Customer Reviews

Night Court: The Complete First Season

5 star:		(72)
4 star:		(18)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

All You Need I Love- Harry's first case as a judge. A husband accuses his wife of trying to kill him.

Santa Goes Downtown- A man dressed as santa is accused of tresspassing. Harry must deal with two teenagerss. Michael J. Fox guest stars.

The Former Harry Stone- The gang tries to find out how old Harry is and discover he has a record. The first appearance of the reporter, Craven.

Welcome Back, Momma- A woman claiming to be the mother who ran out on Harry as a kid appears.

The Eye of the Beholder- Bull is devestated when a charity turns him down to be a volunteer because of the way he looks.

Death Threat- Harry gets a death threat. A bomb is found.

Once in Love With Harry- A prostitute falls for Harry. Dan runs for office.



Quadrangle of Love- Harry, Dan and Bull all fall for and try to woo the same woman.

Wonder Drugs- Lana has a bad reaction to some medication causing her to act strange.

Some Like It Hot- First Yakvo episode. Yakvo is brought before the court, and ends up threating to burn down the courtroom.

Harry and the Rock Star- Harry dates a rock star. Harry tries to break in a new court clerk.

Bull's Baby- One of Bull's neighbors leaves her baby with Bull and doesn't come back. Bull insists to everyone that she will return.

Hi Honey, I'm Home- A woman and her two husbands (one was presummed dead) appears before the court.

Back in the early-to-mid 80's, NBC OWNED Thursday nights with a killer sitcom lineup: The Cosby Show, Family Ties, Cheers and Night Court. And while history will probably ultimately judge Night Court as the least acclaimed of the four, I think it's still the funniest. And you can see the other 3 on TV Land or Nick At Nite...I don't remember the last time I saw Night Court in syndication.

And it's true, the first season was a little rough (hence 4 stars instead of 5). But the brilliant John Larroquette is reason enough for me to own all seasons of this show. I hope someday his own John Larroquette Show will get a DVD release.

I hope fans will scoop this first season up, so we can get on with the later (and better) seasons.

Many of us remember that in 1980s, Thursday nights were a treat on NBC: We were fortunate enough to watch some of the best sitcoms on TV, such as Cosby Show, Family Ties, Cheers, and Night Court in that order. All four shows had great talent and great stories. At last Warner Home Video released the first season of Night Court. There are 13 episodes on two discs. The first season saw several changes that includes departure of Lana Wagner (Karen Austin), and Paula Kelly (Liz Williams) and the incoming Christine Sullivan (Markie Post) and Mac Robinson (Charles Robinson) and a few others. The first season is one of my favorite seasons of the series since the show had better writing and better stories than the latter seasons. Lana Wagner is beautiful and intelligent and made a better love interest for Judge Harry Stone (Harry Anderson). The Former Harry Stone, Death Threat, Once in Love with Harry, Quadrangle of Love, and Harry and the Rock Star are some of the funniest episodes. Dan (John Larroquette) is very funny as usual. This is a good addition to you your DVD library.

Waner is putting out a "Best Of" Night Court DVD next Year. We do not want a "Best Of" DVD. We want Season 2!!!!! Come on, stop this "Best Of" crap.

We Want Season 2 & 3......

This collection is well-put together and exactly what I'm looking for. I only wish I knew when they were going to release the subsequent seasons.

This is a great set of this classic television show's premiere season. All 13 episodes are presented in their original NBC uncut broadcast entirety, clocking in at just over 24 minutes each. I'd seen all of these episodes in syndication as early as 1988, and even then they were already missing some footage for more commercial time. Not here! If you've only seen the edited versions before, you're in for a treat. It was kind of funny seeing the extended scene in the episode "Santa Goes Downtown" where Dan Fielding told Eddie Simms (played by Michael J. Fox) to "go and tease Bull about his hair." Seeing it again on the DVD reminded me that I had actually seen this episode back in 1984 and had forgotten this part due to it's being deemed less important than the almighty advertiser's dollar. It really is great to have the complete versions available to see again!

At the time of this writing, it's been 10 months since the release of this Season One box set. It's unlike Warner Bros. to take so much time between releases of it's TV shows, but for some reason they aren't on the ball with this particular show. However, I still think that they will get around to releasing more seasons. After all, several of the shows they were working on ("Friends", "Gilligan's Island" and "Wonder Woman") have wrapped. It makes sense that this would free up some resources to get to work on some of their thus-far neglected properties (a la "Night Court"). In the meantime, this set will provide you with some great classic entertainment.

Night Court was my absolute favorite prime time TV show when I was a kid. I can't remember exactly how I discovered it, but I remember relying on both syndicated reruns and the current NBC season for my fixes. I had such crushes on Harry Anderson and John Larroquette that I wrote fan letters to them, and even got an 8x10 glossy from Mr. Larroquette (never did get one from Harry...hmph...)

But anyway, the first season of Night Court: it's surprisingly still good after all these years, and I haven't seen much of it since it went off the air, and I've very rarely found it in syndication since then. Perhaps some of the references are dated (oh how we loves the Pia Zadora zingers), not to mention the clothing -- except for the "Harry and the Rock Star" episode: the punks look exactly the same today! :)

However, most importantly the humor is still...well, funny! It also has a lot to do with the characters and how well they're played. On a written page, Selma Diamond's dialogue may not seem like much, but when she says them, it's ALWAYS hilarious. I can't think of an instance where I DIDN'T laugh at her delivery.

You can really see the core characters take shape in this first season. You get to love Harry T. Stone's offbeat sensibility and anticipate the running jokes involving Mel Torme or a lame card trick. You see Dan Fielding's lecherous side come through more and more with each babe who happens to cross his path. You see Bull Shannon transform from a rather scary, lumbering giant into a sweet-hearted, lumbering giant.

Let me also note that the comedy was skillfully offset by an element of drama. And it works because you actually care what happens to the characters.

The abrupt disappearance of court clerk Lana Wagner threw me off and made me wonder why they didn't just write her out, but I guess first seasons don't do that sort of thing, since audiences are still just getting used to the show. The "new girl" Charlie didn't last very long... I did like Liz the defense attorney, and Billie who came after her, but I guess chemistry is the magic word.

There aren't many extras on this DVD set aside from the pilot commentary and a brief retrospective on the show. But maybe the popularity will entice the actors to do something special for upcoming sets. I'm already looking forward to Season Two! Hopefully it'll come within the year.

Great DVD. Although I would have absolutely loved to hear commentary from Harry Anderson and John Larroquette (or even some behind the scenes footage from them as well), the episodes here are wonderful. From what I can see, they're all uncut (including a 26-minute version of the pilot that actually runs longer than the original NBC broadcast from January of '84). Like I said, for the most part, we got the network broadcast versions rather than the chopped-up versions TV Land is airing. I too want the rest of the full seasons of Night Court, and I'd be fine with a release just like this. Sure, it'd be heaven to get interviews and behind the scenes footage of the cast from back in the day, but uncut episodes like we see here are good enough.

But a word of advice any NC fan should heed; the "Best Of" (ha) TV Favorites compilation of six Night Court episodes should be avoided at all costs. It has a poor selection of episodes, which all are cut all to hell. Instead, get this Season 1 DVD, because Warner will be more inclined to release the subsequent full seasons if they see sales go up for this full season.

WE love Night Court and watched it faithfully when it was on the first time. WE have watched the DVD at least 4 times, and we really, Really, REALLY want the next seasons! PLEASE work on this for all us who need our Night Court FIX!
EA

So many people out there asked for Night Court on DVD. We got a great response with Season 1 now out. Yeayyyy!!!!

Where are the other seasons?? Please don't say it's so. We can't settle for just one year of this show to be out. There are so many other classic episodes yet to be released.