Arrested Development - Series 1 (Wide Screen) > Reviews > Best Sitcom

Author's product rating:   

Did you enjoy it?	Loved it
Story	Good
Characters / Performances	Outstanding
Special Effects	Good
How does it compare to similar films?	Outstanding

Advantages:	Hilarious, great selection of actors (David Cross, Jason Bateman, Portia de Rossi), well written
Disadvantages:	Quite difficult following the plot

Recommend to potential buyers:

yes

Full review

Arrested Development is the funniest sitcom I have seen in years and, dare I say it, is more hilarious than "Friends" (Give it a chance - it really is). Living in the UK, Arrested Development graced our screens extremely early in the morning, but after watching a couple of episodes I knew it was something I had to keep on watching so I bought all the box sets...and am so glad I did.

This show is hilarious. I can't pick out a favourite character, but Tobias Funke, a failing actor played by David Cross, is the funniest character I've ever seen on TV and his scenes make me laugh every time. Portia De Rossi shines as Lindsay Bluth-Funke - the stunning wife of Tobias (who is an undeniably closet homosexual), Tony Hale is amazingly funny as the immature son terrified of seals and birds, and Will Arnett is hilarious as Gob - the magician and a literal joke in himself.

The story follows a dysfunctional family with just one "normal" guy - Michael - (Jason Bateman) who on a whole has to take care of his entire family (and there's quite a lot of them!). The script is so well written and incredibly intelligent - the jokes are often hidden, but always there! Each character has their own unique qualities which are brought out by the script-writers who make each episode so funny.

A negative point is sometimes its hard to follow the actual story, but as my friends who also watched it also say, it doesn't matter if you follow the storyline detail for detail or not - it's still so entertaining and has some hilarious gags. Another point to make is some of the jokes are very American and use American slang which is quite hard to get your head around, but this is extremely infrequent and jokes can be understood over here in the UK too (this might sound bizarre but sometimes America and the UK are world's apart when it comes to the English language!).

Not one scene goes by without something there to make you burst out laughing, and a great advantage is there's no canned laughter - thank goodness for that.

There are quite a few extras - deleted scenes, commentary on the pilot episode and a clip of the cast receiving an award from Liza Minelli (who had a cameo role of Lucille Austero - hilariously funny as Buster's girlfriend who reminds him too much of his own mother - coincidentally also called Lucille). The extras as well as the large number of episodes make this product a real good buy.

Buy this DVD, and in fact all the DVDs in the series - you won't regret it! If you love a good laugh then I definitely one hundred percent advise you to buy this DVD series - it's the best sitcom I have ever seen. I love it!