Customer Reviews

Car 54 Where Are You: Complete First Season

5 star:		(41)
4 star:		(15)
3 star:		(8)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(11)

 

 

First of all, This is a great show, and I'm glad to see it out on DVD. The quality of the video is good, they did nice job there. However, what they did not do a nice job with is the packaging - Shanachie should fire Lorien Babajian for providing such a poorly designed package. With a cardboard package I kind of expect there to be a slipcase, but Shanachie does not provide one. That's strike one.

What is even worse are the way the discs are stored within the package. It is just horrendous!!! I have never seen anything like it before, and I hope I never have to see it again! Most cases have some sort of spindle that the discs snap into from the center hole. Not Car 54, no way - this case has slots at the bottom that the discs "slide" into and are held in place by a little plastic tab on each side. Very frustrating packaging. I can easily see a lot of returns for people who scratch their discs getting them out, or even people cracking them if they use force, so heads up Amazon! The instructions are printed directly on the discs (how tacky): "To Remove From Tray - Push Down, Pull Up" - YEAH I GET THAT, RIGHT? This is also where it would have been a good idea to include a slip case, just in case the discs get dislodged from this dreadful packaging!- That is Strike Two - Needless to say, I promptly removed the discs from the package and stored them in slim line cases next to the original on my shelf.

I STRONGLY RECOMMEND ANYONE WHO PURCHASES THIS RELEASE TO HAVE EMPTY CASES READY TO PUT THE DISCS IN.

Finally strike three is the lack of information that comes with such a great series - all you get is the name of each episode printed behind where the discs are stored, and if the episode had a guest star it says "with (so and so)" after the title. No original airdate, no synopsis, no booklet, nothing. Something like that would have really helped this release, especially since Shanachie did NOT PUT THEM IN ORIGINAL AIRDATE ORDER! So, if you want to watch them in the order you aired, you have to do your OWN research first, then piece them together, switching discs. What a botched job. According to the site TVShows on DVD.com, Shanachie determined "the most attractive presentation would be to have the episodes ordered by popularity" I tend to disagree with that logic. But anyway, all the episodes are there and the quality is nice, so I am only downgrading one star overall.

If I could rate the packaging that would be less than one star, your flawed designed is forcing me to take up valuable extra real estate on my shelf, no other series has done that to me.

Somebody was drunk when they compiled the episodes for this set. Here is the correct viewing order:
1 17/Sep/61 Who's For Swordfish?
2 24/Sep/61 Something Nice for Sol
3 01/Oct/61 Home Sweet Sing Sing
4 08/Oct/61 Change Your Partners
5 15/Oct/61 I Won't Go
6 22/Oct/61 Muldoon's Star
7 29/Oct/61 Paint Job
8 05/Nov/61 Love Finds Muldoon
9 12/Nov/61 Gypsy Curse
10 19/Nov/61 Thirty Days Notice
11 26/Nov/61 Catch Me on the Paar Show
12 03/Dec/61 The Taming of Lucille
13 10/Dec/61 Put It in the Bank
14 17/Dec/61 Get Well, Officer Schnauzer
15 24/Dec/61 Christmas at the 53rd
16 07/Jan/62 The Sacrifice
17 14/Jan/62 Boom, Boom, Boom
18 21/Jan/62 Toody and Muldoon Crack Down
19 28/Jan/62 Toody's Paradise
20 04/Feb/62 How High is Up?
21 11/Feb/62 Toody and the Art World
22 18/Feb/62 What Happened to Thursday?
23 25/Feb/62 How Smart Can You Get?
24 04/Mar/62 Today I Am a Man
25 11/Mar/62 No More Pickpockets
26 18/Mar/62 The Beast Who Walked the Bronx
27 25/Mar/62 The Courtship of Sylvia Schnauzer
28 01/Apr/62 The Auction
29 08/Apr/62 Quiet! We're Thinking
30 22/Apr/62 I Love Lucille

I knew something was wrong when disc 4 was telling me it had episodes with Al Lewis before he became a part of the police squad. In the first episode on disc 1 he is already a member, and the Christmas episode would NEVER be the last episode of the season. So the order was just messed up!

Unbeleivable that any manufacturer would chose the type of packaging they designed for this unfortunate great old TV show. Shanachie, correct me if I'm wrong, is new to the DVD business but has been manufacturing CD's for years which is probably what they should stick to. For "Car 54" the four DVD's of this set are not even mounted on spindles. Instead they are placed on top of each other with no protection and only a slight plastic tab to provide tension to hold them in place. When I first opened the package, two of the DVD's immediately fell out and landed on the floor - of course they're scratched now. The other two DVD's also became scratched when I removed them from the box because you actually have to slide them against one another to remove them - guaranteed scratches everytime you view them.

THE FIRST TIME ON DVD WHAT A SCREW UP THIS COMPANY SHOULD REDO THE FIRST SEASON AND SEND A NEW COPY WITH THE SHOW IN THE PROPER ORDER IT WAS MADE AND SEND THE PROPER ORDER DVD SET TO THE PEOPLE WHO ORDERED THROUGH AMAZON.COM AS A REPLACEMENT FOR THE INCORRECT EPISODE ORDER THEY PUT THE EPISODE ORDER LIKE THIS DISC#1 EPISODE 6,19,15,23 26,24,25,5. DISC#2 EPISODE 4,28,16,11,9,27,30,29. DISC#3 EPISODE 13,14,7,22,12,1,17,21. DISC#4 EPISODE 2,8,10,20,3,18. HOW MANY TIMES DO I HAVE TO CHANGE THE DVD TO SEE CAR 54 WHERE ARE YOU IN THE CORRECT ORDER? MAYBE SHANACHIE.COM CAN GIVE US THE BLUE PRINT. YOU ONLY HAVE TO CHANGE THE DVD 19 TIMES TO WATCH 30 EPISODES IN ORDER. WHAT A TREAT! DAVE BLANCHETTE HOPES THIS EPISODE ROAD MAP HELPS.

How hard is it for video company to understand what the tv on DVD customers want. We been saying the same thing for the last decade (All we want is safe and simple packaging for the DVD set that is easy to remove and replace the discs without scratching them, Unedited episodes with original music if possible and in original airdate order) and still they don't listen. Case in point right here. Packaging so badly made it look like something they bought from the video dept. of INSANE 'R US and my theory on how they chose the episode order goes like this: they pin the episode list to the wall of their office and threw darts at the list and where the darts landed is the episode order. How many people agree with me.

First of all, let me join the chorus of other "Car 54" lovers that I am so glad these shows *finally* appear on DVD. They are quite hilarious in an early 1960s sort of way, and Gwynne and Ross are terrific together. There are some wonderful performances throughout, especially the episodes with Alice "M" Ghostly and Carl Ballantine. Look for comedian Nipsey Russell and Billy Sands (from "Bilko" and "McHale's Navy") in several episodes. Classic TV that holds up well.

HOWEVER, there are many, many reasons TO NOT PURCHASE this set, First of all these episodes are the SYNDICATED versions, and are NOT UNCUT! In fact, several have horrible, disjointed cuts where material was excised and the scene begins in the middle. Each show should run 27 minutes, but instead they are clocking in around 25 1/2, which is unacceptable. This fact is not mentioned in any advertising or the box - which to me is pure deception.

Second, these shows are OUT OF ORDER - they are neither presented by production nor air date! If you're aiming for the hard-core DVD collector market, why would you mix the episodes up - especially as there is character development as the season progressed? In another forum, the DVD makers said they spoke with Car 54 "experts" who helped decide the order. I don't believe it. My guess? The episodes are arranged this way for music licensing and the like. Rhino did this with their Monkees TV VHS box set years ago. That is, episodes were not in order due to "licensing fees" (read: cheap.)

Menu authoring is barely at a public-domain level. There are no animated menus, no Car 54 theme playing in the background, no scene selection, no play all function. Each DVD menu is a static and colorized photo of Toody and Muldoon with episode titles. No motion at all. Very, very shoddy.

Then there there are the DVDs themselves. Looking for a really neat photo of the cast or member on each disk? Well, don't look here as the disks are this putrid brown, with no photos or other Car 54 art. The packaging is also very shabby, with the four disks falling out immediately when opening. Couldn't they have sprung a little $$$$ for secure packaging? The "Package Designer," Lorien Babajan, should be fired over this botched DVD set and should never again "design" any future sets.

Of course, there is NO detailed episode list, NO episode commentaries, NO booklet, NO cast bios. Nothing. Nada. I own probably 60 or so TV series on DVD and this is absolutely the worst one.

Car 54 deserves better handling than this. I've written to Shout Factory (who create amazing DVD sets) and suggested that they license season two instead of the pikers that created this box set.

I will NOT be purchasing Season 2.

By the way, I posted similar comments on their Facebook page. Unsurprisingly, they were taken down almost immediately.

Finally one of the all time classics makes it to DVD and rightfully so. Some many actors in comedy today said that the show was way ahead of it's time with the writing talents from Nat Hiken.
This is the way comedy was meant to be smart, like able characters, amusing and funny plots.
The chemistry of Joe E. Ross and Fred Gwynne were perfect., as was the rest of the cast including Al Lewis and Charlotte Rae (Yes Mrs. Garrett from Facts of life)
I can't wait till season 1 comes out I remember some classic episodes that I can't wait to see again and season 2 is planned for later in the year to complete the collection.

If you love classic TV or are just tired of the junk they call sitcoms today then you need to treat yourself to a great show.

Car fifty four is a great clean comedy, why can't we do that now. I watched it with my wife, son of 19 and daughter of 18. We laughed our heads off showing me that we don't need sexual situations or language for a good comedy. I think that the comedy writers of the past have better talent than the writers of today.

This is one of the best written, cleverest television shows of all time. The comedy builds and the plot advances to a wonderful climax in each episdode. This deserves a far better release than it's given here. The fact the price was cut in half once and then I received a one dollar discount after it shipped was telling. When I received the set the disks were rattling loose in the envelope. The holder has the absolutely worst mounting ever conceived. The third and forth disks, the middle episode of each refuse to play in three different players... leads me to believe it's the disks. To return them I need to print a return label,, means buying a printer for the return label, shipping envelope etc. Best to write off the unplayable parts. Even with the botched packaging and faulty disks this is an absolutly brilliant comedy show. I sincerly wish I could award this five stars, I really do. Brings to mind the old saying " It's right what you did, it's just wrong how you did it"

*Update*
When we contacted Shanachie they were very plesant and helpful. They offered a replacement set and sent it at no charge. They even checked them to insure they were in perfect condition.

A classic old series great to finally see on DVD, but then Shanachie blows it by putting the episodes in non-specific order?? How stupid can they be!? They said they did it in order of popularity of the fans??? And what 1 fan was it that they talked to!?!? I now feel like this set is not as complete as it should be. EVERY SERIES should be released in broadcast order PERIOD. I honestly think Shanachie simply BLEW IT and is trying to cover up that fact. If they insist in doing things this way, I may have to reconsider picking up future seasons.