Desperate Housewives: Season 1 [DVD]

Each episode provides a stand-alone drama, beating out a theme, pulsing to the rhythm of some moral … stated at the outset, restated at the conclusion, but with a sharp twist of irony. This is not the neighbourliness of Capra, George Bailey, and "Wonderful Life". There are good neighbours. And there are bad. It's a competitive world living in the suburbs - whatever else happens, you have to maintain the façade, you have to appear to be perfect, or at least have a credible explanation if you're not.

This is a wonderful series. It carries along the mystery of its narrator's death. Others will die. Murder can be brutal. It can also be quite functional. It can have charm. And one by one each perfect household comes unpicked, exposes a flaw like a run in a pair of stockings - once you've noticed it, you can't take your eyes of it. And while you're distracted with one plot strand, writer Marc Cherry works his sleight of hand and conjures up another twist.

The cast is wonderful. With perhaps only Teri Hatcher as a 'star' name, albeit she'd dropped out of sight for a few years, Cherry assembled an ensemble cast who generate some great chemistry onscreen and who amplify one another's talents and energies. There's scarcely a weak performance in sight. Direction and editing are excellent - the juxtaposition of scenes and shots, the ironic counterpoint of humour and mystery, the rapid cutting from one household to the next, and the overall quality of the production keeps your attention rapt.

But the script's the thing. It is beautifully crafted. The DVD extras accompanying season one give you some excellent insights into the writing process. You get a look at the making of the series, you get brief interviews with actors. You get some very interesting commentaries. And much more. It's a fascinating series. The DVD's, like the writing and the concept, are beautifully packaged. Excellent value, a series you can watch again and again. And again.

If you were particularly churlish you could perhaps quibble with the fact that 'deleted scenes' invariably actually mean one scene and the 'extended episodes' are only extended by one scene (on rare occasion two) - but that would be extreme nitpicking I feel. Overall the features are impressive and certainly add to the enjoyment of the overall set.

I have two small grumbles. The first is the inconsistency of subtitling on the disks. Some disks have no subtitles. Some have English subtitles included. Some have subtitles in other languages, but not in English. This was a little frustrating at times.

Secondly, the somewhat long introduction to each disk - a parody of the opening credits, using the actresses. The first time it went past it seemed overlong. By the time I'd reached disk five it was tedious and frustrating to have to wait for it to end before getting to the episodes.

But those are very small annoyances. Generally the set has been put together with obvious care for detail and imagination. And that's greatly appreciated by this buyer.

When it comes right down to it though, the real stars of this set are the episodes themselves and with their superb performances, the sparkling scripts, wonderfully real characters you will care about and intriguing plotlines, you can't fail to consider this the star of your DVD collection and one that you'll revisit and enjoy time and again.