Seeing old episodes of the cancelled show The Critic back in 1997 meant either staying up to 2 a.m. to watch syndicated episodes on Comedy Central or hitting the convention circuit to buy about 10 VHS tapes from a big fat dealer named Dave who was also trying to pimp Battlestar Galactica. Well, now Davy is looking for work because the advent of the DVD has made his stack of black cassettes ancient and decrepit by today’s standards.

DVD is the perfect format for bringing our favorite television shows to our shelves. The sleek packaging can easily fit a six-disc set into a package no larger than six inches in width. In addition, each disc can hold up to four hours of television with no drop in quality, which makes DVD the obvious choice for bringing great television programming onto our televisions (or computer screens) at our convenience. Want to see the episode where Homer falls down the Springfield Gorge? Or do you want to see James Gandolfini have a really weird dream about talking fish? Want to see The X-Files wither and die as Chris Carter makes up the story as he goes along? Now you can, with technology that’s been around for a few years now. But last month, something major happened. USA Today reported that due to excellent DVD sales, 20th Century Fox announced it would consider resurrecting the previously-cancelled Family Guy. Negotiations are currently underway to try and have 35 new episodes start airing in January 2005. And, like that, DVD has started a whole new ballgame.

Cancelled shows, shows that were never to see the light of day ever again and cries of “that show was so good! Why’d they can it?” live once more. Kevin Smith’s six-episode run of Clerks: The Animated Series is now leading to a motion picture. Joss Whedon’s cancelled-but-just-as-good-as-Buffy-or-Angel series Firefly hit DVD this past Tuesday already with a motion picture deal in the works. While it didn’t belong on Nickelodeon at all, look for AnimeWorks to bring Invader ZIM to DVD in Spring 2004. And as for the The Critic, look for the complete series on DVD on Jan. 27, 2004.

However, DVD’s TV resurrection has also had some drawbacks. First, shows that boasted popular soundtracks now find themselves trapped in litigious hell as studios struggle to pay licensing fees for release on the new medium. Efforts are being made to send the short-lived Freaks and Geeks to DVD, but licensing rights are holding up the production.

Furthermore, DVD’s safety net may encourage lazy production. If TV execs feel like they have a back door to push their wares, then efforts to promote a show may fall short, or worse. Firefly is a fantastic show, and it would probably still be on the air if Fox hadn’t stuck it on Friday nights when no one watches television.

But these are small problems and the rewards are too great. If someone had said a year ago that Family Guy was returning to television, they would have been called a filthy liar and accused of playing with people’s emotions. But after becoming the fourth best-selling TV-DVD on the market, the show is coming back. Stewie will live to kill another day.

Dave may be looking for a new way to screw people out of cash, but in the meantime we’ll all be marathoning episodes of our favorite short-lived TV shows.