Home Improvement - Season 1 Home Improvement DVDs
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There's no more reliable engine for comedy than the differences
between men and women; Home Improvement puts that topic front and
center. Launched from the stand-up comedy of Tim Allen (The Santa
Clause, the voice of Buzz Lightyear in Toy Story), this sturdy
sitcom rests on the endearing, befuddled machismo of Tim Taylor
(Allen), the host of a how-to-build-stuff show called Tool Time, who
finds raising three sons and being a supportive husband isn't always
as easy as sanding down a door frame. In the show's first season,
the tried-and-true domestic plotlines (for example: wife wants to
have a romantic dinner, husband wants to watch the big game--the
fodder of every family sitcom since the dawn of television) are
given a fresh spin by Home Improvement's embrace (and gentle
mockery) of the men's movement that flourished in the early '90s.
Tim's neighbor Wilson (Earl Hindman), whose face is always obscured
by the fence between their yards, proves to be a font of Iron
John-style wisdom--wisdom that Tim comically garbles when he puts it
into practice. Allen and Patricia Richardson (as Tim's prickly but
tolerant wife, Jill) immediately established a cozy but smart banter
with enough bite to rise above the bland bickering of too many
sitcoms. Some jokes degenerate into schtick--Tim's manly grunting
becomes rote by the second episode--but Allen and his writing team
consistently found surprises in this familiar territory. The capable
supporting cast also includes Tim's sensitive and woefully single
assistant Al (Richard Karn), his three cute sons (Jonathan Taylor
Thomas, Zachery Ty Bryan, and Taran Noah Smith), and Tool Time's
eye-candy (future Baywatch sex bomb Pamela Anderson). --Bret Fetzer
