After Norm Macdonald got the boot from Saturday Night Live, where he carved a name for himself impersonating Burt Reynolds (or, if you prefer, Turd Ferguson) and Bob Dole and played anchor on the series' long running Weekend Update news cast, he teamed up with producer Bruce Helford for The Norm Show. Helford was on a hot streak with the success of The Drew Carey show, which he'd helped launch, and the two had worked together a few years prior writing on Rosanne, a connection that helped them land the actress who would be Macdonald's co-star, Laurie Metcalf. On top of that, the show featured a cast of regulars including Ian Gomez, Nikki Cox, Bruce Jarchow and then later Max Wright and Artie Lange who would co-star with Macdonald in the feature film Dirty Work before going on to some notoriety for his work on the Howard Stern show and his substance abuse problems.

At any rate, the show was very definitely centered around Norm who played a guy named Norm Henderson who was a hockey player kicked out of the NHL for gambling and for not paying his taxes. In order to not go to jail for his crimes he was sentenced to work as a social worker in New York City, the theory being that he'll do some good for the community and repay his debt to society. Norm, however, remains a lazy and fairly mischievous type who does as little work as possible and who has a tendency to lie his way out of the man problems he inevitably finds himself in. His co-worker, Laurie (played by Metcalf), is frequently required to be the responsible one and to bail him out of the trouble he quite regularly finds himself in, while his other co-worker, Danny Sanchez (Ian Gomez), falls somewhere in the middle as far as accountability and responsibility are concerned. All three of them work under the watchful eye of Mr. Curtis (Bruce Jarchow) who, after the first half dozen or so episodes, would go on to be replaced by Max Denby (Max Wright, best known for playing Willie Tanner on Alf, either that or his notorious crack smoking/sex with homeless guys scandal). Other recurring characters include a foxy reformed prostitute named Taylor (Nikki Cox), Norm's half-brother, Artie (Artie Lange) and Norm's on again-off again girlfriend and parole officer, Shelly (Faith Ford).

The episodes that make up The Norm Show - The Complete Series are spread out across the eight discs in the set as follows:

Disc One:
Norm And The Prototype / Norm Dates A Client / Norm Dates Danny´s Dad / While You Weren´t Sleeping / My Name Is Norm

Disc Two:
The New Boss / Denby´s Son / Drive, Norm Said / Norm, Crusading Social Worker / Norm´s Coach

Disc Three:
Norm Vs. Love / Norm Pimps Wiener Dog / Artie Comes To Town / Norm Vs. Death / Norm And Shelley In Love / Laurie Runs For Office / Norm And Shelley Break Up

Disc Four:
Gambling Man / Norm Vs. Norm / Norm Vs. Denby / Norm Vs. The Boxer / Norm Vs. Christmas / Norm Vs. The Evil Twin / Norm Vs. The Oldest Profession

Disc Five:
Norm Vs. Jenny / Norm Vs. Fitz / Norm Vs. The Wedding / Norm Vs. Fear / Retribution / Laurie Loses It

Disc Six:
Norm Vs. The Sacrifice / I´ve Got A Crush On You / Taylor Leaves / The Norm Law / Norm Vs. Halloween / Norm Vs. The Hopeless Cause / Norm Vs. Youth Part 1 / Norm Vs. Youth Part 2

Disc Seven:
Norm Vs. Tennis / Norm Vs. The Kid / Norm Vs. Schoolin´ / Norm Vs. Freud / Norm Vs. Dad / Denby Quits / Norm Lets Go / Norm Vs. Danny And Shelley

Disc Eight:
Norm And Wiener Dog Vs. Fatherhood / Norm Vs. Homelessness / Norm Is Fat / Norm Vs. Deception / Norm Vs. Cuba / Norm´s Free / Norm Comes Back / Norm Vs. Shelley´s Old Flame

The episode titles give you a pretty good idea of what to expect from the storylines, an inordinate amount of which seem to involve Norm's pet daschund, named, appropriately enough, Wiener Dog. There's also a lot of time spent covering Norm's love life and the complications it always seems to include based, generally, on the three regular female co-stars. The plots are generally pretty straightforward and at times a bit formulaic in that each episode finds Norm getting into trouble because of his own, oafish behavior and then having to weasel his way out of it or rely on his friends to help him out. This formula does, however, allow Macdonald to do what he does best and that's make wise ass remarks and sarcastic comments aplenty. If you didn't like his sense of humor or his style when he was hosting Weekend Update, you probably won't appreciate his character here as he's basically playing the same sort of guy (you get the impression that he's really just playing himself more often than not) but those with a taste for his dry wit and cynical, acerbic style of comedy will appreciate this series for the genuinely funny comedy series that it was.

While the regular cast are all great in their respective roles, there is an impressive array of guest stars appearing throughout the series. Notable cameos include appearances from Tom Arnold, Andrea Martin, SNL alumni Dennis Miller, SCTV star Andrea Martin, Jack Warden, Abe Vigoda, Drew Carey Show stars Drew Carey, Ryan Stiles, and Diedrich Bader, Garry Marshall, the late Richard Pryor (in his last ever role before he passed away). Cloris Leachman, Kate Walsh, John Galecki, and Tommy Smothers among others. You can see by that list that the ties to Rosanne and The Drew Carey Show must have come in handy but the real feather in the show's guest star cap has to be the episode featuring Pryor, one of the greatest comedians of all time and a man who was already sick by the time this episode was shot.

Those who have never seen the show are urged to stick out the first couple of episodes as it seems obvious (in hindsight at least) that the cast and crew were still finding their rhythm. The comedy isn't as constant or consistent early on as it is in the later episodes but it gets up to speed quickly. The first three or four episodes are the weakest of the batch, but after that things do pick up considerably as the characters become more fleshed out and more interesting and the situations more unusual and therefore more comedic. Once the series delves face first into some very unpolitically correct episodes dealing with issues of homosexuality, prostitution, alcohol abuse and infidelity the writing gets edgier (for lack of a better term) and the series stands out quite a bit from your standard office based comedy series.

The Video:

The show was shot and composed for TV as we all know, so it shouldn't surprise anyone to see it presented here in its original fullframe aspect ratio. As far as the transfers go, generally the quality is pretty good. Colors don't pop the way they would on a newer show but they look pretty decent. Black levels stay strong and consistent and there aren't any problems with mpeg compression artifacts or with edge enhancement to complain about. Detail levels aren't the greatest but the series is now over fifteen years old - when you take that into account, there's not much worth complaining about here. The Norm Show looks fine.

The Audio:

All episodes are presented as they were originally broadcast, which is in Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo. Overall everything here is pretty clean sounding. Levels are well balanced and there's a bit of lower front-end action in a few scenes that I hadn't expected but was pleasantly surprised by. Not much to complain about here, really. It's a good, basic stereo soundtrack with clear dialogue and well balanced levels and a few noticeable instances of channel separation to keep you on your toes. No subtitles or alternate language tracks are included, although English closed captions are provided.