It had a brilliant run beginning with its second season, but the American version of The Office stumbled, as many shows did, when the writers’ strike occurred. The show’s plot also lost some serious momentum when Jim (John Krasinski) and Pam (Jenna Fischer) finally hooked up, ending the beautifully drawn-out romantic tension that had subtly but crucially been the show’s emotional engine. And as the fifth season began, it seemed like a series of false starts—bumbling boss Michael Scott’s (Steve Carrell) relationship with new HR rep Holly (Amy Ryan) was cute, but it abruptly ended and the show felt like it was treading water for a while.

But with the arrival of guest star Idris Elba (Stringer Bell from The Wire) and a new plotline involving Carrell’s exit from Dunder Mifflin, things finally took an upswing, and by the end of the season it was nearly the show we’d all loved. This season is now out on DVD, full of commentaries and gag reels and the like, and here’s hoping season six can keep up the funny.

The creators of the American Office also launched a new show last year with the very funny Amy Poehler in the lead and a similar setup. Instead of a goofy boss at a small town company, in Parks and Recreation Poehler plays a goofy bureaucrat in small town government. Despite the presence of her and other likeable funny people like Aziz Ansari and Rashida Jones, Parks and Rec just feels flat, trying too hard to emulate the successful Office formula. But hey, the first season of that show was pretty rough, too—here’s hoping they can pull it together for season two.

If you dig the earth, and animals, and you don’t feel like sitting through the entire BBC Planet Earth series, you can watch a condensed (and highly enjoyable) version of the same project as the feature-length film Earth comes to DVD and Blu-Ray. Instead of Patrick Stewart narrating, you get James Earl Jones—a pretty fair trade-off.