Customer Reviews

Barney Miller Season 2

5 star:		(52)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This is about 4 years overdue. I look forward to picking it up, and I hope the next installment doesn't have to wait another 4 years.
The cast is just beginning to settle into their roles, though they are still adding detectives here an there, trying things out.
Season 3 is the golden season. The really hit a groove that year. I am looking forward to seeing some of these episodes though.
Detrich makes his first appearence this season in the episode Fish, about halfway through this season. But it's only one episode. Steve Landsberg also makes an appearence in the first episode of season 2 as Father Paul. His first full season is season 3 when he gets trained by Fish, and is constantly having to move from desk to desk.

BARNEY MILLER: THE COMPLETE SECOND SEASON is a great addition to anyone's DVD collection.
The show ran from 1975 to 1982, but, other than clothing and references to current events of the day, I found myself forgetting that this second season was originally broadcast more than thirty years ago. The jokes are fast and furious and Hal Linden (Barney Miller) and the rest of the cast are wonderful. The episodes run the gambit of scenarios. Everything from retirement to on-the-job romance to gay bashing are dealt with intelligently and humorously. I'm almost certain you'll find yourself watching these episodes again and again. These are hard times and it's important to make time for laughter. Life is too short.

Here is the official press release with all of the details:

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE




Barney Miller:
The Complete Second Season

Classic Award-Winning '70s TV Cop Comedy Arrives on DVD January 22

All 22 Episodes Available in a Three-Disc Boxed Set



Culver City, CA (November 12, 2007) - Expand your television DVD collection of great classic comedies when Sony Pictures Home Entertainment debuts Barney Miller: The Complete Second Season on DVD January 22. The ABC series, which was nominated for six Emmys® including Outstanding Comedy Series, stars Hal Linden (TV's Search for Tomorrow, The Other Woman) daytime Emmy® nominee Abe Vigoda (The Godfather), and Jack Soo (Thoroughly Modern Millie, The Green Berets).

The three-disc DVD set includes all 22 episodes from the second season, with guest stars Linda Lavin (TV's Alice), David Doyle (TV's General Hospital), and Adam Arkin (Hitch). Only available on DVD currently, watch these classic episodes on your own schedule! Barney Miller: The Complete Second Season will be available for $29.95 SRP.

Barney Miller is the kind of cop we'd all like to meet. He somehow manages to maintain order at New York City's 12th Precinct in Greenwich Village and remains level-headed while dealing with a group of off-the-wall inner-city detectives. Among them is a gambler, another who attends renaissance philosophy conventions for fun, and a third who spends most of his time daydreaming about being an author. This season, the precinct deals with potential layoffs, a man who threatens to blow up the station unless he can speak with President Nixon, marijuana evidence that suspiciously disappears, and a job offer from Florida for Barney.

Barney Miller: The Complete Second Season episodes include:
Doomsday
Social Worker
The Layoff
Ambush
Heat Wave
Arsonist
Grand Hotel
Discovery
You Dirty Rat
Horse Thief
Rain
Fish
Hot Dogs
Protection
Happy New Year
Sniper
Fear of Flying
Block Party
Massage Parlor
The Psychiatrist
The Kid
The Mole

DVD Special Features Include:
Digitally Mastered Audio & Video
Bonus Minisode: Charlie's Angels "Angels in Chains"
Bonus Minisode: Facts of Life "The Growing Pains"
Full Screen Presentations
Audio: English (Stereo)
Closed Captioned

BROADCAST YEAR: 1975-1976
Barney Miller: The Complete Second Season has a run time of approximately 553 minutes and is not rated.

There are several sitcoms from the 70's that have worn well - The Bob Newhart Show, Mary Tyler Moore Show, and this, Barney Miller. The first season, which was just a half season, set the stage for the second season, and the series only got better. A terrific ensemble cast, great stories and very well directed. Linda Lavin's best role was here as Det. Janice Wentworth, definitely NOT Alice. Abe Vigoda as Fish reels off great one-liners. Much was made at the time (I was 15) about the diversity of the group and it genuinely made a difference. Plus you get a better insight to the 70's than just about any show with respect to the issues of the day. I can't wait for the rest of the series to come out!!!

Barney Miller was(along with Hill Street Blues and the first three seasons of MASH) the last prime-time, commercial television show that I actually scheduled into my weekly "To-Do" list, so I greeted with absolute elation the news that somebody had finally made the second season available. I check here almost daily to see if additional seasons have been released (and would appreciate if anybody in the know would let me know if the release of additional seasons are on the way.)
It isn't hard to figure out why Barney M. was, and still is, the high watermark in television comedy: Good writing. The story, the humor was everything. No exotic sets (basically the entire eight seasons are shot in the squad room) no special effects, no sex, no violence. All the money seems to have been spent on writing good scripts. The cast look, talk and act like real, believable people in the real world. (There are actually old people in the cast, women who don't bulge from low-cut blouses and parents that don't look like high school students.) Even more amazing, most of the characters dealt with here are actually non-people like taxi drivers, plumbers, waitresses and street urchins who take a bus to work. Everybody in entertainment today knows that real people are doctors, lawyers, advertising executives, bankers and handsome corporate heads who drive expensive sports cars. Character development is fantastic, and even semi-regulars like Lugar and Skanlon are unique, superbly developed characters..and hilarious.
This show is, above all, a rare adult comedy. I understand it hasn't been released before (aside from the first season) because there didn't seem to be a market for it.

The producers found their niche in the second season of Barney Miller. The laughs are cranked up as is the realism. Will they survive the layoffs? Will they ever get heat again? Will the federal government bailout New York City? And, yet, they find ways to make us laugh at what many consider to be the most real cop show on television.

Linda Lavin makes four appearances as Det. Wentworth (Before she became "Alice"); She & Wojo are developing a relationship. Dietrich makes his first appearance (appearing a few episodes before as a priest who never was). Fish is on the verge of retirement, we even get an episode of him at home. Harris begins his writing career for the local police newspaper.

The comedy is turned on high, we can't help but laugh at what goes on at Precinct 12. Even Barney himself carries on as a trooper maneuvering through a couple of episodes with a broken foot. This set has 22 episodes on 3 discs but there aren't any bonus features. I'm not going to count the two excerpts from other ABC series going on DVD. Get this season 2 of Barney Miller & see what made this show a hit!

The long awaited second season of one of TV's greatest comedies has arrived. The second season is even better than the first for a series that is good enough to carry great comedy for eight years without leaving the squad room.

Now I just have to wait until the 3rd through 8th seasons are released...

It would've been a grave injustice to release the first season without the following seasons. And it was undoubtedly a grave injustice making us wait four years before putting season 2 out on DVD.

Anyone who appreciates fine, quality television comedy of the 1970s will certainly bask in adding this set to your collections. This is a great sitcom, & a prime & shining example of good chemistry among a superb cast. Seven years on broadcast tv in its original run should speak volumes for the success this show had been throughout its initial run. Keep the sets coming. I'll buy 'em all!

Five Stars. Hopefully this will sell off the shelves, and "they" won't wait so long to release future seasons of Barney Miller.

More of this classy series has finally became available on DVD. The first season (a paltry 13 episodes) came out several years ago, and it has taken a long time to add to that collection. With all of the garbage that is being released on DVD, we need more of this level of quality.

Barney Miller is an ensemble piece about a group of policemen trying to control the chaos without losing their humanity. Today's "cop shows" are so obsessed with realism that they forget the value of a little perspective, especially a humorous one. Like MASH, Barney Miller can take you from a guffaw to tears in a heartbeat, and the streets of New York City in the 70s provide an even more varied backdrop than does the Korean (or its analogue, the Vietnam) war.

The episodes in this collection are classic, from "The Layoff" which was written in response to the city's plea to the Federal Government for emergency funding, to which the Feds responded with a resounding "Drop Dead" to the colorful characters that are always multidimensional and unique. The quality of this show is unsurpassed. I sincerely hope that the rest of these shows are released at reasonable intervals. They deserve far more respect and will deliver far more enjoyment than most of the rest of the drivel that is out there.