The ever lovely Way Cool Wife got me the first season DVD set of the Rockford Files for Christmas
I love the Detective story genre but there were so few that were ever any good on television. The Rockford Files was one of only two that were any good. And the Rockford Files was as good as it gets.
For those of you who don't know or were too young to experience its first run in the mid 70s, James Garner played ex-con and ex-con man Jim Rockford who has turned his attention to being a private investigator. There's not much money in it, and he'd rather be fishing, but he's pretty good at it and a guy has to eat.
The show was notable for it's great writing, great supporting cast, and of course James Garner. The character of Rockford himself was notable for his humanness. He got beat up alot, he was sometimes wrong, and he didn't always get the girl. He was, however a great driver, especially when seated in his gold Firebird. He wasn't easily fooled and he had a great sense of humor.
In fact humor is one of the things that made this show great.
The DVD set itself is less stellar than the show. First, the US version doesn't include the pilot episode! What's up with that especially since the Region 2 versions do have it?
The disks, themselves are two-sided instead of double-layered and many people have reported that some of the disks, especially disk three, freeze. I haven't experienced this problem but it does appear to be DVD player-dependent which suggests less than professional mastering.
It also appears that Universal didn't take much care in remastering the original stock. In fact, it seems they didn't bother to remaster it at all. The picture quality in general is no better than a VCR tape.
Having said all that, it is still great to have the ability to watch Jim Rockford and his crew; Police Sgt Joe Santos, former cellmate "Angel" Martin, lawyer Beth Davenport, and his father Rocky; live again on the small screen.
I for one am hoping for all six season to be released and hoping Universal pays more attention in the future.