TVSquad

Valentine's Day is on a Saturday this year, so why not eschew the whole dinner and a night out routine for a day in from the cold watching TV boxed sets on DVD? What better gift is there than an entire day of laziness catching up on those boxed sets you got for Christmas and have had no time to watch? But choose carefully. No one can take a whole day of Rock of Love or Matlock.

Beauty and the Beast: The Complete Series - A tolerable "chick flick" type series, you can probably get away with watching just the first two seasons, before Linda Hamilton left and her character was killed off. And once your significant other gets used to the idea of Ron Perlman in Beast make-up, maybe you can convince her to watch Hellboy with you.

Here are the new TV DVDs, in stores tomorrow.

Glad I held off on getting the season one set of Banacek, as the complete series gets released on DVD tomorrow. I'm also interested in The Starlost, since I think it's something I haven't seen before but I've heard many things about (not all good).

Of course, you Sports Night fans are going to want the new 10th Anniversary complete series set, even if you have the old set.

• Adam-12 - Season 2
• B.L. Stryker - Complete Series
• Banacek - Complete Series
• Beauty and the Beast - Complete Series
• Click & Clack's As The Wrench Turns
• Edward the King - Miniseries
• Laredo - Best of Season 2, Part 1
• Mr. Bean - Best of Mr. Bean, Vol. 2
• My Name is Earl - Season 3
• My Three Sons - Season 1, Vol. 1
• The New Fantastic Four - The Impossible Man
• Numb3rs - Season 4
• Lewis Black's Root of All Evil
• Sports Night - Complete Series
• The Starlost - Complete Series
• When We Left Earth: The NASA Missions

Here are the new TV DVDs, in stores tomorrow.

• Anthony Bourdain: No Reservations - Collection 2
• Beauty and the Beast - Season 3
• Charlie and Lola - Vol. 7
• Dirty Jobs - Collection 2
• The Drak Pack - Complete Series
• The Jerry Springer Show: Undressed, Unleashed and Uncensored - Vol. 1, 2, and 3
• McLeod's Daughters - Season 5
• Mystery Science Theater 3000 - Vol. 10.2
• Perfect Strangers - Seasons 1 and 2
• Route 66 - Season 1, Vol. 2
• Slings and Arrows - Complete Collection
• Soul Food - Season 3
• Third Watch - Season 1
• The Whitest Kids You Know - Season 1

Lists are fun, aren't they? They put everything in perspective, they're easy to navigate, and they spark debate. But sometimes a list has entries in it that just make you scratch your head and wonder, do they really think that or are they just trying to be provocative?

The Chicago Tribune lists their picks for the 25 worst shows of all-time. Many of the usual suspects are here: Pink Lady and Jeff, BJ and the Bear, Manimal, and Small Wonder - but then they go completely off the rails and lists The 100 Lives of Blackjack Savage! If you don't remember this NBC show (it lasted 8 episodes in 1991), it was about a billionaire (Daniel Hugh-Kelly), accused of embezzlement, who escapes to an island, who gets involved with a ghost and has to save 100 lives. This was a really fun show and doesn't deserve to be on any "worst" list.

Here are the new TV DVDs, in stores tomorrow.

• Beauty and the Beast - Season 2
• Bewitched - Season 5 (Color)
• Extras - Season 2
• The Film Crew: Hollywood After Dark (Mike Nelson, Kevin Murphy, and Bill Corbett)
• Home Run Derby - Vol. 1
• Hustle - Season 3
• My Super Sweet 16 - Seasons 1 and 2
• Punky Brewster - Vols. 1-6

Here are the new TV DVDs in stores tomorrow.

• All in the Family - Season 6
• Beauty and the Beast - Season 1
• Cobra - Complete Series
• Emergency - Season 3
• The Golden Girls - Season 7
• Grosse Pointe - Complete Series
• The Hills - Season 1
• Hustle - Season 2
• Masters of Horror - Pelts (Argento)
• Men Behaving Badly - Complete Series
• Reno 911- Most Wanted Uncensored
• Zoey 101 - Season 1

Remember Beauty and the Beast? Ron Perlman as Vincent, the cultured man-lion, falls for savvy assistant DA Catherine played by a pre-buff Linda Hamilton.

The series which began in 1987 had lots of rabid fans, and not just of the romance novel variety. Well, fans, your day has finally come. Beauty and the Beast will be released to DVD on February 13, 2007.

While the official announcement from Paramount hasn't been released, DVD Empire is taking pre-orders.

Now, this is just for the fans. The narration from the opening credits:

Samuel L. Jackson, Ron Perlman, and Kelly Hu have signed on to voice characters in the upcoming animated series, Afro Samurai on Spike. Jackson is also executive producing the project, which is based on a graphic novel by Takashi Okazaki about a black Samurai's quest to find the man who killed his father. Jackson will voice the lead character, while Perlman will voice the villain he seeks. Perlman, by the way, is the guy who played the title character in Hellboy and the Beast in the television series, Beauty and the Beast. Hu plays Okiku, a friend from the samurai's past. She played the female version of Wolverine in X2: X-Men United. The RZA is creating original music for the series.

Spike has ordered five episodes of Afro Samurai. They begin airing January 4th.

Yes, the headline would usually include the "at (age)," but I can't find anything that says what his age was. Nothing on the IMDB, and nothing on his site either.

You would recognize Jay's voice as much as his face, as he voiced an incredible number of cartoons over the years, including The Hunchback of Notre Dame, Reboot, Spiderman, Teen Titans, Superman, The Mighty Ducks, Gargoyles, and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, as well as a massive number of videogames: World of Warcraft, X-Men Legends, Lionhearts, various Star Trek games, Return to Castle Wolfenstein, and just about every other video game ever made that used a voice. But he had live action roles in TV and movies too, including Lois and Clark, Newhart, The Adventures of Brisco County, Jr., Mr. Belvedere, Twin Peaks, Beauty and the Beast, Eerie, Indiana, Matlock, Murphy Brown, Picket Fences, and The Golden Girls. He was also a Royal Shakespeare Company actor and a singer.

He died earlier this week after surgery for removal of a non-cancerous growth on his lungs.

When I was looking at the promos for the new ABC movie Stephen King's Desperation, I noticed that the evil Tak was being played by a familiar face: Ron Perlman. You remember Perlman, right? He's done a number of roles as the big lumbering thug on various TV shows, but he's probably best known as playing Vincent on the early-Nineties tearjerker series Beauty and the Beast. But, since some guest starring roles in the early 2000's, we haven't seen his face on TV. What has been doing? Well, he starred as the title character in the movie Hellboy and he's done small parts in various sci-fi movies. But mostly he's been doing voice work for cartoons and video games. Makes sense, since Perlman's got a fairly authoritative set of pipes on him. His IMDb profile goes over what has been a fairly busy period for Perlman.

Good to see him back on TV, though, in a significant role. I always liked him on Beast, except when he was furrily making out with Linda Hamilton. That was just wrong.

Jacob Young, who plays JR Chandler on the daytime soap, All My Children, will make his Broadway debut this spring in Beauty and the Beast. He'll play Beauty. Just kidding. But seriously, look at the kid. He's gorgeous.

Actually, Young will be playing the candlestick, Lumiere, in a 10-week run starting May 9. Don't worry AMC fans, he'll still be on the soap too. Young will be doing double-duty on stage and on television. His only conflict is the Wednesday matinee, which gives his Broadway understudy a little stage time.