Seinfeld: Seasons 1 - 3 [DVD] [1993]

The extras on the DVDs are interesting and enlightening. The deleted scenes are often interesting because you can see why they were deleted: they are often too overplayed or exaggerated. Most episodes also have an extra two-minute talking head mini documentary with contributions from Larry David (co-writer and star of Curb your Enthusiasm another 5* show), Jerry Seinfeld and the other main actors. These are often insightful, for example, Larry David talks about when he realised that he would have to give some of the script writing commitments over to the writing team rather than do them all himself or the fact that Jerry Seinfeld seemed to enjoy writing lines for his co-actors more than himself. There are also text and verbal commentaries by principle players about specific scenes.

If you like Seinfeld: buy this. If you've never seen it: borrow this and then buy it. If you don't like Seinfeld go back to watching familiar, comfortable, formulaic drivel and claiming that they don't write comedy shows like they used too. Yes they don't, and we have the likes of Seinfeld, Rickey Gervais and Chris Morris to thank for that!

For some reason, the show just never caught on in a big way over here. I can't think why it didn't get at least seventeen million viewers when it was being shown in it's prime time slot of midnight on BBC2!! British writers claim their sitcoms are sophisticated and smarter than their American colleagues, this show blows all those claims out of the water!

The mantra of the show for the writers was always "learn nothing and never, ever hug". By this they meant that shows like Friends were the stars hug and tell each other they love each other every five minutes or shows like Taxi where the comedy was undermined by a completely pointless moral message were getting it wrong. And they were right. Jerry, George, Elaine and Kramer are unbelievably selfish people who act as if they are ALWAYS the number one priority. As a result, the comedy is Oh SO MUCH better!!

The DVD sets (Hopefully the first of the complete series) show series one, two and three when the series was getting on it's feet and was not being championed by the huge ratings it would get in later years, but by the fickle critics who never failed to love, admire and "get" the show. The extras are the obvious blooper reel, extra Jerry stand up segements ommitted from the show, deleted scenes, retrospective interviews and episode commentaries by the cast (Interestingly Jerry Seinfeld never does a commentary with his three co-stars which will no doubt fuel the rumour that they didn't get on - I personally hope that rumours garbage!) and by Larry David who co-created the show and was inspiration for George's character (Larry David has of course gone onto greater fame as...er...himself in Curb Your Enthusiasm).

All in all, a great set to compliment a FANTASTIC show.

STRONGLY recommended.