The Brady BunchThe Complete SeriesHere's the story... The COMPLETE story of America's most beloved TV sitcom family,
The Brady Bunch©! This groovy and far-out collector's edition features all 117 hilarious episodes on 20 discs plus a special bonus disc featuring new-to-DVD Brady gems:
The Brady 500,
A Very Brady Christmas, and two episodes from
The Brady Kids animated TV series!
You'll want to re-live the laughs again and again!
It's the way they became
The Brady Bunch™!CAST:Robert Reed as Mike Brady
Florence Henderson as Carol Brady
Ann B. Davis as Alice
Maureen McCormick as Marcia
Eve Plumb as Jan
Susan Olsen as Cindy
Barry Williams as Greg
Chris Knight as Peter
Mike Lookinland as Bobby
My Thoughts:This past Friday I watched the TV Movie
Growing Up Brady. This instantly put me in the mood to watch this complete series set again. This is the second time for me to go through this set since I bought it 3 years ago. In only 6 days I watched all 5 seasons of the series.... and the bonus disc with contains 2 reunion movies and 2 episodes of the animated series
The Brady Kids. This series started in 1969... the same year I was born. So while I never saw the original run of the series... like many people I grew up watching reruns. When I was a kid I never considered this to be a favorite series of mine... but good enough to watch. Then many years went by without me seeing any episodes. One day I walked in to find my daughter watching some episodes on TV with her grandmother. And she was enjoying it. So I decided to buy this set so she would have a chance to see the entire series. Ironically in the 3 years I have owned it she never bothered to watch the set. But as I was watching the set I found that I oddly enjoyed it more now then when I was a kid. I don't know... maybe it is a strong nostalgic thing. Maybe a reminder of simpler times. But it really grew on me.
Now, about this set...
The first thing to notice is the gimmicky packaging. In my opinion the packaging fails on all levels. It is not pleasing to the eye (come on... green shag carpeting!?!?). All the discs are housed in one (flower shaped) cardboard accordion envelope (Much like the two in the
I Love Lucy complete series set). So I am always worried that the discs will scratch. In my personal opinion... the person that designed this packaging should have been fired as soon as he suggested it!
The discs themselves are the same discs that are in the individual season sets. So that means the only thing that makes this Complete Series set worth it is the addition of the bonus disc with the reunion movies and cartoons. Which I enjoyed the reunion movies a lot... so that made it worth getting the set to me personally.
Of course the show itself is basically what you would figure from the time. A half an hour sitcom where all their problems are solved with a happy ending by the end of each episode (except for the handful of multiple part eps. of course.) The series did bring in quite a few familiar faces...
The Brady Bunch Guests:- Marion Ross (Happy Days)
- Herbert Anderson (Dennis the Menace)
- Desi Arnaz, Jr.
- E.G. Marshall (The Defenders)
- Marcia Wallace (The Bob Newhart Show)
- David "Deacon" Jones
- Julie Cobb (Charles in Charge)
- Jackie Coogan (The Addams Family)
- Jim Backus (Gilligan's Island)
- Jay Silverhills (The Lone Ranger)
- Davy Jones (The Monkees)
- Don Ho
- Vincent Price
- Nicholas Hammond (Amazing Spider-Man)
- Joe Namath
- Melissa Sue Anderson (Little House on the Prairie)
- Ken Berry
- Natalie Schafer (Gilligan's Island)
The Bonus Disc...
As I said... there is 2 reunion movies which I really enjoyed. Unfortunately the whole gang wasn't completely brought back together for neither one of them. In the first reunion movie,
A Very Brady Christmas, Susan Olsen didn't come back so the part of Cindy Brady was played by Jennifer Runyon. And then in the movie
the Brady 500 (Which is actually the first 2 episodes of
The Bradys edited together to make a movie) Maureen McCormick didn't come back... so the part of Marcia Brady was played by Leah Ayres.
While the 2 episodes of the animated series
The Brady Kids was entertaining enough... they are my least favorite of the included extras. It isn't a cartoon I watched much as a kid.... so the interest just wasn't there for me as much.
Over-all I am glad I did add this set to my collection. The bonus disc makes the purchase worth it in my opinion. Though I don't know if I would double-dip this series just to get this bonus disc. If I already had the season sets I doubt I would have bothered.
My Rating: 4/5