Television in The Dvd and video tapes Store

Volume 2:
* LUCKY LUCIANO: CHAIRMAN OF THE MOB: He ran the Mob like a corporation--diversifying rackets, organizing gangs and running his own political candidates--and his top-secret war efforts earned him parole from a 50-year sentence.
* MEYER LANSKY: MOB TYCOON: From the pogroms of Eastern Europe to the heyday of the Vegas Mob, rare footage and interviews reveal the double life of the man known as the Mob's financial leader.
* GENOVESE: PORTRAIT OF A CRIME FAMILY: A soldier breaks the sacred mobster's oath of silence (omerta) and the Genovese family hits the headlines. From Joe the Boss to Vito Genovese to the "Odd Father" himself, every personality and gripping detail in this ongoing saga comes to life.
* BUGSY SIEGEL: Handsome, glamorous and the most vicious crime boss of all, Benjamin "Bugsy" Siegel began as a hit man on the streets of Brooklyn and died the victim of a mysterious murder, but not before turning a desert mirage into a Las Vegas dreamland.

Though the jokes in American Dad! are not as free-associative as in Family Guy, McFarlane cannot seem to resist dispensing with character integrity for a gratuitous potshot at, say, Lisa Kudrow. But as with Family Guy, American Dad! tears at the sitcom envelope. The blasphemous episode "Deacon Stan, Jesus Man," had the distinction of being voted "Worst TV Show of the Week" by the Parents Television Council. And American Dad! has its own version of Family Guy's surreal titanic bouts between Peter Griffin and that chicken. The episode "Homeland Insecurity" features a digression in which a Department of Water and Power worker greedily kills his partner over a gem-encrusted gold "turd," only to find out his wife is having an affair. As he wails to the heavens, the words "To be continued" appear onscreen. According to the audio commentary, the writers do indeed intend to continue this compelling soap opera. So that's something to look forward to. --Donald Liebenson

Love American Style debuted in 1969, a year in which the networks started to reach out to "modern people living in a modern world" with shows such as Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In, The Mod Squad, and The Music Scene (which anticipated Saturday Night Live with its mix of satirical sketches and contemporary music). Love American Style was hip enough to feature a story called "Love and the Pill" and to refer to Philip Roth's novel Goodbye, Columbus. But traditional values invariably triumphed. In "Pill," a young man tells his girlfriend's overwrought parents that they have abstained from you-know. "That's the way we happen to feel about it," he reassures them. But what we truly love about American Style are the casts. You'd have to sail The Love Boat or visit Fantasy Island to find such a stellar gathering of Hollywood greats, comic legends, TV Land faves, future stars, and unsung character actors with the indelible and unforgettable faces. To name a few: Bill Bixby, Sid Caesar, Hans "Uncle Tonoose" Conreid, Broderick Crawford, Dwayne "Dobie Gillis" Hickman, David Ketchum (Agent 13 on Get Smart), Shari Lewis, Regis Philbin, Connie Stevens, Larry Storch, Paul "Tigger" Winchell, Joe Flynn and Carl Ballentine from McHale's Navy, and Mr. Ford, who shows up as Roger, the boyfriend, in "Love and the Former Marriage." Stuart Margolin (The Rockford Files) is the most recognizable face of the show's stock company who appear in Laugh-In-style blackouts that link the stories. These are hit and miss, but some are blink-twice bizarre, as the one in which a black man reassures his reluctant fiancée, "Okay, we'll raise the kids Jewish." So cue the Cowsills ("Love American Style/Truer than the red, white and blue….") and ignite the fireworks. It's dated, yes, but Love will never go out of style. --Donald Liebenson

As with previous R&S DVD sets, the supplemental features are somewhat spare--Kricfalusi and members of Spumco and Games contribute commentaries, and there's a featurette on the show--and the episodes are indeed the edited versions, but the comments by the show's creative team are both entertaining and informative. And no matter what your opinion of these final episodes (before the show's revival as an Adult Party Cartoon on Spike TV), there's still plenty of stinky laughs to be had. --Paul Gaita

Remington Steele has become best known as Brosnan's launching pad (he later become James Bond in GoldenEye and its sequels), but Zimbalist was every bit as crucial to the show's success; her mixture of glamor and toughness gives the show a distinctly adult sexiness and grounds Brosnan's boyish charm. The dialogue sometimes slipped from arch camp to sheer cheese, but even at its most ridiculous (say, a scene where Holt and Steele question homeless bums while dressed in formal evening wear) Remington Steele remains an eminently watchable show, thanks to zippy plotting and the chemistry between Zimbalist and Brosnan. Some episodes clearly implied that the pair had become intimate, yet that didn't defuse their attraction. Even when the stories became a bit silly, the mutual respect and desire between Holt and Steele never lost its sophistication. --Bret Fetzer