Customer Reviews

Dr. Katz Professional Therapist - The Complete Series

5 star:		(33)
4 star:		(8)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Why does the Product Details not include a section for DVD extras?

* 13-disc set including every episode
* three "lost" episodes featuring Dave Atell, Whoopi Goldberg and Conan O'Brien
* An Evening with Dr. Katz: Live from the Comedy Central Stage with Maria Bamford, Kathy Griffin, Andy Kindler, Paul F. Tompkins and series co-stars H. Jon Benjamin and Laura Silverman
* 28-page booklet, with an introduction from Dr. Katz and memoirs from his favorite patients
* The Bibliography of Dr. Katz
* "Short Attention Span Theater" shorts
* "Shrink Wrapped" - an original Squigglevision short
* Checking In: Dr. Katz follows up with former patients Dave Atell, Joy Behar, Emo Philips and Steven Wright
* Audio commentary by Jonathan Katz, H. Jon Benjamin, Ray Romano, Laura Silverman and Tom Snyder

This is one of the funniest series born of American television, in my opinion, and I will certainly purchase this SOME day.

HOWEVER: As another reviewer has written, I've already bought Seasons 1 and 2 on DVD, and it's a manageable purchase for $15-20 per set. But now, to have Seasons 3-6, I will have to purchase the first two seasons AGAIN. And the purchase price (while certainly competitive for the number of discs involved), is a power of 10 higher than I usually put out for DVD entertainment. So that's a bit of a letdown.

I remember watching this show late at night with my college roommates and laughing hysterically. Over the past few years, I have been looking for it. I was happy with the first two seasons coming out of DVD and caught a few episodes on Comedy Central "On Demand" through my cable. I was not disappointed. It is still hilarious. It looked to be in jeopardy of being shelved, but thankfully the full-set is coming.
For anyone wondering, the animation is crude, bordering on annoying. But that isn't the selling point. It could be a radio show and it would be hilarious. About 1/2 of the show takes place in Dr. Katz's office as he has therapy sessions with well known stand-up comedians. Most of it is them doing some of their stand-up material and Dr. Katz reacting. This is the most hit or miss part of the show for me. 75% of the comedians are funny. Big names too. Ray Romano, Dave Chappelle, Jon Stewart, Wanda Sykes, Sarah Silverman, etc. The part of the show that never missed for me was the storyline surrounding Ben Katz. Perhaps my favorite character of all time on television. He never misses. He makes me laugh every episode. His interactions with Dr.l Katz, Laura (the receptionist), and anyone else he encounters are very funny.

This 13(!!) disc "raised" coverart box set contains a booklet, all 48 (44?) original episodes, plus lost episodes, shorts AND a Comedy Central special featuring a REAL LIFE Dr. Katz skit! Damn, is Laura HOT! ;) It was surreal to see the characters in real life doing what they do best. Totally amazing! I'll treasure this box till the day I die! AND don't forget, at this time you can only individually purchase seasons 1+2 on DVD! This box is the ONLY way to get everything ever made in this series on DVD! One of the best, if not THE best, program Comedy Central ever aired! ONLY drawback is lack of audio commentary track for most episodes.

Feels like a ripoff...they release seasons 1 and 2, then suddenly decide to just stop releasing seasons and give us the whole package at once? Guess I'll be buying seasons 1 and 2 yet again, as part of this set.

This DVD set is well designed. All the disks are stored in a single case that's easy to flip through. Each season is split into 2 DVDs of 6-7 episodes each and the seasons have matching colors. The complete series DVDs don't have the obnoxious advertisements that you had to skip through before the menu in the previously released DVDs.

The menus are fairly easy to navigate and provide the names of the comedians and air date of each episode. The video looks good in either widescreen or 4x3 aspects (to me anyway) and none of the image is cut off in either aspect. I can't tell if that's due to the original format or anamorphic formatting on the DVD, but it seems to work.

The only nit I have to pick, and it's a small one, is that they may have purposefully split each season to two disks to jack up the price but it's not enough of a drawback to drop a star.

Regarding the show itself, it had been a while since I'd seen the last episodes and I was pleased that the show was pretty consistent from season-to-season. Some additional background music and transition scenes are mixed in around the 4th-5th seasons and some color creeps into the original b&w backgrounds, but the style of dialogue remains about the same which is impressive over so many seasons.

This is the best comedy show of the early '90's that most people have never heard of! It's one of my favorite comedy shows of all time. The interplay between Dr. Katz, his son Ben, and his receptionist Laura ranges from humorous to side-splitting. His "patients" are all comedians of the time, and are all hilarious -- some better than others, but all great.

My one complaint about this set is the visual quality. I had most of the shows home-recorded on VHS tapes at the lowest-quality setting. Nevertheless, the quality of those VHS tapes was substantially better than on these DVDs. I'm not a video expert, but the "squiggle-vision" which seemed fine on the broadcasts in the 90's (analog?) has been digitized on these DVDs at a low resolution. The viewer is constantly aware of very large black pixels that keep moving around the character's outlines. These episodes should have been digitized at twice the resolution -- the pixels would be smaller and the overall effect wouldn't be so distracting.

However, I'm a huge fan of Dr. Katz, and this set is worth it. My brain can come to ignore the poor pixelation and just take in the show itself. And If they ever decide to come out with a better quality set in the future, I'll probably buy that as a replacement.

Of course this is a great show, but my comment is more about DVD releases and Amazon. I've figured out along with others, it is best to wait until these complete box sets comes out and skip buying individual seasons. I also had Dr. Katz Season 1 and 2, and sold them sealed over the summer, along with my sealed Seinfelds, Andy Griffiths, King of Queens and Frasier, which all had Complete Series Sets come out in 2007. Most of the time the sets are cheaper than buying them individually. I bought the Dr. Katz Complete Series a month ago from Amazon when it was offered for $52.00. Since that time it increased to $84.00, and now it is $118.00. Amazon bounces the price around quite a bit on their DVDs so keep checking back. I saw Andy Griffith Series go from $140.00 to $205.00 then back to $140.00. I assume it is an availablility thing. I have learned to relax a bit when DVDs come out...it's easy to get excited and buy everything as it is released, like I did. Patience is the key...I'm sure Dr. Katz would agree.

Not only is Dr. K.a great therapist but his folk tunes are timeless. It's the perfect way to start your day, laughing with the Dr, Ben and his patients. Highly recommended.

I LOVE this show--possibly my favorite show of all time. Even though it's about 10 years old, the jokes are timeless. When there's nothing decent on basic cable, I watch these DVDs (commercialless, yay). BUY this if you like improv and retroscripting, sly humor, observant jokes.
Nicole in WA (from LA)