The last of the Mike Judge Collections has arrived, Volume 3, and my mixed feelings are carried over from the previous two releases. For those who weren't keeping up with this DVD series, a quick recap is in order. A few years back, MTV attempted to release a DVD compilation of Beavis and Butt-head, calling it The History of Beavis and Butt-head. Even though this 2-DVD set had shipped to retailers, Mike Judge demanded it be recalled - he hadn't been asked to participate. Reasonable enough, it was his creation after all - and, of course, a phenomenal success that made him a household name. Frustrating as the recall may have been for B&B fans starving for something more than the then-recent Time-Life volumes (which were simply DVD reissues of the VHS collections), a Mike Judge-sanctioned release sounded promising.
Last year, the first of three 3-DVD Mike Judge Collections was released. Tucked inside the box was a note from Mr. Judge himself. He explained that he is very proud of about one-third of the approximately 200 Beavis & Butt-head shorts. Another third he feels are pretty good. The remaining third he finds embarrassing. The three collections contain the two-thirds he thinks are good. In other words, some 70-plus cartoons will not be released on DVD. To make matters worse, the "Director's Cut" cartoons found on Volume 1 turned out to be shortened versions. Probably due to a very vocal fan reaction, the cartoons on Volume 2 were not edited.
The good news is that the 42 shorts found on Volume 3 are also presented in their entirety. Fans of the show will be pleased to find loads of classic episodes on this set. Some of my favorites are found on disc one, such as "Buy Beer" where the boys get 'drunk' from non-alcoholic brew. The Great Cornholio makes an appearance on Disc One as well, in "Vaya Con Cornholio." The superb Christmas shorts are also on the first disc, "Huh-Huh-Humbug" (a take-off on A Christmas Carol) and "It's a Miserable Life" (which spoofs It's a Wonderful Life).
Disc two has its share of great moments as well. "Bride of Butt-head" finds the boys ordering a mail order Russian bride (she ends up ditching them and scoring with Todd). "Woodshop" is another favorite of mine, where the two get carried away with the table saw in shop class. The series finale concludes Disc Two, "Beavis and Butt-head Are Dead," and it runs considerably longer than the average episode — about 20 minutes — though much of that time is taken up by clips from earlier episodes.
Article comments
1 - RJ Elliott
Huh-huh. Dude...was this written by a chick?
Dude! I think so! Heh-heh-heh!
Co-o-ol. Do you think she's hot?
Heh-heh-heh! Yeah! I'd do her! I'd do her in the butt! Heh-heh-heh!!!
Heh...co-o-ol...
2 - Dynamo of Eternia
It is disapointing that the entire series may not get released, and it's also disapointing that the episodes are not in order.
With all due respect to Mike Judge, it just seems like his involvement has complicated things more than it has helped. If he hadn't pushed for things his way, we probably would be getting all of the episodes in their proper order.
Maybe he wouldn't have been as involved with the extras as a result, which would stink, but to me the extras are secondary to the main content, and having all of the episodes is much more important to me.
Does anyone know if any of the episodes from the TimeLife releases are ones that were not included on the Mike Judge Collection DVDs?
I've also heard that even though it was recalled, a few of the History of Beavis and Butthead DVDs still leaked out into the hands of some people. I wonder if there's any content on those not included on these sets as well.
3 - patmann
they should include the muic vids with the episode to complete each episode as seen on tv. that would be great :P. Oh well, i'll just have to deal.