While traveling around the 'net, we can't help but notice that fans of
The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour are a bit confused. On the message boards, folks talk about seeing different upcoming releases of "
The Best of Season 3" DVDs, and we talked to Time Life to get to the bottom of it. Here's what we found out:
- A 5-DVD premium set is available from TimeLife.com RIGHT NOW (this is the version we've previously reported about)
- A 4-DVD set will be sold at retail starting on September 16th; retailers such as Amazon are starting to list this version for pre-order. It does NOT contain the Bonus DVD Smothered: The Censorship Struggles of The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour (a 92-minute documentary, which originally aired on Bravo)
- There will also be a 2-DVD set sold via Direct Response broadcasts, which begins on September 9th. This will be the first disc from the 4-disc set, AND the Smothered documentary together. Folks who buy this will have an opportunity to upgrade to the complete five-disc set if desired.
The cover art for the 4- and 5-disc sets will be the same (see below). Prices will vary appropriately among these releases, and your final cost will depend on discounts available on the larger packages (it's not difficult to Google up some discount codes for Time Life, and retailers such as Amazon discount almost all of the DVD titles they sell, including this one). So our advice is the make the choice that's right for you!
