Cheapest Blu MONSTERS And WONKA Ever!! Blu STAR TREK!! CERTAIN AGE!! VAN DYKE!! JACKSON FIVE!!

Herc’s Popular Pricing Pantry

The 8-Movie Blu-ray Universal Classic Monsters Collection, $143.98 in October and $129.00 last week, just fell to its lowest price ever: $79.99!! (50% Off!!) $10 Per Blu Motion Picture!!

The “Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory” 3-Disc 40th Anniversary Collector's Edition Blu-ray/DVD Combo, $58.49 in 2011 and $44.90 last week, just fell to its lowest price ever: $24.99!! (62% Off!!)

The complete 11-season “Hawaii Five-0” complete series set, $386.99 in 2011 and $253.93 last week, just fell to its lowest price ever: $139.99!! (67% Off!!) 284 hours!! $10.77 Per Season!!

3 Blu Movies For $9.99!!:

3 Blu Movies For $9.99!!

The Blu-ray first season of “Clash of the Gods,” $36.99 in 2010 and $35.96 in August, just fell to its lowest price ever: $9.93!! (75% Off!!)

The second Blu-ray volume of “Masters of Horror” featuring Lucky McKee’s wonderful and hilarious “Sick Girl,” $21.98 in 2008 and $17.99 last month, is now $5.17 (75% Off!!)

The complete-series set for the 1970s “Battlestar Galactica,” $89.98 in 2009 and $67.49 last January, is for the moment $24.96!!

New This Week

“Life's Too Short,” like the BBC’s “The Office” and “Extras” before it, is the brainchild of Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant, and it’s a lot like “The Office” and “Extras” – only with 3’6” British actor Warwick Davis in what you’d call the Ricky Gervais role. Nothing I’ve ever seen Davis perform (including his role in “Extras”) even hints at what an adept comic actor he is.

“Short” centers on a vain, vindictive, dim, deluded, boorish and generally unpleasant version of Davis, who in real life played the title roles in “Willow” and “Leprechaun” and has since played a variety of parts in the “Harry Potter” movies.

I like a lot of “Short,” though it’s sometimes sillier than it is funny and on occasion wanders down some paths that don’t yield a lot of laughs.

Like “Extras,” the new series is swimming in celebrity cameos.

There’s a strange first-episode scene with Liam Neeson (playing a loony version of himself) seeking comedy advice from Gervais that builds slowly but proves inspired and hilarious. It also feels like it snuck in from another show.

An extended (and largely improvised?) sequence in episode two with Johnny Depp (playing a loony version of himself) doing research on dwarf behavior quickly grows tedious.

But if you’re reading this you really do owe it to yourself to click on that Neeson clip.

HuffPost TV says:

... There's something sour and awful about Ricky Gervais' comedy these days. He used to be a sly, cheeky observer of human behavior, but his current status as a smug, self-absorbed blowhard finds its clearest expression in his new HBO show … Gervais may think he's bold, but at this stage, he's just a bore.

HitFix says:

... In this case, I wish [Gervais and Merchant] had stuck to their initial impulse of four years ago and decided not to repeat themselves.

Time says:

... the real problem here: we’ve seen this before ... the problem with the humor of discomfort, which Gervais pioneered with distinction, is that it doesn’t last long when it becomes a comfort zone. …

The New York Times says:

... The show’s Warwick is the same inconsiderate jackass but without the prissiness or the lumpen quality that sometimes makes Mr. Gervais’s performances grating. ...

The Los Angeles Times says:

... If Gervais still wants to satirize his chosen field, he needs to figure out another way. ...

The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette says:

... it's a little too familiar. … The show conjures the most laughs when Mr. Gervais is on screen, but his presence doesn't mesh naturally with Warwick's world. …

The Washington Post says:

… almost everything about “Life’s Too Short” somehow echoes pieces of all of Gervais’s previous TV work, which makes this show seem particularly limp. … Like “Extras,” the show leans too heavily on celebrity cameos, where even the funniest lines barely encourage a smirk. …

The San Francisco Chronicle says: