The weekend’s here. You’ve just been paid, and it’s burning a hole in your pocket. What’s a pop culture geek to do? In hopes of steering you in the right direction to blow some of that hard-earned cash, it’s time for the FRED Weekend Shopping Guide – your spotlight on the things you didn’t even know you wanted…
(Please support FRED by using the links below to make any impulse purchases – it helps to keep us going…)
TV doesn’t get more perfect than the story and character bliss found in the second series of Steven Moffat & Mark Gatiss’s brilliant Sherlock (BBC, Not Rated, Blu-Ray-$39.98 SRP). While “The Hounds of Baskerville” is a bit shaky, both “A Scandal In Belgravia” and ” The Reichenbach Fall” are just stunning. Bonus materials include audio commentaries and a behind-the-scenes featurette.
Do you have kids who have money they want to store in a fun way? Why get a traditional static (and boring) piggy bank when you can get a dynamic, motorized doggy bank? That’s just what Bailey The Mechanical Doggie Bank ($19.99) is. Put a coin in his food dish and he laps it up, right into safekeeping. Bow wow.
As brilliant as the author himself – who happens to be quite brilliant – Dave Hill’s collection of autobiographical essays, Tasteful Nudes: …and Other Misguided Attempts at Personal Growth and Validation (St. Martin’s Press, $24.99 SRP), is a slice of recursive brilliance. Go ahead and buy it, but only if you like to laugh. And if you don’t like to laugh, let this change your life. With laughter.
What’s wonderful about The Woman In Black (Sony, Rated PG-13, Blu-Ray-$35.99 SRP) is that it feels like a proper gothic ghost story, full of bumps and chills and none of the lazy gore and grisly grotesquerie that passes for modern horror. Blood and violence on screen is too easy, but the suspense and release that’s at play in this film, about a widowed lawyer (Daniel Radcliffe) sent to re mote village to save his career by putting the affairs of a recently deceased eccentric in order, only to find the town, and house, are full of secrets – is textbook proper. Bonus materials include an audio commentary and a pair of featurettes.
In the age of digital delivery, Paul McCartney is making the special edition purchase of traditional media truly desirable with exquisitely put together and very affordable deluxe catalogue releases for the true fan. Case in point is the Ram: Deluxe Book Edition (Hear Music, $94.19 SRP). Not only does it contain a beautifully restored version of the classic album, but also contains an additional 3 CDs full of rarities, demos, and live tracks, plus a DVD of videos, live performances, and a newly-produced documentary. If that weren’t enough, there’s also book, 5 8 x10 photos in a vintage-style photographic wallet, 8 full size facsimiles of Paul’s original handwritten lyric sheets, a mini photographic book of outtakes from the original album cover photo shoot, a Ram photo flip book, a free download card, and a year’s access to the member section of his website. This is the set to get.
Continuing their release of always must-see Studio Ghibli titles in high definition, Disney brings The Secret World Of Arriety (Walt Disney, Rated G, Blu-Ray-$22.99 SRP) – Ghibli’s take on The Borrowers – to the US in both its original Japanese form and the usual star-studded English vocals track. Bonus materials include featurettes, storyboards, trailers, and TV spots.
We’ve gotten the Die Hard films in high definition. We’ve gotten the Alien films. Superman? Check. Batman? Check. The most notable film franchise that hadn’t yet made it to high definition finally gets its turn with the release of the Lethal Weapon Collection (Warner Bros., Rated R, Blu-Ray-$79.98 SRP), which collects all four films plus a bonus disc packed with a clutch of new retrospective featurettes, in addition to all of the commentaries, deleted scenes, featurettes, and more which carry over from the previous DVD special editions of the films. Does the remastered sound and picture and batch of bonus featurettes make the upgrade worth it? Yes indeedy.
As much as I loved the music from the first season of Sherlock (and its accompanying score), I’ve enjoyed David Arnold & Michael Price’s music from Sherlock: Season 2 (Silva America, $15.00 SRP) even more. Pretty much equivalent to how absolutely brilliant that second season turned out to be.
It took awhile to finally hit a watchable groove, but when it did, the debut season of The River (ABC Studios, Not Rated, DVD-$29.99 SRP) made for a nice mystery about a missing nature TV presenter who goes missing in the Amazon, and the journey his wife and estranged son undertake into that odd, now-supernatural region to find him. Bonus materials include audio commentaries, deleted scenes, and a featurette.
While it’s interesting and mostly fun to see Chris Pine and Tom Hardy as a pair of covert CIA operative buddies who go to war over the love of a woman in This Means War (Fox, Not Rated, Blu-Ray-$39.99 SRP), the fun mood is killed by the fact that woman ion question is played by Reese Witherspoon, who somehow manages to become more brittle with every role. I fear in a matter of a few more films, she’ll shatter. Bonus materials include featurettes, deleted scenes, alternate endings, and a gag reel.
When it comes to the subject matter, the documentary Carol Channing: Larger Than Life (E1, Rated PG, DVD-$24.98 SRP) certainly lives up to its billing, as it delves into the 90-year-old Broadway dynamo’s legendary career and the life behind it. The disc also sports 15 bonus featurettes.
You can get all of the kicks you could possible want via the new 24-disc Route 66: The Complete Series set (Shout Factory, Not Rated, DVD-$129.99 SRP), featuring all 116 episodes plus vintage commercials, an in-depth look at the Corvette, and the 1990 Paley Festival panel spotlighting the show.
Celebrate Queen Elizabeth II’s Diamond Jubilee (that’s 60 years of rule) with a pair of celebratory releases from the fine folks at the BBC. First and foremost is The Diamond Queen (BBC, Not Rated, DVD-$19.98 SRP), a documentary hosted by Andrew Marr which looks back at her reign. For architecture buffs, there’s The Queen’s Palaces (BBC, Not Rated, DVD-$19.98 SRP) which is a tour of exactly what it says on the tin.
I spent the entire first season of Teen Wolf (Paramount, Not Rated, DVD-$39.98 SRP) trying to figure out how this MTV hairy teen drama fit in with the Michael J. Fox (and Jason Bateman) sports comedy franchise. I suppose this modern angsty take isn’t intended for old people like me. Bonus materials include audio commentaries, featurettes, deleted scenes, and a gag reel.
So there you have it… my humble suggestions for what to watch, listen to, play with, or waste money on this coming weekend. See ya next week…
-Ken Plume
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