The (corn)Holiest of Holy Days

Today is a holy day. The new, Mike Judge-approved Beavis and Butthead is out on DVD. To commemorate the event, I would humbly like to offer a few thoughts on the matter.

First, to all you Amazon.com reviewers and chat-room whiners everywhere ... you have no idea what you're talking about. You complain about the new DVD is a slap in the face because it does not run in 'seasons' but rather as a 'best of.' Of the hundreds of posts I read through, only one (by 'M. Power' on Amazon) made the correct point: BnB was not written in sequence where storylines build over episodes and seasons, so presenting a DVD collection in episode format is irrelevant.

What's relevant is that Judge has selected his 40 favorites from a pool of 201 episodes of one of the funniest TV shows ever. What's also relevant is that Judge endorsed this collection. For those who got the TimeLife collection a few years back, I am sure you will agree that this will be an improvement, and worthy of an almost-permanent slot in your disc changer.

Second, I'd like to thank MTV2 and TiVo for helping me get through the dry spell between the TimeLife collection and the Mike Judge collection. As though I needed to say that TiVo rules, but TiVo rules. It RULES! It means I don't have to waste my precious TV-watching time on ads for the new 50 Cent movie (which I wouldn't pay 50 cents to see) and the latest cheesball rock band. It means I can watch uninterrupted as Beavis and Butthead are hit on by their chick counterparts in the parking lot of the Creatures of Rock concert.

In addition to Tivo, Creatures of Rock also rule. Say it to yourself a few times: Creatures of Rock. Creatures of Rock. Their videos would surely put Gwar to shame.

Which brings me to point three: Where the hell are the videos? I thought an MTV-endorsed version of the show would include the videos that BnB watch between episode segments. This social commentary was (and is) more incisive and infinitely more hilarious than than anything South Park or The Daily Show or any of VH1's shows with C-list celebrities quipping about pop culture.

Turns out MTV can show video-enhanced episodes on their channels, but they would have to pay hefty licensing premiums to every band/label featured if the videos were spliced into episodes on DVDs. There are 201 episodes, and MTV aired two episodes plus about 4 videos per show. Which means they were looking at individual licensing agreements with 402 bands/labels. Apparently, even the mighty music network didn't want this kind of hassle.

At any rate, the issue of 'Videos vs. No Videos On Beavis and Butthead' is worthy of further examination. This topic alone should be the focus of some aspiring film student's senior thesis, or perhaps be integrated into curricula at all film schools that take themselves seriously.

Until that happens, you can report in here. I will dig deeper into this topic once I've had proper time to watch the new DVD collection. But for now, I'd just like to conclude by saying that I am not proud of spending hours scouring the web for fellow fans of BnB. But it am very proud to have spent the time on behalf of my favorite timeless TV comedy next to Seinfeld. At least now I can put down the mouse, pick up the remote, and enjoy.

I know the cool BnB fans are out there somewhere amidst the whiners.

So on this (corn)holiest of holy days, I bow deeply to all of you. Wherever you may be watching your DVD. And laughing along with me.