Get Smart

With Get Smart about to hit the big screen, starring Steve Carell as Agent 86, the role originally filled by the sadly missed Don Adams, now would seem like the ideal time to revisit the classic original ’60s series to remember just what made the franchise so beloved (and to get annoyed at the film for not being "authentic enough”). Well, that’s what I thought anyway, and when I heard that Get Smart The Complete Series was available for review I jumped at the chance, only to find out the minute that I got home that rather than getting a season of the original series (still only available by very overpriced mail-order from Time Life, for some reason), I’d ended up with the short-lived revival series broadcast on Fox in 1995 starring… Andy Dick!!! They know what they’re doing — unless you look incredibly close at the box, you’ll miss the tiny picture of Dick in the corner and instead concentrate on the giant image of Adams — and there’s good reason for it: the 1995 Get Smart is a lame shadow of the original. It feels horribly dated, in a sort of "mid-’90s filler” way, and even fans of Dick would be better served by picking up NewsRadio on DVD. Speaking of NewsRadio, the show is half of the oddest "special features” I’ve ever seen on a DVD: two heavily edited "minisodes” of shows completely unrelated to Get Smart (the other is TJ Hooker) jammed on the DVD for what appears to be no reason at all. Andy Dick isn’t even in the NewsRadio episode they included!