Several old TV shows have made their way to DVD this week, ranging from classic comedy to tough wartime action to a science-fiction sequel.
And they're pretty good.
"You Bet Your Life: The Best Episodes" (Shout! 1950, not rated, b/w, $39.98, three discs.) This second collection of "You Bet Your Life" episodes from the Shout! Factory is loaded with plenty of terrific bonus material, and it's just as hilarious as the first ("You Bet Your Life: The Lost Episodes").
The full-length half-hour shows (some with commercials) offer further evidence that Groucho Marx was, arguably, the sharpest wit television has ever had to offer. His ad-lib repartee with wacky everyday folk is priceless. And there are also such celebrities on hand as Groucho's brother Harpo, Edgar Bergen with his 11-year-old daughter Candice, and young Phyllis Diller in her first TV appearance. (Diller also provides an audio commentary on the episode.)
But nothing can top the hysterical episode that features a married contestant who complains about her husband and then flirts outrageously with emcee George Fenneman; it's a riot.
Extras: Full frame, 18 episodes, Marx Brothers commercial, outtakes, three Groucho pilots ("The Plot Thickens," "What Do You Want?" "Tell It to Groucho"), audio commentary (by Phyllis Diller on her guest episode), original commercials, chapters.
"Combat! Season 1, Campaign 1" (Image, 1962-63, not rated, b/w, $39.99, four discs). This early black-and-white World War II series demonstrates why the late 1950s and early '60s are often referred to as the "golden era" of television. While there is plenty of action, this show is primarily about the wide-ranging cast of characters, led by Vic Morrow as a gritty sergeant.
These early episodes are all quite good — including one prize that has an audio commentary by the man who directed it, Robert Altman ("MASH," "Gosford Park"). A retrospective featurette has actors and crew from the show, including director Richard Donner (the "Lethal Weapon" films), who remembers the late Morrow.
Harry Dean Stanton (billed as "Dean Stanton") and Tom Skerritt (unbilled) are in the first episode, and later shows feature Jeffrey Hunter, Joan Hackett, Keenan Wynn and Tab Hunter. ("Combat! Season 1, Campaign 2" is also available.)
Extras: Full frame, 16 episodes, audio commentary on two episodes (one by Robert Altman), making-of featurette, text trivia, text bloopers, photo gallery, chapters.
"The Jeff Foxworthy Show: The Complete First Season" (Columbia/TriStar, 1995-96, not rated, $29.95, two discs). The "You might be a redneck if . . . " stand-up comic has a brand-new half-hour variety show on the WB, but how many people remember his two-season domestic sitcom in the mid-'90s?
Foxworthy plays a small-business owner with a beautiful wife (Anita Barone) and a precocious son (Haley Joel Osment), and the usual array of goofball friends and relatives. They all play off each other quite well, and young Osment shows a real knack for comedy (a few years before he'd hit it big with "The Sixth Sense"). But much of the humor stems from Foxworthy doing variations on his stand-up routines.
I have to confess, however, that I laughed at this show a lot more than I expected to. The initial episode is a bit wobbly, but the series gets better as it progresses.
The following year, however, the entire cast would change except for Foxworthy and Osment. We'll have to see if that was for the better when "Season Two" is released.
Extras: Full frame, 18 episodes, chapters.
"V: The Complete Series" (Warner, 1984-85, not rated, $39.98, three double-sided discs). This series, which ran only one season, is a direct follow-up to two enormously successful sci-fi miniseries — "V" and "V: The Final Battle" (both previously released on DVD).
Most of the original cast (Faye Grant, Jane Badler, Robert Englund) returns in this continuing the story of freedom fighters (led by Marc Singer and Michael Ironside) waging war against the "Visitors" — aliens who landed on Earth claiming to be friendly, but who were revealed to be lizard creatures planning to eat us; a Nazi Germany allegory.
However, the campy dialogue and B-movie acting that gave the miniseries an amusing '60s sci-fi feel hinders the weekly series, which also has way too much redundant fighting and not enough character development.
But beware: The series ends with a cliffhanger that was never resolved.
Extras: Full, frame, 19 episodes, optional subtitles (English, French, Spanish), chapters.
E-mail: hicks@desnews.com