Happy Days - The Complete First Season
by Art Fisher, Joel Zwick, George Tyne, James Tayne
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DVD Cover Information
Actor: Henry Winkler, Ron HowardDirector: Art Fisher, George Tyne, James Tayne, Joel Zwick
Brand: Paramount
DVD: Region Code 1
Audio: English (Original Language), Dolby Digital 2.0 Mono
Format: Box set, Closed-captioned, Color, Dolby, DVD-Video, Full Screen, NTSC
Picture Format: 1.33:1
Running Time: 360 minutes
DVD Release Date: 2004-08-17
Audience Rating: Unrated
Studio: Paramount
Movie Reviews of Happy Days - The Complete First Season
Movie Review: Seasons 1 and 2 Are The Best Season in the Whole Series
Summary: 5 Stars
Seasons 1 and 2 are the best seasons of the whole series. The first two seasons have the original concept of the TV show "Happy Days" which first appeared on the TV show "Love American Style" in 1972 as "Love and the Happy Days." Unfortunately, it is not included in the DVD box sets. BAD POINT.
In fact, there is an episode in Season 1 that is a sequel to the pilot. In the pilot, Richie wants to date this girl named Arlene. She shows no interest in him until he invites her over to his house to watch TV. The Cunninghams were one of the first families in the neighborhood to get a TV set.
The girl and her parents moved to New York City for three years and now return to Milwalkee.
The first two seasons take a comical adult view at growing up in the 1950's in white middle-class America.
Someone in review did not like the first season which they purchased for their 11 year old child to watch and were surprised at the adult theme introduced in the first episode. They said that they shut the TV off and would want to return the set if they could.
I would have to tell that person that this was the way the first two seasons wer, but they would not have to worry about the other seasons, because after the second season, "Happy Days" begins to be transformed into a live-action Saturday morning cartoon. In fact, a few years later, it did become a Saturday morning cartoon along with "Laverne and Shirley."
The TV shows became so cartoony and sugary sweet. No wonder Ron Howard and Donny Most left the series. Who can blame them? And no wonder why Donny Most did not show up to make an appearance on the series finale episode. Again, who can blame him?
The series started out so great and then was trashed. Yes, I know that the ratings did go up because of Fonzie being given a main role getting the second billing next to Ron Howard in the third season, but at teh beginning of Season 5, that was when the "Happy Days" series along with Fonzie, "jumped the shark" with regards to the show's popularity and ratings.
In closing, I have to say again that Seasons 1 and 2 were the best seasons of "Happy Days."
However, regarding the "Happy Days" Season 2 box set, I see that those THOSE CHEAP, PENNY PINCHING "nERDS" at paramount did not want to shell out the money for the rights to use the original 1950's music on the TV episodes and replaced it with lousey generic music like which was used in the later "Happy Days" episodes in the later seasons. ANOTHER BAD POINT. Those Hollywood Studio Executive "NERDS."
In fact on one episode int the Season 2 DVD box set in a scene at Arnold's, you see the kids shaking and dancing, but there is no music playing. Also in some episodes, you have Richie walking down the street thinking about the dilema of the week. The scnes originally were accompanied by songs like "When You Pretend" by Nat King Cole and "Who's Sorry Now" by Connie Francis. The music was supposed to set the mood and give the viewers an idea of what Richie is feeling, but the music is now gone.
But just talking about the seasons themselves, Seasons 1 and 2 were the best, the greatest.
Summary of Happy Days - The Complete First Season
Set in Milwaukee, Wisconsin in the 1950's, HAPPY DAYS revolves around Richie Cunningham and his family and friends. A "wholesome" young man, Richie is a Jefferson High School student who would do anything to get a date and he spends plenty of time with his friends at Arnold's, the local burger joint. Contrasting with his wholesome nature is Arthur Fonzarelli, best known as Fonzie, a rough-around-the-edges motorcycle riding high school dropout famous for his slicked hair, leather jacket, and the catchphrase "aaayyyy!" Fonzie is a regular around the Cunningham house, with Mrs. Cunningham doting on him and Richie turning to him for advice on how to attract girls.Less than a year after Ron Howard played a college-bound adolescent enjoying a final, summer-of-1962 romp with old friends in American Graffiti, he turned up as high school innocent Richie Cunningham in the memorable, ABC television network debut of Happy Days, set a few years earlier in Milwaukee. The show would last a decade and go through many changes in tone, cast, and character development, but that first season got a boost from the natural perception that it had some things in common with Graffiti: Howard, of course, but also fumbling teenage sex, drag races, drive-in food, pesky little sisters, and laconic greasers.
Happy Days: The Complete First Season is a sweet trip back to the Garry Marshall-produced sitcom's 1974 entry in primetime television, before political correctness would make stories about clean-cut boys fixated on seducing girls unthinkable, and long before older kids were defined by angst on the WB and Fox TV. At least in its first year, before Happy Days developed more of a comic-book feel and energy, the show was about Richie's all-too-human inclination to grow up too fast, to bite off more than he could chew and learn poignant lessons in the process. He was a sympathetic naif, not the charming braggart he later became, and major characters appear to have been created to provide both ballast and motivation. Among them is best friend Potsie (Anson Williams), a superficial hustler who typically incites Richie's enthusiasm for booze, reputed nymphomaniacs, and sophisticated, older girls, and fast-talking Ralph Malph (Donny Most), owner of a fantastic, yellow hot rod. More important are counterparts Arthur "Fonzie" Fonzarelli (Henry Winkler), a vaguely dangerous drop-out, and Richie's exasperated father, Howard Cunningham (Tom Bosley), each of whom provides Richie the validation of an experienced male: Fonzie's raw worldliness versus Mr. C's seasoned view of a man's responsibilities. First-season highlights include the pilot episode (co-written by Rob Reiner), "All the Way," in which Richie's typical decency allows him to see past the sex-mad reputation of an amiable girl from school. Season closer "Be the First on Your Block" finds the Cunninghams' plans to build a bomb shelter turning into a popularity contest as Richie's friends vie for a guaranteed spot in the event of nuclear war. --Tom Keogh
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