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STUDIO: Sony Pictures Home Entertainment
MSRP: $39.95
RATED: Not Rated
RUNNING TIME: 1102 min
SPECIAL FEATURES:
• Silver Spoons Boys will be Boys minisode
• The Facts of Life And Into the Frying Pan minisode
The Pitch
Five kids get orphaned.
The Humans
Matthew Fox, Neve Campbell, Scott Wolf, Lacey Chabert, Jennifer Love Hewitt and Scott Grimes
She grows up to be hot, trust me.
The Nutshell
Party of Five is a show about kids living on their own and crying a lot. Family leader Charlie Salinger (Matthew Fox) is trying to keep his relationship with Julia going, while helping out his younger siblings. There’s the fun-loving Bailey (Scott Wolf) who just can’t stay out of trouble. There’s the sisters Julia (Neve Campbell) and Claudia (Lacey Chabert). Throw in a baby and you’ve got primetime network drama.
One of the rare sightings of the youngest Salinger. It only happens five times during this season.
The Lowdown
The third season opened up on Charlie having trouble with his girlfriend’s mother. She’s crashing at the Salinger household, while she tries to deal with her failing marriage. Julia is trying to deal with her boyfriend Griffin, while she holds down a job to support the family. Claudia tries to repair things around the house in a desperate attempt to win the older kids’ attention. The baby Owen just kind of vanishes. One minute he’s onscreen, then bam…he vanishes quicker than John Locke in the South Pacific.
Party of Five hit its apex with the Bailey is an Alcoholic story arc during this season. Once, he was the most responsible of the Salingers and now he’s a fucking drunk. If memory serves me, he starts fucking around on his girlfriend. Then, he ditches his childhood friend. The worse thing is ruining the baby’s birthday party. I didn’t get why that was such a big deal. The kid’s fucking two, he won’t remember. They could’ve converted one of the neighborhood toddlers into a fleshy bong and the tykes wouldn’t be that upset.
Talk about having a forehead like Julia Stiles.
The show was one of those constants that I can remember from High School. All of the girls talked about it and you never could escape it on television. Today, it seems like a really aggressive look into the self-obsession of the young. The fact that Claudia or Owen didn’t die due to Charlie or Julie’s neglect is amazing. Outside of The Hills, I can’t think of a show that celebrates the ability to put other people under your heel in order to make yourself less interesting.
Twelve years later, Party of Five is this odd time capsule that only serves to illustrate how lame television can be. But, I can’t find complete fault with the show. It was the vehicle that introduced Jennifer Love Hewitt’s amazing rack to the world. Those mammary globes of perfection are worth their weight in shitty Matthew Fox led storylines. But, what happened? She leaves the show and it gets cancelled. Which brings me back to the point I had when I started this review. Big tits save jobs in the entertainment industry.
I thought I saw cleavage. Sorry, guys.
The Package
Party of Five – The Complete Third Season comes to DVD with only mini-sodes as special features. I fucking love Silver Spoons and The Facts of Life. Nothing is better than breaking off from the main feature to guess whether or not this will be the episode when Natalie finally eats Blaire. What’s the deal with this shit? It’s fun on MySpace, but you’re not even going to give fans a full bonus episode on DVD? Eat my balls, Sony.
The A/V Quality is pretty impressive for an older show. You get that video shimmer that’s on all of those FOX shows from the era. But, it isn’t that distracting. The Dolby 2.0 Surround is pretty flat and unimpressive. That’s not really surprising.
In the end, orphans aren’t always entertaining. They don’t sing or dance in this show. They just mope about and criminally ignore their minor siblings. Nowhere can Child Protective Services be seen in the mix, but you get plenty of other shit. It’s just that the other stories aren’t that interesting.
There’s no rhyme or reason to this. I just wanted to show you that Neve Campbell did something on the show. That’s all.