Which years do you think were better?The early years of "The Dick Van Dyke Show",or the latter years?In my opinion,both early and latter years had good episodes.

The later years are much better.

I think the quality of this series stayed the same from beginning to end.

I agree with Marvo-- each of the five seasons were consistently good. I think TDVDS is one of the few shows that never "jumped the shark"-- while each season had a couple episodes that maybe weren't as great as the others, the show itself continued to be funny. While there were some minor natural changes (the cast getting older, Laura becoming more outspoken, etc.) I think the fact that no major changes (Rob and Laura having another baby, Sally getting married, etc.) happened kept it from getting too stale. There's sooo many shows out there that became unwatchable at the end because of cast members leaving, moving, etc. and thankfully, the Dick Van Dyke Show stayed away from that.

I also thought the show started out great too-- while there were a few minor elements that changed pretty quickly, I find just about all of the season 1 episodes totally watchable today. So many shows take a good 2-3 years to develop before it even becomes watchable. Now, some people think that the first season was more about the office scenes and the later seasons were more about Rob and Laura, but I feel like the show kept a pretty even split throughout the whole run. So, to put it simply, I really don't have a preference as far as seasons go.. it was a funny, funny show from beginning to end! :)