TVSquad

I suppose we're lucky that this is a "season one" DVD and not a "complete series" set. The nut campaign aimed at CBS worked, and the second season of Jericho will start in a few months. It's only going to be seven episodes long, and then they'll look at those ratings and see if it warrants more episodes.

In the meantime, we have this season one set. You either like the show or you don't, which will help you decide whether you will want the DVD or not. And if you buy it, you're interested in the extras, and on this set they're actually pretty good.

Packaging

Three separate cases that house two discs each, for a total of six discs (I'm awesome at math). I wonder about the cover photo though. I mean, if you had just seen a nuclear mushroom cloud appear in front of you, would you be looking out the window to see what's behind you?

Audio/Video

I'm never quite sure what to say about the audio/video aspects of a DVD release. If it's really bad then that stands out, but if it's good or very good or excellent, then it's harder to really get into the tech aspects of it and really what it means to the average viewer. That said, I'd say the picture and sound is between "very good" and excellent."

Commentaries

You ever get a DVD set for your favorite show and there are hardly any commentaries or deleted scenes, and if there are they're usually scattered about and not very interesting? The Jericho set has either a commentary or a deleted scene for almost every episode. Some episodes have both (usually with producers Jon Turteltaub and Carol Barbee), and even the deleted scenes themselves have commentary by producers to explain what the scene meant and why they didn't include it in the final version of the episode. And yes, fans, stars of the show do a couple of commentaries, too; Skeet Ulrich and Lennie James.

Extra Features

The set includes two documentaries. One is "Building Jericho," and it takes a behind-the-scenes look at how the show is put together and features interviews with several cast members, producers, and crew members. The short documentary "What If?" explores how real the possibility of a nuclear war or natural disaster is and how we're preparing for it (or not). It's only around 10 minutes long, just short enough to disappear from your memory forever or to completely freak you out.

Changes?

This is another in a growing number of TV DVDs that have the warning "some music has been changed" on the back of the package. But I didn't really notice that much of a difference. I do know that there were pop songs used in many episodes, and many of them are here with no editing, including "Run" by Snow Patrol, "Mad World" by Andrews and Jules, and "Times Like These" by Foo Fighters. Can anyone else tell me if they replaced other pop songs on the soundtrack?

The episodes have also been edited from their CBS versions. I'm not quite sure why they would want to do this (other than the changes that naturally occur if they had to edit the music). But I don't see anything so incredibly glaring that Jericho fans would not want to buy the set (you could always still enter our giveaway, ending shortly!)