“Longmire: The Complete First and Second Seasons” (Warner Archive/Blu-ray, 2012-13, six discs, 23 episodes, extended episodes, introductions, featurettes). This cable series is a first-rate adaptation of the novels by Craig Johnson, a modern-day Western set in Wyoming, focusing on Sheriff Walt Longmire (Australian actor Robert Taylor) and his team (including Katie Sackhoff), as well as his friend and conscience, an American Indian tavern owner played by Lou Diamond Phillips. This set upgrades the show to Blu-ray for the first time. Season 3 is currently airing Mondays on A&E. (Available at warnerarchive.com.)
“Kung Fu: The Legend Continues: The Complete First Season” (Warner Archive/DVD, 1992-93, six discs, 21 episodes). Sequel to the 1970s “Kung Fu” series, which was set in the Old West and focused on a wandering Shaolin monk (David Carradine) who was adept at martial arts. Here, Carradine plays the grandson of that character (with the same name, Caine), still wandering, settling disputes, solving mysteries and occasionally calling upon supernatural assistance. But now he’s doing it with his police officer son (Chris Potter) in a modern U.S. Chinatown setting. (Available at warnerarchive.com.)
“Rizzoli & Isles: The Complete Fourth Season” (Warner/DVD, 2013-14, four discs, 16 episodes, featurettes). Wisecracking, sports-loving detective Jane Rizzoli (Angie Harmon) and prim, every-hair-in-place pathologist Maura Isles (Sasha Alexander) continue to solve crimes in the Boston area while dealing with their complicated personal lives. Harmon and Alexander are a great team, the perfect embodiment of Tess Gerritsen’s novels in these smart and funny episodes. Co-stars Bruce McGill, Lorraine Bracco and Lee Thompson Young are great in support, and Sharon Lawrence, Jacqueline Bisset and Chazz Palminteri have recurring roles. (Season 5 begins June 17 on TNT.)
“Klondike” (Discovery/Cinedigm/Blu-ray/DVD, 2014, two discs, three episodes, featurettes). The Discovery cable channel takes on its first scripted show, an engaging three-part miniseries allegedly based on “actual events,” set against the backdrop of the 1890s Gold Rush. Produced by Ridley Scott, the show stars Richard Madden and Augustus Prew as naïve New Yorkers who attempt to become prospectors in the Yukon. Abbie Cornish (in a scene-stealing role), Sam Shepard and Tim Roth co-star. Based on Charlotte Grey’s best-seller “Gold Diggers: Striking It Rich in the Klondike.”
“True Detective” (HBO/Blu-ray/DVD/Digital/On Demand, 2014, three discs, eight episodes, deleted scenes, audio commentaries, featurettes). Matthew McConaughey and Woody Harrelson star in this film noir miniseries set in the 1990s as police detectives in Louisiana tracking a serial killer. But the show focuses more directly on their characters: McConaughey as a loner whose view of the world is unrelentingly bleak, and Harrelson as a family man who can’t shed the job when he goes home. Because this is HBO, it’s relentlessly profane, contains disturbing violence, sex and nudity, and is very dark, all on an R-rated level.
“Major Crimes: The Complete Second Season” (Warner/DVD, 2013-14, four discs, 19 episodes, deleted scenes, featurettes). Spinoff of “The Closer” stars Mary McDonnell as a Los Angeles police captain heading up a major crimes unit. This season, a new prosecutor (Nadine Velazquez) comes aboard. (Season 3 started airing on TNT last week.)
“Resurrection: The Complete First Season” (ABC/DVD, 2014, two discs, eight episodes, deleted scenes, featurettes, bloopers). Fantasy about the dead suddenly reappearing, beginning with a young boy who drowned three decades earlier being found in China. He’s still 8 years old and is returned to his now middle-aged parents (Kurtwood Smith, Frances Fisher). (Season 2 will begin airing in the fall.)
Comments are closed.