Welcome

Welcome to my ever-evolving blog. It started out as a blog on Beachbody workouts and products, mainly when I was a Beachbody coach. I no longer coach, not because I don't believe in Beachbody's programs (I subscribe to Beachbody on Demand and use their workouts every day), I am just not a salesperson and hated that aspect of it. I am more than willing to answer questions about my experiences with their products and the various workouts, and I feel freer to do so without the appearance of giving a biased review of something.

I have also started adding reviews for various things I have purchased like movies, books, CDs, and other products. This was brought about by a fight with Amazon in which all of my reviews were removed over a completely bullshit allegation that I posted a review that violated their terms of service. After going back and forth with the morons in the community-reviews department (even after they admitted that my posts did not violate their guidelines) they restored my account (which took them six months to do), but I have been posting my reviews on my blog to have them preserved in case something like that happens again. And here, I will post uncensored reviews so I will swear from time to time and post reviews that may be longer than Amazon's character limit. Everything I post here on any topic or product is my personal opinion, and I take no compensation for any product reviews I post. I am a member of Amazon's vine program and because I get those products for free, I keep those reviews on Amazon only, but everything I have purchased with my own money, whether from Amazon or some other store/website/outlet, I will post here.  

I also plan to do some longer blog posts on various topics, such as how to learn physics, how to get through calculus, and longer reviews of workout programs as I do them. Basically, whatever strikes me as interesting at the time.  As you can see if you navigate around the blog, I had many years in between postings. During that time I was going back to school to get an engineering degree, and learning material that I avoided my first time through college was a different experience and one that gave me a lot of insight into how to do well in those classes, which I will try to impart here for those who are looking to get a science or engineering degree. 

Sunday, February 4, 2024

Blu-Ray/TV Series Review: Friends: The Complete Series

 


In the 1990s and early 2000s, the two biggest comedies on TV were probably Friends and Seinfeld. Friends was aimed at the younger demographic, going for the viewers that were in their mid to late 20s, while Seinfeld was aimed at the demographic about a decade older. Friends premiered in 1994 and was about a group of friends living in New York. The series starred Courtney Cox, Jennifer Aniston, Matthew Perry, Lisa Kudrow, David Schwimmer, and Matt LeBlanc. I actually never watched the series consistently when it was on the air. I was a senior in high school the year it began, so I just never really got into it and never appreciated how good it really was.

Friends was one of those shows like ER, where the cast was made up of relative no names (at least at the time), but unlike ER the main cast stayed together for the entire run. I think that allowed the show to keep the same feel and tone throughout the series. The writing was very very good in that they allowed the characters to evolve and grow over the course of 10 years but never lost the core of who they were over that time. They also did a great job of referring to old jokes without (for the most part) making them stale. For the ones that did, it got to the point that they would even poke fun at it (for example "We were on a break"). I also liked how the show relied on more than just sex jokes for the comedy (unlike many of the sitcoms of today). While there were certainly sex jokes throughout the series, the show did not lean on them and there were a lot of smarter jokes in the series too, that presumed the audience was smart enough to be entertained by other material.

The Blu-Ray set is a 21-disc set. The 234 episodes and some of the bonus content are spread across discs 1-20, and disc 21 has additional bonus content. The A/V quality of the set is good, but not outstanding, especially if you are a big A/V wonk. Even though the A/V quality is not perfect, it is a step up from the A/V quality of the DVDs. One big drawback (for some) in this release is that the episodes were only the ones that were broadcast. Apparently, the DVD sets included a lot of extended episodes, but this is just going to give you the show as it was intended to originally be seen. If that is a deal breaker for you, then don't waste the money. The extras include commentary tracks on select episodes, trailers, "Friends of Friends" featurettes, which give a breakdown of all the guest stars for that particular season, featurettes on the fans, the on-location episodes, gag reels, and more.  The final disc also includes appearances by the cast on The Tonight Show and the Ellen DeGeneres Show, the "I'll Be There for You" music video, a couple of series retrospectives, and the original version of the episode "The One Where Rachel Tells Ross" which aired shortly after 9/11 and was edited because of a bomb joke. 

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