As a matter of fact, "The Waltons" started as a Christmas movie, but it's not available in any of the boxed sets.

"The Homecoming: A Christmas Story" aired as a TV movie on CBS on Dec. 19, 1971 as a pilot for the series that would become "The Waltons." It was successful enough, apparently, and the series itself premiered on Sept. 14 of the next year.

All nine seasons of the classic, multi-award-winning series are now available on DVD, as is the pilot telefilm, but not together.

The problem seems to be a rights issue. Though both the pilot and the regular series aired on CBS, the video rights to the series are owned by the show's main producer, Warner Bros. (well, technically it was produced by Lorimar, but that company was bought out by Warner in the late '80s), while all the rights for the pilot belong to CBS. And so, seeing as those two are competing studios, they'd never consent to putting out a DVD set together - it'd be like asking the Hatfields and the McCoys to open a lemonade stand together.

"The Homecoming: A Christmas Story" opens on Christmas Eve, 1933, when John Walton is late getting home for the holiday; it's a sort of slice of life of the then-unknown Walton family of Walton's Mountain, Virginia.

And though it introduced viewers to the members of the Walton clan, many of the actors who played them would not return.

Indeed, Patricia Neal won a Golden Globe for her portrayal of Olivia Walton in the pilot movie, but she was replaced in the series by Michael Learned (who, it must be said, won two Emmys for the role).

The other actors to star in the pilot and then not return were Andrew Duggan (who played patriarch John Walton) and Edgar Bergen (Grandpa Walton). That left Grandma Walton as the only adult character to be played by the same actor in both the pilot and the series; the child actors all returned.

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