Stargate Atlantis - Complete Season 1-5 [Blu-ray] [Region Free]

After reading previous reviews of the box set of all five seasons of Stargate Atlantis I felt troubled. It was definitely a show I wanted on blu-ray but other reviews mentioned the problems with the sharpness of the image, especially in the early seasons.

There is good and bad news. As reported by others FX or composited scenes are softer than pure live action scenes but even season one, where you are watching a pure live action scene the image is quite sharp. Even some composited scenes where say the characters are in front of the cgi city or sitting in a puddle jumper cockpit looking out the viewport are sharper than expected. And as the show progresses through it's seasons the FX work does look sharper and clearer.

Atlantis hasn't looked better and I am now glad I bought the set.

On the downside all the extras I have looked at so far are in standard definition, not even upscaled and hence framed all around by black. They often seemed to have alignment issues and are cropped on their title bars at times.

I'd suggest you keep your dvd sets for the extras, they definitely look better than on the blu-ray!

Stargate SG1 is an interesting and entertaining story-driven Sci-fi series, although the characters tend to be rather bland. Conversely the latest evolution of the program Stargate Universe is character-driven, but (currently) at the expense of any strong story-line.

Stargate Atlantis however manages to combine both an engaging story and genuinely likeable characters.

Indeed not since the original Star Trek (with Spock and Kirk) has a sci-fi series managed to balance so effectively all the key components of memorable escapist entertained. Enthralling stories, good scripts, challenging ideas, really nasty villains, lovable characters, and plenty of humour, along with a strong slice of action, all make up the perfect mix for that most rare phenomenon ... a TV series you can watch time and again and still love every moment. And this only happens when you become so fond of the characters you simply want them around.

In Atlantis the characters remorselessly send themselves up, frequently comparing each other to Star Trek or Star Wars figures (usually in a less than flattering way), and the program is littered with memorable one-liners. However the heart of the series has to be David Hewlett as Dr Rodney Mckay. Brilliant and resourceful but often obnoxious, cowardly, anti-social, and hopeless with the ladies, Mckay lifts the entire series out of the mundane and into something genuinely entertaining. That said he is ably supported by a troop of actors who are clearly having as much fun playing their characters as we are having watching them.

Added to this the DVD of the entire series also demonstrates how cleverly the central story grows, and expands and develops, thrusting the characters into more and more dangerous and challenging dilemmas, leading ultimately to breathtaking escapes and momentous space battles. Moreover the stories lead on from one to another so effectively that watching many episodes at one time starts to feel like reading one very long (and massively satisfying) book.

Clearly this is five star entertainment (for me anyway), and I am only surprised the series was never as popular as it deserves to be.

This five series box set is the best Christmas present I've had in a long long time!

There are two things to rate when it comes to a boxset such as this.
The first being the content of the series, special features and whatnot; the latter being the aesthetic and quality of packaging.

For the majority of people purchasing this series, at this moment in time, it's most likely you have seen the series before and know what to expect. If that is the case, expect a whole lot more, the DVDs also contain MASSES of special features. If I'm not mistaken every episode has a commentary, or at least a great deal do. I believe Martin Gero, one of the Stargate writers comments in one that he hopes you've watched the series before then going into watching the commentary, as they often link up talk about character development, prop usage and all manner of things which may occur in later seasons - which is by no means a flaw, it just adds to the replay value of this box set.

If you haven't seen Stargate Atlantis before and have seen SG1, there are a lot of similarities to comfortably keep you at ease, and a whole GALAXY of differences to add to a whole new adventure. I'm not going to go into plot lines, but the series gets progressively better per season in my opinion.

The product itself, the aesthetic and quality is somewhat pleasing. On the plus side we have a beautiful box and a well presented means of storing the DVDs within the ideal holding of the cases.