ALF Season One

[spman 0]

Am I the only one on earth willing to admit they boiught this? ALF was a great sitcom, way ahead of it's time. Unlike the other schmaltz on TV at the time like The Cosby Show or Full House, ALF had attitude. Sure, the show may seem really geeky by todays standards, but watching it now, it still stands the test of time, and still holds up today unlike the shows I mentioned previously which are of little value to audiences today. A quick rundonw of this set, it's 4 discs and contains all twenty five episodes of the first season. Unlike the later seasons of ALF, which had quite a few really bizarre episodes, this first season doesn't stray too far from the normal sitcom formula, and it works out well. Like I said earlier, while it might not seem too crass by todays standards, ALF really stood out amongst the other family oriented sitcoms of the time because it wasn't about teaching values or morals, it was about attitude.

 

The episodes have been remasterd and are presented in 4:3 Full Screen with 2.0 Dolby Digital which both looks and sounds outstanding. I'm glad Lions Gate seemed to take their time with this set, because many companies lately seem to just do a direct film to DVD transfer without care for how it looks, and just want to make a quick buck.

 

Special Features include the Original Unaired Pilot, which really isn't a whole lot different then the one that ended up being broadcast, a 10 minute gag reel featuring outakes from the show, and a short "ALF Trivia" section which just contains a brief synopsis of the series. The menus are wll d0one and feature interactive segments hosted by ALF, which are pretty funny. A commentary track or two featuring the creator of ALF or better yet the original cast would have been interesting, especially considering just about all the original actors fell off the face of the planet after the series ended, but the stuff they did include was a nice touch.

 

Overall I must say I am happy with this set. Fans of the show will probobly be dissapointed with the thin selection of extras, buremasterd picture and sound certainly make up for it. Hopefully Season 2 will have more behind the scenes stuff na dmaybe a commentary or two, but I hear that Paul Fusco, the creator of ALF is really adament about keeping the illusion alive that ALF is real, and not a puppet, so it's doubtful that we'd ever learn too much of the dirt behind the series

 

Overall 8/10

[Bruiser Chong 0]

I ordered it for $21 yesterday and can't wait until it gets here. I was going to pass initially because of the $32+ price tag, but finding it for that price, I couldn't let it slip by. I was disapointed to just hear that the episodes appear to be the edited for syndication cuts. If this is true, I may turn around and sell the set. The whole point of TV on DVD is to get the uncut, original versions of the shows.

[spman 0]

I ordered it for $21 yesterday and can't wait until it gets here.  I was going to pass initially because of the $32+ price tag, but finding it for that price, I couldn't let it slip by.  I was disapointed to just hear that the episodes appear to be the edited for syndication cuts.  If this is true, I may turn around and sell the set.  The whole point of TV on DVD is to get the uncut, original versions of the shows.

 

Really? I have a tape around here somewhere with a few original airings on it, so I'll have to compare the two later.

 

Edit: I ran a few episodes through my DVD player downstairs with the timer, and each episode runs about 21:30 which is in sync with the length of time with commercials most broadcast TV shows go for. Untill I dig out my old tapes, I have nothing to compare it to, but considering most other series that I've seen cut for syndication rarely go over the 20 minute mark after editing, I am inclined to believe these episodes of ALF are uncut.

 

Edit Again: http://www.tvshows.de/alf/e-stats.htm According to this, he average episode length is 23 minutes so it's possible that there is a minute and a half of editing. I will investigate this further.

[LivingLegendGaryColeman 0]

I passed on it today but I plan on getting it sometime soon, today just ended up being a really good release day, with a bunch of cool re-release/first time releases along with Kill Bill.

[spman 0]

Ok, I just Compared the First Episode with one I have on tape, and yeah, about a minute and a half is missing from the beginning. Nothing major, but it does make me angry. Perhaps when the series went into syndication, they did not bother to hold onto the original episodes and erased them?

[PsychoDriver 0]

I'm buying this thing ASAP. Bout time Alf arrived on DVD.

[JasonX 0]

Ok, I just Compared the First Episode with one I have on tape, and yeah, about a minute and a half is missing from the beginning. Nothing major, but it does make me angry. Perhaps when the series went into syndication, they did not bother to hold onto the original episodes and erased them?

 

Current word is this from TVShows on DVD (which suprisingly pulled the news article off their website after posting it, opting to wait until Lion's Gate gives an official press release to them): That Lions Gates had access to two sets of Masters for Alf Season One. The Uncut NBC airing version and the Cut Syndication version. Apparently the Uncut Masters needed to be remastered so Lions Gates (apparently not wanting to spend money on fixing the uncut episodes) opted to just use the cut Syndication masters for their DVD release.

[Drury37 0]

I am going later this week to buy this and I am really looking foward to watching it.

Thanks.

[Bruiser Chong 0]

This has to be some of the worst packaging I've ever seen in my life. I just got mine in the mail and just from picking up the DDD.com box, I could tell I had a floater. Damn thing sounded like a murraca.

 

Anyway, I opened up the set itself and no freaking wonder why the discs don't stay put. You have to put Disc 2 and 4 ON TOP of Disc 1 and 3. What the hell is that? I can't even get the two discs to stay in place now.

[Downhome 0]

I don't have the set, but it sounds like how they have disc two and three set up in the 3-disc Mystic River set. You have to take disc two out if you want to listen to the soundtrack, I HATE that. I just know this Alf set would piss me off.

 

I'm not going to buy it, as I've heard too many bad things about it. I'm going to hold out for a re-release of the set, with ALL of the original episodes.

[Bruiser Chong 0]

Yeah, my mistake. You put discs 2 and 4 in first and 1 and 3 go on top of that. Just really shoddy packaging, nonetheless. I'm probably going to return mine.

[Guest The Winter Of My Discontent]

Alf DVD set? C'mon, did you pick up Boy Meets World too?

 

folks, frighten me

[spman 0]

Alf DVD set? C'mon, did you pick up Boy Meets World too?

 

folks, frighten me

Boy Meets World falls under the Full House / Cosby Show category of "It really wasn't funny then, and you can't help but roll your eyes at how bad it is now" ALF on the other hand is still a genuinely amusing show, even by todays standards.