Rules of Engagement The Complete First Season

Rules of Engagement
The Complete First Season
Patrick Warburton, Megyn Price, Oliver Hudson, Bianca Kajlich
7 Episodes
Sony Pictures Home Entertainment 2007

I hate David Spade in spades so the fact I actually liked Rules of Engagement says a lot. Even a one-note non-talent like Spade and his slimy bachelor character cannot spoil a solid and funny relationship situation comedy. The Rules of Engagement The Complete First Season DVD features only 7 episodes but they are all quite entertaining and a promise of more to come in the 2007-08 season

Rules of Engagement is a sitcom built around two couples: newly engaged Jennifer and Adam and long-time married Audrey and Jeff. Any similarity with the Brad Garrett sitcom Til Death is not purely coincidental but the focus in Rules of Engagement is a little more balanced towards both couples and David Spade plays the annoying single guy.

Read our review of Rules of Engagement Season 2

This situation comedy features a solid ensemble cast. Patrick Warburton is especially good as the experience married man who advises innocent Adam (Oliver Hudson) on the real nature of a relationship with a woman. A lot of the comedy comes from that mentor/grasshopper relationship. Megyn Price and Bianca Kajlich respectively play Audrey and Jennifer, women who must deal with the fresh twist the series’ writers bring to the guy stuff of situation comedies. For example, episode 3, The Young and the Restless is about Jeff being uneasy with his fiancée having a past with the added fresh twist of Audrey betting her husband he can no longer pick up a woman in a bar.

Not all seven shows of Rules of Engagement The Complete First Season DVD set are absolutely brilliant but even the weaker one, Game On, has some really good moments like when Jeff is waiting for his wife to get dressed for a basketball game or the conclusion to the video game problem.

The writing in this situation comedy is above par, especially when it comes to the zingers the characters toss at each other. Story wise, the episode where the couples discuss having kids is original and the punch line superb and the t-shirt and double entendre show is also not your usual sitcom fodder.

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