Conceived by Barbara Pyle and media mogul Ted Turner, Captain Planet was an ecological hero way ahead of his time. The animated series ran for years with some nifty design work by Neal Adams and his Continuity Associates. Each episode featured an adventure and a lesson (of course). It endeared itself to a generation of viewers and remained an enduring figure from the 1990s.

Now, Warner Home Entertainment has released Captain Planet the Complete Franchise, with 41 hours and 31 minutes of environmental goodness. For silly legal reasons, the show has two titles evenly split among its six seasons: Captain Planet and the Planeteers (animated by DIC) and The New Adventures of Captain Planet (animated by Hanna-Barbera) for the final three seasons.

Gaia, the spirit of Earth, was voiced by Whoopi Goldberg, who set the tone and standard for the entire series. She was accompanied by a voice cast that included Margot Kidder (who replaced Goldberg in season four), Meg Ryan, Martin Sheen, Jeff Goldblum, LeVar Burton, Ed Asner, and Dean Stockwell.

As Gaia awakens after far too long, she is unhappy with the shape of Earth and sets about to repair things, with the help of teens drawn from the continents, granting each power — earth, fire, wind, water, and heart — to help save the world. United, they summon forth Captain Planet (David Coburn). The excellent captain can be felled by pollution and similar harmful environmental factors. Our teen heroes —Gi (Janice Kawaye), Kwame (LeVar Burton), Linka (Kath Soucie), Ma-Ti (Scott Menville), and Wheeler (Joey Dedio) — respond to Gaia’s alerts via their solar-powered Geo-Cruiser.

Their recurring foes include Hoggish Greedly (Ed Asner), Hoggish Greedly Jr. (Charlie Schlatter), Rigger (John Ratzenberger), Verminous Skumm (Jeff Goldblum/Maurice LaMarche), Duke Nukem (Dean Stockwell/Maurice LaMarche), Leadsuit (voiced by Frank Welker), Dr. Barbara “Babs” Blight (Meg Ryan/Mary Kay Bergman), MAL (David Rappaport/Tim Curry),  Looten Plunder (James Coburn/Ed Gilbert), Argos Bleak (Scott Bullock), the Pinehead Brothers (Dick Gautier and Frank Welker), Sly Sludge (Martin Sheen/Jim Cummings), Ooze (Cam Clarke), Tank Flusher III (Frank Welker), Zarm (Sting/David Warner/Malcolm McDowell), and of course, the good captain’s evil twin, Captain Pollution (David Coburn).

The DIC episodes were very much formula, and when H-B took over, backstories and more depth were added throughout, making for a more enjoyable viewing experience. Still, there were many times the themes were heavy-handed, making them feel like an “eat your spinach” experience.

It did spawn The Captain Planet Foundation in 1991, as Pyle donated a percentage of the show’s merchandising revenue to do some actual real-world good. It ran a decade until new parent company TimeWarner shit it down. After the disastrous AOL merger, the foundation was resurrected in 2007 and continues to do good work.

The series looks fine on DVD, reproduces the original animation well, and offers Dolby Digital audio. Little expense was spent on cleaning and unifying everything, although the entire package is a lavish one. Not a single special feature has been included.

Okay, I get it. The West Wing is a fantasy. But it’s not just a liberal fantasy television series. It is a series that celebrated patriotic Americans who all thought they were working to create a better country. The staffers in the west wing of the White House and their president strove to bring their best efforts, and as we watch, we see them try and fail, we see them try and succeed, and we see them try and not get everything they wanted. There was no breast-beating or pouting on national television.

The 1999-2006 series celebrated patriotism and intelligence, two things lacking from way too many elected officials today, making us long for the Bartlet Administration. Long overdue, Warner Home Entertainment has chosen the show’s 25^th anniversary to finally release The West Wing: The Complete Series on Blu-ray.

Created by Aaron Sorkin, using leftover material from his entertaining The American President, he created a rich, varied cast of characters. With producer/director Thomas Schlamme, they cast one of the finest ensembles you could hope to find on American prime time television. They oversaw the first four seasons before burnout and drug problems led Sorkin to step aside, with Schlamme with him. The fifth season saw Executive Produce John Wells step in, and it was an uneven season, but it found its footing. Seasons six and seven introduced fresh characters as the next election loomed, and it found new energy, ending on a high note.

Even its weakest episodes were stronger than most of its network competition, rivaling the upcoming Golden Age of cable as it competed with series like The Sopranos. We saw the struggles to run a country each week, along with their horrible work/life balance. Their little personal time often involved attempts at romance, which gave rise to many wonderful relationships.

We also learned a lot about how the government works and issues large and small. Sorkin would have people bring him the boring, and he somehow would have it turned into fascinating badinage and debate.

The show has endured, not just through cable and now streaming accessibility. Still, it spawned the first series rewatch podcast, The West Wing Weekly, and has spawned numerous mini-reunions for good causes (most recently, on the Emmy Awards). The show’s enduring nature and its influence over many worthy causes were also celebrated in What’s Next: A Backstage Pass to The West Wing, Its Cast and Crew, and Its Enduring Legacy of Service, written by two of its stars, Melissa Fitzgerlad and Mary McCormack.

The 156 episodes, across 28 discs, carry over the 20+ commentaries, behind-the-scenes featurettes, unaired scenes, gag reels, and more from the DVD editions. The 1080p transfers are sharp and clear, with a fine DTS-HD MA audio track. Alas, only English captions are available, which I think is a missed opportunity, as there was a lack of anything new to celebrate 25 years (the live recreation of an episode done as a Democratic fundraiser would have been welcome). The plastic cases cram the discs in place and can be easily dislodged, which is another shame.

In spring 1994, I was reading a series of articles in The New York Times about pilots for the forthcoming TV series, and they profiled a series featuring six twnetysomethings trying to adjust to adulthood. It sounded promising so my wife and I sampled the NBC series the following September.

And Friends has been running somewhere on television ever since. It is now 30 years old and to celebrate, Warner Home Entertainment recently released Friends: The Complete Series, debuting on 4k Ultra HD for the first time. Every episode is included along with a variety of bonus features making this an ideal addition to your video library.

What’s interesting about the series today is how it has endured despite aspects no longer appearing as fresh. The creators, David Crane and Marta Kauffman, cleverly found six types that could bounce off one another with heart and humor. With director James Burrows handling the pilot, all the elements from the first episode were there and remained in place for the next decade.

Largely set in two adjacent apartments in Manhattan, and their favorite coffeeshop, the six worked to live with running gags about their jobs (or not having jobs). They never seemed to worry about paying the rent or utilities, so their struggles were more about relationships—finding them or keeping them. They loved and lost, laughed and cried, and turned to one another for support. Over the course of ten seasons, we saw two couples form, one long-simmering and filled with pathos, while the other unexpected and funny. By the time they turned the lights out in an hour-long finale, they had become part of the national dialogue.

The show endures because the character relationships feel real and their affection for one another is evident from when Monica’s friend Rachel turns up in her wedding dress, having run away from her wedding and is immediately adopted by the others.

Wisley, the showrunners, plotted out the character arcs for each season well before writing and filming began, serving the characters first, then the gags. This may be one of the reasons why it is among the series I continually find my high schoolers watching via streaming.

The series has 23 triple-layered 4K discs and two dual-layered Blu-rays for the special features. They’re tidily packaged in a nice plastic case that fits snugly on the shelf. The 2160p transfers, framed at 1.78:1, look just fine, and as you remember, the series back in the CRT days. That said, the color is oddly saturated throughout and look just a wee bit off, enough to nag at veteran fans.

The 4K discs come complete with a fine DTS-HD 5.1 Master Audio, serving the dialogue and music just swell.

The Special Features are mostly taken from previous Blu-ray and DVD editions of the seasons such as the audio commentaries with executive producers Kevin S. Bright, Marta Kauffman and David Crane.

On the first bonus disc, we get a new Friends: Through the Peephole (15:18), hosted by Warner Bros. archivist Matt Truex, examining some of the 2,000 props and costumes. There is also the less interesting trivia contest How Well Do You Know Your Friends? (6:37).

Each season carries over the other Blu-ray extras such as trailers, music videos, shorts spotlighting the series’ international appeal and other topics.

The second disc contains extras imported from seasons 6-10, so we have gag reels, Gunther’s chats about each subsequent season, and various Friends appearances on talk shows plus the Extended Broadcast Episodes – “The One Where Rosita Dies,” “The One Where They All Turn Thirty,” “The One with Joey’s New Brain” and “The One with the Truth About London.”

I suppose the Max reunion special should be here, but it isn’t, which is a shame. Overall, though, it’s nice to have the entire series in one place, so you can watch at your leisure and not worry about the show vanishing from your favorite streaming service or cable channel. As promised in the catchy title song, one of the last to chart on top 40 radio, they’ll be there for you.