Classic TV Series on DVD
Complete series sets, season collections and rare television that has never had a commercial release anywhere else. VCI has spent decades tracking down surviving broadcast material from the 1950s and 1960s — much of it from an era when networks routinely discarded their own tapes.
Complete Series and Season Sets
Honey West: The Complete Series collects the 1965 Anne Francis show, the first American television series built around a female private detective. Burke's Law, the Gene Barry mystery series, is available in a season one collection, and Zane Grey Theatre — the western anthology hosted by Dick Powell — is here in a complete first season. Also stocked: The New Loretta Young Show and the animated Denver the Last Dinosaur complete series.
Golden Age Sitcoms
I Married Joan, the Joan Davis comedy that ran opposite the early Lucille Ball years, is collected across five volumes. My Little Margie with Gale Storm is available in collection two, and Four Star Playhouse presents the anthology series that rotated Charles Boyer, Dick Powell, David Niven and Ida Lupino through leading roles.
Rare and Lost Television
Television's Lost Classics is the clearest expression of what this part of the catalogue is for. Volume one includes early John Cassavetes material and volume two collects four rare unsold pilots; both are available on DVD and Blu-ray. The supernatural anthology One Step Beyond is here in collection one, alongside the drama series Waterfront across two collections, The Star and the Story, the interview series Gore Vidal Uncensored and You Should Meet Studs Terkel, and Caveman: V.T. Hamlin & Alley Oop.
Why Classic Television Is Hard to Find
A great deal of American television from the 1950s and 1960s no longer exists. Kinescopes were thrown out, videotape was wiped and reused, and syndication prints were left to decay in storage. What survives often does so by accident. Every title in this collection has been located, transferred and — where the source allows — cleaned up for release. In several cases the VCI edition is the only home video release the programme has ever had.
Frequently Asked Questions
- Are these complete series or partial collections?
- Both. Titles described as "Complete Series" or "Complete Season" contain the full run. Volume-numbered releases are partial collections, with contents listed on each product page.
- What condition are the source materials in?
- Condition varies with what survived. Where a programme exists only as a kinescope or a worn syndication print, that is reflected in the picture. Any known limitations are noted on the product page.
- Are episode guides included?
- Episode listings and running times appear in the technical details on each product page.