Carstairs Considers....: TV Show Review: Mary Tyler Moore Show

Saturday, March 2, 2013

TV Show Review: Mary Tyler Moore Show - Season 2

Stars: 5 out of 5

Pros: Sympathetic characters and humor that holds up 40+ years later

Cons: None

The Bottom Line:

Still making us laugh

With charming characters, plots

A winner for sure

Finally Mary Returns to DVD

When TV shows started being released on DVD, there were only a handful of shows I was going to allow myself to buy. While that number has increased, I've been waited anxiously to get more of this show, one of the originals on the list. I'm so thankful to finally have a chance to get season two.

With the groundwork laid in the highly successful season one, the cast and crew push on to better themselves with season two. The show follows the exploits of single working woman Mary Richards (Mary Tyler Moore). At home, she is surrounded by friends Rhoda (Valerie Harper) and Phyllis (Cloris Leachman). She works as the associate producer of the news at WJM-TV which is lowest in the ratings thanks to bumbling news broadcaster Ted (Ted Knight). Also on the staff are news writer Murray (Gavin MacLeod) and producer Lou Grant (Ed Asner).

Several of the supporting characters get better developed here, most noticeably Ted, who gets several episodes that show his big talk is hiding some very low self-esteem. Phyllis' daughter Bess also gets more episodes this season and some very funny ones at that. Even Rhoda's mother makes a return visit. The only character who still seems to suffer is Murray, who only gets one episode devoted to him. Of course, he doesn't truly come into his own until he has Sue Ann to spar with starting in season 4.

Some of the standout episodes of this season include:

"A Girl's Best Mother is Not Her Friend," which features the return of Ida Morgenstern who tries to bond with Rhoda after watching Phyllis and Bess together.

"Thoroughly Unmilitant Mary" finds Mary and Lou the only two members of the newsroom not on strike.

When Mary continues a chain letter, her responses include two men in "Don't Break the Chain."

A spineless Mary gets frustrated with a "Feeb," a person who just can't do her job no matter what it is.

Rhoda and Mary find they are better friends then roommates in "Where There's Smoke, There's Rhoda."

And Phyllis overreacts to an A for Bess in "The Care and Feeding of Parents."

Fans will love this three-disc set. The episodes have been restored and look great with only the minimal dust in the full frame picture. The mono sound is great as well. The extras were originally completed before the set was postponed several years ago and are mostly featured on the back of the third disc. They included cast and crew commentary on three episodes, clips of the Emmy winners from this season, and an interesting documentary on all eight of the main characters and actors who were on the show over the curse of it's run. There's a twenty-minute look at filming the new footage for the fourth season opening which I found very entertaining. The parody from "Mad Magazine" has some funny bits, but like most stuff from them goes too far and looses it's whit before it's over. While the "Newsbeat Segment" had a few interesting bits in it, most of it wasn't worth watching.

Watching the extras, you get the feeling that everyone loved working on this show. I think this comes through in the finished product. While the fashions and sets are dated, the laughter isn't at all with season two. Here's hoping season three follows soon.

Season 2 Episodes:

1. The Birds...and...um...Bees

2. I am Curious Cooper

3. He's No Heavy, He's My Brother

4. Room 223

5. A Girl's Best Mother is Not Her Friend

6. Cover Boy

7. Didn't You Used to be...Wait...Don't Tell Me

8. Thoroughly Unmilitant Mary

9. And Now, Sitting in for Ted Baxter

10. Don't Break the Chain

11. The Six-and-a-Half-Year Itch