Topic: I Love Lucy: The Complete Series

[addicted2dvd]

I Love Lucy

The Complete Series

Fall in love again and again with the timeless comedy that entertains generation after generation. This special 34-disc DVD collection contains every hilarious episode of every classic season of I Love Lucy — from the Lost Pilot to the The Lucy-Desi Comedy Hour shows. Join Lucy, Ricky, Fred and Ethel for non-stop laughter as you savor every magical moment of the greatest sitcom of all time.

Extras:

This set is completely loaded with extras. The set contains all the discs from the season set releases. So there is all the extras released with the season sets Plus there is an extra bonus disc that was made for this Complete Series set.

Season Discs:
- Flubs
On every disc of the set that contains episodes they have this feature. The bulk of the episodes was recorded live in front of an audience. Because of this some mistakes made it to air. This feature points out many of these mistakes. It is a fun extra. One of my favorites... and one I felt I had to watch on every disc.
- Lost Scenes
- Deleted Scenes
- Featurettes
- Original Series Opening
- Original Animated Sequences
- Script Excerpts
- Production Notes
- Lucy Radio Series: My Favorite Husband (Several Episodes)
- Guest Cast Info
- Promotional Spots
- Original Cast Commercials
- Desilu / Westinghouse Sponsor Presentation
- Audio Commentary on episode Lucy and Superman, Lucy does the Tango & Country Club Dance

Bonus Disc
- Colorized version of "Lucy Goes to Scotland"
pretty obvious what this is. They colorized an episode from season 5 for some reason
- I Love Lucy:  The Movie
In 1953 with the TV show being so successful, Desilu decided to create a theatrical movie by stitching together three episodes from the first season (The Benefit, Breaking the Lease, and The Ballet.)  Some extra material was filmed to join the episodes together and an intro was created. The movie was never released, since studio execs thought it would hurt the box office results of Lucy and Desi's film The Long, Long, Trailer, which was in release at the time.  Shelved, the movie was forgotten until it was discovered 50 year later.
- A three minute Kinetescope excerpt from The Ed Wynn show
The first time Desi and Lucy appeared on TV together was as guests on The Ed Wynn show  in 1949.
- Phillip Morris introduction to First Episode
The disc concludes with the Phillip Morris introduction, by John Stephenson on the set of the show, to the first episode of I Love Lucy.

My Thoughts:

The Packaging:
The first thing you notice about this set is how it is packaged. Which while it is a fun thing... you don't feel too confident that the disc themselves are safe the way they are stored. Being in a multiple disc cardboard envelope I worry about the possibility of the discs getting scratched. I really like the good hard outer box... but instead of those accordion style cardboard envelopes... I would of preferred something more like THINpak cases for the discs protection. No I haven't had any problems with these discs. But I do worry a bit and feel the need to be extra careful.

Package Images:

The Show:
This sitcom really is a timeless classic. I absolutely loved the seasons 1-6. These were the original concept I Love Lucy half hour episodes. There was many... many episodes that I literally laughed out loud watching. To many great, hilarious moments to even attempt to list here. Though I will mention one of my favorite episodes being where Superman comes to Little Ricky's Birthday Party.

When the show went to hour length and named changed to the Lucy Desi Comedy Hour I felt  it went a bit downhill. I don't really feel that it could handle the hour long format as well as it did the half hour format. Sure I still enjoyed it. But it just seemed to lose some of the charm it had in the half hour version.

One thing this series became famous for is getting big named guest stars... most the time playing themselves. Some of the big names that showed up in this series includes....

- William Holden
- Eve Arden
- Ross Elliott
- Cornel Wilde
- Rock Hudson
- Harpo Marx
- Richard Widmark
- John Wayne
- Charles Boyer
- Bob Hope
- Orson Wells
- Claude Atkins
- George Reeves
- Cesar Romero
- Betty Grable
- Danny Thomas
- Red Skelton
- Milton Berle
- Ernie Kovacs

Half of these people I never heard of before myself.. but they seemed to be big in their time. Between the 2 versions of the series there is 194 episodes in this set to enjoy. Not to mention the tons of extras listed above. This set is definitely a lot of bang for the buck!

Final Thoughts:

Over-all this is an excellent release for a great classic sitcom. I bought this series back in May of 2009... as I bought it as an early birthday present to myself. It took me till today to finish watching all the episodes. And there is still a ton of extras I still have to watch. The quality of the episodes looks great. though a couple of the extra I looked at could have used some more cleaning up. But this is a set I definitely would recommend if you were a fan of this series.

My Rating:
Out of a Possible 5

[Najemikon]

Can someone kick this troll, please? 

[DJ Doena]

Can someone kick this troll, please? 

Why do you call poor Pete a troll?

(click to show/hide)

Troll kicking successful.

[addicted2dvd]

I never seen a post between mine and Jon's... so I was scratching my head there for a second! 

[Najemikon]

I did for a moment there! "Am I going mad? How do I undo this?" 

[Achim]

Wow, for a second I also thought Jon wanted to get rid of Pete

Thank God for Karsten's spoiler tag. Would have been a terrible joke if he had played it straight (gotten rid of the troll withouit posting about it ; Jon would have had some explainin' to do )

[addicted2dvd]

Now Achim... do it right... after all this is an I Love Lucy review....

Lucy Jon... You got some splaining to do! 

[addicted2dvd]

I was flipping through the channels trying to find something for background noise while I am on the net. When I saw The Halmark Channel had I Love Lucy on... It is an episode I enjoyed so figured why not... put it on and I can';t believe how spoiled these DVDs made me. The one shown on cable was terrible compared to the DVD. the image wasn't nearly as good... and the sound had a constant hissing. Not to mention the Halmark logo in the lower corner... as well as some of the other stuff they had up on the screen over the picture.

[Dragonfire]

It is so much better to watch shows on DVD.

[RossRoy]

I can't stand it anymore. Commercials. Station logos. Half screen unrelated show promos DURING the episode. I can't stand it.

I'd rather pay 40$ for a TV series boxset, than suffer through it on TV.

There's a few new TV shows coming out this year on Quebec TV, one in particular, Les Rescapés, which is written by the same author of another show I liked a lot, Grand Ourse. But I'm not configuring my computer or anything else record it. And I'm certainly not going to be sitting in front of the TV like a slave at specific hours every week. I'll wait for the DVD.

That's what I do with every shows I want to see. It's a lot more expensive - but it's so much more entertaining!

[Jimmy]

There's a few new TV shows coming out this year on Quebec TV, one in particular, Les Rescapés, which is written by the same author of another show I liked a lot, Grand Ourse.

The new serie here on TV that looks really interesting to me, and it's kind of weird since I really don't like V the channel that will shows it, is "Prozac". At least the promo is interesting and the cast include Patrice Robitaille, Isabelle Blais et François Létourneau (wich is a nice strong cast). The serie begins today (Tuesday) at 8h30 so I will know soon enough if it is as good as it sounds and if the publicity will ruin the watching...

News article about the show (sorry guys it's in french)

[addicted2dvd]

If Anyone is interested in this I Love Lucy: Complete Series set... it is on sale as golden box item at Amazon for only  $79.99! Awesome Deal!

I Love Lucy: Complete Series @ Amazon!

[Kathy]

I had a $50 amazon coupon I needed to use so I ordered this series. I've wanted it for a long time but kept putting it off.

Lucy was from Jamestown New York, which is just outside of Buffalo, so I've heard and read a lot about her. But, I really don't remember watching this series. I can't wait to see watch it from the beginning.

[addicted2dvd]

I hope you enjoy it as much as I did Kathy! The series really is timeless!

[Dragonfire]

That is a decent price...I really don't have the extra money to get it right now.