The guys (and gal) of The League are back for another fun season of spirited competition. Kevin (Stephen Rannazzisi) is still reeling over last year’s Sacko “win”—and it doesn’t help that his wife Jenny (Katie Aselton) was the big Shiva winner, and gets to dole out his punishment. As the new season kicks off, tragedy strikes and the league finds itself down a member. However the mourning is short-lived when the gang discovers that a Laguna beach house has bequeathed to whomever wins this year’s compeition—as long as there is a full 8-man roster. So the gang recruit recovering sex addict Russell (Rob Huebel) to fill the open slot (so to speak).

I am the furthest thing there is from a sports fan—the only football I see on Sundays is when I turn on the TV at 7pm to see how delayed my FOX and CBS shows are going to be. However, for some reason I find The League hilarious. To me, the whole fantasy football aspect takes a backseat, and I am just drawn to the craziness of this group of friends and the lengths they will go to in order to win this competition. Every season is filled with pranks, put-downs, crazy schemes and total political incorrectness. I’m sure sports fans will thoroughly enjoy all of the sports banter and smack-talk between the characters, and the cameos from professional athletes, but most of that just goes over my head.

Some of this season’s storylines include Kevin deals with his diagnosis that he has low T; Andre (Paul Scheer) becomes known as “Tefl-Andre” when the group’s insults just seem to bounce right off him; Taco (Jonathan Lajoie) finds a new investor in his Eskimo Brothers Database (EBDB), and decides to use the money to open an EBDBBnB (which seems more like a brothel); Andre and Russell partner to open a wine bar; Taco invents his own time standard, and Pete (Mark Duplass) has relationships with several different women over the course of the season. During this season Ruxin (Nick Kroll) has some problems at work which has him “out of the country” and hardly in several episodes (not sure if this was due to Kroll being unavailable).

Meanwhile, for those who are fans of Rafi (Jason Mantzoukas) and Dirty Randy (Seth Rogen), fear not about last season’s big death scene. There is once again an entire episode dedicated to these two characters this season—an epic origin story that shows how these two devolved from “Clean Randall” and Rafael into the men they are now.

This season also features some great non-sports guest stars, including the return of Zach Woods as Lane, Adam Brody as Ted, and Jayma Mays as Trixie, and the addition of Rob Riggle as Ruxin’s boss. Also making guest appearances this season are Jerry O’Connell, Corbin Bernsen, Lizzy Caplan, Andrea Savage, Seth Morris, Anna Camp, Romy Rosemont, Bobby Lee, Erinn Hayes, Rich Sommer, June Diane Raphael, Jorma Taccone, Nathan Fielder, Moshe Kasher, Andrew Santino, and more.

In the past, my favorite character has always been Taco, however, I think he’s been dethroned by Andre this season. I love all of Andre’s crazy outfits and his complete obliviousness to the absurdness and homosexual-nature of his words and actions. In this season there is a hilarious scene where he dresses as “Andrea” to dole out a self-imposed punishment—the reactions from the other guys is priceless and had me laughing out loud. And when the guys discover that Andre has named his new cat “Milady”, the fall-out is excellent!

I really enjoyed re-watching the sixth season of The League on this DVD set. With over 23 minutes of new and uncensored footage inserted back into 6 of the 13 episodes, it was an entirely new experience. The new footage is seamlessly added to the episodes and doesn’t feel out of place. Plus, there is an additional 25 minutes of deleted footage available in the bonus features. Overall, I found this to be a slightly weaker season than some of the earlier ones, but there are still plenty of great laughs, and it is certainly worth checking out.

The picture quality on the DVDs is decent, but the show doesn’t look as crisp and sharp as it did when I first watched the season on the HD FXX channel—I wish TCFHE had continued to release this series on Blu-ray as well. The audio track provides clear dialogue, and makes use of the surround channel in the bar scenes to help set the ambiance. In addition to the extended episodes/deleted scenes, the bonus features also include a really long gag reel, alternate takes, and Taco’s EBDBBnB song. While it would have been nice to get a true behind the scenes featurette and/or some audio commentaries, this DVD release is still an easy recommendation if you’re looking for a great comedy series with high replay value that can be enjoyed by sport fans and non-fans alike.

What’s Included:

Episodes: (5:42:35)

• All 13 Episodes of the Sixth Season:
  Disc 1 – “Sitting Shiva”,”Tefl-Andre”,”The Height Supremacist”,”When Rafi Met Randy”,”The Hot Tub”,”Breast Awareness Month”,”The Heavenly Fouler”
  Disc 2 – “Man Land”,”Taco Standard Time”,”Epi-Sexy”,”EBDBBnB”,”Menage a Cinq”,”The Beach House”
• 480p / Widescreen 1.78:1
• Audio: English Dolby Digital 5.1
• Subtitles: English SDH, Spanish, French
• Closed Captioned

Extras:

• 6 Extended Episodes
  Over 23 minutes of extra footage integrated back into the episodes. This is my favorite way to view deleted footage, however, unlike some previous releases of this series, there is no option to watch these episodes as they originally aired.
  • “Sitting Shiva” (aired 23:49, extended 28:09)
  • “Tefl-Andre” (aired 22:12, extended 24:58)
  • “When Rafi Met Randy” (aired 27:23, extended 33:08)
  • “The Hot Tub” (aired 24:51, extended 29:34)
  • “Epi-Sexy” (aired 24:58, extended 28:10)
  • “Menage a Cinq” (aired 24:29, extended 26:58)
• Deleted Scenes (24:57)
  An additional 25 minutes of fun deleted/extended scenes. Each disc contains a Play All option, or select from:
  • Disc 1 (16:49) – “Extended Combine”, “Who Gets The House?”, “Would You Date Ted’s Ex?”, “More Cameron Jordan Cameron”, “Extended Funeral Ending”, “So You Want to Work for Taco Corp?”, “More Andrea!”, “Taco, The Height Supremacist”, “Rand and Evan, Architects”, “Detox Room”, “More Andre Examines Kevin’s Balls”, “Taco and the Chinese”
  • Disc 2 (8:08) – “Lane’s long message to Andre”, “Gluten Free Conversation”, “Kevin on Khat”, “Ménage a Cinq Gets a D”, “More ‘Funny Business'”, “Horse Bath”
• Taco Tones (2:18)
  Watch Taco’s hilarious ad/theme song for the EBDBBnB (Eskimo Brothers Database Bed-and-Breakfast).
• Alt Nation (13:44)
  This talented cast is so great at improv—here’s a collection of hilarious alternate lines, takes and ad-libs that weren’t used in the episodes.
• Gag Reel (14:43)
  In what may be the longest gag reel I’ve ever seen on a DVD, hilarity ensues as the cast flub their lines, crack each other up, deal with prop malfunctions and just have fun on set.

Final Thoughts:

The sixth season of The League is another fun collection of episodes, with loads of laughs to be had—including some of my favorite moments of the series so far. The DVD comes loaded with extended episodes, deleted scenes and many other fun bonus features. If you’re a fan of the series, you will definitely want to pick up this release!