All nine seasons of the groundbreaking series are offered in deluxe, limited edition fashion, packaged with the X-Files movie and a wealth of cool extras, including a comic book, classic art cards, and the theatrical poster. For fans of classic TV and geeks alike, this is the mother lode. True, hardcore fans already have the individual sets like I do with the extras those include. But what completist can ever resist sets like these… one big box full of everything from your favorite show ever. It’s mostly essential for fans of smart TV who don’t already have any X-Files sets or may only have the themed alien story sets or a single season or two.

—Sarah Zupko

Everyman Michael Moore is well known for his at times comically, at times painfully blunt approach to the gawdawful truth of life as it is in the US for the average person.  Indeed, Moore is among our most astute cultural/political critics, in the non-academic sense, of course. The fat cats who keep the rest of us underfoot are no match for the Big Man and his team in this TV series—when he can corner them.  He gets a lot closer to them than the average Joe, even makes them squirm, at times, and that’s damned cathartic to watch.  The Emmy nominated show, captured here in the Entire Series and Best of DVDs, make an ideal gift for anybody you know who feels their tax money is misdirected, and their lives and the lives of others, undervalued.

—Karen Zarker

If you loved Casino Royal and thought this hard-edged yet flippant character—without the tongue-in-cheek that usually accompanies a 007 film—is exactly what the spy genre needs, go back to the beginning. Before Sean Connery became James Bond in 1962, Patrick McGoohan was finding danger as John Drake as early as 1960. No, he wasn’t the first in the spy genre, nor did he popularize it, but he was one of the coolest to covertly defend the free world this side of Golgo 13. Danger Man, better known as the “Secret Agent” to US viewers, had his own show from 1960 to 1966 and every episode can be found on the Complete Collection from A&E home video, further cementing the channel’s love affair with classic British programming. In each adventure, Drake must use his wits to find a way to route out his enemies. Sometimes this is nothing more than overpowering a strongman or wrestling a gun from a sharpshooter, but more often than not it means going deep undercover as a swinging disc jockey, a savvy technician, or an unassuming salesman. The series doesn’t have the same ‘60s vibe of Mission: Impossible, but it does capture the optimism of the era after the Red Scare of the ‘50s and before the gritty reality of the Vietnam War set in.

—Kevin Garcia

Naturally, anyone who experienced even but a fraction of the 30-year run of The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson will see a bit of their life and times captured in this show.  Every topic in the news and pop culture throughout its run is documented in virtually every episode of this Emmy and Peabody winning show. Viewers with a strong sense of their times, and an appreciation for recent history, will garner satisfaction from the six-DVD set, Timeless Moments, the three DVD-set The Original Ultimate Collection (vol 1-3), Carson Country (country stars on the show from 1964-1991) and The Best of Stand-up Comedians (2 discs).  Some things get funnier with age; The Tonight Show is one of them.  Besides, it’s good to get a laugh in, along with the memory.

—Karen Zarker

The only thing possibly more fascinating than each and every gorgeous, vivid, mind-bogling episode of this award-winning BBC series is the “making of” short that followings each episode. Even the most casual viewer will lose herself in the beauty, violence, and fragility of this planet as conveyed in these stories of life on Earth in places where few humans can or should go. At some point she’ll realize that a few brave and talented humans did go to such places, and went to considerable effort to bring these stories to her TV set. An obvious choice for nature lovers, this exceptional series will also appeal to visual artists, armchair adventurists, and anybody who likes well-told stories of epic scale. (Available for $59.95 at Discovery Channel store)

—Karen Zarker

Aaron Sorkin’s signature sharp, snappy dialogue and historically and pop-culturally adroit characters who can pull an educated pun out of thin air, lickety-split, is so much more fun than the conversations we have with most people in everyday, real life. Studio 60‘s lefty sensibility struggles in a period—that is, the present—when the socio-political culture has taken on a frightening hue of red. Among other things, a respectful bow to the artists who briefly walked the halls of the studio before, until succumbing (although not without a fight) to the bulldog bite of the McCarthy era, is given in some form in virtually every episode.  The modern-day equivalent faced by the Studio 60 staff, of course, involves dodging a hail of bullets shot from the Far Right. Naturally, any fan of Sorkin’s West Wing will want this in their collection. One episode serves as a stiff tonic for the all too stiff times we inhabit, these days.

—Karen Zarker