When I was in collage, many moons ago back in the 80's, I went through a phase where I'd catch every stand-up comedy special on HBO.  In these pre-Comedy Central days, that was about the only place that you could see a full comedy show without actually going out to a comedy club.  Everyone enjoyed George Carlin, Steven Wright and Bill Cosby, but I liked them all: Gilbert Gottfried, Bobcat Goldthwait, and yes, Gallagher.  His comic observations and bizarre inventions always made me laugh.  Now Anchor Bay has released a set of 11 of the comic's specials in a three disc collection: Gallagher - The Smashing Watermelon Collection.

Gallagher is a little different from the other comics.  He doesn't have the edge that many comics have, but he's not G-rated either.  (He doesn't swear too much, but some of his jokes are sexually suggestive.)  He's known as a prop comic, but he isn't as stupid as most of them and the props are only a small part of his act.  He fills his shows with social and political commentary, much of which is fairly intelligent.

Gallagher has never been hip or cool either, as his audiences of middle-aged folks illustrates.  That doesn't mean he isn't funny.  On the contrary, he can be hilarious.  (I have to laugh at his idea of a playboy magazine for married men:  "Every month the same girl.")

After watching these eleven comedy specials, each of which is about an hour long (with the exception of Two Real which runs 35 minutes), I was struck at how similar his style is to George Carlin in parts.  Like Carlin, he likes to point out the oddities of the world.  "How come Seven-Eleven's have locks on the doors when they're open twenty-four hours?" He also enjoys playing with the English language: "Why do you have a hot water heater?  If the water is hot, it doesn't need to be heated."

Of course, Gallagher has forever been typecast as a prop comic.  That's most assuredly because of the closing of his act, the Sledge-O-Matic.  The idea sounds a little silly on paper, but Gallagher's trademark routine is pretty funny.  His version of the perfect kitchen gadget, one that instantly turns apples into applesauce and cabbage into coleslaw all while splattering the audience with food, is a gigantic sledge hammer.  He gets pretty creative with his recipes, and these closings are often the highlight of the show.  (Though the first two specials on this collection don't include this routine.)

As I mentioned, these shows are funny, but with a caveat: They are funny if you lived through the 80's.  The lion's share of these shows were recorded in that decade, and a lot of the jokes are a little dated.  He tells some Iran jokes, comments about smokers on airplanes, and talks about the space shuttle being behind schedule.  There are also several jokes about old commercials that haven't been on in decades.  Even his Sledge-O-Matic routine is making fun of the Ronco style ads that used to be constantly shown on UHF channels, but are rarely seen today.

Some of the bits don't work either.  It seems like just about every show had a slow part.  Melon Crazy has a 20-minute appearance by comedian Bill Kirchenbauer in the middle of the show.  That was about 18½ minutes too long.  In another show there is an extended sequenced where he creates a giant picture of the US out of food that just wasn't that funny.

My favorite show in this set has to be Overboard, which had the highest production values and seemed to just flow the best.  He's really at the top of his game in this show, and it is really funny.

On the opposite side of the spectrum is his most recent show, Messin' Up Texas.  There's not a copyright date listed in the credits, but this looks like it was done in the last few years.  It features an aging Gallagher who seems a little bitter and cranky.  When a heckler yells out some old material, Gallagher looks down and sighs deeply.  He turns to the audience member and with an exasperated tone says "Hey listen, dem are jokes that are already on my tapes.  I'm here tonight to do new stuff."  And he does mostly, it just doesn't work very well.  In one section his nephew comes out (who seems to be about 4 years old) and they play with toys that are on the stage.  Gallagher tries to make some jokes about how expensive the toys were, and how they are too complicated, but it's just not funny.

Luckily, they end off the set with another good special,  An Uncensored Evening from 1980.  This features some of Gallagher's more suggestive material that he presents in a nightclub instead of a large theater.  This was a very good show, and was an excellent way to end the set.

The largest disappointment I have with the content side of this set is that my favorite show, Totally New, isn't in this collection.  That has his take on spelling and word pronunciation that I've always though was one of his best bits.  Why doesn't the work "comb" rhyme with the work "tomb" anyway?

The comedy specials presented in this set are:

Mad as Hell (?  no copyright date)
Two Real (?  no copyright date)
Stuck In The 60s (1982)
The Maddest (1983)
Melon Crazy (1984)
Over Your Head (1984:
The Bookkeeper (1985)
Overboard (1987)
We Need A Hero (1993)
Messin' Up Texas (?  no copyright date)
An Uncensored Evening (1980)

This set comes in some creative packaging that I really like, but then again I'm a sucker for unique things like this.  (I'd bet that most people will dislike the way these DVDs are packaged though.)  The three discs come in a thin cardboard box that is shaped like a watermelon.  The top comes off, and the three discs are stored on flat 'watermelon slices.'  They are held on by a little rubber hub on the slice.

One thing that is a little irritating about the set, is that there are no chapter stops in the shows themselves.  You can't just jump to your favorite joke or routine.

Audio:

These shows are presented with a two channel audio track with no subtitles.  Overall the audio quality is mediocre.  Some of the older material is a little rough, with some very light background noise and it just isn't as crisp as it should be.  This isn't a large detriment though, Gallagher's speech is easy to hear and the jokes come through fine.

Video:

The video quality of this set isn't very good.  They shows ranged from pretty bad to about average.  There was a lot of aliasing in most of the shows, and color bleeding was fairly prevalent.  The image to Melon Crazy was horrible.  It looked like a EP VHS copy.  The picture was slightly fuzzy with poor definition and bad color. Messin' Up Texas looks like a VHS copy too.  Some of the other specials looked fine though, most notably Overboard and The Bookkeeper.  Definitely not a reference level disc.

Extras:

Each disc starts off with a warning that the material in the commentaries and bonus material doesn't reflect the opinions of Anchor Bay.  This is rather odd, since there isn't any bonus material at all!  I was really hoping for a contemporary interview with Gallagher looking back on his career in general and these specials in particular.

Final Thoughts:

This is a good collection of Gallagher's comedy.   When you watch these all in a row they lose some of their impact, so I'd recommend spreading it out a little.  The real problem with this set is that much of the material is dated.  If you didn't live through the 80's a lot of the jokes just don't work.  A good part of Stuck in the 60's is comparing the 60's to the 80's and if you don't remember either of them a lot of the jokes just fall flat.

Having said that, when he's in the zone Gallagher is funny.  He's never gotten the credit he deserves for his more intelligent comedy routines, always being overshadowed by his prop comedy.  This set has a good mixture of both.  If you remember seeing these when they originally aired and enjoyed them at that time, this set is Recommended, though barely because of the less than stellar video quality.  If you're too young to recall the 80's this would make a better rental.