Disclaimer: Warner Brothers Home Entertainment requests that we note we received a free review copy of Young Sheldon: The Complete Series and The West Wing: The Complete Series for review. The opinions I share are my own.
From creators and executive producers Chuck Lorre and Steven Molaro, Young Sheldon centers on Sheldon Cooper, a once-in-a-generation mind capable of advanced mathematics and science, which isn’t always helpful in a land where church and football are king. And while the vulnerable, gifted, and somewhat naïve Sheldon deals with the world, his very normal family must find a way to deal with him. For 12 years on The Big Bang Theory, audiences came to know the iconic, eccentric, and extraordinary Sheldon Cooper. This single-camera, half-hour comedy takes viewers through his childhood, as he embarks on his innocent, awkward, and hopeful journey toward the man he will become. — from Warner Brothers
Seven seasons and 141 episodes of a spinoff prequel is nothing to sneeze at. In fact, you need fourteen discs just to pack the whole thing into this box. And considering just how popular the show was during its run, it’s not all that surprising but still a little sad that the bonus bits are so sparse. It appears that you get six behind-the-scenes featurettes, of which one only appears to be new to this set: a retrospective from the cast and producers. Maybe they were too busy getting Georgie & Mandy’s First Marriage ready to air, but I would think this is the best the series is going to get probably. If you don’t already own the show, this would be the way to go, but if you’ve been picking up season sets along the way, there’s no reason to go back for this one. It’s available from Amazon here.
Gomez (Raul Julia) and Morticia (Anjelica Huston) welcome a new addition to the Addams household—Pubert, their soft, cuddly, and mustachioed baby boy. As Fester (Christopher Lloyd) falls hard for the new nanny (Joan Cusack), cynically suspicious Wednesday (Christina Ricci) and Pugsley (Jimmy Workman) discover she’s a black-widow murderess. Though they’re shipped off to summer camp, Wednesday still has a Thing or two planned to save Fester and the family. — from Paramount
To this day, Raul Julia gets acclaim for this role…and well deserved too. In fact, the entire live-action family was pretty damn excellent. And now it hits 4K UltraHD and, wonderfully, it brings along some new things. First, there’s a new behind-the-scenes/interview roundup from things produced at the time. Then, most importantly, a commentary by the director Barry Sonnenfeld and the scribe Paul Rudnick. (As part of this rollout, it’s going to return to cinemas on November 10th and 13th of this year. Nice.) If you enjoy the film and need to get it for the first time, this is the way to go…even if you don’t currently have a rig to support it, you will eventually. And if you want to upgrade to this, there’s plenty to make it worth your while. Snag it from Amazon.
The West Wing ventured where no other TV series had gone before: an extraordinarily intimate look at the inner workings of the White House. Experience all the crises, triumphs, lofty idealism and hard realities of the acclaimed series in this complete series set. — from Warner Brothers
A massive set this: seven seasons, twenty-eight discs, 156 episodes. And the good news is if you’re getting this for the first time, you don’t have to worry about missing out on any of the legacy bonus content that’s come before. There is scads of it: over twenty commentaries with cast and crew, deleted scenes, multiple featurettes, gag reels and more. This, from what we can tell, is all material that appeared previously. The main attraction here is having the series upgraded to hi-def. If you don’t already own it but need to, this is definitely the way to go. And if you own it but want to upgrade, your path is clear. Find it at Amazon.
