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61 of 63 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
FUNNY, REAL, ORIGINAL, June 17, 2006
One of my favorite seasons. The bike shop closes. Becky elopes with Mark. The Lunch Box opens. This had some really good episodes. From Jackies abusive boyfriend, to the death of Roseanne and Jackies father, to David moving in with the Conners. Definately a worthwhile purchase.
98.Terms of Estrangement (1)-- Dan and Roseanne have some adjustments to make, when the Bike shop and the Diner both go out of business, leaving Roseanne the sole wage earner. Becky takes the news hard, it means that Mark will have to leave town; so she elopes with him, and leaves with him.
99.Terms of Estrangement (2)-- Roseanne and Dan prepare to say goodbye to Becky, when her an Mark come back to gather some belongings, and head out to start their married life together.
100.The Dark Ages-- The power company cuts off the Conners' power. Dan and Roseanne must look at Darlene in a new light after David spends the night in her room.
101.Mommy Nearest-- Roseanne and Jackie are stunned when their mother hands each of them a check for ten thousand dollars, to do with what they like. Bev then announces she is moving to Lanford, that causes a series of arguements. Jackie agonizes over dating Fisher, a perfect but much, much younger man.
102.Pretty in Black-- Roseanne mortifies Darlene with a sweet sixteen party, then sends her off to her friends while the adults enjoy the festivities, which include a game of Truth or Dare; the Tildens move in next door; Darlene dyes her hair black to make Roseanne mad, but is shocked when Roseanne reacts differently.
103.Looking for Loans in All the Wrong Places-- Denied a loan to open the restaurant, Roseanne must turn to her mother, who has a different solution to her money woes. Darlene catches D.J. peeping at neighbor Molly. and sets up a trap to teach him a lesson, and gets a lesson herself about the peeper.
104.Halloween IV-- Roseanne sends everyone to a party while she stays home -- and is visited by the ghosts of Halloween past, present, and future.
105.Ladies' Choice-- Nancy takes Roseanne and Jackie by surprise with the announcement that she and Marla are gay lovers; Bev announces she is moving into a Lanford retirement centre, which leaves Roseanne feeling over the hill.
106.Stand on Your Man-- The Lunch Box welcomes its first customers, including a weirdo whose presence sends the gals to a self-defense class. Meanwhile, Arnie questions his own manhood after hearing that Nancy is gay.
107.Good Girls, Bad Girls-- Roseanne reluctantly allows Darlene to go to a rock concert in nearby Rockford with Molly -- who abandons her.
108.Of Ice and Men-- After Dan pressures him to find a sport, or activity, D.J. decides to take up hockey and becomes the terror of the rink. Roseanne meddles to reunite Jackie and Fisher, after Jackie decides that he is too young for her, and breaks it off with no explanation. Dan gives DJ his first sip of beer.
109.It's No Place Like Home for The Holidays-- A Christmas Eve snowstorm scatters the Connors, with Roseanne and Jackie trapped at the Luch Box with Bev and Nana Mary, while Darlene takes shelter at David's and learns the truth about his home life.
110.Crime and Punishment (1)-- After receiving a phone call from the school, Dan is asked to come to speak with the principal, concerning DJ's offensive reading material, which turns out to be Darlene's Comic. When it is uncovered that the reason for Jackie's mood swings is domestic violence, Dan sets off to deal with Fisher man to man. Darlene is sent to bail Dan out, and makes his life hell.
111.War and Peace (2)-- Dan returns home to rampant rumors about his behavior, while Roseanne urges a dazed Jackie to leave her abusive boyfriend.
112.Lanford Daze-- As a punishment, Darlene has to serve meat at The Lunchbox but she refuses to serve a celebrity customer.
113.Wait Till Your Father Gets Home-- The death of their father finds Jackie blubbering, Roseanne angry -- and sharing a drink with the "other woman" in his life. (Roseanne won her only Emmy for this episode)
114.First Cousin, Twice Removed-- A wealthy and successful cousin whom Roseanne hasn't seen in 25 years comes to bury the hachet, and encourages Darlene to leave home.
115.Lose a Job, Winnebago-- The Conners and the Tildens travel to California in a motor home, with Dan pondering his future and Ty contemplating Jackie.
116.It's a Boy!-- Roseanne wants Darlene's boyfriend David to move in with them, but Dan refuses to allow it.
117.It was Twenty Years Ago Today-- For their anniversary, Roseanne poses in a sexy photo for Dan, while he moonlights at a big-and-tall men's store to pay for his present for her.
118.Playing with Matches-- Darlene wants nothing to do with David after Molly kisses him; and a new friend puts a smile on Bev's face.
119.Promises, Promises-- Darlene springs a prom-night surprise on David: she has rented a motel room. Meanwhile, Dan is reluctant to share with Roseanne his plans for a new business.
120.Glengarry, Glen Rosey-- Roseanne and Dan fear a financial crisis when they cannot sell the house they refurbished and their new partner Roger skips town.
121.Tooth or Consequences-- Dan realizes that he needs a steady job to take care of his family when he accidentally knocks out one of Roseanne's teeth on the day she is to meet with a health inspector (who turns out to be Leon); Darlene is accepted to art school - but David is rejected.
122.Daughters and Other Strangers-- Roseanne worries that Darlene may be planning to run away from home; new neighbor George befriends D.J.
Season 5 features guest stars Bill Maher, Joan Collins, Tim Curry, Lorreta Lynn, Red Buttons, Sara Rue, Morgan Fairchild, Ed Begley Jr, and Joseph Gordon-Levitt.
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10 of 11 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
A few changes over the years., September 7, 2006
I agree with the earlier review about the abrupt changes over the years on the show. But they did mention Roseanne's fathers abuse in the fourth season episode "This Old House" Roseanne and Jackie went to the house they grew up in before it was torn down and were discussing the things that went on during childhood. Roseanne pointed to the wall and said to Jackie "Remember what was hanging there?" Referring to the belt they were hit with. Roseanne also referred to her dad as a lunatic in the Tornado episode from the 1st season when Jackie said he used to get them all in the car during a storm and chase it. They changed the character of Dan's mother also. I think in the second season Dan's mother comes to Thanksgiving with her boyfriend and seemed like a perfectly normal woman and in a later season she had mental problems and was put in a hospital. Then Debbie Reynolds played her as a psycho. David's name started as Kevin. They might have cleared that up in a later episode though. And of course the two Beckys. All in all Roseanne was a great show and I am thrilled that they are bringing them out on DVD so quickly. I gave only 4 stars because I felt the 2nd 3rd and 4th seasons were the best, although I absolutely love the episode on this one where the power is turned off. That has some of the biggest laughs of the entire series. I would place Roseanne in my top 5 series of all time. Even the lesser episodes are better than most things on TV. If anybody does read this, could you let me know if the Roseanne 1st season DVD is uncut? I have only watched a couple of the episodes and it seems like exactly what is on Nick at Nite. I always love getting the scenes that they have cut out over the years. Thanks for listening.
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3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
And the best sitcom in TV history is...., March 24, 2008
Ahh Roseanne, quite easily (notice I said "quite easily," not "quite possible") the greatest sitcom in TV history (sorry Seinfeld [overrated and repetitive] and move over M*A*S*H). For a great many Americans, Roseanne was the ONLY sitcom to depict our home lives in a way that even remotely approached ringing true. My wife and I are both such big fans that we periodically watch the entire show from beginning to end (yes, all the episodes--on DVD of course). As I do in many of my reviews I will try to offer a few observations that other reviews haven't already made.
The show was serendipitously blessed by its cast, the best any sitcom has ever enjoyed. The comic timing between Roseanne and John Goodman was not only flawless, but their chemistry rang so true that they really did seem like they were married in real life. The show was lucky to cast both Goodman and Metcalf, two actors whose performances really raised the entire show up another level.
The show starts off wonderfully, portraying a blue-collar family in a way that not only feels real, but that is genuinely laugh-out-loud funny too. And that says a lot. Most sitcoms are not actually all that funny. Believe it or not, studies show that with most TV shows people are not actually laughing at the jokes (which suck) but at the sound of other people laughing. Producers know this and that is why they often insist upon laugh tracks, even when writers object. The authentic portrayal of a working-class Midwest family in-and-of-itself had a lot to do with the show's immediate appeal: Finally here was a family most Americans could actually relate to. Forget the Cosby family (the No. 1 show at the time).
Season One is dynamite. Roseanne thought the scenes at Wellman's Plastics were boring, and joked that the set must have been built over a burial ground or something. I disagree and actually greatly enjoyed Wellman's. In Season Two the show peters out with a few episodes that are actually quite boring and stupid. Many people say the show got worse in later seasons, though I actually think (excepting the last season) that some of Season Two's episodes are the worst the show ever saw. In my opinion, for instance, the Season Two episode Sweet Dreams is the worst episode in the entire show's run. Seasons Three, Four, and Five are all great, maintaining the show's high standard set in Season One. (Season Three may in fact be the best season of all.) At times more episodes focus on incidences outside the Conner residence, which to me is unfortunate as the shows staying inside the house (especially the kitchen) and focusing on the whole family together are the ones that really shine. Thus, when a season focused too much on Roseanne at work (such as endlessly boring scenes of Roseanne at the beauty salon or in the mall's café) it really detracted from the humor.
With Season Six Sarah Chalke was devastatingly miscast as Becky. It really didn't matter that she didn't at all look like Lecy Goranson, the problem was that the performance she turned in was of an entirely different character (and it was quite a bad performance at that). Sure, other characters changed as the show progressed, but this was ridiculous. Roseanne, for instance, becomes more sarcastic and bitchy as the show progresses, but as my wife pointed out to me, if you revisit Season One you'll see that she didn't at all start out that way (in fact she was quite the loving mother at first). And yes, her appearance constantly changed as she lost weight, tanned and had numerous surgeries. Jackie's character changes too, dramatically, as many others have noted here.
Many here say that Season Seven or Eight is the beginning of the end of the show. I however think that the beginning of the end had to do with the disintegration of Roseanne's real-life marriage to show producer Tom Arnold. After that fiasco, if I recall, Roseanne went kind of nuts in real life, becoming all new agey and crap and it really started to come through in the show. (All one needs do to get a sense of just how nuts she's become is read her blog on her website.)
Season Eight was actually supposed to be the last season of the show. If it had been the last season then the show would have ended with Dan and Roseanne's big fight in which they trash the house. That would have been a great ending for one reason: It starts with the same fight they had in the show's pilot, where Dan starts yelling that he can fix dinner! Roseanne was, instead, given full power to finally do whatever she wanted with the show. And she trashed it. I here claim that Roseanne is the greatest TV sitcom in history. I stand by that statement, but it does NOT apply to Season Nine. Season Nine was a debacle, plain and simple. In fact, it was so embarrassing that I will spend much of the rest of this review discussing it.
Season Nine is the only season of Roseanne in which it was not a top-rated show. And it's obvious why. By Season Nine Roseanne thought that she was so important that people really wanted to hear about her views on anything and everything (even though her views are incoherent) and that she was so funny that people would laugh at anything she did. Wrong. (It didn't help that, as noted above, she was pretty wacky by this time.)
The episode in which Roseanne sees herself and Dan in older TV shows states that Dan and Roseanne are one of the greatest TV couples of all time. No disagreement here. Later episodes seem to try and set up that Roseanne and Jackie are one of the greatest comic duos. Ahem. This is ironic in that in Season Nine Roseanne and Jackie's antics ceased to be funny altogether and actually greatly hurt the show's ratings. Jackie became so obnoxious and bizarre and downright annoying that many viewers incessantly complained about her character. The season also suffers in that for much of it John Goodman was off starring in movies.
(By the way, can some fan out there tell me what the joke is behind the rooster and egg design? It appears on a shirt that Roseanne often wears. At the end of one season it shows every major character wearing it in turn. Later, strangers at the Lobo are shown wearing it. Then it appears on aprons at The Lunchbox, and in Season Nine's Halloween episode it is seen framed in the Satanists' place. Please leave a comment explaining this!)
Some people argue that though Season Nine was downright terrible, that the twist ending somewhat redeems it. Even Roseanne perhaps knew that the season wasn't up to snuff (after all the ratings were tanking) and was trying to restore some of the show's quality. (It's certainly too bad that by the time Blues Traveler recorded the excellent opening song for the show that the show no longer had anything to do with the lyrics of that song.) I, however, do not like the twist (though it does pack a punch). Here's why: It means that the entire show never happened!
The twist should have been simply that the Conners never won the lottery and that Dan actually died when he had his heart attack (which means that Dan died at Darlene's wedding!). This at least would allow that the show was "real" before the heart attack and then was all Roseanne's fantasy afterwards. Nope. The actual twist is like The Usual Suspects. It's just a little too clever for its own good. So the entire show is Roseanne's fantasy; it's just a book she's writing. For instance, if Jackie is really a lesbian, then Gary and Fisher and Booker and Fred (and for that matter, Andy) never even happened. The whole show never happened. The twist should have been simply that Dan had passed away, NOT that Darlene and Mark are together, and Becky and David, etc., etc. It went too far.
Or here's another one: The original twist ending was going to be that Roseanne woke up from a dream (been done before though--Bob Newhart). What would have been cool is if the last episode ended with a cut to Dan sitting at the old kitchen table, with everything back the way it was when they were poor. He could have been wearing his Four Aces Dry Wall hat and reading a comic. Roseanne would then walk in and say, "I just had the weirdest dream!"
By the way, the twist ending is foreshadowed in the episode Home for the Holidays. When Roseanne is waiting to go get Dan at the airport she says something like this to Jerry, "I have so much to tell your Dad, and it's all so weird! It's like a crazy woman made it all up!" As most fans sadly lamented, Season Nine was not up to the rest of the show's standards. One interesting reason why--and a reason many seem to have missed--is this: Seasons One through Eight had really good writers. The episodes were NOT written by Roseanne. In Season Nine, for the first time, most of the episodes were written by Roseanne herself, and they weren't very good.
Roseanne, as evidenced in interviews, thinks that Season Nine is "deep." Whatever. She says that Season Nine was taboo because it's a big no-no to talk about class in America--according to her. If you're born poor, she says, you're gonna die poor. In the very next sentence she then boasts that she was born poor and went on to become a multimillionaire. Apparently the contradiction here escaped her.
Roseanne claims that Season Nine was so socially important that she should be seen as a modern Che Guevara, I kid you not. She also claims that Season Nine contained such taboo political commentary that it makes her the first Michael Moore. Oooookkaaaaaayyyy....
One thing that can be said is that Season Nine portrays her political views in that she considers the show to be about her own real life. Having the Conners win the lottery was akin to saying that she recognizes that she won the lottery in real life by becoming famous. Making it show business and comedy is, after...
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