7 | / 10 |
Users | 0.0 | |
Reviewer | 3.5 | |
Overall | 3.5 |
A series centered around a group of football players and their families, friends, and handlers.
Starring: Dwayne Johnson, Rob Corddry, John David Washington, Omar Benson Miller, Donovan W. CarterSport | 100% |
Comedy | 8% |
Drama | Insignificant |
Video codec: MPEG-4 AVC
Video resolution: 1080p
Aspect ratio: 1.78:1
Original aspect ratio: 1.78:1
English: DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1
French: DTS 5.1
Spanish: DTS 2.0
English SDH, French, Spanish, Danish, Finnish, Norwegian, Swedish
Blu-ray Disc
Two-disc set (2 BDs)
Digital copy
Slipcover in original pressing
Region A (B, C untested)
Movie | 3.5 | |
Video | 4.0 | |
Audio | 4.0 | |
Extras | 1.5 | |
Overall | 3.5 |
Jerry Maguire kind of oddly added not one but two phrases
to the public lexicon, the tearful confession by Dorothy Boyd (Renee Zellweger) that “you had me at hello,” and the ebullient if forceful “show me the
money!” uttered by signing prospect Rod Tidwell (Cuba Gooding, Jr.). That second quote provided subtext for what helped to make Jerry
Maguire so
memorable, namely the hunt for untold riches by promising sports stars just at the beginning of their professional careers. Ballers kind of
wants to evoke the same sort of excitement, but I had to wonder a bit as I watched this second season how much drama, or indeed even interest,
could be generated after these sports icons had been shown the money. It’s hard to get too emotionally involved with a bunch of
characters who are living the high life, or at least attempting to, with careers that, albeit fraught with a certain amount of physical danger and at
times emotional intrigue, nonetheless pay outrageous sums of money and help them to maintain lifestyles that many would consider fairly lavish.
Ballers coasts on the considerable charisma of star Dwayne Johnson, here playing sports financial manager Spencer Strasmore, himself a
former NFL player with both physical and psychological issues emanating from his time on the gridiron. But the series repeatedly gets sacked (so to
speak) by overly sudsy writing that wants to make this high stakes world the stuff of soap opera. There is consistent enjoyment in Ballers,
especially for sports fans who might like to imagine what the behind the scenes story is for their favorite players, but the series takes a while to
get to serious touchdown territory in this second season.
For those wanting to catch up on the story thus far, our review of the series’ first season can be accessed by clicking on the following link:
Ballers: The Complete First Season Blu-ray
review
Ballers: The Complete Second Season is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of HBO with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 1.78:1. The IMDb hasn't updated their data from the show's first season, and so I'm assuming this was shot with the Arri Amira, or, if not, with a similar digital capture technology. The show continues to look great when it's out and about in brightly lit environments, with the palette looking fresh and natural and detail levels remaining uniformly high. A few detours to sites like the Everglades give individual episodes a little more "local color" at times as well. As I mentioned in Ballers: The Complete First Season Blu-ray review, the tendency of some directors and/or DPs to shoot toward light sources in otherwise kind of dimly lit scenes can occasionally lead to a bit of murk and therefore less fulsome detail levels (see screenshot 18), but generally speaking this is a sharp and well detailed looking presentation that doesn't suffer from any overt compression issues and which should please the series' fans.
Ballers: The Complete Second Season features a winning DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 track that is very much in line with what was heard on Ballers: The Complete First Season. The best immersion opportunities tend to be in elements like the big party or other gathering scenes, where crowd noises fill the side and rear channels and discrete channelization of sound effects helps to establish appropriate cacophony. There are a couple of fun moments involving cars and other vehicles (like an airboat in a swamp) that provide nice panning effects. Dialogue is rendered cleanly and clearly and is typically well prioritized, though a few noisy crowd scenes can tend to occasionally bury parts of lines at times.
Disc One
Johnson's charisma continues to carry Ballers down the field, even when the show can tend to tackle itself with needlessly melodramatic subplots. This season builds to a rather interesting climax with regard to Spencer, who seems to be on the verge of becoming an almost classically tragic character. That will be an interesting challenge to see Johnson tackle. Technical merits are strong, and for sports fans if for no one else, Ballers comes Recommended.
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