Murdoch Mysteries – Season Two (2009/Acorn Blu-rays)/The Complete New Avengers (1976 – 1977/Umbrella Region Four/Import PAL
DVD Set)/F/X
(1986/Orion/MGM/Umbrella Region B Import 50i Blu-ray)
Picture: B-/C+/B- Sound: C+/C+/B- Extras: C/C/D Main Programs: C+/B-/B-
PLEASE NOTE: The
Region 4 PAL DVD set of The New Avengers
can be ordered from our friends at Umbrella Entertainment at the website
address provided at the end of the review.
Before
forensic police procedural shows made gadgets, science, devices and crime
boring and pseudo-intellectual, they used to be fun and the following new
releases show us how.
Set over
100 years ago, Murdoch Mysteries –
Season Two (2009) is a hit still on the air as you read this, but Acorn is
just getting around to use very old, then-new and even groundbreaking
technology on the rise to solve the cases, which for me, makes this a much more
bearable show than its modern (or is that post-modern) counterparts. But the 13 episodes here with Detective
William Murdoch (Yannick Bisson) and company who have slightly more advanced
understandings of the emerging sciences at work has the most energy when it is
being episodic and the money spent to recreate the past is a plus for the show.
However,
this might wear thin for some still and though you can start with this set over
the debut season, I still think that might work a little more if you intend to
take on the whole show eventually.
Extras include a photo gallery and 60minutes-long behind the scenes
clip.
The 1960s
British spy classic The Avengers was
such a hit and so imitated, it was a show that everyone hoped would be revived
at some point, including bringing back Diana Rigg as Mrs. Emma Peel long before
the unfortunate Uma Thurman/Ralph Fiennes feature film. The French loved Linda Thorson as Tara King
(who succeeded Mrs. Peel before the show folded) that they funded a mid-1980s
revival entitled The New Avengers. It lasted two seasons before it folded, so it
was a moderate success, in part because it tried to be more realistic than the
original. The Complete New Avengers (1976 – 1977) DVD set combines the two
seasons we covered as separate sets A&E issued years ago and are now
discontinued. You can read about them at
the following links:
1976
http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/84/New+Avengers+1976+Set+One+(A&E+D
1977
http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/1313/New+Avengers+1977+Set+Two+(A&E
The show
has aged in odd ways, with Joanna Lumley (who played Purdey and is best known
in the U.S. for the hit comedy Absolutely
Fabulous, somewhat sending up her sexy image here) an even bigger star now
than when the U.S. DVDs arrived, while co-star Gareth Hunt (who played Mike
Gambit) sadly passed away a few years ago for reasons of poor health, though
the two did get together to launch the show on home video in the U.K. years
ago.
The
episodes follow the same order as the U.S. DVD sets, but now in a more compact
case. No doubt the trio with Patrick
Macnee again as John Steed had chemistry and the episodes like Target, Sleeper, howler Angels Of
Death, Obsession and
Canadian-made Complex are the ones
that hold up most. Clemens had a choice
between making the last four shows in the U.S. or Canada, chose Canada which
had no infrastructure at the time and made what fans consider the four worst
shows of the series, the shows that kicked the series (Clemens in a more recent
interview revealed his unhappiness with his choice) and ended the Macnee era of
the franchise for good, but I still think Complex
(penned by Dennis Spooner) is better than it gets credit for and is as fitting
an ending to the original franchise as Bizarre was for the 1960s show.
It is
also among the last pre-Thatcher U.K. action shows (along with Return Of The Saint, reviewed elsewhere
on this site) and each show is worth seeing at least once. Car fans will enjoy Steed’s scarce 2-door
variant of a Jaguar XJ-6, but others will be amused to see an earlier Range
Rover and Rover car in several shows.
Gambit landed up with a red Jaguar XJ-S, while Purdey got a yellow
Triumph TR-7, vehicles that showed up later in the opposite colors in the
Canadian shows.
The fight
sequences are not bad, some of which were brutal for their time, others of
which are not as successful. Nice to see
the shows again, especially as the U.S. sets are hard to come by now.
Until
those sets are reissued in the U.S.,
they are going for big money, but they do not have the extras this set
has. It is not as much as it should have
had, but we get an episode guide on the inside of the cases’ insert sleeve (the
plastic case is transparent plastic, while the episodes “The Eagle’s Nest” and “Dead
Men Are Dangerous” feature audio commentary tracks by the Gareth Hunt and
Brian Clemens.
Finally
we have a moderate hit film that has been forgotten somewhat in the shuffle of
franchises, bankruptcies and imitators.
Robert Mandel’s F/X (1986)
was a hit for the now defunct Orion Pictures, but they were not able to turn it
into a series, especially after a bloated, goofy sequel that lost enough money
to kill all. Often compared to The Stunt Man (reviewed elsewhere on
this site) to some extent, Bryan Brown (sadly now most known for the inept hit Cocktail with Tom Cruise) is Roland
‘Rollie’ Tyler (definitely inspired by Martin Landau’s character in the
original TV classic Mission: Impossible)
is hired to fake an actual mobster/gangster to help out a turncoat/snitch in
the Witness Protection Program with his expert work in make-up and other motion
picture-caliber visual effects.
In the
process, he becomes a target himself when he is betrayed and additionally has a
very good at his job cop (Brian Dennehy) also going after him, so he’ll have to
use all of his talents and resources on both of them until he can find a way to
resolve his dilemma.
Like The New Avengers unintentionally and Murdoch Mysteries nostalgically and
intentionally, seeing the older analog technology in full swing in ambitious
productions make it all worth seeing and versus most of the shallow digital
garbage we are now getting with zero imagination, it is all worth seeing for
the fun of it, even when things don’t always work or age well. There are no extras, but the big screen Tom
Cruise revival of Mission: Impossible picked up where these films left off and are still
going.
Oh well…
The 1080p
1.78 X 1 digital High Definition image transfer on Murdoch (shot in HD) and 1080/50i (only playable on European and
Australian HDTV set-ups normally) 1.85 X 1 digital High Definition image
transfer on F/X are about even with
each other, despite the fact that the latter is a smooth 35mm feature
film. This is an older interlaced HD
master and the film should get the 4K treatment at some point being one of
Orion’s few original franchises. It was
never a visually spectacular film, but the effects are very interesting and
having seen this film in 35mm, know it can look better. The 1.33 X 1 transfers on New Avengers are from the same video
masters used on the U.S. DVDs with aliasing errors and mostly the same
results. Too bad these are not from HD
masters as this entire series is nicely shot in 35mm in real life, but these will
do for now.
The lossy
Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo on Murdoch
(with no major Pro Logic surrounds) sounds newer and fresher than the older
lossy Dolby Digital 2.0 Mono on New
Avengers, but not by as much as expected and again, the New Avengers tracks are the same as the
older U.S. DVDs. I bet the show could
sound better, but that will probably not happen until lossless sound is offered
on a Blu-ray release, though it will not be as good in lossless mono versus the
owners of the show going back to the original music and sound stems and
considering a stereo or 5.1 upgrade. The
PCM 2.0 Stereo on F/X is encoded in
old Dolby System analog A-type noise reduction and plays back interestingly in
Pro Logic surround. This was not bad for
its time and a film not offered in 70mm blow-ups with better 4.1 or 5.1 sound,
because the possibilities are there.
As noted above, you can order the import Region 4 DVD set version
of The New Avengers exclusively from
Umbrella at:
http://www.umbrellaent.com.au/
- Nicholas Sheffo
