"The Dick Van Dyke Show Season 3" -- A Personal Review (1 Viewer)

[David Von Pein]

Season 5 details and box art announced today (April 16th) by Image Entertainment (Release Date -- June 29): .........

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This cover image comes via the Season-Two episode, "Ray Murdock's X-Ray", when Rob is desperately trying to keep Laura from watching the "X-Ray" show on TV...so he entices her to a dance-fest in the Petrie living room.

S.5 info ..........

Audio Commentaries Featuring Carl Reiner and Dick Van Dyke for Selected Episodes; The Cast Remembers "Coast-to-Coast Big Mouth"; Remembering Richard Deacon; Cast Memories of the Last Show; Cast on the TV Land Awards; Emmy© Award Telecast Clips Featuring the Cast; Clip from Dick Van Dyke and the Other Woman, a 1969 special with Dick and Mary; Cast Reunion on Comic Relief; Original Commercials Featuring the Cast and Network Promotional Spots; Collectible Booklet Featuring Trivia, Biographies, Illustrations and More.

 

[David Von Pein]

Also on June 29th, Image will be releasing 5 "Best Of Dick Van Dyke" volumes, with a nice low $9.99 MSRP attached to them. Nice idea, IMO. So fans who might not want to purchase the more-expensive full-season sets can still get some great episodes on DVD with top-notch PQ.

Each volume contains 4 episodes. ........

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Episodes include:

Volume 1 -- The Sick Boy And The Sitter, Big Max Calvada, Coast-to-Coast Big Mouth, Dear Sally Rogers.

Volume 2 -- Where Did I Come From?, That's My Boy??, It May Look Like a Walnut, October Eve.

Volume 3 -- 100 Terrible Hours, Uhny Uftz, Never Bathe On Saturday, The Secret Life Of Buddy And Sally.

Volume 4 -- Oh How We Met The Night That We Danced, My Blonde-Haired Brunette, 4-And-A-Half, The Alan Brady Show Goes to Jail.

Volume 5 -- What's In A Middle Name?, The Curious Thing About Women, All About Eavesdropping, One Angry Man.

 

[Casey Trowbridg]

I like what Image did there, and they picked some of the very best episodes to put on those DVDs. David, thanks for the S. 5 info, much looking forward to S4 at the end of the month.

 

[David Von Pein]

If someone still needs the Season One DVD-On-DVD set, check out
THIS INCREDIBLE DEAL @ AMAZON ($19.99!!)!

I've never seen Amazon offer ANY product at more than a 40% discount. This is 71% off!

Pick it up before they realize the insanity of this price and change it back.

 

[BrianP]

Amazon will most likely cancel any orders for the Dick Van Dyke Show Season One sets at that price. However I am not trying to stop anyone who wants to take a chance on it. But as a word of warning I would recommend not adding another item for filler to get free shipping unless it is something you were going to order anyway. Otherwise you may find out later that Amazon cancels the Dick Van Dyke set, but the remaining portion of the order will still be open and ships before you can stop it. Unfortunately a situation like this happened a few months ago at Amazon involving another mispriced DVD. A few people ended up with items they really never wanted.

 

[David Von Pein]

I don't see how they could get away with that.
It's being advertised at this lower-than-low price (albeit unquestionably in error I would surmise).

They can't possibly make a dime selling it for under 20 clams, but they'd have every S.1-buying Tom, Dick, and Harry screaming "false advertising!" and slapping Amazon.com with lawsuits faster than Buddy can insult Mel's chrome-dome if they didn't honor the price as quoted.

Interestingly....This $19.99 take-home price has no doubt been on the site for at least a couple of days now...seeing as how this DVD has had enough time to raise its DVD Ranking @ Amaz. to #19. (And no wonder....might as well buy a dozen at that price and sell 'em @ E-Bay for twice the price.)

 

[Casey Trowbridg]

Amazon has done this before and fairly recently. They had an error that listed a series of I think like 12 movies sold as a set that retailed for $70 or something and yet they were selling it for the low price of $5.99. I think there is a thread about it over in the Coupons and Bargons forum. All the orders were canceled when Amazon caught their mistake.

 

[David Von Pein]

Boy howdy! Upon gazing at the Amazon website, it rarely fails to mesmerize me re. the amount of different things you can look up on there.

eg: You can now look up every major (and even not-so-major) city in the USA and see what is selling best in any particular city.

Can't really see how this data is going to aid my purchasing choices...but Amazon seems to think it's useful to know what are the top-selling items in Traveler's Rest, South Carolina or Signal Mountain, Tennessee.

(But what I REALLY need to know is what Baby 'N Bath products are selling well at Lake Sissy-mi-noo-noo, N.Y. (where Rob & Laura vacation on occasion). Now that would be useful. )

 

[David*P]

Hey David VP, thanks for the heads up on that AMAZING deal at Amazon.com. I sure hope they stick to what they are advertising.

I've been watching DVD on TV Land since they started airing the series from the beginning like a month ago or so. They are just coming up on the last episode of the first season. I have never really watched the show before except for maybe one or two episodes (including the Walnut episode). I really like the show. I just watched the episode "Where You Been, Fassbinder?" today as I was catching up on what I've recorded. I really enjoyed it because of what an emotional episode it was. I really felt bad for Sally potentially ending up alone on her birthday, and even more so when Fassbinder had shown up to sell her insurance. I like that the show was able to incorporate some "drama" into a great comedy.

I also am amazed at what a great physical comedian Dick is! Especially in that episode where he is nominated as Father of the Week in Richie's class.

Thanks for guiding to me to a real great show!

 

[BrianP]

I suggest reading the "comfirming prices" section at Amazon on their policies for misprices. The last several years Amazon has been notorious for not honoring mispriced items on their site and cancelling orders. However I did read over at the DVDTalk bargain forum tonight that a few people claimed to have their orders for the Dick Van Dyke set ship. But I would be very surprised if they honored every order for the set at the current price.

Also since the price has been available for a few days at Amazon is really meaningless for them to honor it. The last major misprice for the History of Cinema box set also ran for several days before all orders were cancelled. Here is a link to that long thread at DVDTalk for reference. Hopefully I am wrong and they will honor all the orders but just be aware they can cancel them.

 

[David Von Pein]

You're welcome, David.
I hope you can get the very low S.1 price. But, from what Brian has pointed out (in Post #90), I wouldn't bank on it.

Thanks, Brian, for the "Fine Print" Amazon link. Had never seen that previously.

 

[Paul_Scott]

well, i ended up digging deep to pick up S3 and from what i've seen so far (about 5 of the eps spread out over the season), this is much more the series i remembered liking.
even larry Matthews perfomance looks to be greatly improved.

so i have heard that the show hit its stride here- but when did it start to slide?
the 4th season?
5th?

is the 2nd season closer to the first in tone or to the third?

 

[David Von Pein]

Never.

 

[Casey Trowbridg]

Never has so much been said with only 1 word, but David is correct. IMO the show never slid, they quit while they were on top.

If season 3 were considered the best, or the very peak of the show, than the total regression of the last 2 seasons would be like an inch and a half below the peak in other words any drop would be varely noticeable.

 

[Carlos Garcia]

I notice that the best comedy shows that never "jumped the shark" are usually those shows that never went "dramatic". This includes The Dick Van Dyke Show, The Odd Couple and Seinfeld. Those that DID go dramatic, such as All In The Family, Happy Days, Roseanne, and many others, usually jumped the shark as soon as they became dramatic. Is it a coincidence, or is it that fans want a comedy to STAY a comedy? You decide.

 

[Paul_Scott]

to me, Happy Days started out more dramatic (or at least more realistic) and progressively got more sitcom comedic, and more silly.
the first season of HD has more in common tonally to the Wonder Years than it does to its own later seasons.

 

[DanFe]

Carlos, well you had to go dramatic when Edith died (All in the Family).

 

[David Von Pein]

Interesting TDVDS side note ........

I see Image has decided not to produce Seasons 4 and 5 on VHS (which they did produce for 1 thru 3).

Not surprising. Those must've sold like lead balloons. I'm surprised they went to the trouble of coming out with them on VHS in the first place.

 

[Casey Trowbridg]

Yeah no kidding, I didn't even know that until I read your post. I think discontinuing them on VHS is probably the wisest move...

 

[David Von Pein]

Well, I guess I was incorrect (re. S.4 on VHS). Amazon is listing S.4 on VHS on its site.

Although, IMO, a person would have to be more than a few bricks shy of a load in order to spend $60 for the VHS versions of these sets, when they can get them for less (with accompanying extras) on the DVD format. It's beyond silly to buy them on VHS.

Very odd, though, that the Image website stops listing any Van Dyke VHS sets after Season 3.