Highlander The Series - Season 1 (1992) Review

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(More customer reviews)Highlander Season One, a 9-disc DVD Collection, collects the entire 22-episode first season (1992-1993) of the syndicated action series based on the cult-favorite film.
THE STORY
"Highlander" tells the tale of a race of "Immortals" who battle one another throughout history for "the Prize." The "Immortals" game is simple -- take the heads of all other Immortals and receive ultimate knowledge and power. In the end -- there can be only one.
In 1986, the first Highlander the film, starring Christopher Lambert as Connor McLeod hit theatres. In 1992, Highlander: The Series debuted in syndication to tell the Highlander's tale anew. The series followed the adventures of a new Highlander, Duncan McLeod (Adrian Paul), a kinsman of Lambert's Connor from the original movies.
THE DVDS:
Here are the contents of each DVD.
Disc 1
Episode 1: The Gathering - Connor McLeod returns to "pass the torch" to kinsman Duncan McLeod as he helps Duncan prepare for a deadly Immortal who's set sites on Duncan's head.
Episode 2: Family Tree - Richie searches out for his long lost father and runs afoul of a con man and the mob enforcer sent to collect from him. Can McLeod save him in time?
Episode 3: The Road Not Taken - When Richie's friend dies from an apparent drug O.D., McLeod suspects an old Immortal friend of his.
Disc 2
Episode 4: Innocent Man - McLeod searches out an Immortal who took the head of a good friend.
Episode 5: Free Fall - McLeod trains a "new" immortal woman. All is not as it seems though.
Episode 6: Bad Day in Building "A" - Highlander goes Die Hard as McLeod takes on a bunch of criminals who have taken a courthouse hostage.
Disc 3
Episode 7: Mountain Men - McLeod goes Survivor when Tessa's kidnapped by a bunch of survivalists in the mountains.
Episode 8: Deadly Medicine - A psychotic surgeon takes McLeod prisoner to study his miraculous healing powers.
Episode 9: The Sea Witch - Richie helps an ex-girlfriend outrun the drug dealers whom she double-crossed.
Disc 4
Episode 10: Revenge is Sweet - A master swordswoman seeks revenge on McLeod for the death of her (Immortal) lover whom she believes McLeod killed.
Episode 11: See No Evil - McLeod searches out a serial killer who patterns his killings after an Immortal McLeod beheaded in the 1920s.
Episode 12: Eyewitness - Tessa's life is endangered after she witnesses a murder by an Immortal who's "above the law."
Disc 5
Episode 13: Band of Brothers - McLeod's old friend Darius sends warning that a deadly Immortal, clearly beyond McLeod's league, is coming for McLeod's head.
Episode 14: For Evil's Sake - McLeod takes on Kuyler, the Immortal Assassin, who's one-upped McLeod a few times in the past.
Episode 15: For Tomorrow We Die - McLeod takes on Xavier St. Cloud, an Immortal killer with poison gas and no regard for mortal lives.
Disc 6
Episode 16: The Beast Below - A "beast-like" Immortal is threatening Richie's new girlfriend. Can McLeod save her?
Episode 17: Saving Grace - McLeod comes to the aid of Immortal Dr. Grace Chandel, an old-flame, who's being stalked by her Immortal ex-husband.
Episode 18: The Lady and the Tiger - Will Amanda, an old friend and lover of McLeod's, sacrifice his head to save her own?
Disc 7
Episode 19: Eye of the Beholder - Richie falls for a model who's associated with a beauty obsessed Immortal who will do anything to collect and keep beautiful things, including killing Richie.
Episode 20: Avenging Angel - McLeod takes on a new Immortal who believes he is on a Holy Mission to destroy all sinners.
Episode 21: Nowhere to Run - McLeod and the gang must defend the arrogant and maladjusted son of Tessa's friend who is accused of raping the step-daughter of a dangerous Immortal.
Disc 8: Episode 22 and Extras
Episode 22: The Hunters - Season Finale. MacLeod and Fitzcairn investigate the recent disappearances of several Immortals and uncover a deadly plot.
THE DVD EXTRAS
By far, this set clearly has one of THE best DVD extras packages you'll ever see.
COMMENTARY AND NOTES
ALL EPISODES include commentary from producer Bill Panzer and "Watcher" notes. The producer commentary provides great insight into the situations surrounding each episode production including location, special FX or the actors and actresses. The "Watcher" notes gives additional background and provides more insight into "Highlander" canon with reference to events and characters. In all, these two features alone make purchase of the DVD well worth it. BUT, there's more...
BLOOPERS
Disc 8 includes the "Highlander Blooper Reel." Nearly 20 minutes of stunts gone wrong, lines flubbed and other hilarious outtakes featuring our favorite "Immortal" stars.
BEHIND THE SCENES
This is the half hour documentary used to promo the series before it debuted in 1992. Like most "behind the scenes" features we get the standard on-location footage and interviews with the cast and production crew.
THE SCRIPTS
Disc 9 includes the finalized shooting scripts for ALL 22 episodes in season one. The scripts are presented in Flash format. The scripts are a Highlander completist's dream as it includes all the lines and all the stage directions.
THE VERDICT
This series may have passed by a lot of people's radars due to syndication, but lovers of action-adventure and romance are bound to fall in love with this series. The "historical" flashbacks to earlier time periods in the Immortal's lives are something unique not seen in TV before or since. The martial arts and swashbuckling action will fix most people's action craving and the countless romantic "love scenes" featured in the series will reel in the ladies too. If you've never been exposed to world of Highlander before check this series out and see what Highlander fans have known for years, "In The End, There Can Be Only One" -- and this series is it!!
Highest Recommendation

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Item Name: Highlander The Series - Season 1; Studio:Starz / Anchor Bay

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Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's The Lost World - Season One (1999) Review

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(More customer reviews)This is very loosely based on "The Lost World" written by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. So loose that if you took away the character names it would pretty much lose all resemblance. That however does not take away from the wonderful stories and characters. The acting is quite good and the sets, special effects, and music are better than adequate. The dinosaurs may not be up to Jurassic Park standards, but they are fairly good. My whole family enjoys this series. Devout fans of the book may find it a let down, but anyone that enjoys light TV series like Hercules with Kevin Sorbo, Zena, or Mutant-X should find it fun. Even fans of more in depth series like Stargate SG-1 will probably like it.

The set includes six slender cased DVDs with twenty-two episodes. It is 16 hours and 8 minutes of entertainment. The first two seasons have all the original cast. The cast includes Peter McCauley as Professor George Challenger, Rachel Blakely as Marguerite Krux, Will Snow as Lord John Roxton, David Orth as Ned Malone, Jennifer O'Dell as Veronica, and Michael Sinelnikoff as Dr. Summerlee. After that the Australian TV industry intervened with tax laws at the the end of the second season, both Ned and Veronica had to be guest stars and the series started to go down hill after that. I highly recommend the first two seasons. The picture and sound quality is good and although the set does not includes any extras it is well worth the price.

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Determined to prove the existence of The Lost World, dashing adventurer and scholar Professor Edward Challenger mounts a British expedition team consisting of a mismatched group of enthusiasts, all with less than selfless reasons for making the journey. Traveling through the uncharted Amazon jungle to this prehistoric plateau, the group encounters incredible adventures: tribal headhunters, vicious ape men, giant crocodiles, and terrifying dinosaurs! This thrilling spectacle from Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, the creator of Sherlock Holmes, brings cliffhanging action into your home with this special box set! 22 action-packed, one-hour episodes the entire first season of this exciting TV hit! As seen on WGN and in National Syndication Still a Viewer Favorite from Coast to Coast! Dinosaurs Are Huge Business! Market to fans of the Jurassic Park series and Walking with Dinosaurs From Executive Producer John Landis, Creator of An American Werewolf in London and National Lampoon's Animal House Eye-Catching Deluxe Slimcase Packaging with Collectible Artwork! Each DVD case highlights a different personality from the TV program. Episodes include: The Journey Begins, Stranded, More than Human, Nectar, Cave of Fear, Salvation, Blood Lust, Out of Time, Paradise Found, The Beast Within, Creatures of the Dark, Tribute, Absolute Power, Camelot, Unnatural Selection, Time After Time, Prodigal Father, Birthright, Resurrection, Prophecy, The Chosen One, Barbarians at the Gate.

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Being Human: Season 1 Review

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(More customer reviews). . . and best werewolf and best ghost show on TV. Mind you, I like TRUE BLOOD and have even come to see the upside to THE VAMPIRE DIARIES, but both of those are enjoyable diversions with no real subtext (TRUE BLOOD gestures at subtext with its parallels with prejudice against all kinds of difference, but in 2010 that is a pretty worked over subtext and lacks power at this point). But if you want more depth of subtext and a more subtle narrative and richer character development and, well, less garishness, than this is a show you should check out. Not yet available in the U.S. on DVD and Blu-ray (every time I have checked on Amazon I've only seen an outrageously overpriced $70 Blu-ray that never seems to be available -- though if you have an all regions DVD player, you can order an infinitely more affordable edition from Great Britain, which I strongly recommend, I repeat, only if you have an All-Regions player). There are only six episodes in Season One and eight in Seasons Two, so the idea of paying over $10 per episode is rather offensive. But you can either catch the show on BBC America or on Region 2 DVDs.
The series starts when two orderlies at a hospital at Bristol decide to room together. What makes this desirable for them is that they are supernatural creatures. Mitchell is a vampire. Not a terribly old one by vampire narrative standards (less than a century old). George is a werewolf and on three nights a week has a rather violent transformation into a truly nasty beastie (and thanks to CGI his transformations are truly horrendous). Both of them are trying to pass as normal humans, and for economic reasons and simply because they don't want to live alone, they decide to find an apartment together. By happy circumstance, the apartment they find and move into is inhabited by an outrageously sunny and upbeat ghost named Annie. Together, the three of them try to lives that are as normal as possible.
The trouble is, the rest of the world doesn't want them to live normal lives. The vampire community (why does there always seem to be a vampire community?) wants Mitchell to return to the fold. They especially don't want him living with a werewolf. And meanwhile, the afterlife wants Annie to move on, into the light, and away from her human life. So their struggles are unusually rich and complex.
What made BUFFY and ANGEL so vastly superior to TRUE BLOOD and MOONLIGHT and THE VAMPIRE DIARIES and the TWILIGHT series (both novels and movies) was what they were able to do with the premises, with the metaphorical richness of the stories. TRUE BLOOD ends up being a glorious one-dimensional guilty pleasure show, all glorious surface with nothing beneath. BEING HUMAN is much more like BUFFY, with richly developed, deliciously articulated stories with timely cultural references. Mitchell's vampirism, for instance, is used less as a metaphor for homosexuality, as it is in TRUE BLOOD, but addiction and the difficulty of human self-control.
The show is driven by its appealing leads. Russell Tovey (George) will be perhaps best known from his appearance on DR. WHO and the movie THE HISTORY BOYS, but Lenora Crichlow (Annie) and Aidan Turner (Mitchell) are appealing newcomers. There are endless polls about who the hottest vampires are and if Mitchell were better known in the U.S. he'd almost certainly win them all. He is a spectacular incarnation of the really bad boy who wants to be good but for whom it is a constant struggle. George, meanwhile, is like the big silly family dog. There is meanwhile absolutely noting ghostly about Annie except that she can't be seen. She is dark complexioned, but if you had to assign a color to her personality, it would be yellow. Bright yellow. She is sunny and irrepressibly happy and upbeat. Any room she is in has no dark corners. In other words, the polar opposite of all of the stereotypes of ghosts.
SyFy has announced that they are developing an American version of BEING HUMAN. Hopefully they won't blow it. The BBC series is a great one. I am not opposed to an American version, as long as it is more like the American adaptations of THE OFFICE than other efforts. But even if it fails, it should be seen as a gesture towards the excellence of the original. But even if the American version turns out well, if you love extremely high quality shows dealing with the supernatural, you should definitely know the original. The only thing I hate about this show is that there have been only fourteen episodes to date.

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Being Human is a witty and extraordinary look into the lives of three twenty-somethings and their secret double-lives - as a werewolf, a vampire and a ghost – as they struggle to live normally despite their strange and dark secrets. George (Russell Tovey) and Mitchell (Aidan Turner) work in anonymous drudgery as hospital porters in Bristol, England. They lead lives of quiet desperation under the burden of a terrible secret - Mitchell's a vampire and George a werewolf. Deciding to start life afresh and leave behind the dark side, they move into a house, only to find that Annie (Lenora Crichlow), the ghost of a woman killed in mysterious circumstances, haunts it. As the threesome deal with the challenges of their new lives together, they're united in their desire to blend in with their human neighbors. But with unwelcome intruders into their world, a threatened revolution from the vampire underworld, constant threats of exposure, and the day-to-day issues faced by young people - the only thing they may be able to rely on is each other.

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