TV Show Review: I Love Lucy - Season 1 Volume 6

Stars: 5 out of 5
Pros: Lots of laughs

Cons: "The Young Fans"

The Bottom Line:

One week episode

But the rest of them are great

Coming together

One Subpar Effort and Three Winners

Now that Lucy, Ricky, Fred and Ethel (Lucille Ball, Desi Arnaz, William Frawley, and Vivian Vance) have reached the second half of their first season, things are really starting to gel. This disc contains four more episodes from that first season, and there is only one episode that isn't that great.

A quick recap in case you've somehow missed this classic. Ricky Ricardo is a Cuban band leader who works in a night club. His wife Lucy wants to get into show business, but Ricky constantly keeps her out. They are best friends with their land lords, Fred and Ethel Mertz. And Lucy is always getting them into some scheme or other and making us laugh.

"The Young Fans" - The Ricardos' neighbor has developed a crush on Ricky and won't leave him alone. In order to solve the problem, Lucy tries to teach a young man to dance, only to have that teen fall for her. Now that both of them have young admirers, what will they do? There are some funny moments here, but it's not the best episode. The Mertzes are no where to be found, which always weakens an episode. And I've never found the ending at all believable. But maybe I'm just trying to be too logical about it.

"New Neighbors" - This episode more then makes up for the last one. Some new tenants are moving into the building, and Lucy and Ethel can't resist spying. But when Lucy gets trapped in a closet, she overhears the neighbors plotting - to kill Ricky and Lucy. This takes a great premise and makes it absolutely hilarious. It's worth watching this episode just to see Lucy impersonate a chair.

"Fred and Ethel Fight" - After a huge fight, Fred and Ethel stop speaking to each other for three days. Lucy can't stand it any more, and comes up with a scheme to get them back together. However, it's soon Lucy and Ricky who aren't speaking. Since neither one is willing to show signs of weakness, they concoct two very different schemes to get back together without actually, you know, calling the other first. This episode starts out fairly ordinary (but funny), but the second half really takes off. The ending is classic stuff that is guaranteed to make you laugh.

"The Moustache" - Ricky decides to grow a mustache, but Lucy is having none of it. To prove her point, she glues on a fake beard - with permanent glue. What makes this episode work so well are Lucy's facial expressions. It's worth watching just for them.

The writing has definitely improved. The situations are beginning to get crazier, which is a good thing. The characters have also gotten sharper, which helps make the situations funnier.

And the actors are still going a great job. Everyone seems to really have found their characters and know what to do with the great material they are getting.

Speaking of great material, we've got some here on the DVD as well. In addition to the good sound and clear picture, we've also got some behind the scenes trivia, a couple mistakes, info on the guest cast, and an episode of Lucy's radio show that inspired the "Young Fans" episode.

This disc is rather expensive, however, not only in money but in space. These four to a disc volumes were how CBS/Paramount originally released this season. Fortunately, they saw the error of their ways and released the first season in a cheaper, slimmer set. Unless you only want these episodes, I recommend you skip this disc and buy the complete first season instead.