Waking
The Dead: Season Eight (2009/BBC DVD Set)
Picture:
C Sound: C+ Extras: D Episodes: C
The
BBC had made it to the Eighth Season of Waking The Dead
by 2009, and while still having some compelling stories to tell is
definitely showing it's age as another BBC police procedural drama
series that is ready to be put out of it's misery. Even the
clinically depressed mugshot of the ensemble cast on the cover of
this 8th season DVD looks like their the inmates running
the asylum (so to speak)! The DVD set bills itself as "deeper
and darker than ever before" which is the the show's biggest
travesty. The gratuitous violence can be unsettling to watch and is
not for everybody (even people who are used to American crime
dramas). This cold case crime series dark tone almost seems like
it's more for shock value than how it pertains to the story!
The
cast, while being together for 8 seasons, are still good
individually, they are lacking as an ensemble who've been together
that long, unlike Law & Order: Special Victims Unit or
even the American Cold Case series (which was a great show
without the graphic violence to this extent)... Det. Peter Boyd
(Trevor Eve) heads up a team of Detectives and Doctors. Rounding up
the cast are Psychological Profiler Dr. Grace Foley (Sue Johnston)
who is still relevant one on one, DI Spencer Jordan (Will Johnson)
and Forensic Scientist Dr. Eve Lockhart (Tara Fitzgerald) who joined
in 2006 was a good foil to keep Det. Boyd in line, the rest of the
above characters have all been with the show since the beginning and
have had a good long run. The series is past it's expiration date at
this point!
This
2-DVD set comes with four installments:
Magdalene
End
of The Night
Substitute
End
Game
The
16:9/1.78 X 1 anamorphic enhanced DVD image is adequate but nothing
totally special which is similar in previous seasons. The lossy
Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo sound is good enough but doesn't take my
breath away and has no Pro Logic surrounds. There are no extras, but
you can find previous seasons reviewed elsewhere on this site.
-
Howard Saul
