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…)
While the MST3K version is still near and dear to my heart, it is fun to see the restored original Gamera: The Giant Monster (Shout Factory, Not Rated, DVD-$19.93 SRP) in its DVD debut, sporting an audio commentary and a retrospective featurette. It’s a giant turtle, for criminy’s sake!
Matt Smith’s tenure as the new Doctor on Doctor Who isn’t the only change that producer Steven Moffat has wrought – there’s also a brand new Sonic Screwdriver ($25.99). Gone is the rather plain blue-tipped model, replaced by a spring-loaded, green-tipped contraption with a LED light and sounds.
One of the things I eagerly await is the arrival of a new volume of classic Charlie Brown & co., and The Complete Peanuts: 1975 to 1976 (Fantagraphics, $28.99 SRP) certainly doesn’t disappoint. In fact, if anything, things go a bit surreal, which Robert Smigel points out in his introduction. This also marks the halfway point in these collected volumes.
You know what other book always delights me when it arrives? A new installment in the wonderfully awkward misadventures of dim-witted detective Frank Burly, courtesy of author John Swartzwelder (writer of 59 episodes of The Simpsons). The latest is The Last Detective Alive (Kennydale Books, $15,95), and I suggest you pick it up at the same time you pick up the previous 6. Right now. Go on… I’ll be waiting for you. Seriously… Go. I’ll be here. Go get those books.
There’ve been plenty of young actresses tackling vintage royalty in recent years, but a gold crown to Emily Blunt’s portrayal of a young Queen Victoria in the appropriately named The Young Victoria (Sony, Rated PG, Blu-Ray-$34.95 SRP), which finds the inexperienced young monarch asserting her control while falling head over heels for Prince Albert. Bonus materials include featurettes and deleted/extended scenes.
There’s many a stand-up release that comes down the pike where I merely shrug my shoulders and say, “Eh.” And then there’s the new release from Reggie Watts, Why $#!+ So Crazy? (Comedy Central, Not Rated, DVD/CD-$15.95 SRP), which is like a laugh-out-loud reminder of what stand-up should be all about. You know… Funny.
With The Spy Next Door (Lionsgate, Rated PG, DVD-$29.95 SRP), Jackie Chan has been converted into a toothless family film star, a fate that befell The Rock just a few short years ago. In this flick, Chan plays a spy. Who lives next door. And baby-sits he neighbor kids. And stuff happens. Bonus features include a pair of featurettes and a blooper reel.
It’s by no means a bad film – in fact, Invictus (Warner Bros., Rated PG-13, Blu-Ray-$35.99 SRP) is actually a rather rousing tale of Nelson Mandela’s plan to bring together the fractured post-Apartheid South Africa via the country’s rugby team, captained by Matt Damon. Morgan Freeman is a stirring Mandela, but there’s something about the film that feels very by-the-numbers/Rudy-esque. Bonus materials include picture-in-picture commentary, a trio of featurettes, and the theatrical trailer.
I still haven’t figured out what I think of The Jeff Dunham Show (Paramount, Not Rated, DVD-$16.99 SRP) and the titular man behind its puppet co-stars. The materials can be crass and a bit too Carlos Mencia for my tastes. Bonus materials include an unaired sketch, a behind-the-scenes featurette, and a blooper reel.
A trio of cryogenically frozen astronauts return to an asteroid-devastated, rough-and-tumble post-apocalyptic Earth 150 years in the future in Gene Roddenberry’s Strange New World (Warner Bros., Not Rated, DVD-$19.95), the latest vault release from the Warner Archive Collection. Hey, it stars John Saxon!
What doe Tom Selleck, Yul Brynner, Leonard Nimoy, and Sam Elliott have in common? They all star in at least one of the three movies contained in Warners Louis L’Amour Western Collection (Warner Bros., Rated PG-13, DVD-$19.98 SRP), which contains The Sacketts, Catlow, & Conagher.
If you were to make the It’s A Mad Mad Mad Mad World of romantic films, it would be director Garry Marshall’s Valentine’s Day (New Line, Rated PG-13, Blu-Ray-$35.99 SRP), which throws dozens of actors into a slew of plots that all hang together into some kind of narrative collage dealing with love and the titular holiday. Bonus materials include an audio commentary, featurettes, and a blooper reel.
You know the Warner Archive is dedicated to fulfilling every obscure nostalgic wish when they release Kid ‘N Play’s Class Act (Warner Bros., Rated PG-13, DVD-$19.95). Yes – you heard me right. So all of those fans of HBO-friendly comedy and impossibly tall hair now have a purchase to make.
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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The Brits have a knack for taking the tired old sitcom format, blowing it up, and creating some absolutely brilliant television. Those bastards. Most definitely to be included in their long line of triumphs is Spaced, a show about a pair of twenty-something slackers – Tim & Daisy (Simon Pegg & Jessica Stevenson) – who pose as a professional couple in order to get a North London apartment. Sure, Tim could be a comic book artist if he tried, and Daisy’s quite a good writer, but being successful in either of those careers would mean applying themselves… By, of all things, *working*. Gah! With a gaggle of off-the-wall friends and acquaintances, if you think of it as a twenty-something Seinfeld with a postmodern pop culture twist (there are frequent surreal diversions) you wouldn’t be far off the mark. After much legal wrangling, fans and soon-to-be fans in the US can now pick up 
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If you want a sure sign that an action figure line has gotten traction, a good indicator would be that they’ve been successful enough to begin releasing a second wave. Such is the case with 
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Before Family Guy decided to jump on the bandwagon, Adult Swim’s Robot Chicken decided to venture into a galaxy far, far away for a bit of a good-natured puncture. With full cooperation from Lucasfilm, 
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