Drop Dead Diva – The Complete First Season (2009/Sony DVD Set)
Picture: C Sound: C+ Extras: C Episodes: C
A good idea for a
comedy that plays it too safe for its own good, Drop Dead Diva (2009) has two different women
(one a slender blonde named Deb, the other a hard-working, heavy set brunette
named Jane) both in fatal situations at the same time. Jane gets to go to heaven-on-hold while Deb
has to go into Jane’s body because the angel checking her in is unhappy with
her history and calls her shallow. Now
zapped into Jane’s body, she will learn how lucky a life she led.
The Complete First Season of the show wants to be classy
and take the high road as a passively funny comedy, but the problem is that it
is also too politically correct for its own good and new stereotypes and
archetypes result. In this, it wants to
be in the mode of the current women’s shows like Desperate Housewives (which it definitely pines to be) and Sex & The City (which is alive and
well on the big screen), but I would have liked more and maybe the show will
grow instead of playing it safe. Until
then, if you buy the premise, you might like it. Otherwise, skip it.
The anamorphically
enhanced 1.78 X 1 image on each show is a little softer than a new
production should be. In addition, color
can be good, but sometimes looks phony or sub par. The
Dolby Digital 5.1 mix on each episode is stretching out the sound a bit thin,
but it is well recorded, yet don’t expect much outside of music in the sense of
surrounds; especially fore a dialogue-based comedy. Extras include Deleted Scenes, a Making Of
featurette, Cho & Tell with
Margaret Cho offering her thoughts and Rosie’s
Rap, which you’ll have to just see yourself.
-
Nicholas Sheffo
