"It's so great to have a store in walking distance. It's a great walk. I actually drove, but the people I passed seemed to be so happy.just friendly. 'Hey Ellen, welcome home!' 'Good to see you!' 'Slow down, you maniac!' Just the sweetest people." - Ellen Richmond (Ellen DeGeneres) on her hometown
The Ellen Show: The Complete Series DVD Review
By A.J. Carson
Ellen Richmond (Ellen DeGeneres) has a terrific life. She runs homelearn.web, a Web site based in Los Angeles. She's been involved with so many internet startups that she can't even remember the names of her employees anymore. And now she's returning to her tiny hometown of Clark where she's scheduled to receive the "Spread Your Wings" award. While waiting to accept her award, she finds out that her Web site has gone under. She then makes a truly radical decision. Rather than returning to her fast paced L.A. life, she'll stay in Clark and live with her mom Dot (Cloris Leachman, The Mary Tyler Moore Show) and her younger sister Catherine (Emily Rutherfurd). Her room is exactly like she left it, complete with Wonder Woman, Charlie's Angels), and Billie Jean King posters tacked to the wall.
Soon Mr. Munn (Martin Mull), the principal of Clark High School and Ellen's former teacher, offers her a job as the school's guidance counselor. Her onetime prom date, Rusty Carnouk (Jim Gaffigan) teaches at the school. He still carries a torch for her, even though she's a lesbian and she got home from their prom date in time for her to watch The Bionic Woman). Not everyone is happy that Ellen has joined the faculty, especially high-strung home economics teacher Pam (Kerri Kenney) who wanted to expand her kitchen into Ellen's office.
The Ellen Show was created by Carol Leifer and Mitchell Hurwitz. Standup comedian Leifer also served as the executive story editor of Seinfeld for many seasons, writing several classic episodes, including "The Understudy." Hurwitz went on to create the irresistible cult hit Arrested Development (well, irresistible to everyone except TV audiences).
Bits of both shows shine through in The Ellen Show. The series often exhibits wackily convoluted, Seinfeld-esque plotlines and jokes. Ellen mourns the fact that she cannot find a good cup of coffee in Clark and ends up joining Alcoholics Anonymous when she discovers that they serve the only decent cup in town ("Joe"). When Vanity Fair decides to feature Ellen in a photo essay on dotcom failures, her family and friends convince her to get a new hairstyle. She consults someone she believes is a Vanity Fair stylist, but he turns out to be a pet groomer from "Vanity Hair" ("Vanity Hair").
Although The Ellen Show is more of a traditional sitcom, it also shares characteristics with Arrested Development. The characters are mostly believable, but they are also oddballs in the extreme. The similarity extends to Ellen's complicated family life. Catherine lacks self-confidence and constantly finds herself dating losers, like a guy who makes cotton candy at carnivals. The family also bonds while watching Judge Judy over dinner. When Judge Judy is moved to a new timeslot, dinner is served two hours earlier than usual.
Fans of The Mary Tyler Moore Show will be pleased to see a pair of episodes reuniting Cloris Leachman with several members of that classic sitcom's cast. Well, half pleased, anyway. In "Missing the Bus," Betty White guests as Mrs. Gibson, the school's bus driver. When Ellen sees Mrs. Gibson in the teachers' lounge, she guiltily remembers how her incessant talking accidentally caused the driver to get her first and only traffic ticket many years ago. When Ellen learns that Mrs. Gibson's birthday is approaching, she decides that throwing a party in the lounge will redeem her. There's only one problem - Ellen's meddling brings to light that the driver has reached the mandatory retirement age. Soon Mrs. Gibson is out of a job.and Ellen is stuck driving the bus. White is as delightful as usual, and this episode is silly fun.
Lightning, however, doesn't strike twice. Mary Tyler Moore guest stars as Aunt Mary, a successful Chicago reporter, in "Ellen's First Christmas." Mary and Dot have been feuding for years because Dot resents Mary's lavish gifts and highfalutin' city ways. Unaware of the fight, Ellen flies Aunt Mary in for Christmas. She then has to figure out a way to patch things up between the sisters. Ed Asner even makes a cameo appearance as a mall Santa, leading Aunt Mary to witlessly proclaim, "Oh, Mr. Claus!" The episode is obviously meant to be special, but it isn't very funny, and the plotline is rather bland.
As this point in a review of a short-lived series, I usually mention that the show didn't have enough time to fully develop and that it probably could have grown into a funny series. That is difficult to say with The Ellen Show, however. Although the entire series has funny moments, the show's best episodes seem to be concentrated at the start of the season. As the series goes on, the episodes become blander with some of its boldness abandoned for traditional sitcom clichés. There's even an episode in which Ellen visits the taping of an Antiques Roadshow-style TV show with junk she found around her house ("One for the Roadshow"). Would the show have gotten better with time? It's hard to tell.
Guest stars appearing on The Ellen Show include John Francis Daley (Freaks & Geeks), Marissa Jaret Winokur (Hairspray), photographer Herb Ritts, Tom Poston (Mork & Mindy), Dakota Fanning, Maureen McCormick (The Brady Bunch), Susan Walters (The War Next Door), Susan Diol (One Life to Live), and John Ritter (Three's Company).
The eighteen episodes that make up The Ellen Show: The Complete Series are divided onto two discs. The discs are housed in two slim, clear plastic keepcases. The fronts of the cases are decorated with composite photos of DeGeneres and several of the series' guest stars. Yes, Dakota Fanning may have appeared onscreen for all of forty-five seconds, but there she is plastered on the front of one keepcase as if she stars in the series. The same basic images are rearranged to decorate the actual discs. The backs of the cases include titles and brief synopses for each episode. The interiors of the cases include publicity stills of DeGeneres sitting on a lawn. The keepcases slide into a cardboard outer sleeve.
The DVD menus are simple and easy to navigate. Viewers can play all of the disc's episodes or choose an individual one. The episodes are divided into chapters, but there are no scene selection menus.
