On Campus (vhs):

Amazon.com video review: The dean of observational humorists in America preaches to a like-minded choir in this lively 1984 college performance by George Carlin. Beginning with a little offstage psychodrama (albeit funny) about the pain of being a class clown in Catholic school, Carlin on Campus soon hits the boards with the former Hippie-Dippie Weatherman's take on Brooklynese pronunciations of the names of sexually transmitted disease ("hoipes"), plus a prayer for the separation of church and state, feuds between breakfast foods, and the absurdity of wearing jungle camouflage in a desert. Carlin's tone and choice of material toughen up as the show goes along: he makes an astute assault on passive-aggressive drivers, lobbies hard for his "world's most obscene cheer," and suggests that people may be ready for "full-contact chess." Much of this stuff is pretty funny, though the program is marred a bit by reliance on some lowbrow, pretaped material that punctuates Carlin's monologue. A contrarian to the end, however, Carlin is going to do what he's going to do, and that's part of his charm. --Tom Keogh

The George Carlin Collection (vhs):

Amazon.com video review: Once upon a time, George Carlin was a closely cropped, dues-paying, Ed Sullivan-approved comedian popular for his fast-paced satire on any number of (mostly safe) topics. That was during the 1960s; by the start of the '70s, a restless Carlin had removed his tie, broadened the range of his trippy observations, and kicked up a freedom-of-speech challenge to laws governing obscene language. He drew a dedicated, young audience and later the attention of Home Box Office, a fledgling cable channel seeking ways to distinguish its programming from that of more restrictive, commercial networks. A relationship was born that lasted more than two decades and resulted in a dozen uncensored George Carlin comedy specials on HBO. The George Carlin Collection, a five-volume set, skims some of the best material from that hefty television legacy and puts us in touch again with Carlin's classic repertoire.

On Location with George Carlin revives his slightly tentative 1977 debut on cable, taped at the University of Southern California and featuring superb bits about playing Monopoly and shopping while stoned. George Carlin Again! offers an in-the-round performance from 1978 and inspired pop philosophy on the nature of time. Carlin on Campus and Carlin at Carnegie are fine touchstones from the '80s, while Personal Favorites constitutes a worthy greatest-hits package culled from a number of Carlin/HBO specials. Carlin freaks will gobble it all up, while more casual observers will cherish such hall-of-fame material as "Baseball vs. Football" and "A Place for My Stuff." --Tom Keogh