Uhhh… this doesn’t suck. Beavis And Butt-Head was a series I only knew of by extension when it first aired in its original run from March of ’93 to November of ’97. I didn’t have cable TV back then, but had several friends that talked about the show. I remember playing an old Windows game where you spit loogies (Virtual Stupidity) from the top of the Highland high school from the show onto moving targets, but that was about the extent of my knowledge of the show until I was offered this new Complete Collection DVD set for review. Full disclosure, I have not watched all of this DVD set as I write this — it’s nearly eighteen hours and, well, it’s not the most entertaining show if you know what I mean. Some of its humor still clicks, I mean, the stupidity of the infamous duo is pretty funny at times, but much of the time it’s forgettable. There is an audience out there for this DVD set, and while there is nothing that hasn’t already been released before here, it is at least the first time that all released material has been put into a single collection — and at a price ($25) that’s rather impressive.
I’m not up on the details of the missing episodes or cut episodes, and the ones Mike Judge does not like, or the drama of the music videos and the licensing costs preventing those from coming out, but there what’s offered here seems to amount to the best of Beavis And Butt-Head. One of these twelve discs is also the Collector’s Edition of the 1996 movie. Otherwise, you get the previously released Volumes 1-4, including the 2011-2012 series. There is a Blu-ray release of this season if I’m not mistaken, but it’s all DVD in this particular set. Extra features are spread out on the last disc of each volume, and include a lot (but not all) music videos. These are no longer seamlessly integrated into the cartoons themselves, but, at least they’re available in this set. These music videos includes acts like Pantera, Radiohead, Extreme, and others. The three-part “Taint of Greatness: The Story of Beavis And Butt-Head” includes Mike Judge and many other creators and crew at MTV discussing the history of the show from the start. Coinciding with this is the un-cut short of “Frog Baseball,” which launched Beavis And Butt-Head into a series. Other features include special appearances (like at the VMAs), promos, montages, a Thanksgiving with Kurt Loder, MTV 20th Anniversary Special, the 2011 Comic-Con panel, and a lot of other stuff (including a ton of junk trailers and ads for Comedy Central DVD releases and such).
In terms of presentation and packaging, it’s pretty straight-forward, as you would expect for a re-release priced at $25. A simple, but effectively designed exterior slip cover reveals a double-thick DVD case with the same artwork as the slip cover. Inside, you’ll find two discs on each side of three ‘pages,’ thus yielding twelve discs. The discs all have similar appearance in as far as the artwork on them, and I liked how the discs with special features were labeled as such. There are no ‘inserts’ of any kind or a booklet, which would have been nice, but it’s understandable it was skipped for this release. The menus of the discs, which is probably identical to the previously released DVDs, is functional and looks fine. Furthermore, the image and sound quality is as basic and untouched as you would expect; it gets the job done, and heck, not being cleaned up or remastered at all may instill some welcomed nostalgia in some viewers, too.
Ultimately, this is a pretty plain-jane release, but it’s likely a welcomed one for fans of the series that want a complete collection inside a single box and it’s hard to argue with the price which makes each disc only cost about $2. It’s a great value for fans other than the most devout purists who, honestly, may never get the truly complete and unedited episodes of this cult series.
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