From creator Tom
Fontana (Homicide: Life on the Street) comes Oz, a
tough-as-nails drama set inside one of the most violent prisons, the
Oswald State
Penitentiary.
Led by Warden Leo Glynn (Ernie Hudson) and created by Tim McManus
(Terry Kinney), the experimental Emerald City (Em City) is a large
unit where the prisoners live, converse, plot, deal, and kill, among
other things. Narrated by prisoner Augustus Hill (Harold Perrineau),
Oz focuses on a select group of prisoners and their everyday
actions, including Muslim leader Kareem Said (Eamonn Walker), unaffiliated Tobias
Beecher (Lee Tergesen), Irish badboy Ryan O'Reilly (Dean Winters), drug kingpin Simon
Adebisi (Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje), and Aryan Brotherhood leader Vern
Schillinger (J.K. Simmons).
CRITIQUE
A lot of shit happens on
Oz. This is not a sugar-coated or cliché-type view of prison
life. The power, hate, and love is real and scary. The violence is
often very graphic and the occasional frontal male nudity just shows
how uninhibited this show is. As for the people inside Oz, each
character exhibits different emotions and agendas, sometimes (most of
the time, really) going to extremes to get what they want. A lot of
the success of the show is not only due to its brilliant storytelling
but also the great cast of characters. Oz has been called
"gritty" a thousand times over by critics and other folks, and I must
concur, but I doubt it's ever been called "very fucking intense,"
"addicting as shit," or "insanely terrific." Either way, Oz is
perhaps one of HBO's most underrated programs, and Season 4 offers
very high entertainment value (there are six seasons in total).
The storylines in Season
4 create a lot of drama and intensity: The Beecher/Chris Keller
(Christopher Meloni) relationship deepens, Beecher and Schillinger go
to extreme lengths for revenge, the drug trade war intensifies, Ryan's
love for Doctor Nathan (Lauren Velez) sees a new development, Said is
asked back to lead the Muslims again, Leo hires a new Unit Manager who
turns a blind eye as long as the violence subsides, and much more is
going on. Rest assured, everything comes full circle as the last few
episodes come to a close, plus the end of Medium Rare will
shock and surprise you at the same time. Oz may be fictional,
but it might as well be real.
Disc 1 A: A Cock
and Balls Story, Obituaries, The Bill of Wrongs
Disc 1 B: Works
of Mercy, Gray Matter, A Word to the Wise
Disc 2 A: A Town
Without Pity, You Bet Your Life, Medium Rare
Disc 2 B:
Conversions, Revenge is Sweet, Cuts Like A Knife
Disc 3 A: The
Blizzard of '01, Orpheus Descending
Disc 3 B: Even
The Score, Famous Last Words
THE VIDEO
HBO presents Oz
in 1.33:1 fullscreen format. Video quality is pretty good but not by
any large standards. There aren't many flaws with the picture except
for occasional specks and grain. The colors look well saturated but
not very crisp, but that's alright. The nice thing about this DVD set
is that there are only three discs, each of them dual-layered. It
makes the packaging smaller and overall the quality is quite good.
Optional subtitles include English, French and Spanish.
THE AUDIO
HBO presents Oz
in English Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround. The dialogue is clear and very
easy to understand without any noise problems. The music cues sound
good, too. The front speakers get a lot of attention and perform quite
well. The 2.0 track works fine, too, and the Spanish Mono
dub track seems fine also.
THE EXTRAS
Previous extras on the
Oz DVDs consisted of only commentary and deleted scenes (except
for an interview piece on the first set), the same material that we
get for the fourth season DVD release. While interviews or a making-of
featurette with behind the scenes footage would've been real nice, the
two commentary tracks here are informative and therefore should
satisfy Oz fans on a good level.
The commentary on
You Bet Your Life by series creator Tom Fontana and Rita Moreno,
found on disc 2 side A, is fairly informative with a variety of
tidbits to be heard here and there. Some dead spots exist, but overall
a decent track.
Much more engaging and
actually quite fun to listen to is the commentary on Famous Last
Words by Tom Fontana and actors Dean Winters and Lee Tergesen.
These guys discuss just about anything that pops into their heads,
with Fontana acting as the moderator of sorts, trying to engage
Winters in discussions who spends most of the time in the background
but also offers some fun info. Tergesen tends to engage in more
raunchy talk and has an odd attitude about it (kind of), but as the
track went on I think it was just him having a good time with the
other two. Fontana is the one who describes some plot elements as
scenes unfold on the screen and offers some interesting trivia (amidst
some random stuff) as well as the reason why the fourth season was
sixteen episodes long.
Lastly there are 30
Minutes of Deleted Scenes located on the B side of disc 3. These
aren't scene extensions but actual deleted scenes with the time codes
stamped at the top and bottom. Most of these don't add a whole lot to
the stories, although some flesh out certain elements. These scenes
can be played via the "play all" option or one at a time selected from
informative menu screens that list what episode the scenes were cut
out of and a one-sentence synopsis.
FINAL THOUGHTS
Oz is a great show.
Enough said. Season 4 is awesome, especially since it's sixteen
episodes long instead of the usual eight. Fans will definitely want to
pick up this set, specifically for the commentary by Fontana, Tergesen
and Winters.
