UHF
Blu-ray
Director: Jay Levey
Screenwriter: Jay Levey, “Weird Al” Yankovic
Cast: “Weird Al” Yankovic, Kevin McCarthy, Michael Richards, David Bowe, Victoria Jackson
Shout! Factory
Rated PG-13 | 97 Minutes
Release Date: November 11, 2014

In UHF, “Weird Al” Yankovic stars as George Newman, a daydreamer with a hyperactive imagination who becomes the manager of Channel 62, A UHF (Ultra High Frequency) TV station on the verge of bankruptcy.

Before long, George’s eclectic programming – including shows like Stanley Spadowski’s Clubhouse, Wheel of Fish, and Raul’s Wild Kingdom – is saving the station. Channel 62’s sudden increase in popularity gains the attention of the nefarious R.J. Fletcher (Kevin McCarthy, Invasion of the Body Snatchers), owner of the rival VHF network station, Channel 8.

Furious that George’s rinky-dink UHF station is beating him in ratings, Fletcher sets out to buy Channel 62 and permanently cancel George’s programming. Absurdity ensues as George and his friends attempt to raise money to out-buy Fletcher through a telethon.

For this week’s edition of The Digital Wire we’ve got a slim selection of offbeat titles from the film and television domains, including one influential horror classic. Below you’ll find info on several future home video releases complete with technical specs, release dates, and links to pre-order at Amazon. We would greatly appreciate it if you use those links to order because a small percentage of each order helps keep this website running at max power. The cover art for certain titles has yet to be finalized.

Welcome back to another edition of The Digital Wire. For this week’s roundup of the coolest upcoming Blu-ray and DVD release news we’ve got gunslingers, dragons, unusual weather phenomenon, telephone boxes that can travel through time and across the universe, and a rogue television station run by a weird guy named Al. All that plus Jenny Slate in one of the year’s most beloved comedies.

Below you’ll find info on several future home video releases complete with technical specs, release dates, and links to pre-order at Amazon. We would greatly appreciate it if you use those links to order because a small percentage of each order helps keep this website running at max power.

A week ago I wrote a retrospective article on the 25th anniversary of “Weird Al” Yankovic‘s supremely silly cult classic UHF and ended it with these words:

I automatically assumed at the time that Shout! would pick up the license to release UHF on Blu-ray because it’s an MGM title and they typically distribute that studio’s lesser-loved catalog entries. Plus this year would be the most appropriate time for a UHF Blu because the movie celebrates its silver anniversary in 2014 and anniversaries always look good on a Blu-ray/DVD cover. But I had no idea that when Shout! announced its upcoming home video release slate over the weekend at the San Diego Comic-Con they would be including a new 25th anniversary edition of UHF among some of their better-known titles.

In the early 1980’s “Weird Al” Yankovic sold millions of albums and on occasion infuriated a famous musician or two with his quotable (and often superior) parodies of the most popular songs of the day. He made countless appearances on hit late night talk shows and MTV, and as his fan base grew Yankovic’s music began to make its way onto the rare movie soundtrack (the title track from his 1985 release Dare to Be Stupid received a prominent placement in the following year’s Transformers: The Movie).

Short of writing his autobiography and inventing the Internet years before anyone else, the only obstacle preventing Yankovic from becoming the King of All Media (eat it Stern) was his very own big screen comedy motion picture.