Boardwalk Empire: The Complete Series Blu-ray Movie

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Boardwalk Empire: The Complete Series Blu-ray Movie United States

Blu-ray + UV Digital Copy
HBO | 2010-2014 | 5 Seasons | 3360 min | Rated TV-MA | May 19, 2015

Boardwalk Empire: The Complete Series (Blu-ray Movie)

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List price: $119.99
Third party: $117.82 (Save 2%)
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Buy Boardwalk Empire: The Complete Series on Blu-ray Movie

Movie rating

8.5
 / 10

Blu-ray rating

Users0.0 of 50.0
Reviewer4.5 of 54.5
Overall4.5 of 54.5

Overview

Boardwalk Empire: The Complete Series (2010-2014)

An Atlantic City politician plays both sides of the law, conspiring with gangsters during the Prohibition era.

Drama100%
Crime97%
Period82%

Specifications

  • Video

    Video codec: MPEG-4 AVC
    Video resolution: 1080p
    Aspect ratio: 1.78:1
    Original aspect ratio: 1.78:1

  • Audio

    See individual releases

  • Subtitles

    None

  • Discs

    50GB Blu-ray Disc
    Twenty-disc set (20 BDs)
    UV digital copy

  • Packaging

    Slipcover in original pressing

  • Playback

    Region A (B, C untested)

Review

Rating summary

Movie4.0 of 54.0
Video4.5 of 54.5
Audio5.0 of 55.0
Extras4.5 of 54.5
Overall4.5 of 54.5

Boardwalk Empire: The Complete Series Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Kenneth Brown April 28, 2015

Throughout its five-season run, the hit HBO series was a resounding television achievement, garnering 18 Emmy Awards and critical accolades for its superb cast and its unfaltering attention to 1920s period detail. From Academy Award nominee and Emmy Award winner Terence Winter and Academy Award-winning director Martin Scorsese, the series chronicles the life and times of Enoch "Nucky" Thompson (Golden Globe winner Steve Buscemi) as he undergoes vicious power struggles and deals with opportunistic rivals, including Arnold Rothstein, Lucky Luciano and Al Capone, at a time when Prohibition proved to be a major catalyst in the rise of organized crime in America.


Reviews for each season of Boardwalk Empire are already available:



Boardwalk Empire: The Complete Series Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality  4.5 of 5

Boardwalk Empire's individual seasons have already been reviewed, and while the disc counts for Seasons 1-3 from been reduced from five discs per season to four, there is no discernible or significant difference in video quality. Click the following links to read more detailed analyses of the series' 1080p/AVC-encoded video presentations and to view numerous screenshots from each season:


Boardwalk Empire: The Complete Series Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality  5.0 of 5

Boardwalk Empire's individual seasons have already been reviewed, and while the disc counts for Seasons 1-3 from been reduced from five discs per season to four, there is no discernible or significant difference in audio quality. Click the following links to read more detailed analyses of the series' DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 surround tracks:


Boardwalk Empire: The Complete Series Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras  4.5 of 5

The 20-disc Blu-ray release of Boardwalk Empire: The Complete Series includes all previously released, standard issue extras spread across the 19 BD-50 discs that comprise Seasons 1-5. (Disc counts for Seasons 1-3 have been reduced from 5 per season to 4.) Each season is bundled in a standard Blu-ray case housed within a sturdy outer box with a thin slipcover. The box set also includes a 20th disc that offers an additional assortment of exclusive special features, which break down as follows:

  • The Final Shot: A Farewell to Boardwalk Empire (HD, 30 minutes): Executive producer Martin Scorsese, creator/executive producer Terrence Winter, actor Steve Buscemi (Nucky Thompson) and other members of the cast start at the beginning -- with the development of the series and the casting of its leading man -- and work their way through to the show's final episode, sharing their experiences, explaining what drew them to and into the series, reminiscing about their favorite moments, and more. It's also not a chronological, season by season overview of the show by any means, which actually works to its benefit. It serves more as a smartly constructed, worthwhile retrospective than a tacked-on extra. The newly produced documentary also features everything from audition tapes to behind-the-scenes footage and other previously unseen materials.
  • Anatomy of a Hit (HD, 8 minutes): This shorter featurette finds Winter, executive producer/director Tim Van Patten and executive producer/writer Howard Korder revisiting select scenes and commenting on the power, brutality, choreography, and the method-to-the-madness of the series' violence.
  • Building the Boardwalk (HD, 4 minutes): Van Patten, director of photography Jonathan Freeman, production designer Bill Groom, set decorator Carol Silverman, and visual effects supervisor Lesley Robson-Foster discuss the design, construction and FX expansion of the series' centerpiece set.
  • Shooting the Series (HD, 5 minutes): Freeman, Groom and fellow Boardwalk Empire director of photography Bill Coleman dissect the look of the show, from tapping the emotional elements of the scripts to the use of light and shadow, wide and low angles, studying photos, developing scene transitions, complementing the pace of each episode, blocking and more.
  • Designing the Series (HD, 4 minutes): Groom and Silverman expound upon their approach to authenticity and delivering historically accurate production design, focusing on the research and choices involved in making the era accurate, believable and visually arresting.
  • Visual Effects (HD, 8 minutes): Robson-Foster talks about the various challenges she and her team faced as they worked to seamlessly incorporate visual effects into practical shots. The goal? To make their contributions and efforts so invisible that a viewer is completely unaware of their hand in any given scene.

For a detailed breakdown of each season's non-exclusive special features -- among them 28 audio commentaries, 13 episode-specific Picture-in-Picture tracks, and more than four hours of production documentaries and featurettes -- see the following Blu-ray reviews:


Boardwalk Empire: The Complete Series Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation  4.5 of 5

Boardwalk Empire: The Complete Series isn't aimed at fans who've purchased the series season by season over the past four years. With only an hour of exclusive special features, there isn't much here to justify a double dip, particularly with it being an expensive box set. Instead, HBO is gunning for viewers who've held out for a Complete Series box set, and to that end they've delivered everything one could hope for: all five seasons, impressive AV quality, and a slew of extras. If you don't already own the individual seasons, add Boardwalk Empire: The Complete Series to your cart or wish list post-haste. If you do, though, don't fret. You won't be missing out on much. The exclusive special features aren't sprawling or earth-shattering.