Michelle Trachtenberg

The Adventures of Pete & Pete: Season Two

A terrific kids show crashes DVD with a superlative Season Two set.

February 6, 2006 - Big Pete Wrigley (Michael Maronna) and Little Pete Wrigley (Danny Tamberelli) are two brothers living in an average suburban town known as Wellsville. Big Pete deals with big kid issues such as dealing with the trials and tribulations of high school, falling for his best friend Ellen, and forgetting about the magic that is Halloween. Meanwhile, Little Pete has the inverse troubles having to defend his exuberant childhood against a world filled with uncreative adults who just want him to act normal.

This release of the second season features thirteen episodes, amounting to a little over 300 minutes.

Disc 1:
Grounded for Life
Field of Pete
The Call
The Big Quiet
Time Tunnel
Inspector 34
Halloweenie

Disc 2:
X=Why?
On Golden Pete
Farewell, My Little Viking Part 1
Farewell, My Little Viking Part 2
Yellow Fever
Sick Day

While The Adventures of Pete & Pete season one was amazing, season two is the best to ever come out of the show.

Fan favorite episodes such as "X=Why?" and "Sick Day" are here in all their glory. Another classic, "Time Tunnel," which followed the Petes during daylight savings time as they time travel and relive an hour, packed a really subtle emotional punch while still retaining the quirky humor of the previous seasons. Even the departure of Artie, the Strongest Man in the World (Toby Huss) from the show was represented in a poignant story arc about Little Pete’s imaginative childhood coming to a close.

If that’s not good enough, there are even more celebrity cameos. Iggy Pop, Janeane Garofalo, LL Cool J, and Steve Buschemi all appear in episodes. These cameos are great because they don’t just feel like stunt casting - most kids weren’t going to watch more Nickelodeon just because Bebe Neuwirth was playing a mailwoman. Rather, the show’s creators sought out character actors and musicians that they felt fit into the strange world of Pete & Pete.

Even the show’s Scrappy-Doo, Nona (Michelle Trachtenberg), only has a small role here compared to her presence in later seasons.

While many shows would follow in the style of Pete & Pete’s confused suburbia (namely, the more adult Strangers with Candy), none ever did it as well as here. Every joke is spot-on, and watching this show as an adult feels just as smart and fun as it did when I was ten. I don’t love this show for its nostalgia. I love this show because it has sharp writing that never underestimates the intelligence of the viewer.

The best season of one of the best children’s show in television history is perfection.

Score: 10 out of 10

Click on the source-link to read the rest of the DVD review!

10 The Movie The best season of Nickelodeon’s groundbreaking family series.
2 The Video An awful transfer undermines the quality of the content.
4 The Audio A slight improvement from Season One doesn’t mean much.
5 The Extras Great commentaries compensate for more modest special features.
8 OVERALL
(out of 10 / not an average)

MPAA Rating: NR
MSRP: $26.99
Publisher: Paramount Pictures
Running Time: 286 Minutes
Genre: Family
Expected Release Date: November 1, 2005