Sanford and Son is a television series that is entirely new to me and I wasn't extremely satisfied by the series. The comedy, while funny, comes off far too repetitive and at some points appears somewhat lackluster. In short, it's in my opinion that this thirty year old series does not live up really well to modern television programming. Of course, this isn't to say that the series is completely dry, because it does have its moments and the fifth season is worth watching.

The majority of the comedy in this season is fairly plain. It's all comes from pretty much one place, Fred Sanford (Red Foxx). It's his outrageous and neurotic behavior that turns normal everyday situations into something comical. Furthermore, he's a bit of a grouch and constantly insulting everyone around him. The insults come off more or less as a joke and not really an insult. This has been a staple of the series. One of the biggest comical interactions is the coarse relationship between Fred and his son Lamont (Demond Wilson).

Additionally, there are a few reoccurring characters that have a run in with Fred or are at the butt of his jokes. However, I did not care for a lot of these characters. For instance, Aunt Esther (LaWanda Page) plays the church going gal who always seems to be at odd ends with Fred. While Esther can be a fun character, sometimes her shrieking voice can get annoying. Another recurring character, Grady (Whitman Mayo) plays the dumb-as-a-brick friend. He's completely oblivious to the obvious and sometimes, he's a little too much over the top. The point is that no matter which reoccurring character was in an episode, it really didn't matter. None of them really brought a great deal to the series, except that it provided someone for Foxx's character to interact with and make fun of.

Because of this limited approach, I really did not get the impression that any of the cast members, with the exception of Foxx, were funny. All of the laughs came from the "comical" interactions between Foxx and the other cast members. In effect, it felt like we were being subjected to the same thing over and over again. The first few times it was funny, but after a while it began to feel lackluster. For this reason, I found that the fifth season had some great comedy, but at the same time it came off fairly limited. Overall, I can't really say that the fifth season of Sanford and Son blew me away, because it didn't. However, I can say that I enjoyed the season enough that I feel a single viewing is worth the time.

Some of the notable episodes of this season included "Steinberg and Son", an episode where the Sanfords find out that there's a television sitcom based on their lives, "Sanford and Rising Son", an episode that guest stars Pat Morita (The Karate Kid), "The Olympics", an episode where Fred competes in the Senior Olympics to win his girl's heart, and "The Escorts", an episode when Fred starts his own male escort service. All of the twenty-five episodes in the fifth season were pretty plain, but they have enough comical content to entertain you for a while.

Episode Guide
1. The Overall the Hill Gag
2. Earthquake II
3. Divorce, Sanford Style
4. Bank On This
5. The Sanford Arms
6. Steinberg and Son
7. Brother, Can You Spare an Act
8. Della, Della, Della
9. Donna Pops the Question
10. My Fair Esther
11. Sanford and Son Rising
12. The Olympics
13. Ebenezer Sanford
14. The Oddfather
15. Can You Chop This?
16. Greatest Show in Watts
17. Fred Sanford Has a Baby
18. The TV Addict
19. Lamont in Love
20. The Escorts
21. The Engagement Man Always Rings Twice
22. The Director
23. A Pain in the Neck
24. Sergeant Gork
25. Camping Trip

The DVD

Video:
The video in this TV on DVD release is given in its original television aspect ratio of 1.33:1 ratio full frame color. However, considering that the video is from the 1970s, the picture looks pretty decent. Of course, it's far from great. Stated on the back of the DVD case and I quote, "original video elements may contain digital anomalies or artifacts." These anomalies do occur a lot, but they do appear frequently enough that it is annoying. In general, the picture is very soft and colors do not always look as rich as they should. Overall, it looks good for its age, but doesn't live up to current releases.

Audio:
The audio track in this release is in English 2.0 Dolby digital stereo sound. Like the video quality, the sound quality has its drawbacks. In general, the audio track has a slight hiss, as well as both the dialogue and music sound relatively flat. There are no subtitles with this release, but it is closed-captioned enabled.

Extras:
There are no extras with this release.

Final Thoughts:
Watching the fifth season of Sanford and Son was a completely new experience. Prior to this review, I had never seen an episode of the series. While I enjoyed the comedy of Foxx, I felt that this season (and also as a series) that Sanford and Son is pretty limited by modern standards and there isn't a whole lot to really differentiate from episode to episode. The bottom line is that this show is heavily repetitive in its comedy, which sometimes causes it to be lackluster. The fifth season is worth watching, but I wouldn't expect to watch more than once.