"Ever see one of those safari shows where a bunch of cheetahs jump all up on an antelope? Guess which one you are..." - T-Bag (Robert Knepper) before jumping a fellow prisoner during a riot
Prison Break: Season One DVD Review
By Jude Clement
Cliffhangers have been an effective plot device since Queen Scheherazade employed them to save her life in 1001 Nights. She stopped each of her stories right before the end, thus ensuring that her husband would let her live another day so that he could find out how the story ended. Movie serials of the 1930s - often with actual cliffhangers - left audiences clamoring for more. Cliffhangers on TV have mostly been reserved for daytime soap operas and season-ending stunts. Wondering who shot J.R., for example, could keep audiences talking about a show like Dallas during its summer break, building anticipation for its fall premiere. With the success of shows like Lost and 24, cliffhangers have become an almost weekly occurrence. Fox's tense, addictive Prison Break: Season One takes it a step further, offering a cliffhanger practically every thirty seconds.
Lincoln Burrows (John Doe's Dominic Purcell) and Michael Scofield (Popular's Wentworth Miller) are brothers whose lives took dramatically different directions when their father abandoned them at an early age and their mother died of liver cancer. Younger brother Michael picked himself up, became an electrical engineer, and got a steady job. Lincoln began drinking, couldn't hold even the simplest of jobs, and fell in with the wrong crowd. Lincoln finally hits bottom when he is convicted of murdering his former boss and sentenced to death. That former boss, by the way, was the brother of the Vice President of the United States. Lincoln burns through his appeals in record time and is sent to Fox River State Penitentiary in Joliet, Illinois to await his execution.
Despite an overwhelming amount of evidence, Lincoln proclaims his innocence, and Michael believes him. When all of his legal options are exhausted, Michael decides that the only way to save his brother is to break him out of Fox River. Michael's firm was in charge of refurbishing the prison several years ago, so he has access to detailed blueprints. He comes up with the perfect escape plan, but of course he can't simply walk into the prison with a sheaf of blueprints and rescue his brother. Michael redesigns the plans as an intricate tattoo that covers his entire upper body. He then commits a halfhearted armed robbery, pleads guilty, and has himself shipped off to Fox River.
Of course, getting into Fox River is much easier than getting out, and Michael soon has to navigate a varied group of inmates and prison officials. Brad Bellick (Wade Williams) is the corrupt, ambitious captain of the prison's guards. Henry Pope (Mike Hammer's Stacy Keach) is the sympathetic warden who enlists Michael's help in building a scale model of the Taj Mahal for his wedding anniversary. Sara Tancredi (Tarzan's Sarah Wayne Callies) works as the prison's doctor despite the objections of her father, Illinois' governor who rode into office by whipping up support for the death penalty.
Michael's cellmate, Fernando Sucre (Amaury Nolasco), can barely wait for his prison term to end so that he can get back to his girlfriend. John Abruzzi (Peter Stormare) is a cunning mob boss who runs the prison's work program. Theodore "T-Bag" Bagwell (Robert Knepper) is a rapist and child murderer. Charles Westmorland (Muse Watson) may or may not be the famed D.B. Cooper who in 1971 hijacked an airliner before parachuting out over the Pacific Northwest with $200,000.00 in cash. Benjamin "C-Note" Franklin (Rockmond Dunbar) is in jail for transporting stolen goods, but his family believes he's still fighting in Iraq. If Michael is going to break out of Fox River, he'll have to figure out exactly how to exploit - or avoid - each of these sometimes volatile personalities.
Outside of the prison's walls, Lincoln's ex-girlfriend, attorney Veronica Donovan (Robin Tunney), begins a legal crusade to overturn his conviction. She enlists the help of Nick Savrinn (Frank Grillo), an anti-death penalty advocate. Together they discover a conspiracy that extends all the way to the highest branches of the U.S. government. Can they put a stop to the conspiracy before Secret Service agent Paul Kellerman (Paul Adelstein) puts a stop to them?
Each episode of Prison Break contains more twists and turns than a corkscrew. Stunning betrayals, capricious outbreaks of violence, and unforeseen roadblocks are the order of the day. Some of the series' major implausibilities are a bit hard to swallow. Sure, they have different last names, but someone should have known that Lincoln and Michael are brothers. And why is a man who is sentenced to death for murdering the Vice President's brother allowed to work in the yard? Yes, it's totally unbelievable, but ultimately the series' bravura performances and anything-can-happen attitude makes it irresistible.
One of the sweet tortures of cliffhangers is that you have to wait until next time to see how it turns out. Prison Break: Season One allows viewers to see how it turns out in as little time as it takes for them to grab their remote control. The only problem with gorging on the series in this way is that it becomes clear that it is sometimes the same show every week. The characters take a few steps forward and are then forced to take a step back. The exception proves the rule in the standout episode "Brother's Keeper." This compelling flashback episode gives us background on the characters, detailing exactly how they ended up in jail. It is a welcome departure from the typical episodes, and it really helps to flesh out the supporting characters.
Guest stars in season one include Daniel J. Travanti (Hill Street Blues), John Heard (Home Alone), Patricia Wettig (thirtysomething), Holly Valance, Michelle Forbes (Wonderland), Anthony John Denison (Crime Story), John Billingsley (Star Trek: Enterprise), and Silas Weir Mitchell (24).
The twenty-two episodes that make up the first season are divided onto six discs. The discs are housed in three thin, clear keepcases, all of which holds a pair of discs. The front of each case features the same close-up photo of Michael on their top halves. Smaller photos of Michael, Lincoln, and Sucre are featured on the bottoms of cases one, two, and three respectively. The back of each case features a listing of episode titles, airdates, and brief synopses. The cases slide into a cardboard outer sleeve.
The DVD menus are evocative of the series. After a full-motion introduction exploring Michael's tattoos, the main menu lists that disc's episode titles. Choosing an individual episode brings viewers to the individual episode menu. From here, viewers can play the entire episode, view the scene selection menu, choose language options and, if applicable, view the special features associated with the episode. There is no "play all" feature, and there is no way to jump from one individual episode menu to another.
The episodes and menus do have one annoying quirk. After watching through the end of an episode, viewers should be taken back to that episode's individual menu. Sometimes, however, viewers are sent to a completely different episode's individual menu.
