Magic City: The Complete Series [Blu-Ray]
Cast: Jeffrey Dean Morgan, Olga Kurylenko, Danny Huston
Release Date: Now Available on Blu-Ray & DVD
A Review By: Kevin Lovell
Disc Rating: 9/10
Plot Summary:
Centers on Miami mobsters and other characters from Miami Beach in the late 1950s.
‘Magic City’ tells the story of Ike Evans and his family as they deal with the daily ins and outs of running one of the most glamorous hotels in Miami during the late 1950’s. While Ike may be the main public face behind the deluxe resort, his dream has been funded by the infamous and off balance Ben ‘The Butcher’ Diamond. As Ben deals with things in a true gangsters fashion and has no problem murdering and dumping anyone who might dare cross him or affect the chances of him reaching his intended goals, Ike is therefore forced to deal with the result of this being the public face of the resort. As folks start accusing him of being a murderer among other things, he begins to realize that the backlash of Ben’s methods is only going to continue falling back on him. Not to mention the fact that his son can’t keep away from Ben’s wife and this can certainly only lead to even more trouble.
‘Magic City’ is a fantastic series that really keeps the viewer enthralled through every moment and event as things continue to unravel throughout. The show is brutal, uncompromising and even painful to watch at times, but regardless the viewer can’t possibly peel their eyes away from the screen. The tension that is so impressively built and crafted on so many different levels in this show really keeps things on a wavering level where you can’t help but both anticipate and dread just what may happen next. This fantastic show is complemented most by its astounding cast. Jeffrey Dean Morgan does an excellent job in the lead role of Ike Evans and as a big fan of Morgan personally, this definitely feels like the type of role he was born to play. Danny Huston also gives a truly impressive and downright loathsome performance in the role of Ben ‘The Butcher’ Diamond. I can’t imagine anyone possibly pulling off this despicable character any better than Huston did. While those are two extremely notable performances, that is in no way to say the rest of the cast doesn’t do a stellar job as well in their respective roles, because they most certainly do.
For those who haven’t had the pleasure of ‘Magic City’ before, I would highly recommend giving it a shot, especially now that you can pick up this nice box set compiling the entire series (unfortunately only a short lived 2 seasons containing 8 episodes apiece) at a more than reasonable price. For fans of the series that haven’t yet had a chance to pick up a copy to add to their collection, this would definitely be the way to do so as well. I feel that I should also note that for those who already own the separate season releases, you may want to steer clear as the complete series collection does not bring any new content to the mix as far as I’m aware and actually retains the same artwork with both of the previously released season sets inside of the new box.
VIDEO:
The video on the Blu-Ray release of ‘Magic City: The Complete Series’ is a full 1080p High Definition presentation utilizing the show’s original 1.78:1 Aspect Ratio on all episodes in both seasons. The video presentation looks pretty great. All of the colors and beautiful scenery present in the show is on gorgeous display here and every aspect of the video looks pretty spot on with no real imperfections noticeable throughout.
AUDIO:
The Blu-Ray release features an uncompressed English 5.1 channel Dolby TrueHD soundtrack on all 16 episodes of the series (8 episodes in each respective season). While it doesn’t hit quite as hard as some of the TrueHD soundtracks on the Starz Original Series’ that is of no fault to the soundtrack and is more due to the subtle and creeping nature of the series. The quiet moments are discrete and eerily calm giving off an almost creepy tone, while the more exciting and action oriented sequences in addition to the shows fabulous soundtrack really give this lossless multichannel soundtrack a chance to strut its stuff, which it does quite admirably.
SPECIAL FEATURES:
The Blu-Ray release of ‘Magic City: The Complete Series’ contains the same extras as each of the separate season releases did. Each of the seasons includes a nice collection of bonus content that fans should enjoy, yet for those who already own the previous season sets I don’t believe any new bonus content has been included here.
*Please note that the above images are taken from the Blu-Ray and resized. They additionally will suffer quality loss as a result of .jpg compression. Larger versions of each image can be viewed by clicking on the image. All images and content included on this Blu-Ray release are the property of their respective owners.