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.

In Desperate Housewives every actress and actor is amazing, being funny, believable and sympathetic, although the underrated Eva Longoria (Gabrielle), James Denton (Mike Delfino), and Jesse Metcalfe (John the gardener) are definite highlights on the eye-candy front!

The DVD extras are also excellent, there are a huge amount of bonus features compared to the normal Dawson's Creek/Roswell/Buffy/Angel/Will & Grace/Friends boxsets. You get the normal deleted scenes and commentaries, but also features on the costumes, characters, storylines, plots for season 2, actors and actresses, etc, and they are of a decent length rather than the annoying 3-minute 'featurettes' that often abound on boxsets. I was, however, unable to figure out why some episodes can be viewed as 'extended episodes' with one extra scene, whereas some episodes simply had deleted scenes accompanying them.

A word of warning though - many of the special features include spoilers for both season 1 and season 2, so it would have been better to put them all on the final disc rather than spreading them out on the different discs. My advice would be to watch all the episodes, then go back and watch the features.