Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #3090 in DVD
• Released on: 2004-08-24
• Rating: NR (Not Rated)
• Aspect ratio: 1.33:1
• Formats: Color, Dolby, Full Screen
• Original language: English
• Subtitled in: French, Spanish
• Number of discs: 3
• Running time: 966 minutes

Amazon.com
It has its own stormy weather and fire-breathing housepet named Spot, but the mansion at 1313 Mockingbird Heights is otherwise like any other American sitcom home. This is the address of the Munsters, the family that for two seasons, 1964-66, found a permanent place in pop culture--if not "monster" success. Developed by Leave It to Beaver team Joe Connelly and Bob Mosher, the series was a standard sitcom (complete with the same awful canned laughter), except that the Ward Cleaver character was a reanimated corpse.

Dad Herman (Fred Gwynne) was a Frankenstein's monster, mom Lily (Yvonne DeCarlo) and Grandpa (Al Lewis) were vampires, and son Eddie (Butch Patrick) a little wolf-boy. Munster niece Marilyn was inexplicably normal, which prompted much worry from the other members of the family (she was played in early episodes by Beverly Owen, who left to get married, and then by Pat Priest). The plots revolve around typically tortured sitcom situations: Herman must lose weight to fit into his old Army uniform, Herman has insomnia, Herman takes dance lessons from a crooked instructor. (As that list would suggest, 6'5" Fred Gwynne's wonderfully agile slapstick and Borscht Belt comedy made him the center of the show.)

What distinguished The Munsters from Father Knows Best was the Universal horror-movie lineage and the ghoulish one-liners (the latter growing a bit tedious after a while). The three-disc DVD has all 38 first-season episodes in excellent transfers, a 15-minute pilot with different actors as Lily and Eddie, and no extras or commentaries. High points include "Hot Rod Herman," which features the tricked-out Munster Koach and Drag-u-la (boss wagons both), and "Eddie's Nickname," the one where Grandpa gives Eddie a potion that causes the boy's beard to grow (a weirdly memorable image, if you're a kid). The show was either pure kiddie farce or a radical comment on the absurdly unreal world of sitcoms. Either way, if you grew up with them as an alternate TV family, you can't help but have warm feelings for the Munsters, as clammy as they are. --Robert Horton

Customer Reviews

LILLLLLLYYYYYY!
Never got into The Addams Family. I always preferred The Munsters. The casting was perfect and Fred Gwynne is brilliant as Herman. No-one could play the character better. His facial expressions are priceless. Fred and Al had a real chemistry. Great viewing!

Munsters season 1
Great DVD collection of The Munsters season one!
Nice to be able to watch this classic show without all those TV comm's.
Nicely put together in a box set. Easy to follow menus.
I give it two thumbs up!

Munsters 1st Season
See the original Marilyn! This is a great old show! Very silly. Black & white! I love these older shows. This is great to watch with the whole family! Another must have!