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DVD : Alias - The Complete Collection (Seasons 1-5 + Rambaldi artifact box) |
- AliasI brought this set for my husband. He loves watching this show. He is on season 3 and said, "My head hurts. There are so many twists and turns". Again he loves the show, and watches despite having his head hurt.
Rating:
- involvingI enjoyed J.J. Abram's creation while it was still on TV. So to have the complete set is a real pleasure. The box set is worth it if you are a serious fan. Normal DVD cases will do, but the cube is just more fun. There is a hidden compartment, writings on the exterior and a small book.
My only warning is that the individual cases have a tendency to scratch the DVDs, at least in my experience. But you almost feel like you are holding a replica of a Rambaldi design.
Rating:
- Excellent SeriesI just finished the entire series a few weeks ago and i gotta say its one of the best shows! It's quite expensive to buy but worth every penny in my opinion! Jennifer Garner is a great actress and really makes this series worthwhile! The series has a great plot that stays with it from the first episode until the last one! Never will this show fail to surprise or excite you to go and watch the next episode! I hope you choose to buy this intriguing and action-packed series. Enjoy it!
Rating:
- The complete Seasons ALIASI don't have almost anything against this collection, is everything that I expect and more, the content is very complete,superb quality and with lots of extras.
The only problem that I found was scratches in some discs despite being wrap with the original protection plastic. This is the reason for the 3 stars in my rate.
Paulo Soares - Portugal
Rating:
- A Well-Crafted, Visually Vibrant Spy Series Set Apart by its Wild, Endless ImaginationJust out of college, Sydney Bristow (Jennifer Garner) is recruited by Arvin Sloan (Ron Rifkin) to be part of a globe-trotting secret government spy agency known as SD-6. When tragic events occur Sydney realizes that SD-6 is not what it seems and joins up with her father (Victor Garber) at the CIA as a double agent to bring Sloan down with the help of her undercover handler and future lover Vaughn (Michael Vartan) and her partner Dixon (Carl Lumbly). Meanwhile, Sloan races to uncover the artifacts of an ancient profit known as Rambaldi, the possessor of all of them will become so powerful that they could become immortal and rule the world.
ABC was unusually good to "Alias". While they gave the show an opportunity to bring its 5-year story toward a satisfying conclusion, the show went through so many changes in the meantime it is hard to talk about it as one entity. Creator J.J. Abrams starts out keeping things very simple. Season 1 is like a run-and-gun video game where in episode after episode Sydney sneaks into a secret facility in a fantastic disguise, steals or downloads something for the CIA under the cover of SD-6 and then runs, kicks and punches her way out. Part "La Femme Nikkita", part "Mission: Impossible", it is a light and sound show.
In a rare example of positive network and creative collaboration Abrams got a call to reinvent the fledgling series (5th place will make a network start to get religion). What came out of the meeting was a complete dismantling of the series as we knew it and the establishment of something better. The show ditched the head-scratching cliffhanger endings for more self-contained episodes, but Abrams was given the freedom to continue his story arcs and flesh out the character relationships into what will ultimately be a tangled web of familial soap opera drama involving Syd's mother (Lena Olina) and Sloan's daughter.
Mid-way though the 2nd season and into the 3rd , "Alias" hits its stride. In a series filled with stupendous action sequences, a 2-hour finale that culminates in a rollicking, all-out brawl between Sydney and an evil duplicate of her roommate (just watch) that rips their apartment to splintered shreds ranks as one of the coolest scenes in modern TV for me. It is also here when the look of the show is expanded to a gorgeous cinematic scope it will have to the end. I could just drink up the colors and cinematography of this show. In addition to a perfectly short and sweet intro, Micahel Giacchino's on-target original score is laced with sound-alike Bernard Hermann violin riffs that beautifully puts a classic Hitchcock spy thriller spin on things.
Abrams has wrapped his core cast so tight with indispensable characters - including a show-stealing Kevin Weisman as computer ace Marshall (a 4th season bit where Marshall goes in the field, and must pass a retinal scanner, is classic) - that he has little room for twists and suspense. Unlike 2001's "24", we know that all of the "Alias" characters must stay safe to keep the story moving. He compensates by bringing in one long lost family member after another. Mothers, sisters, aunts and stepfathers all are revealed to be a close part of Sydney's universe. Some will find it a convoluted overkill, others will find it giving everyone more depth and resonance.
At the center of it all is Garner, who gamely goes for all the network's guilty pleasure requirements to put her in skimpy bikinis and lingerie. Strikingly beautiful, she has two modes as an actress (fighting and crying), but fills the heels of our kick-butt heroine perfectly - commanding the show and the audience around her just as a great hero should. Garber is an ever-present force of dignity and credibility. The show's fuel is arguably Rifkin who makes such a classically nasty villain and yet give him a vulnerability that, despite his pension for murder, makes you want to believe him.
Now, here's the problem with "Alias" and Abrams' writing style. Abrams spends a lot of time, for lack of a better word, stalling. Several episodes go by with nothing being revealed and wrenches being thrown into the gears of the story for no other purpose than to artificially drag out the over-arching plot until the end of the season, end of the series or maybe even until Abrams can finally settle on an endgame. Like many of the HBO serials, there is a lot of pointless running in place here.
Delivering a kick-butt girl-power action hero, a few David E. Kelley music-over-dialog montages and a focus on fashion and exotic locations mixed with some fierce violence, smashing guy-movie car chases and creativity in the gadgets and story lines that most women won't appreciate, "Alias" may have suffered a bit of gender confusion with the viewing public. I'm not sure if Abrams set out to create the ultimate gay man's spy series, but here it is. The big difference between "Alias" and the other spy shows is the endless imagination Abrams and his crew infuse it with. Tiny details like the inventive array of gadgets and weapons (like DNA replicating masks and microwave bombs) keep us enthralled.
Sure there are quite a few cracks in cinematically polished armor, but "Alias" is an overall solid, action-packed, visually vibrant piece of popcorn entertainment. Recommended for those that want something a little different and are willing to indulge its contrivances and trust that it actually might be going somewhere. The modern spy series given a little twist - Abrams gives it a refreshing imagination, Garner gives it strength, Garber credibility, and Rifkin a force to be reckoned with.
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