Product Details

• Actors: Paul Fusco, Max Wright, Anne Schedeen, Andrea Elson, Benji Gregory
• Directors: Paul Fusco, Gary Shimokawa, Nancy Heydorn, Peter Baldwin, Peter Bonerz
• Writers: Adrienne Armstrong
• Format: Color, NTSC
• Language: English (Dolby Digital 2.0 Surround)
• Subtitles: English, Spanish
• Dubbed: French, Spanish
• Region: Region 1 (U.S. and Canada only. Read more about DVD formats.)
  
• Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1
• Number of discs: 4
• Rated: NR (Not Rated)
• Studio: Lions Gate
• DVD Release Date: August 10, 2004
• Run Time: 616 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (236 customer reviews)
• ASIN: B0002DB5N6
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #12,328 in Movies & TV (See Top 100 in Movies & TV)
• Learn more about "ALF - Season One" on IMDb

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com

"He's just like E.T.," says a character of the fuzzy extraterrestrial stranded on Earth in the pilot episode of ALF. But the fun of this late 1980s family sitcom is that the sardonic ALF (an acronym for Alien Life Form) is nothing like the interplanetary innocent of Steven Spielberg's classic. With his whiplash wit and huckster sensibility, ALF (real name: Gordon Shumway from the late planet Melmac, Lower East Side) enters the lives of the Tanner family as a fully formed rascal whose spacecraft crashes into their garage one night. Worried that the feds will chop ALF up for research purposes, the Tanners--father Willie (Max Wright), a cautious civil servant who doesn't like a lot of fuss at home; wife Kate (Anne Shedeen), and kids Lynn (Andrea Elson) and Brian (Benji Gregory)--reluctantly take ALF in like a shambling, profligate uncle who cracks wise despite having fallen on hard times.

There is a touch of darkness to ALF that inspires some interesting episodes. While most of season 1's episodes find the Tanners and their permanent guest struggling with compatibility, certain stories are sharper for indulging a little black comedy. "Looking for Lucky," for instance, finds Willie and Kate assuming that ALF--who is quite open about his fondness for eating cats--made a snack out of the family kitty. In "Pennsylvania 6-5000," Willie is accused of being a terrorist after ALF uses his host's ham radio to contact Air Force One. One of the best episodes, "Wild Thing" (written by David Silverman, later a co-producer on The Simpsons), is a nutty burlesque in which ALF asks the Tanners to lock him in a crate while he undergoes a 24-hour madness peculiar to Melmac-ians. After he escapes, chaos ensues in the community as cats disappear, a gorilla is freed at the zoo, and Willie--looking for ALF--prowls the streets in his pajamas. Fans of Jerry Stahl's book Permanent Midnight: A Memoir, in which the Hollywood writer describes working on ALF while supporting a severe drug habit, will be interested in his season 1 scripts, particularly the surreal "La Cucaracha," in which ALF and Willie do battle with a car-size cockroach. --Tom Keogh

Product Description

Max Wright, Anne Schedeen. One starry night in 1986, the Tanner family get an unexpected houseguest-a furry, four-foot-high Alien Life Form" they call Alf, who quickly becomes part of the family. Includes all 26 episodes and more. 4 DVDs. 1986-1987/color/10 hrs/NR/fullscreen.

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

112 of 120 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars My all time favorite sitcom finally on DVD! June 12, 2004

By Ted VINE™ VOICE

Format:DVD|Amazon Verified Purchase

At long last, my favorite sitcom is being released on DVD.
I remember when my father had me watch the show ehn it first aired. I was 5 years old at the time. He taped several episodes which I continued to watch. A few years ago, I was able to gat all the episodes on tape from a friend. The humor became much more understandable as I was 20 years old.

An interesting fact is that almost all the episodes are named after songs and that the episode name often describes the plot.

Here is a brief synopsis of the episodes

Pilot Episode
ALF crash lands his spaceship in the Tanner family's garage and he begins to live with them

Strangers in the Night
The next door neighbor babysits Brian and ALF causes trouble but later catches a burglar

Looking for Lucky
After ALF trashes the house and the family cat, Lucky disappears, the family falsely accuses ALF of eating him.

Pennsylvania 6-5000
When ALF usus Willie's shortwave radio to call the president on Air Force One, Willie is arrested for the crime

Keepin' the Faith
ALF buys $4000 worth of cosmetics and convinces the family to resell them at a higher price

For Your Eyes Only
ALF meets a blind woman on a call in radio show and wants to meet her in person.

Help Me Rhonda
ALF manages to contact his girlfriend, Rhonda, on the shrtwave radio and debates about whether he wants to live with her

Don't It Make My Brown Eyes Blue
ALF has a crush on Lynn and makes a rock video to woo her.

Jump
ALF convinces Willie to try again on a skydive that he chickened out on years earlier.

Baby You Can Drive My Car
After Lynn complains about not having a second car in the family, ALF sells the gold on his spaceship to buy a $90,000 Ferarri

On the Road Again
The family go on a camping trip and Willie gets mad at ALF and ALF gets lost.

Oh, Tannerbaum
After ALF cuts up the family Christmas tree, and all the places are sold out, ALF convinces Willie to go out to the mountaians to cut one down.

Mother and Child Reunion
Kate's mother comes to visit but stays because she has nowhere else to go. Fed up with having to stay in the garage. ALF decides to meet her.

A Little Bit of Soap
When Kate and her mother get in a fight, ALF turns what they say into a script and sends it in for a soap opera which airs on TV

I've Got a New Attitude
ALF helps Kate's mother, Dorothy with finding a new friend.

Try to Remember (two part episode)
After getting electrocuted in the bathtub, ALF gets amnesia and believes that he is an insurance salesman from Michigan. The family helps him jog his memory and we see flashbacks of what they talk about.

Border Song
A teenager from Mexico meets ALF and they become friends

Wild Thing
ALF enters a day long phase that his species goes through were extreme craziness occurs.

Going Out of My Head Over You
Fed up with ALF's antics, Willie consults a psychologist to meet with ALF

Lookin' Through the Window
ALF believes he saw the next door neighbor murder his wife and begins to investigate

It Isn't Easy... Bein' Green
When Brian plays an asparagus in a school play, ALF tries to help him overcome stage fright.

The Gambler
After ALF loses a lot of money betting on a horse race, he changes the prices on the items on the garage sale.

Weird Science
When Brian adds planets to his solar system model at ALF's suggestion, he flunks the contest and ALF covinces Willie that the extra planets do exist there.

La Cucharacha
A cockroach from ALF's spaceship gets loose and a can of bug spray causes it to greatly increase in size.

Come Fly With Me
The family goes on a trip with their neighbors, the Ochmoneks.

I have waited a long time for the show to be released and am glad that they are finally doing so.

45 of 47 people found the following review helpful

3.0 out of 5 stars Show's funny, gets less stars for the syndicated thing August 13, 2004

By Joseph Siegler VINE™ VOICE

Format:DVD|Amazon Verified Purchase

If you've read the other reviews, you'll already know that the episodes on this disc are syndicated versions, not the original NBC ones. That's a shame, as my wife and I watched the show since Day 1 (I'm 38 in 2004, you do the math).

It is nice to have them on DVD. Would it have been better to have the original uncut ones? Hell yeah. But I'll take this. I just hope that if the next seasons are released, that they don't use syndication.

The comments by Alf on the DVD menus are pretty funny, and the blooper reel is awesome (What the hell is that? A plane?) As a long time Alf fan, I'm glad to see these on DVD, but my excitement is tinged with disappointment over them being edited.

The DVD intros recorded by Alf are quite funny. The bit about more FBI warnings made me laugh out loud, as did some of the blooper reel - to hear Alf (mildly) swear made me and my wife really laugh out loud). The syndicated issue aside, the show is STILL damn funny - there's no getting around that issue. :)

NOTE: There's a statement from Lion's Gate on why they have the syndicated versions over the originals online over at TVshowsondvd.com - look in their Alf section.

52 of 57 people found the following review helpful

3.0 out of 5 stars MAJOR disappointment! August 11, 2004

By skinnyrobbie

Format:DVD

I have most every episode taped from the original NBC airings. I expected to be able to eliminate them from my ever-cluttered collection of stuff with the purchase of this long awaited set. Why Lions Gate chose to use edited syndication episodes completely baffles the imagination. Perhaps they plan on later releasing a "Deluxe Edition" so that the consumer will get hit twice to pay for the same product. The $40 list price should have more than adequately covered licensing the rights to the full episodes, but I guess there's no end to corporate greed.

I am stunned by the rave reviews of the Extras: 1) a short gag reel of which only about 15% is funny, 2) some brief trivia screens which is mostly made up of obvious facts that any fan of the show already knows (like A.L.F. stands for Alien Life Form, for example), and 3) credits screens - credits for the DVD authoring is now considered a bonus extra?!?! Sheesh! Would have made better sense to have included some of the best ALF bits from Hollywood Squares, or even included some of the many commercials ALF has appeared in over the years. Or interviews with the cast reflecting on being a part of the show.

The omission of a feature to play all of the episodes on a disc is simply appalling. Interactive is nice, but can you imagine an audio CD in which you have to select each song separately? Adding this feature would have taken the authors mere minutes to code. I just don't get it.

Rather than deluxe packaging, like you get with most TV series box sets, a clamshell case crams in the four discs in a clunky, overlapping layout. No book, either, just a single sheet listing the discs and episodes, and a slipcover for the case. I've seen public domain sets packaged better.

I'm not sure if the picture quality is due to the original source or not, so I'll reserve judgement on that. Just don't touch the Zoom button because the artifacting from the low bitrate encoding is completely useless. Even still frames in normal mode look bumpy. No other TV series sets in my collection have these problems. How could so many elements get overlooked?

The three stars are for the episodes themselves, which are priceless. A smart, funny, irreverent sitcom that eclipsed "Mork and Mindy", which aired opposite ALF on rival network ABC. I still laugh out loud every time I view this wonderful series. The disc introductions by the ol' ALFer himself are quite amusing in their own respect and deserve to be a part of a package that was created with more care, passion, and respect to the fans of the series.