Call it owl-stretching time, as John Cleese would, although few owls of my acquaintance give a hoot.

But it is true that exactly 40 years, two months and 29 days ago, Monty Python’s Flying Circus launched on the BBC, bewildering the British with its Wither Canada? episode. The Pythons soon created an entertainment juggernaut that still reverberates.

Meanwhile, exactly 30 years, two months and nine days ago, Cleese’s Fawlty Towers premiered the finale of its 12 legendary episodes. It would eventually — recently — be cited as the best British television series of all time.

With anniversaries in mind, we hail the recent arrival of three Monty Python DVD box sets. Among them is the jewel, The Best of Monty Python: 40th Anniversary Edition, as well as a newly remastered version of Fawlty Towers that significantly improves the picture quality and adds to the lore with a bonus disc called Farty Towels.

We also salute the members of Monty Python, who had been inadvertently assembled in the 1960s as a gag-writing team by David Frost. He may have seemed like a mainstream fuddy-duddy, but Frost nurtured new performance talent (and, yes, this is the same befuddled fellow who became famous for his Nixon interviews).

The individual Pythoneers are as well-known as their troupe: Britons John Cleese, Eric Idle, Michael Palin, Terry Jones and Graham Chapman, plus the only American, Terry Gilliam. All but Chapman, who died in 1989, are still more-or-less active. Gilliam is most prominent — as a film director. His latest opus, The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus, is rolling out now in theatres.

The tragedy of Chapman, who succumbed to a rare cancer but just as easily could have expired earlier from alcoholism, instantly became the source of more Python humour. This illuminates how a bunch of well-educated free radicals could change the world through irreverent intelligence, mock belligerence and tasteless trifles. They had no boundaries.

Chapman’s death came one day before the 20th anniversary of the Python series. Jones accused him of “party-pooping.” Cleese delivered the eulogy, describing Chapman merely as the co-author of the Parrot Sketch and then propelling mourners into loud laughter about death.

The DVD box sets operate in that same vein, either by going back to the original sketches for highlights or through vintage and contemporary interviews. The Pythoneers explain when and how and why they came together to create their sometimes savage satires.

Monty Python: Almost the Truth: The Lawyer’s Cut is a three-disc set containing an excellent six-part documentary that plumbs the roots of Python and brings us mostly up to date. The third disc includes episode highlights, among them the Parrot Sketch, the Fish Slapping Dance and the infamous Lumberjack Song with the Canadian Mounties (Chapman, the troupe’s gay member, was proud that he bedded a male Mountie during the first Python tour of Canada).

Monty Python: The Other British Invasion is a two-disc set with two top-notch documentaries that set the scene for Python’s rise: Before the Flying Circus and Monty Python Conquers America.

The Best of Monty Python: The 40th Anniversary Edition is a seven-disc set with the same discs from British Invasion, adding two Monty Python Live discs and three more in the Personal Best series. Each of the six members of Python (Chapman was done by proxy) get to introduce their favourite sketches — with surprise selections!

No one I have recently interviewed in comedy fails to mention Monty Python as an influence. Steve Coogan, who just released his own career DVD set, says in admiration: “If it hadn’t been for what Python did, other people would not have been enabled — including me!” Monty Python, themselves influenced by The Goon Show, radicalized comedy and changed popular culture forever.