The Walking Dead: Complete First Season

The Walking Dead: Complete First Season

[DVD Walking]

Having just ended its second season on the AMC cable network last night, The Walking Dead is one of the most impressive television series I've watched in recent years. This boxed set gathers the first six episodes, which comprised the first season in Oct-Dec 2010. The plot, in a nutshell, is that Georgia police officer Rick Grimes is injured in the line of duty and ends up in a coma. When he awakens, in an abandoned hospital, he discovers that the world around him has gone to hell. Undead humans (zombies, called Walkers in this incarnation) are everywhere, and the few remaining human beings are on the run, hiding out and trying to survive. Grimes connects with a small band of survivors, including his wife and child, and the first season features their efforts to get to Atlanta and the CDC headquarters, where they hope to find a cure for the undead problem. The production design on this show is incredible, particularly in the 2-hour pilot. The cast provides intense, dramatic performances, and the storytelling (though it differs somewhat from the graphic novels it is based on) is compelling. Viewers have to be willing to accept the basic premise, but if you can get past that, this is a powerful, visually unforgettable series, telling all-too-human stories against an apocalyptic background. I can't recommend this one highly enough. The bonus features in this Season One boxed set were impressive as well, including missing scenes, behind-the-scenes footage and a great feature on Zombie Make-Up. [If you enjoy this, you may also wish to try the graphic novel series that this tv series is based on; also, any of the classic "zombie" movies like Night of the Living Dead. -- recommended by Scott C. - Bennett Martin Public Library [subscribe to Scott's monthly booklist newsletter - It's All Geek to Me!]

[Also available in multi-issue graphic novel format, plus a stand-alone novel, The Governor.]

[ Internet Movie Database entry for this film ] | [ official Walking Dead web site ]

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