TVSquad

Mention The Man From U.N.C.L.E. to a younger, casual TV fan, and they'll probably look at you with a tilted head, the ways dogs often look at people. But to people of a certain age, The Man From U.N.C.L.E. (side note: that's a really hard title to type out) brings back a lot of cool memories. It was a spy spoof that debuted in 1964, in the height of the James Bond craze, but unlike a lot of 007 spoofs that didn't make it or were just plain lousy, U.N.C.L.E. stood on its own and still does today as a really fun light adventure show.

I had a chance to talk with U.N.C.L.E. star Robert Vaughn in conjunction with the release of the massive Time-Life Man From U.N.C.L.E.: The Complete Collection set.

Here's an odd little tidbit I didn't know. The first season of The Odd Couple that was released earlier this year was not released by Paramount. It was actually released by Time-Life (they also did that cool Get Smart set). But now the first season is going to be released again.

Paramount has announced that they too will release the first season of the show on April 24. TVShowsonDVD says that the set will probably be the exact same set as the one released by Time-Life, but there's no official word on it yet.

I'm still waiting for season two to be released! As I've said before, the first season of the show is rather lackluster to me. It's not that funny, and it has a different apartment set and wasn't filmed in front of a live audience. The later seasons are much better, as I think any fan or even crew member on the show would tell you.

Here's an update to the post I had a couple of days ago about new DVDs that have been released this week.

Get Smart fans who pre-ordered the DVD set a while back (including my roommate) might be a little bummed out to hear that shipping of the DVDs have been delayed. Seems that the company that Time-Life (the only place you can get the DVD set, at least right now) got to make the plastic "O" case used a thicker plastic than they were supposed to, and now the set doesn't quite fit in the special phone booth box that set is housed in.

I guess you can say that the plastic "missed it by THAT much."

TVShowsOnDVD has all the details, including info on when the sets will be shipped.

We told you a while back about the first season Get Smart DVD set that will be released via mail order (and only mail order, for now at least ) from Time-Life. Now comes information on what extras we'll see in the set.

Actress Barbara Feldon and creators Mel Brooks and Buck Henry will do commentary on episodes. Feldon on the "Kisses for KAOS" ep and Brooks and Henry on the pilot. There will also be an episode of The Bill Dana Show, the episode where Maxwell Smart made his first appearance (I never knew that). The set will also include the Museum of Television & Radio roundtable from 2003 that included Don Adams, Feldon, Bernie Kopell, director Jay Sandrich, and producer Leonard Stern.

Yeah, it sounds like a cheesy late-night ad, but TVShowonDVD is reporting that the Get Smart DVDs we talked about last week (they're coming out this fall) will not be sold in the usual locations (Best Buy, Circuit City, your local video store, etc). Instead, they will be sold like a lot of other Time-Life CDs/DVDs, via commercials, mail order, and their web site.

But that's fine. In this age of web ordering and Amazon.com and all that, I don't mind getting them this way. Plus while I'm on the phone I can buy those Fitness Made Simple videos and call those hot girls that are waiting just to talk to ME.