I remember The Beverly Hillbillies from when I was a little kid, and then when I was 12 years old we had cable TV for the first time and I was able to catch it three times a day! That's when one of the stations decided to run all the episodes in their original sequence, starting from the first episode. Now Walmart has been selling Beverly Hillbillies' DVD's of 16 episodes at a time for around $10. It's a great deal, but the only drawback is that whoever puts out these DVD's didn't get the rights to use any of the opening and closing theme songs. There's plenty of good banjo playing, but no narration by Jerry Scoggins and no closing tune. Still the episodes are extremely enjoyable.
Of course some of it is cornball and dated, but this sitcom beats the pants off any current shows I've seen. Contrary to what some reviewers here have said, the Clampetts always seem to come out on top of every situation by simply being themselves. If that means they're stupid and backwards, then I'd rather be that than something else. By being themselves, decent and simple, they unintentionally expose everyone else's agenda's, phoniness, and crookedness, whether it's Mr. Drysdale's love affair with Clampett money or just some interloper trying to seduce Elly Mae, or whatever. I also find their unabashed Southern pride to be refreshing in today's stifled and overly-militant PC world. Again, they're simply being themselves. Maybe it helped that Irene Ryan was from Texas, Donna Douglas was from Louisiana, and Buddy Ebsen was from rural Illinois. I guess Max Baer was just a natural as Jethro, and he later dwelt on mainly Southern themes in his post-Jethro life as a film producer. PC or not, the show is funny!!
