Green Acres: The Complete Series
DVD Wholesale Quick Overview:
BOTTOM LINE: One of THE funniest comedies ever made. Now, Shout!Factory finally tackles the chores that those clodhoppers at MGM left unfinished years ago, herding all six seasons into one inclusive boxset, complete & unedited! (I re-gifted my original MGM seasons 1-3 sets and ponied up the money to get this compete edition. Kinda sucks, but I really don’t regret it. This show is that good.) 5 STARS!
THOUGHTS: Genuinely good comedy is timeless. This show is one of those oddballs that truly defies pinning down. Sure, the hairstyles & clothing peg it as a product of the 60’s, yet the non-specific bucolic locale and the frequently downright bizarre nature of this series transcend the hippy & psychedelic trappings which hopelessly bogged down so many other shows of the era. Of the country-fried comedies of the time, (Petticoat Junction & Beverly Hillbillies being the other two), GREEN ACRES is far and away my favorite. Brilliantly written & acted. Versatile actor Eddie Albert makes for a bemused & amusing leading man, playing the eternally confounded, confused and frustrated Olivahhh Douglas. Blonde Hungarian beauty Eva Gabor is his well-meaning, supportive but ultimately clueless wife, Lisa. And then there’s the gang of Hooterville regulars: the Ziffels, Hank Kimball, Mr. Drucker, Eb, the Monroe ‘brothers’ and of course, that jovial corn-fed con artist, Mr. Haney. A wonderfully witty, laugh-out-loud series which often dabbled in the surreal, and frequently broke the 4th wall. GREEN ACRES would almost certainly have lasted longer if CBS hadn’t gone through with their foolishly absurd “rural purge” in the early 70’s. (“Of all the stupid…!”)
THE DVD SET: The good eggs at Shout!Factory present the entire 6-season GREEN ACRES show in its entirety. All the episodes look & sound great. The picture is mostly clean and crisp. The audio is clear and level. Bonus content includes a “Making of…” retrospective featurette, vintage interviews with Eddie & Eva appearing on the Merv Griffin show, an audio commentary track on the pilot episode, and several episodes of the classic Granby’s Green Acres radio show, which (for those who don’t know) was the inspiration for the GREEN ACRES TV series. If you’re a fan of this show then THIS SET is what you’ve been waiting for. Those, like me, who bought the original releases from MGM but got pitchforked when those halfwit hayseeds gave up after season three, will just have to knuckle under and re-purchase those first three again, as seasons 4-6 are not being sold individually at this time. 🙁 I will admit to being bummed that Shout! didn’t go one step further and offer the whole shebang in hi-def as a deluxe Blu-ray set, but I’m honestly just thankful that someone picked up the rest of the seasons and finished releasing them for us fans.
– Hose Knows
I’m a huge Green Acres fan and this is a great collection. The packaging is very efficient and colorful. There are six color coded, four disc cases; one for each season. The video transfers are as good as I’ve seen for this series and the menus are minimal and easy to use. There are a few extras but the quality of the series and the packaging are the most important thing to me.
– Theodore C Kerchner
This is a wonderfully well written comedy series. Very brilliantly done, with clever themes that only simpletons would incorrectly call stupid. This series is written with tight comedic lines throughout. It is like a standup comedy routine, by each performer. No greed on the part of Shout Factory, because the first 3 seasons were released by the “greedy” MGM studio. They did nothing to enhance the video from the 35mm original prints. Judging by the past, Shout Factory on the other hand will take the 35mm prints and give us the first 3 and last 3 seasons in pristine condition. I for one am excited to finally be able to buy these fun shows via Shout Factory, the way they should have been done. Even if you purchased the first 3 seasons, they weren’t worth the price. SF will correct the greed and mistreatment of MGM. This is one series not to miss, if you watch it the way it was meant to be watched, as a standup comedy, smartly written, thematic episodes with running congruity, referencing other top rated rural series of the time. Very few shows have been written this well. Enjoy!
– B A Dayley
DVD Wholesale Main Features:
Actors: Eddie Albert, Eva Gabor
Directors: Various
Format: Box set, Color, Full Screen, NTSC
Language: English
Region: Region 1
Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1
Number of discs: 24
Rated: NR Not Rated
Studio: Shout! Factory
DVD Release Date: October 17, 2017
Run Time: 4245 minutes
ASIN: B073LJT6NY
