It's a good thing I don't actually have anything to do this weekend, because the sheer volume of amazing television released on DVD yesterday will be taking up all of my free time -- and my Must List -- for the foreseeable future. As Ken Tucker noted yesterday, beloved '90s comedy series The State finally got its long-awaited release (just in time for the premiere of Michael and Michael Have Issues on Comedy Central tonight), and the second season of AMC's '60s-set drama Mad Men hit shelves in preparation for the show's third season premiere later this summer. But wait! There's more. The HBO movie Grey Gardens, starring Drew Barrymore and Jessica Lange, made its DVD debut, so all HBO-less citizens can watch the movie about Jackie O.'s eccentric cousins in the comfort of their own homes, as opposed to commandeering the couches of their premium cable-having friends. It's the best thing to watch for the day, you understand.
Get psyched by watching the full-length trailer for Grey Gardens below, then tell us what's on your Must List this week. List up to three items from current TV/movies/music/books/games/online. Don't forget your e-mail address, in case we decide to use your submission in the magazine. Deadline is Thursday, July 16 at noon ET.
Have you noticed that the comedy geek in your life has an extra spring in his or her step? It’s because today sees the long-long-awaited DVD release of MTV’s early-90s sketch show, The State. Members of the comedy troupe went on to make some of my favorite comedies: Reno 911!, Wet Hot American Summer, Role Models, Viva Variety, Stella, the new Michael and Michael Have Issues…the list goes on and on. Must List Live! has an exclusive clip from the DVD, so check it out: The mark of a great sketch series is when even the old topical clips hold up, and this one does: It may be a takeoff of Footloose, but the teen-movie cliches it mocks are just mockably delicious today.
The long-awaited 13th episode of Joss Whedon’s Dollhouse, the post-apocalyptic "Epitaph One," will debut July 24 at Comic-Con, then on the season 1 DVD and Blu-ray July 28. In the issue of EW out today, we have the first look at SPOILER ALERT! Caroline (Eliza Dushku), who, having escaped for some time, is seen in the top photo entering an abandoned Dollhouse in the year 2019 with Paul (Tahmoh Penikett).
We also have an EW.com exclusive photo of SPOILER ALERT! Whiskey (Amy Acker), who has been left behind in the Dollhouse in a "wiped" state. She is discovered by a group of rebels (including Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog's Felicia Day), which you see in the clip below.
Fox had declined to air "Epitaph One," which Whedon says was designed to either close out the series or to lead into the
second season (which premieres Sept. 25). "So you will find out snippets of everything and all of nothing," Whedon tells EW. "Every flashback answers something about where people are heading but brings up a lot more questions about where they end up or how they got there." (Whedon says the season 2 opener he's writing and directing won't pick up right where the May season 1 finale left off, with "We've got to find Alpha!", but a little bit later.)
Though he would've loved to have seen "Epitaph One" air on TV, Whedon understands Fox's decision to save it for the DVD. "It has a very different structure and feel from what we do on Dollhouse, so it would have been ridiculously startling to have aired it the week after the season finale as just this insane coda," he says. "And it is a little bit insane, except that we sort of follow everything through to its logical conclusion. As always, it's logical to conclude that people are terrible and will try to destroy each other."
Seth Green and Matt Senreich will promote the July 21 Robot Chicken: Star Wars Episode II DVD release (and the continuation of their Adult Swim show's fourth season -- nine new eps starting July 26) with a nine-city roller rink tour. The parties, which kick off July 25 in San Diego at Comic-Con, will feature performances by Gym Class Heroes, as well as appearances by the creators (who will travel from city-to-city on a tour bus), the show's writers (including Breckin Meyer), and famous fans. Also apparently, there will, in fact, be roller skating.
So, are you ready to return to the roller rink? My memories of the one I frequented growing up in Central Pennsylvania are mostly blocked. But I remember the joy of realizing that my shirt glowed and the fear that made me afraid to do whatever it is you have to do with your skate to stop (so I would just run into the wall). Okay, I need to stop before I remember that humiliation that happened by the Pac-Man machine. It's close to surfacing... Abort! ABORT!
Your turn. What's your favorite roller rink memory? Dates and details on the parties after the jump.
I've been doooooown this roooooaaad, etc., etc. Rejoice, '90s fans, because Ally McBeal is finally coming to DVD. While Fox hasn't announced a firm release date yet, both the first seasonandthe complete series are available for pre-order on Amazon, in full-on Region 1 not-illegal form. Holla!
I was nuts about this show back in the day -- it popularized the concept of "knee pit" (soft!), taught me that every decade or so, Americans will engage in a broad discussion about feminism (between Ally and Hillary, how often did it come up? Never?), and also there was kooky lawyering and dancing. Ah, we will miss you this season, David E. Kelley.
Back in March, when Disney and ABC announced that they were finally releasing the first two seasons of Lost on Blu-ray (both are on sale today), I was both elated and frustrated. On the one hand, I was imagining how neat these two box sets would look stacked up alongside my Lost season 3 and 4 Blu-rays. On the other hand, I wasn't looking forward to a dilemma that all Blu-ray addicts like me go through regularly: the double-dip decision. I already own Lost season 1 and 2 on DVD -- how much do I really want them on Blu-ray, too?
My brain goes through a series of intricate, sometimes irrational, calculations to determine if it's worth investing in Blu-ray versions of standard definition DVDs I already own. In cases like these Lost Blu-rays, which have the same bonus features as their lower-def DVD counter-parts, double-dipping is even more painful. But Lost is my favorite show on TV by a country mile and Disney has done an exceptional job with the other Lost Blu-rays (the image quality is even better than that of the high-def broadcasts), so ultimately, I went for the upgrade. With other video releases -- I'm looking at you 12 Monkeys Blu-ray coming out next month -- the answer isn't as easy.
What about you PopWatchers? What criteria do you use when you decide to double-dip with a Blu-ray purchase?
Okay, well, it's not really. But if I had the power to declare such holidays, then June 16th would now and forever more be an American day of commemoration for the greatest of all Stooges, Shemp Howard.
For the past couple of years, Sony has been cranking out Three Stooges DVD box sets every few months or so -- and there certainly seems to be a renewed interest in the Stooges thanks to a feature film in development, potentially starring Jim Carrey, Sean Penn, and Benicio del Toro. But it wasn't until today's release of The Three Stooges Collection, Vol. 6: 1949-1951 that we were treated to such a pure, heaping, unfiltered dose of Shemp -- the most tragically overlooked of all Stooges.
I realize that Curly will always be the most popular and beloved Stooge to many. Heck, he even had a minor Top 40 splash back in 1983 with the homage novelty song, "The Curly Shuffle." And his nyuck-nyuck, oh-a-wiseguy antics are certainly lovable. But he always seemed a little too desperate for a laugh for me. He was a cross between Baby Huey and a black velvet painting of a sad clown. On the opposite end of the spectrum, of course, was Moe, the sadistic ring leader who never met an eyeball he couldn't poke. And then rounding out the troika was Larry, a.k.a. Porcupine, the sad-sack who always seemed to get caught between Moe's knuckles and Curly's mug. He was like the existential Stooge, the one who keeps trying to roll the cream pie up the hill only to have Moe push it back down to the bottom. In a way, he was always too tragic to be funny.
Enter Shemp Howard, born Samuel Horwitz, real-life older brother of Curly and Moe (the fact that he was the real-life brother of Moe makes all of those blows that landed on his melon from his sadist sibling all the more psychologically fraught, if you ask me, but I digress). Shemp was the third Stooge in the early years of the act, but gave way for Larry Fine. He would return in the late '40s after Curly suffered a stroke. And what a return it was as the new Stooges' box set makes crystal clear. Shemp had the face of a frying pan -- a frying pan that had been hit in the face with a frying pan. On good days and after a visit to the makeup chair, it might upgrade to looking like a side of roast beef. Nervous as a jackrabbit and with an oil slick of hair parted down the middle, Shemp appeared in 73 Stooges shorts, a bunch of the best of which are included in Vol. 6
If you've never considered yourself a true Shemp fan, or if you always had a softer spot for Curly, Moe, Larry, or even Curly Joe, check out this classic clip from "Don't Throw That Knife," where the boys play census takers who show up at the apartment of a woman whose jealous husband just happens to be a knife-thrower. Classic.
Before she costarred in Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog, Felicia Day already had a web hit to her credit, The Guild. She writes and stars in the award-winning series about a group of adult online gamers who, for better or worse (mostly worse), come to know one another off-line. Seasons 1 and 2 were just released on DVD, with audio commentaries and other extras, exclusively through Amazon. Taking a break from penning Season 3, which she begins shooting next month, Day phoned PopWatch to chat about The Guild, "the frowny face heard 'round the world," a recent high school production of Dr. Horrible she attended, and her Dungeons & Dragons dice collection. (That's why we administer the Pop Culture Personality Test, people.)
ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY: You're right on time.
FELICIA DAY: I try to be. I sit in front of the phone. It's the equivalent of sitting in your car outside someone's house. I do that, too.
For a half hour, like Cyd [a.k.a Codex, her character in The Guild] does?
No. You have to take everything and exaggerate it in comedy. I would say, conservatively, I'm usually 15 minutes early in the car.
The show is written for gamers, by a gamer, but I stopped playing back in the day of Atari 2600, and I still related to it. Is that something you hear a lot of?
Yeah. A lot of our fans are not gamers at all. They're kinda geeks, they're techno people. And there are a lot of women who like my show, which I find to be gratifying, 'cause that's what I was aiming to do -- give a geek girl a chance. I mean, listen, you don't have to be a surgeon to understand ER. Just because you don't know gaming terms doesn't mean you're not gonna get it, as long as I did my job and made jokes understandable.
How are you going to top the final shot of Season 2, with Codex running away from herself in a sort of out-of-body experience? [Note: That would only really be a spoiler if we told you why.]
I have no idea. I was actually a little intimidated when I sat down to write Season 3. That visual was actually the one thing I got in my head to be able to write Season 2. I was like, Oh, this would be a really cool analogy for somebody dying inside. Which some gamers pointed out was inaccurate because your ghost should be running back to your body, but I figured people would intellectually understand. [Laughs] It's always hard to sit down [to write] and have enjoyment without having pressure on yourself. I got over that in a couple of weeks.
Describe your writing process. I follow you on Twitter, so I've got some idea of --
The agony? [Laughs] The problem is I do so many other things that it's hard to stick with a schedule, and I think scheduling is really important with writing. So after a couple weeks, I figured out that I need to get up in the morning, and I need to not check my email, and then I need to write, and then I need to whine a lot, and then I need to go buy some kind of expensive coffee and maybe some peanut butter pretzels, and then I need to sit down and get a first draft on paper, a "vomit draft" I like to call it. Because I could agonize over a page for weeks... It's hard with comedy because you read it, and then you go back, especially with a rewrite, and it's hard to trust that if it made you laugh the first draft, you should keep it. Your instinct is, Oh, I've seen that. Maybe I should make it funnier. It's like watching a sitcom taping. The first couple times you watch [a scene filmed], you're like Oh, that's kinda funny. Then after the fourth take, you're like, Please get me out of here.
Why did The Guild succeed online when so many web series don't?
Web video is really at a weird position now. There are a lot of
companies going under. Personally, I think that's because people were trying to do
TV shows on the Web. When I see people funding Web
series and I look at the description of the show, I'm like, "Why would
I watch that on the Web with lower production values, when I could see
that on TV next week?" TV has to please everybody to make a show, the
Web needs to be the opposite. If it's a Somali immigrant family
comedy set in Chicago, it's something you've never seen before, and it
might be really interesting. You're more likely to give it a chance
than Hey, it's a bunch of white people who work in a coffee shop. Seen it. It's been done better. With very attractive people.... The Guild is tailor-made for an
audience that is specific. We were able to get our show to people
because it was aiming toward a niche. Then we were able to grow out of
that niche because it's about the characters not the gaming. But you
probably never would have seen the show unless the hardcore gamers had
spread it around the first year.
And you're hoping to take Season 3 footage to Comic-Con? That should be fun. I only went the first time last year for Dr. Horrible. I saw a rumor on the Internet that they're going to screen my Dollhouse episode.
Save the casting of Jerry O'Connell in Piranha 3-D, nothing has gotten me this excited since I reviewed Sci Fi's Mansquito. Check out the trailer for the May 19 straight-to-DVD release Mega Shark vs. Giant Octopus starring Deborah Gibson and Lorenzo Lamas (sadly, not as Mega Shark and Giant Octopus). I'm not sure who I'm rooting for, but since Mega Shark can jump out of the water to take down a bridge and an airplane, I'm going with him. (Then Deborah. Then Giant Octupus. Then Lorenzo.)
Hmmm. We were excited to present an exclusive clip from the DVD release of Russell Brand's Comedy Central stand-up special until we realized that we couldn't actually post most of what he says. Below, you'll find his G-rated take on Google, which comes after he shares why fame is so important to him -- "Without fame, this haircut just looks like mental illness" -- and before he details his experience hosting the 2008 MTV Video Music Awards (which he refers to as a "bloodbath"). You'll just have to buy the DVD on May 19 to watchthe deleted scene of Brand, currently reprising his Forgetting Sarah Marshall role for the follow-up Get Him to the Greek, handling a drunk female heckler.
Before she costarred in 
