Leonard learns that jealousy is bad for a relationship (with Penny) but science is good for seduction (of Penny). Howard finds life in the International Space Station is no escape from terrestrial turmoil between his mum and his new wife Bernadette. Raj meets someone special who may be a good match, if he can keep her from fleeing mid-date. And then there’s Sheldon. He learns what not to say after facing harassment charges or competing for tenure at work and how Dungeons & Dragons can be the icebreaker his relationship with Amy needs...

The sixth season of The Big Bang Theory delivers another 24, 20-minute, episodes that follow Leonard and Sheldon, two brilliant physicists who are also roommates. While they are wizards in the laboratory, they are sadly socially inept outside of it. Their beautiful, free-spirited neighbour, Penny, aims to teach them a thing or two about life. Penny and Leonard's romantic relationship continues, while Sheldon is quite content video-chatting with platonic partner Amy Farrah Fowler, or playing Dungeons & Dragons with their friends, including fellow scientists Raj Koothrappali and Howard Wolowitz, and Wolowitz's wife, the adorable micro-biologist, Bernadette.

Highlights in this season include:

The 43 Peculiarity: Sheldon's friends start to wonder why, and where, he disappears to every day at exactly the same time. Raj and Howard decide to follow him and discover he heads down to a locked room in the basement of the university. When they break in the next day they find nothing of interest other than a blackboard with the number 43 chalked on it. Their interest peaked, the two decide to unearth what Sheldon is up to by sneaking in a hidden webcam. What they learn makes their hair turn white.

The Fish Guts Displacement: Aimee is ill and uses her Relationship Agreement with Sheldon to ensure he looks after her. But, when he rubs vapour rub on her chest and bathes her, she pretends to still be ill long after she has recovered. Meanwhile Howard has to go to Bernadette's parents house for dinner and, as her father is not a big talker and very intimidating, Howard is not looking forward to the evening.

The Santa Simulation: This season's Christmas episode sees the boys playing Dungeons & Dragons with a festive twist - something that Sheldon doesn't like as he hates Christmas. The girls decide to have a girls night out and Raj deliberately kills his D&D character so that he can join them. While out, the girls decide to find Raj a woman.

The Closet Reconfiguration: Sick of the state of their cupboard, which is being used as a junk room, Howard and Bernadette throw a dinner party and deliberately show Sheldon the state of the cupboard. Howard knows that Sheldon won't be able to pass up the opportunity to sort and arrange the cupboard into some sort of order. However, while tidying, Sheldon finds a letter Howard's absent father sent to Howard on his 18th birthday.

The Proton Resurgence: Sheldon discovers that a childhood hero of his (Professor Proton - a children's TV presenter who performed science experiments on his show) is available to hire for kids parties. Sheldon hires him so that he can hang out with him. Bob Newhart guest stars as Professor Proton and steals the entire show (as you'd expect).

To be fair, there isn't a dull episode in this season, it's just that the above episodes were a little more impressive. This season also sees Sheldon hire a new, sexy assistant, who then goes on to make advances towards Leonard; Raj and Stuart, from the comic book store, becoming close friends; and Raj finally getting a girlfriend who is probably more of a mess than he is.

Extras include The Big Bang Theory: The Final Comedy Frontier (11 min, 11 sec featurette that reveals, amongst other things, that one of the actors who plays an astronaut in the opening episodes, is actually an ex-NASA astronaut; an interview with Buzz Aldrin, who has a small cameo in an episode; and a segment from Comic-Com where a Big Bang Theory fans wins the chance to go into space); Houston, We Have a Sit-com (9 min, 52 sec which is a live link-up between the cast of the show and a real astronaut fan who is on the International Space Station); The Big Bang Theory at Paley Fest 2013 (28 min, 12 sec Q&A from fans with the cast and crew. One of the interesting aspects is the talk of the flashmob dance sequence that Kaley Cuoco (Penny) organised for one of the live recordings. It's a shame that the footage wasn't available elsewhere on the Blu-ray); Electromagnetism: The Best Relationship Moments in Season 6 (30 min, 26 sec look at some of the characters romantic moments. This can be played as individual featurettes for each couple, or a one long feature. Each also contains interview with the actors talking about how they view their character's relationships - Poor Kunal Nayyar (Raj) is interviewed on his own); and Gag Reel (9 min, 16 sec collection of outtakes).

Another great collection of episodes from this monster show.

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Darren Rea