THE WALKING DEAD: THE COMPLETE FIFTH SEASON -- Blu-ray Review by Porfle

Originally posted on 8/18/15

 

Well, here we go again--another season of the AMC series "The Walking Dead", which means another nonstop binge-watching session that drags on into the wee hours of the morning.  But I wouldn't have it any other way.

This is quite simply, in my opinion, one of my most watchable TV shows ever.  My annual viewing marathon is almost on the same anticipation level as a yearly holiday such as Labor Day, or at least Arbor Day.  And THE WALKING DEAD: THE COMPLETE FIFTH SEASON, a 5-disc Blu-ray set from Anchor Bay, is a worthy continuation of that show's tradition of insane watchability.

Most people are familiar with the premise by now--a ragtag group of survivors make their way through the zombie apocalypse with ex-Georgia sheriff Rick Grimes (Andrew Lincoln) as their dauntless leader, trying to hold on to their humanity even as circumstances make them more hard-edged and ruthless with each struggle to stay alive.

The longer they do survive, however, the more callous they become, and season five finds Rick and his people dealing with their enemies with a blood-and-thunder attitude that would've shocked them all just a year or two ago.  If they'd run into their present selves back then, they'd have fled the other way. 

But by now they've pretty much had enough of all the other living humans who've screwed them over, such as their nemesis from the last couple of seasons, The Governor (David Morrissey).  This new set begins with the resolution to last season's tantalizing cliffhanger in which our heroes were taken prisoner by the inhabitants of a community called Terminus which is supposed to be a haven for survivors but turns out to be anything but.

Led by a smirking young sociopath named Gareth (Andrew J. West), the Terminus gang turn out to be a bunch of cannibals who gleefully harvest their human captives like cattle. The first episode casts us right into the middle of a harrowing slaughter sequence which leads to a thrilling free-for-all of humans vs. zombies vs. cannibals involving several group chow-downs of screaming victims by ravenous walkers and loads of special makeup effects, rivalling season four's spectacular opening.

Further segments will take us on a journey with our protagonists through many gripping battles for survival and encounters with other groups of people whose motives are ever under suspicion.  While the walking, flesh-devouring dead remain a constant threat, it's the living who consistently pose the greatest danger.

By this point in the series, many other factions exist with their own laws and principals, centered around a leader who is either good, bad, or insane (or a combination of the three).  Just like Ben and Harry in George Romero's original NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD (from whence all other current zombie apocalypse sagas seem to have been spawned), this can lead to serious conflicts in which it's hard to tell who's right and who's wrong. 

This is especially true when Rick's group discover an idyllic walled-in community known as Alexandria, near what's left of Washington, D.C.  They're invited to become citizens of the seemingly genteel and peaceful collective, yet even here there's danger of many different kinds lurking at every turn. And by now, Rick's people have themselves become too feral to coexist with civilized society!  Tovuh Feldshuh guest stars as Alexandria's leader, Deanna, whose initially warm welcome toward them will soon turn to fear and mistrust.

The show features more fascinating continuing characters than ever and most get their time in the spotlight, including the ever-popular crossbow-wielding wild man Daryl Dixon (Norman Reedus), samurai swordswoman Michonne (Danai Gurira), lovebirds Glenn (Steven Yeun) and Maggie (Lauren Cohan), and Rick's son Carl (Chandler Riggs), whose adolescence has been unconventional to say the least. 

Tyreese (Chad L. Coleman) and his sister Sasha (Sonequa Martin-Green) each get some highly-dramatic storylines that bring home the emotional devastation that comes from living so close to death on such intimate terms every day.  Maggie's missing-in-action sister Beth (Emily Kinney) turns up again in a hospital setting known as "Slabtown" in the middle of ruined Atlanta, dealing with a mentally-unbalanced policewoman (Christine Woods) and her squad of fascist cops. 

And there's the continuing saga of Eugene (Josh McDermitt), a scientist who ostensibly holds the solution to the zombie problem if only he can get to Washington, D.C. with the help of his hulking ex-military bodyguard with the anger-management problem, Abraham (Michael Cudlitz).

Best of all, we get to see the continuing saga of Carol (Melissa McBride), the once-timid domestic abuse victim turned hardened survivalist who is the most calmly and ruthlessly pragmatic of them all.  After being exiled from the group last season, Carol is the one who rescues her former friends from the cannibals at Terminus while drenched in blood and guts in order to throw surrounding zombies off her scent.  Later, she gets back together with her friend and fellow one-time outcast Daryl in a storyline that will tie in with Beth's adventures in Slabtown. 

While most of the drama and action involve the living, there's always the ever-present threat of the walkers, who seem to pop out of nowhere every time someone turns around (sneaky little buggers).  These shambling corpses are all getting more decomposed than ever--sometimes we see something that's so horrible we think "Oh, that's not right." 

Greg Nicotero's SPFX team keep coming up with endlessly imaginative ways of grossing us out, such as zombies that are little more than blobs of napalmed flesh stuck to the pavement--still horribly "alive", of course--and waterlogged zombies who've been slogging around in a flooded basement for months. 

The combination of practical effects with impeccably-rendered CGI is excellent, often downright spectacular.  Thanks to the creativity and imagination of everyone involved, the show still has the power to flabbergast us after all these years.  Just when we should be starting to get numbed by all the gory violence and horror, something will happen to make us say "whoa."

The 5-disc, 16-episode Blu-ray set from Anchor Bay (which includes instructions for a complete digital download of its contents) is in 1.78:1 widescreen with English Dolby TrueHD 7.1 and French Dolby 2.0 surround sound.  Subtitles are in English and Spanish.  Several of the episodes have cast and crew audio commentaries.  (A couple of episodes have post-credits "sting" scenes, so be sure not to miss them.) 

Disc five contains a wealth of extras including:
•Deleted Scenes
•Inside “The Walking Dead” (covers each individual episode)
•The Making of “The Walking Dead” (covers each individual episode)
•The Making of Alexandria
•Beth’s Journey
•Bob’s Journey
•Noah’s Journey
•Tyreese’s Journey
•A Day in the Life of Michael Cudlitz
•A Day in the Life of Josh McDermitt
•Rotters in the Flesh

These days "The Walking Dead" has so many good characters that we get several alternating plotlines to keep things interesting.  Rick and his followers are changing, growing, evolving (in some cases devolving) all over the place this season, and it makes THE WALKING DEAD: THE COMPLETE FIFTH SEASON an endlessly entertaining treat for fans of both this show and gory zombie apocalypse epics in general to gorge themselves on. 



Our Season One review
Our Season Two review
Our Season Three review
Our Season Four review

THE WALKING DEAD: THE COMPLETE FIFTH SEASON -- Blu-ray Review by Porfle

THE WALKING DEAD: THE COMPLETE FOURTH SEASON -- DVD Review by Porfle

Originally posted on 8/27/14

 

When we last left AMC's "The Walking Dead" at the end of season three, there was one exasperating hanging thread--the fate of the Governor (David Morrissey), the charismatic but psychotic leader of a community of people who had come together to survive and help protect each other from the constant threat of the reanimated, flesh-eating corpses wandering the land like something right out of a George Romero movie.

But with Anchor Bay's latest 5-disc DVD set, THE WALKING DEAD: THE COMPLETE FOURTH SEASON, that maddening bit of unfinished business is dealt with in such spectacular fashion that I didn't mind having to wait for it. In fact, the character of the Governor, who now calls himself "Brian Heriot", is fleshed out in such fascinating ways that we almost begin to root for him until, ultimately, he fully reverts back into the ruthless, power-mad whacko that we all know so well and forms yet another collective of blind followers.

All of this, of course, occurs even as former Georgia state trooper Rick Grimes (Andrew Lincoln), the series' hero and main character, is still trying to keep his own hardy band of survivors together within the walls of an abandoned prison that serves as their sanctuary. Last we saw, they'd just weathered a fierce assault by the Governor and his previous acolytes, many of whom have since seen the light and are now a part of Rick's group.

Picking up the pieces and getting on with the business of life is hard enough even if you don't have hungry hordes of zombies forever massing around your fenced-in perimeter in ever-growing numbers. Rick's still dealing with the death of his wife Lori last season while trying to raise their son Carl (Chandler Riggs) to be both a good man and a capable zombie killer. As always, the ever-present plague of the walking dead casts its shadow over every story element, giving even the most soap opera-tinged moments an undercurrent of twisted existential dread.

Scott Wilson (IN COLD BLOOD) returns as the group's current sage, Hershel Greene, whose calm wisdom is essential in enduring each new crisis. This is especially important during one of the season's most pressing concerns, a deadly flu epidemic which creates killer zombies who attack from within the prison itself when those infected start to die off. A rigidly-enforced quarantine seperates Hershel's daughter Maggie (Lauren Cohan) from her beloved husband Glenn (Steven Yeun), who is in an advanced stage of the disease.

This storyline keeps things tense for much of the early part of the season, with many risking their lives in perilous supply runs in search of medicine which, needless to say, they must fight their way through armies of the living dead in order to procure. This gives us a chance to become reacquainted with such fan-fave characters as redneck outlaw-turned-hero Daryl Dixon (Norman Reedus, BLADE II, MESKADA) and samurai sword-wielding Michonne (Danai Gurira), both loners who learn to thrive as valuable members of the group.

There's a lot of dramatic turmoil in that group as well.  Carol (Melissa McBride), formerly a timid abused wife, now displays such a fierce, unflinching resolve that her actions force a shocked Rick to send her into exile. Rick himself comes to blows with Tyreese (Chad L. Coleman) after two of his friends are found murdered and their bodies burned, which the burly newcomer suspects Rick to have done.

We even see the strange effect the continuing zombie threat has on two small children, sisters Lizzie (Brighton Sharbino) and Mika (Kyla Kenedy), one of whom must watch as the other becomes more dangerously unbalanced with each passing day. Sharbino ("True Detective", CHEAP THRILLS) is especially good in her demanding role, with the sisters' storyline supplying some of the season's most stunning moments.

All of which leads to a mid-season finale which, action-wise, blows the doors off of everything that's gone before. When the Governor and his brand new army--now fortified with an honest-to-goodness tank in addition to plenty of other lethal weapons--show up at the front gates of the prison demanding that Rick and his people evacuate immediately, the situation erupts into a carnage-drenched clash between two living armies both of which quickly become engulfed by the resulting zombie feeding frenzy that we knew was inevitable since the season's first episode.

At this point, we understand why the whole business of defending the prison against the Governor took a whole season and a half to work out--it's because this is a tale that was worth taking the extra time to tell. The climactic battle is cathartic, exhausting, and, by the end, exhilarating because the catastrophic outcome takes the series back to its hardscrabble roots, with our beloved characters scrambling through the wilderness scrounging for food and eking out an existence amidst constant threat from both the dead and the increasingly desperate living.

Even worse, this time they've been broken up into small groups unaware of each other's location or even which of the others are still alive. Once again our peace-loving heroes come into contact with the most ruthless of roving survivors, including a band of bad boys led by Jeff Kober ("Sons of Anarchy", THE BABY DOLL MURDERS) whom Daryl immediately regrets falling in with. 

 Like characters out of Stephen King's "The Stand", they're drawn to a distant place that promises sanctuary, in hopes that their loved ones will also be there, but is this place known as "Terminus" really the end of their struggle--or just the beginning of a whole new fight for life?

The 5-disc DVD set from Anchor Bay Entertainment (also available in Blu-ray) is in anamorphic widescreen (1.78:1) with English Dolby Digital 5.1 and French Dolby Surround 2.0 sound and subtitles in English and Spanish. Disc 5's many bonus features include:

Featurettes:
•Inside THE WALKING DEAD (covers each individual episode)
•The Making of THE WALKING DEAD (covers each individual episode)
•Drawing Inspiration
•Hershel
•The Governor Is Back
•Society, Science & Survival
•Inside KNB EFX
•A Journey Back to Brutality
•Deleted Scenes
 Cast and crew commentaries for episodes 1, 5, 12, and 14 (also for episode 9 on Blu-ray).
 Episodes 9 ("After"), and 14 ("The Grove") are extended on the Blu-ray™ only.

As usual, I devoured THE WALKING DEAD: THE COMPLETE FOURTH SEASON in just two or three marathon viewing sessions and was left ravenous for more at the cliffhanger conclusion. This is, without a doubt, one of the most compulsively watchable and addictive series in television history, and one which, according to some people I've talked to, you don't even have to be a monster fan to appreciate.

But it helps, especially if you're a gorehound, because--also as usual--this show is a non-stop, total indulgence in state-of-the-art zombie and gore effects. The SPFX artists that make the show's title come alive (so to speak) just keep outdoing themselves, and even when we think we've become numbed to such sights, they think of new ways to flabbergast us. Still, it's always the fascinating characters, and the riveting storylines, that keep bringing us back for more.



 

Third Season Review
Second Season Review
First Season Review

THE WALKING DEAD: THE COMPLETE FOURTH SEASON -- DVD Review by Porfle

THE WALKING DEAD: THE COMPLETE THIRD SEASON -- DVD Review by Porfle

 

Originally posted on 8/24/13

 

Sometimes it seems as though the TV people make a show just for me, and AMC's "The Walking Dead" is one of those shows.  So the release of the 5-disc DVD set THE WALKING DEAD: THE COMPLETE THIRD SEASON means one thing--another marathon viewing session that doesn't end until my bloodshot eyes have watched every last episode. 

This is the good stuff as far as I'm  concerned--a continuing zombie apocalypse series that follows a particular group of disparate characters as they struggle to survive in a world  increasingly overrun by reanimated corpses hungry for human flesh.  Writer-director George Romero created this world in 1968 with his notorious classic NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD, and, with wildly varying degrees of success, filmmakers have been riffing on the same premise ever since. 

But it was filmmaker Frank Darabont (THE SHAWSHANK REDEMPTION, THE GREEN MILE) who gave us the first zombie serial and made it one of the most riveting and addictive shows on television.  Even with his unfortunate departure (due mainly to budget disputes with AMC, he told TV Guide) the show continues to keep me helplessly hooked.  It's as though that first group of people in Romero's seminal film managed to survive and attempt to carve out a life for themselves in the world of the dead.

Here, it's former Georgia state trooper Rick Grimes (Andrew Lincoln) reluctantly leading a ragtag assortment of weary survivors including his wife Lori (Sarah Wayne Callies), pregnant with a child whose father might be either Rick or his late partner Shane (Jon Bernthal ), and his son Carl (Chandler Riggs), a mixed-up kid for whom blowing away zombies on a daily basis might not be conducive to a healthy mental attitude.

Last season found our heroes seeking shelter in a pastoral setting that seemed deceptively zombie-free--the isolated farm of aged veterinarian Hershel (Scott Wilson, IN COLD BLOOD) and his daughters Maggie and Beth (Lauren Cohan, Emily Kinney).  When a herd of zombies showed up to end their idyll in a flesh-eating free-for-all,  they were forced to flee once again. 

Season three finds them setting up housekeeping within the walls of an abandoned prison, giving us a situation not unlike DAWN OF THE DEAD with its fortified shopping mall.  But there are still zombies roaming the vast network of corridors, along with a hidden gang of live convicts who will themselves pose a danger to the main group. 

This lends the show a constant air of sustained tension that frequently erupts into the usual gore-drenched action setpieces.  It also causes Rick to display an increasingly coldblooded and ruthless attitude in dealing with any threats to his family and friends, with sometimes shocking results. 

The ever-present irony of the series,  of course,  is that the biggest threat against them often comes not from the walking dead,  but from the living.  In season three,  this is demonstrated in no uncertain terms when we discover a nearby community of survivors led by a charismatic Pied Piper known as "The Governor" (David Morrissey). 

Their small but well-fortified town seems a haven of peace and security, but beneath that fascade is an endless wealth of corruption and madness that I found wonderfully entertaining as each layer of The Governor's outward sanity gets peeled away for our viewing pleasure. 

Needless to say, he'll eventually declare war on our heroes who are holed up behind the walls of the prison and,  with his superior  firepower and military-trained soldiers, it won't be pretty--especially with the living dead waiting to close in on every side.  Complicating things is the reappearance of last season's gun-toting alpha babe, Andrea (Laurie Holden), currently under The Governor's seductive spell, and her warrior-woman friend Michonne (Danai Gurira), who wields a samurai sword and leads two defanged zombie pets on chain-leashes. 

The dramatic possibilities inherent in all of this are nicely fleshed out,  so to speak, especially when we find out what kind of scientific experiments The Governor's mild-mannered toady Milton (Dallas Roberts, THE SHADOW PEOPLE, THE RIVER WHY) is conducting on the living dead and why (with shades of Romero's DAY OF THE DEAD).  The romance between Glenn (Steven Yeun) and Hershel's headstrong daughter Maggie continues and is surely one of television's most blood-drenched courtships.  Other soap-opera-type aspects of the group's intimate interactions pick up where they left off last season and keep things percolating between "walker" attacks.

Perhaps best of all, however, is the return of one of season one's most vivid and frightening characters--none other than the great Michael Rooker (HENRY: PORTRAIT OF A SERIAL KILLER) as the ever-popular uber-redneck, Merle.  What he gets up to in dealing with both sides of the upcoming war and how his return affects his little brother Darryl (Norman Reedus, BLADE II,  MESKADA)--who has been acting more and more human while removed from Merle's evil influence--will give this season some of its most scintillating moments. 

But with it all,  there's always the threat of being attacked and overrun by those ever-present ambulatory corpses who are determined to eat anything with a heartbeat.  THE WALKING DEAD doesn't shy away from the buckets of gore that we've come to expect, whether done with good old-fashioned practical effects or, more and more lately, passable but not always convincing CGI.  Thankfully, the writing and SPFX teams keep coming up with new ways to gross us out, which gives those scenes in which familiar characters meet a gruesome demise even greater impact.

The DVD set from Anchor Bay is in 1.78:1 anamorphic widescreen with English Dolby Digital 5.1 and French Dolby Surround 2.0 sound.  Subtitles are in English and Spanish.  Extras include eight featurettes,  audio commentaries for five episodes, and deleted scenes. 

While there isn't a single killer moment to match last season's "Sophia reveal", season three of "The Walking Dead" nevertheless gives us a mind-numbing succession of powerful,  disturbing, and often emotionally devastating situations and images that can only be possible when a premise this outlandish is convincingly realized.  Although it doesn't come to a relatively satisfying conclusion the way the previous season did, THE WALKING DEAD: THE COMPLETE THIRD SEASON hits the highway running and never allows the drama and suspense to let up until the last skull is splattered. 




1st season review

2nd season review

4th season review

5th season review

THE WALKING DEAD: THE COMPLETE THIRD SEASON -- DVD Review by Porfle