Saddle Up
When I received the Deadwood Complete Series box set for review, the first thing that struck me was how beautiful the packaging was. The quality of the presentation goes beyond just the packaging, but I’ll get into that aspect of this release shortly. I popped in the first disc, which was to be my first experience with this series that I had heard much about, and was fairly impressed. Three episodes later, I was hooked and became steadily interested in the series from there. This is definitely an abrasive, in your face show, featuring the worst of the west from gutter-mouth dialogue to blood and gore and plenty of other ‘bad’ things. Fortunately, the foul language manages to avoid becoming too overt or fatigued, although I admit it took me a few episodes to get used to it. You probably wouldn’t expect less from an HBO show, and to a degree, I’m sure a lot of what is presented here is reasonably historically accurate.
The grittiness aside, you’ll quickly discover that Deadwood is about its characters more than anything. While I thought that some of them were introduced, developed, and killed off a little too quickly, there are nevertheless many characters that enjoy a continued development throughout the series. While Timothy Olyphant (Seth Bullock) may be considered the lead role, it’s shared impressively with the likes of Ian McShane (Al Swearengen), Powers Boothe (Cy Tolliver), Paula Malcomson (Trixie), and actually quite a few other key characters. The muddy, hard town of Deadwood in 1870s South Dakota is almost a character in its own that is slowly introduced and grows and changes as the series moves on.
I found myself not only enjoying the characters themselves, but their complicated relationships are another motivating factor to keep you glued from episode to episode. You’ll also discover that this show is willing to make drastic changes quickly, which really adds to the intensity and captivating nature of watching Deadwood.
On Blu-ray
I think this is the best presentation, from a packaging and menu standpoint, that I have seen to date. The complete series arrives in a gorgeous box set that includes a textured removable hard cover outer box. This removable box isn’t flashy — it only states the name of the release on two of its faces and no other text or images are included — but I really like the textured feel of it.
Within this box is what looks like a thick book which contains all thirteen discs. The exterior of this book features some of the stars of the series in an interesting black and white photo. The backside has another photo, a more general one, of Deadwood. But the best part is opening this book itself; each ‘page’ is stiff and contains a single disc. There are beautiful color photos on each page that show a character from the show and one of their quotes at the bottom of the picture. Discs are held securely in place but are also easy to remove. Each page reveals the list of (four) episodes that are on the disc, with the final disc being a bonus disc. The bonus disc at the back of this book also has a nice looking hand-drawn map of Deadwood imprinted on it.
You can tell a lot of effort was put into the design of the packaging and that carries into the menus as well. Each disc maintains the same menu design and it’s one I thought was very clean and functional. I liked that a detailed synopsis is included within the menu system for each episode. Scenes from episodes and the theme music plays while you navigate, which is nice.
As for the actual image and sound quality of the show, it’s quite good. I will say that some scenes had some significant grain, but by far the image quality is usually very crisp and vibrant. Most of the show takes place in the drab town of Deadwood but there are plenty of detailed shots of the actors’ faces and clothing which is impressive. As for the audio, the DTS-HD Master Audio in 5.1 more than gets the job done — from the opening theme to all of the language and shouting, everything sounds great.
There are quite a few extra features included in this box set as you would expect. Let’s take a look:
-Audio Commentary – Seventeen commentary tracks with cast and crew.
-Making Deadwood: The Show Behind The Show (HD, 14m) – A nice, but brief, making of feature.
-The New Language of the Old West (HD, 30m) – Curious about the language in the series? This feature takes a closer look at explaining it.
-An Imaginative Reality (HD, 29m)
-The Real Deadwood (HD, 25m) – A study of the history behind the show and the time period that the series is based in (1870s).
-Making of the Season 2 Finale (HD, 70m)
-The Real Deadwood: 1877 (HD, 22m) – Another historical look at the time period.
-Deadwood Daguerreotypes – A collection of about thirty images related to the series.
-Deadwood Matures (HD, 21m) – A closer look at one of the most important events of season two.
-Deadwood Daguerreotypes – Another collection of still images.
-The Meaning of Endings – (HD, 23m) – Director David Milch on his thoughts of season three.
-The Education of Swearengen and Bullock (HD, 20m) – The two most significant characters in the series are examined in depth by cast and crew.
-The Real Deadwood: Out of the Ashes (HD, 30m)
-Deadwood 360 (HD, 8m) – A closer look at the town of Deadwood.
-Al Swearengen Audition Reel (HD, 10m) – A bit of comic relief.
-Cast and Creative Team Q&A (HD, 63m) – An interesting Q&A with some of the many talents involved in the series.
This is an impressive set of extra features, and what’s more, they’re all in HD, or of HD quality in the case of the still images. Combined with the packaging and presentation quality, these are definite signs that the studio put a lot of effort into making this a superb release.
To the summary…
