Gomer Pyle, USMC Season 1 Released on DVD

The first season of Gomer Pyle, USMC was released this week. Now before you immediately move on to another article, bear with me. Gomer Pyle has the reputation of being one of the lightweights of television comedy history; the Jerry Lewis of sitcoms. But just as Jerry Lewis belongs in the pantheon of great comic actor/writer/directors alongside Keaton and Lloyd (and well ahead of Chaplin, whose appeal I have yet to understand) so is Gomer Pyle, USMC a brutally underrated series.

The first season, of course, is significantly different from the show it would evolve into. For one thing, it was filmed in glorious black and white. But more importantly, the dynamic of the show pretty much consisted of Gomer Pyle, a hayseed hick from the backwoods of North Carolina, being played for a fool and stumbling and bumbling and making his drill instructor Sgt. Carter go insane. This set the stage for most of the episodes of season one, and more than a few of season two. Eventually, however, it wisely realized that this basic set-up could run dry pretty quickly.

Gomer Pyle was a spin-off of the much beloved classic The Andy Griffith Show. What is odd is that while that show is considered very much an example of all that is great with television comedy, it began with much the same premise. If you want the first few episodes of The Andy Griffith Show you will notice that Andy Taylor is much more of a hick than what you remember him as. He very quickly transformed into the wise, albeit human, sheriff we know.

Well, Gomer Pyle started out as a hick and evolved into something much more profound. Following in a long line of tradition, Pyle became the wise fool; the guy who doesn't always seem to connect with what's going on around him, who makes some mistakes here and there, but who turns out to be far wiser than anyone around him. He is a gentle soul, pure and true and loyal; in other words, the kind of guy everyone would love to have as a friend.