as on the screen by the type of people they were.
 

David*P

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In addition to the "new" S.5 promo I've become aware of in the past couple days there is a "new" S.2 promo that has popped up...the cool thing about this promo is that it contains un-used footage from "A Very Special Delivery"!

Check it out:

http://bedazzled.blogs.com/bedazzled...abc_tv_pr.html

It's part of a collection of other ABC promos and starts at 3:23.

DAMMIT! Why couldn't Sony have included ANY promos?? It makes the whole DVD viewing experience so much cooler!
 

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