Product Description

Studio: Uni Dist Corp. (mca) Release Date: 08/22/2006

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #9177 in DVD
• Brand: Universal Studios
• Released on: 2004-08-24
• Rating: NR (Not Rated)
• Aspect ratio: 1.33:1
• Formats: Color, Dolby, Full Screen
• Original language: English
• Subtitled in: Spanish, French
• 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

The Munsters Are Coming To Get You!
I grew up on both the Munsters and the Addams Family, so I've always had much love for both shows, but when it came down to it, the Munsters was always my top pick. Maybe it was the collection of "monsters" within the family, or Marilyn, or the family's crazy hot rods the Munster Coupe & the Dragula from legendary customizer George Barris, or just the comfort zone of the corny one-liners and family-oriented atmosphere. In any case, the Munsters is definitely classic in every sense and now it's here on DVD!

The set's package design is somewhat inspired. The outer box opens "coffin-style" to reveal the disc-holding "digipack" inside, as the flipped-open box top has the table of contents on it with only the episodes plus the unaired pilot listed. The episodes are spread across 3 double-sided discs. Here's a list of the season 1 episodes:

The Munsters Unaired Pilot
Munster Masquerade
My Fair Munster
A Walk on the Mild Side
Rock-a-Bye Munster
Pike's Pique
Lo-Cal Munster
Tin Can Man
Herman the Great
Knock Wood, Here Comes Charlie
Autumn Croakus
The Midnight Ride of Herman Munster
The Sleeping Cutie
The Munsters' Family Portrait
Grandpa Leaves Home
Herman's Rival
Grandpa's Call of the Wild
All-Star Munster
If a Martian Answers, Hang Up
Eddie's Nickname
Bats of a Feather
Don't Bank on Herman
Dance With Me, Herman
Follow That Munster
Love Locked Out
Come Back, Little Googie
Far Out Munsters
Munsters on the Move
Movie Star Munster
Herman the Rookie
Country Club Munsters
Love Comes to Mockingbird Heights
Mummy Munster
Lily Munster, Girl Model
Munster the Magnificent
Herman's Happy Valley
Hot Rod Herman
Herman's Raise
Yes, Galen, There Is a Herman (aka My Friend Herman)

38 episodes plus the unaired pilot, that's ALOT of Munsters!

Finally The Munsters on DVD!
I am overjoyed at the prospect of owning The Munsters - The Complete First Season. This series has been and probably always will be one of my all-time favorite television shows. I can still remember growing up watching the afternoon reruns on WPIX from New York.

The Munsters was created by Joe Connelly and Bob Mosher, the same team that brought Leave It To Beaver to television. Beaver was the quintessential American family sitcom of the late 50's - early 60's. Connelly and Mosher helped to establish all those nostalgic family sitcom cliches we've all come to love (or hate) in Leave It To Beaver then they went on to totally parody them in The Munsters. The first season opening credit sequence of The Munsters is a great example of the way they parodied the typical family sitcoms of the time. You see Lily Munster, housewife and mother, sending her brood off for the day in the same manner June Cleaver and Donna Reed did. Lily hands each of her loved ones their packed lunches or school books as she pinches their cheeks or gives them a little motherly kiss.

Although The Munsters was considered much less sophisticated than its 60s creepy TV rival, The Addams Family, it is overall a much more entertaining series to me. Although the subversive quality of The Addams Family continues to make it an entertaining series to watch as an adult, I have to admit I didn't enjoy it as a child. The Munsters with its broad comedy and more obvious monster characters was much more fun to watch as a kid. It's worth pointing out that even though Morticia and Gomez Addams had a fiery sexual relationship on screen, Lily and Herman Munster may have been one of the only 60s TV couples to have been seen sharing the same bed (rather than the customary twin beds).

The Munsters - The Complete First Season contains all 38 first season episodes (yes 38 shows in one season!) as well as the original unaired pilot (in color I think). It doesn't appear that there are too many more extras in this set which is a bit disappointing. I would have loved to have seen episode commentaries by surviving cast members, documentaries, behind-the-scenes footage, etc. Hey, maybe we will get some of those extras on the Second Season set?

Entertaining, Inspiring, Heartwarming and Educational
I have purchased this set as a gift for a friend who was mentioning for the past several months how much he'd like seeing these episodes again. As I read some of the reviews posted here, I was concerned whether these DVDs will play properly and was delighted that the set I purchased through amazon.com played perfectly.

Having seen these episodes for the first time now (with my friend) I found the series both entertaining and heartwarming and was happy that the episodes are also geared toward instilling ethics and moral values. Whatever challenges the heroes of these episodes may be facing, they always act with integrity, and even though the main character - Herman Munster looks like Frankenstein and is rather clumsy, his good nature makes him a very lovable character. He is a wonderful example of what makes a human being worthy of love and respect, regardless of the physical appearance and whatever quirks one might have.