Created by:
Philip Rosenthal
Starring:
Ray Romano ………. Raymond “Ray” Barone
Patricia Heaton ………. Debra Barone
Brad Garrett………. Robert Barone
Doris Roberts ………. Marie Barone
Peter Boyle ………. Frank Barone
Madylin Sweeten ………. Ally Barone
Sawyer Sweeten ………. Geoffrey Barone
Sullivan Sweeten ………. Michael Barone
Monica Horan ………. Amy MacDougall
The Show
Everybody Loves Raymond… a show that for years was the number one rated sitcom on television. This reviewer needs to come clean with you on something, I’ve never sat through a full season of this show. Not in its initial air dates, nor on DVD. The only knowledge I have on it is from the five episodes I’ve managed to catch through syndication. Not that I’ve only watched it on five separate occasions mind you, it’s just the fact every time I tried to give it a shot it was one of the same five shows I had already seen before. Unless every single episode revolved around Ray and Debra arguing about bringing the luggage upstairs. So getting a chance to finally see what the fuss was about is something I was looking forward to.
As most would know by now, Everybody Loves Raymond is about sports columnist Ray Barone and his messed up family. There are his parents Marie and Frank who live directly across the street from him barging in and loitering around as they please. His brother Robert who is constantly moping around talking about how he’s always playing second fiddle to his little brother. And last Ray’s wife Debra who is constantly having to put up with the other three and takes out her aggravation on Ray because of it. They’re all one big happy family.
By the time season five kicked off the cast and crew had developed their characters to a point where they no longer had to worry about establishing who they were and instead focus on the stories they told. With a two part episode taking place in Italy that started the season it was clear they were ready to start big and keep building from it. Everyone involved is in their own groove and play their roles perfectly and enjoyably. Just about every characters this season go through some personal adult growth.
A large storyline that carries through the entire season is the love life of Robert, in the two part episode Italy Robert starts of with a torn relationship between his current girlfriend Amy and his ex-wife joanne, which only gets worse when he meets Stefania and falls head over heels for her. In Meant To Be he’s forced to somehow pick one of the three women which only leads to more trouble. Young Girl has Robert once again in a relationship only this time with a much younger woman, almost 25 years his junior to be exact. Episode sixteen, Stefania Arrives has Stefania come in to town from Italy expecting to be with Robert only he’s not exactly sure if she’s the one any more. The last episode on Roberts love life is Let’s Fix Robert, where Stefania, Amy, Marie and Roberts cop partner Judy all come together and try to understand exactly what’s wrong with Robert, all while he’s sitting in the same room. These episodes encapsulate Roberts change through the season of trying to find someone to finally settle down with once and for all.
Wallpaper see Marie and Frank crash their car in to Ray and Debra’s house where Ray finally takes a stance against his parents that he’s rarely taken before. Another episode that has Ray standing up against his father is Frank Paints the House where he confronts his father over him just barging in and taking control over something that wasn’t his to take command of. In Ray’s Journal we see Ray finally get angry at his mother over her reading the private journal he kept as a kid every night after Carson.
For Debra Fighting In-Laws has her dealing with the sudden knowledge of her parents divorce and Separation makes her confront these feelings head-on when her mother and father finally break the news that they’re splitting up.
When it comes to relationship issues, in Silent Partners Ray and Debra take an interest in each others personal activities when they realize they’ve run out of things to talk about with one another. They realize that sometimes silence can some times be beautiful in a relationship. While Christmas Presents shows the one-upsmanship of married people and how sometimes a present isn’t completely from the heart.
The show is simply a series of “hey my life is like that” moments, where each episode is basically a story you’ve personally experienced or heard through the grape vine over the years. It’s not exactly breaking new ground in the realm of sitcoms or anything, it follows a set up that hasn’t changed since the Honeymooners, but they do pull it all off in a way where the episodes are fun to watch. While not a good idea to watch the series in large doses, I can’t see anything wrong with spending an hour or two with the Barone family and having some laughter at their expense.
Score: 7/10
The DVD
Video:
(Presented in 1.78:1 Anamorphic Widescreen)
While the video is beautiful since the show was shot in high definition widescreen by this point there just isn’t much for the camera to capture when the show is generally taking place in either Ray’s home or his parents. The series opening in Italy and Rome certainly makes good use of the filming quality but seeing as it last all of two episodes there just isn’t much that makes good use of the superior cameras. The shows are spread out evenly at five per disc with the quality as nearly pristine, but like I’ve already said, there just isn’t much to look at with the shows being so claustrophobic. Still, the transfers are virtually free of any artifacts.
Score: 8/10
Audio:
(English, French and Spanish 2.0 Stereo)
As you would guess, a series like Everybody Loves Raymond only needs a 2.0 track, with writing being the main focus of the show a 5.1 would have been a waste of disc space. The audio comes out crystal clear but is by no means a bench mark for the quality in which a DVD could sound. What’s here is exactly what the show needs, nothing too fancy or extravagant.
Score: 6/10
Extras:
Three Commentary Tracks are included inside the set with Ray Romano, Phil Rosenthal and an occasional third rotating guest. The first episode with a commentary is the two-part season opener Italy with only Ray and Phil. They discuss the genesis of how the idea came about for shooting in Europe, and the way they shot the shows exteriors there for six days and later shot the interiors on set in Burbank. The tandem of Ray and Phil are very lively and fun to listen to making the commentaries a blast, something that’s very important when it comes to TV show commentaries.
Young Girl has the second track with Ray, Phil and Tom Caltabiano the writer of this specific episode. We learn how Tom wound up being the inspiration for the episode because he brought a young woman to a crew party and how it all came together because all of the other writers explained to him how it makes them all look bad in front of their wives.
Last we have The Canister where Patricia Heaton joins Ray and Phil. The episode is a very fun plot driven story. As Phil remarks in the commentary, it’s a caper, the three like to think of it as a character study and they’re very right, the fun from the episode comes from the characters reacting to all the hurdles in front of them. Patricia won an Emmy for her work in this episode.
Sixteen Deleted Scenes are available to view separately and some are clearly cut because they’re not very good, a few are quite funny, which means they were probably cut due to runtimes going over. It would have been nice of them to include some type of branching feature that would have allowed the deleted scenes to be put back in to the episodes they were cut from. Strangely these are presented in full frame yet the show was shot in widescreen.
A Bloopers Reel is included that runs a little under fifteen minutes and is like any other blooper feature, there are some funny flubbed lines by the cast but after viewing it once or twice there is very little to go back to and watch again and again.
Score: 7/10
