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| Prison Break - Season One | 
 enlarge | Directors: Bobby Roth, Brad Turner, Brett Ratner, Dean White, Dwight H. Little
Actors: Dominic Purcell, Wentworth Miller, Amaury Nolasco, Robert Knepper, Wade Williams
Studio: 20th Century Fox
Category: DVD
List Price: $59.98
Buy Used: $19.49
You Save: $40.49 (68%)
New (70) Used (44) Collectible (3) from $19.49
Avg. Customer Rating:  210 reviews
Sales Rank: 1001
Format: Box Set, Color, Dolby, Dubbed, Dvd-video, Subtitled, Ntsc
Languages: English (Original Language), English (Subtitled), Spanish (Subtitled), French (Subtitled), English (Dubbed)
Rating: NR (Not Rated)
Number Of Items: 6
Running Time: 960
Aspect Ratio: 1.78:1
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.7
Dimensions (in): 7.6 x 5.4 x 1
MPN: FOXD2236083D
UPC: 024543260820
EAN: 0024543260820
ASIN: B000FKO3GW
Theatrical Release Date: August 29, 2005
Release Date: August 8, 2006
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Condition: DISCS WILL COME IN A PLASTIC CASE. NO ARTWORK WILL BE INCLUDED. THEY PLAY GREAT. IMMEDIATE, FIRST CLASS SHIPPING
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| Customer Reviews:
The best new show of the year and the best show on tv! May 12, 2006
10 out of 14 found this review helpful
This show is absolutely amazing: funny, suspenseful, genuinely unpredictable plot twists, and some great acting. Literally every week I curse it for only being on Monday nights and have to wait an entire, agonizing week to see what on earth will happen next. I watched the pilot casually just to check it out, never intending to watch the show again, and have been totally hooked ever since! I NEVER buy dvd sets of any show ever, not even when I was thoroughly hooked on Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Angel or Alias, but I CANNOT wait to buy this show on dvd! My vcr tapes are completely worn out from rewatching all the episodes over and over.
Prison Break is the Greatest Show August 8, 2006
10 out of 12 found this review helpful
What a great show! All the episodes have the suspense, drama, and cliffhangers that any show needs! Go out and buy Season One because you will regret it if you don't. Wentworth Miller is such a great actor and I can not wait for Season Two starting on 8/21! Best Show Ever!
The best network show in ages . . . July 18, 2006
9 out of 11 found this review helpful
It's a mystery to me that the first season of this show didn't get more attention while it was running. While viewers and reviewers were ranting about 24, Grey's Anatomy and Desperate Housewives, this show slipped completely under the radar.
Tragic for those who missed it, but a real find for those who caught it. This show had me entranced and, literally, on the edge of my seat, from the very beginning and I didn't, couldn't, wouldn't let myself, miss an episode.
Prison Break is a masterpiece of suspense (Yeah, I said it, a masterpiece). Not only did every episode conclude with a cliffhanger that made you feel like you were facing the longest seven days of your life before you could find out what happens, but even the commercial breaks were torture. Absolutely none of the cliche' and predictability of most network television (including the series mentioned above).
Prison Break is so brilliantly crafted that, by the 15th or 16th episode, I actually found myself wishing for just one predictable turn, for just one thing to happen the way I guessed it might. Fortunately, it didn't happen. Every time I thought I knew what was coming, thought it was even obvious what would happen next, I was way off, and never so delighted to be wrong in my life.
You might wonder how a prison show would play out on network television with no room for vulgarity, hard-core violence or other elements of an action series set in a maximum security prison. But the script is well crafted enough that you truly don't notice the lack of expletives that should be commonplace in such a setting, even a fictional one.
Who are these writers? Where have they been? and Why have they not been hired to write every show on television?
The acting is decent but, with the exception of Wentworth Miller as Michael and Robert Knepper as T-bag, not great. It doesn't matter though, because the story and script is so good, I'd watch it if a team of farm animals were acting it out. Maybe next season.
In closing, Prison Break is the most engaging, suspenseful series on network television and one of the best shows on network or cable television.
Fair warning to those who watch it on DVD for the first time - When you sit down to watch the first episode, you may want to plan for a 22 hour marathon, because once you start watching, you won't be able to stop.
An enormously entertaining serial drama of the first rank August 21, 2006
9 out of 13 found this review helpful
Here is my recommendation to anyone toying with the idea of watching PRISON BREAK but put off by the initial premise: just ignore how absurd the initial pretext and just plunge in and give it 4 or 5 episodes. You'll quickly forget your initial doubts and quickly discover one of the most exciting shows on TV. By the end of the final disc you'll ask yourself why you ever found the premise silly to begin with.
I really didn't want to watch PRISON BREAK when I first heard about it. After, the whole premise is a bit silly, and even the cast members and producers sometimes snicker about aspects of it. A guy tattoos the blueprints of a prison onto his body in order to break his brother out after he gets himself thrown in for committing a felony? It just seemed too farfetched and absurd. What changed my mind? Two things. First, a number of fans and critics who stated that they, too, found the premise absurd. Secondly, person after person and critic after critic stated that it was one of the most entertaining shows on TV. Besides, my all time favorite TV show is about a sixteen year old California cheerleader who discovers that she has been called to be her generation's vampire slayer. I figured that if a show as great as BUFFY could start off with a silly premise and end up with something that was truly great, so could PRISON BREAK.
Speaking of BUFFY and PRISON BREAK, the two shows had many overlaps. The person who green lighted PRISON BREAK was Gail Berman, the person who first had the idea of turning BUFFY into a TV series. One of the executive producers for the new show was Marti Noxon, who wrote for BUFFY and was the show runner in its last two seasons. The show's star, Wentworth Miller, was the main guest star in a late Season Two episode of BUFFY (albeit one of the few weak episodes in a string of episodes that are largely masterpieces) entitled "Go Fish," playing the star of the swim team. Wade Williams, who plays Bellick, had a small but memorable role as the general of a Knights Templar-like group of knights.
The two immediate influences on PRISON BREAK are 24 and LOST, especially the former. Like 24, the show strives to keep the viewer on the edge of his or her seat and end each episode with a cliffhanging ending. Like 24 and LOST, the show is concerned to tell an ongoing story with no one episode especially self-contained. Like LOST, there often turn out to be more interrelations between the characters than one might initially suppose and like LOST often tries to plumb the causes of present events by flashing back to the past.
But any show could emulate 24 and LOST. The challenge is to do it well. The only eal negative about this show is the initial premise. Luckily this is an extremely well written show. The writers have a genius for creating one dilemma after another that seems to have no resolution, only to have our hero miraculously extricate himself and his plans each week. It is a wonderful experiment in grand storytelling, with heartbreaks, surprises, and so much excitement that sometimes it gets a little too exciting. I promise that from first to last this show will present you with a string of adrenaline rushes.
Apart from the writing, the other thing that really makes this show work is the cast, which brings together as many first rate character actors as any show on TV. Wentworth Miller is absolutely outstanding as Michael Scofield, an absolutely brilliant structural engineer who is intent on helping his brother escape from prison. Dominic Purcell does a wonderful job in the difficult role of Michael's brother Lincoln Burrows, who is awaiting execution for the murder of the vice president's brother, but who was framed in a elaborate conspiracy. Much of the rest of the cast is filled with scene-stealers of the first rank. Veteran actor Peter Stomare (perhaps best known for stuffing Steve Buscemi's leg down a wood chipper in FARGO) is wonderfully threatening and insane as mobster John Abruzzi. Even more memorable is Robert Knepper, who plays animalistic pansexual molester and murderer Theodore "T-Bag" Bagwell. The aforementioned Wade Williams is marvelous as the crooked and brutal guard Bellick, while Stacy Keach is the admirable and highly principled warden Henry Pope. The show's main romantic interest revolves around the flirtation and chemistry between Scofield and the prison doctor Sara Tancredi, played by the red-haired Sarah Wayne Callies. There are many other marvelous performers, though in particular I would like to mention Silas Weir Mitchell, who played the utterly psychotic Haywire. I'm not sure that any actor today plays a more convincing insane person than Mitchell.
I personally believe that in the past ten years TV has become for the most part a higher form of entertainment than the movies. Certainly there are far more hours of high quality TV produced than high quality film. PRISON BREAK is further evidence of this. There has been on and off debate about when the Golden Age of television was, but personally I think it started in the 1990s and continues to today, with shows like THE X-FILES, BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER, THE SOPRANOS, SIX FEET UNDER, FARSCAPE, THE WEST WING, THE GILMORE GIRLS, 24, ANGEL, ARRESTED DEVELOPMENT, SCRUBS, DEAD LIKE ME, THE SHIELD, BATTLESTAR GALATICA, LOST, and VERONICA MARS. The only problem today is finding time to watch all of the truly worth TV series. I certainly would encourage anyone interested in quality entertainment trying to find time for this enormously entertaining show.
My favorite show on tv May 24, 2006
8 out of 10 found this review helpful
I have never been this hooked on a tv show. I've been waiting for the dvd to be announced. If you enjoyed "Shawshank Redemption" then you will love "Prison Break". The show has so many twists and turns that it's so addicting. I was very mad when Fox cut the season short by making viewers wait until March to watch the rest of the season. "Prison Break" will be the first broadcast tv show DVD box set that I have purchased. I have HBO box sets, but I'm referring to non-premium channel tv shows.
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