6.8 | / 10 |
Users | 3.0 | |
Reviewer | 3.0 | |
Overall | 3.0 |
This half-hour comedy focuses on the urban adventures of Ben (Bryan Greenberg) an aspiring designer who has seen previous passion projects derailed by fate and fortune, and Cam (Victor Rasuk), Ben’s best friend, free spirit and would-be mogul.
Starring: Bryan Greenberg (II), Victor Rasuk, Lake Bell, Eddie Kaye Thomas, Kid CudiDrama | 100% |
Comedy | 43% |
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
English, French, Spanish, Danish, Dutch, Finnish, Norwegian, Swedish
50GB Blu-ray Disc
Two-disc set (2 BDs)
Region A, B (C untested)
Movie | 2.0 | |
Video | 4.0 | |
Audio | 4.0 | |
Extras | 3.0 | |
Overall | 3.0 |
It's not TV, it's HBO. I would add: unless it's a half-hour series, in which case there's no guarantee. While the premium cable network's hour-long, Emmy-darling dramas are nestled all safely and snuggly in their beds, its half-hour comedies and dramedies aren't afforded the same luxury. Quality may be higher, content may be more adult in nature, the writers' rooms freer to pursue their showrunners' visions, but the chance of cancellation? Cancellation can come just as swiftly on HBO as anywhere else, particularly when it comes to shows that clock in at thirty-minutes per episode. Hung: ousted after three desperate-to-offend ten-episode seasons. Bored to Death, one of HBO's finest and funniest: gone to the great city in the canceled series sky after three eight-episode seasons. But How to Make It in America, booted after two eight-episode seasons? Well, let's just call its cancellation a mercy killing and move on.
You wouldn't know How to Make It in America's days were numbered by looking at its 1080p/AVC-encoded video transfer. Like its first season Blu-ray counterpart, the second season's striking presentation comes alive beneath the lights and shadows of the city, be it on the streets at midday, in a shop in Manhattan, or in a club, drowning sorrows long into the night. And with fashion being the name of the game, color is in abundance whether the boys are still breaking in or just starting to make it. Primaries punch, black levels dig deep, and contrast, while a touch hot on occasion, doesn't falter. Crush is an issue, as is some disruptive noise, but neither causes much trouble. It's also worth noting that detail is perhaps the most inconsistent aspect of the image, although only by nature of the series' photography, not some other underlying problem. Overall, there's really nothing to nitpick. Artifacting, banding, aliasing and other encoding mishaps don't show up and crash the party, and The Complete Second Season fares just as well as the first.
How to Make It in America serves up a fusion of hip hop beats and hustling, bustling city hotspots thanks to HBO's solid DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 surround track. It isn't a perfect experience -- the rear speakers enthusiastically embrace the series' music but fail to make every (key word being every) interior or locale as immersive or convincing as the last -- but it isn't too far off. With clear, grounded dialogue, spot-on prioritization, enough LFE oomph to blend the downbeats of the soundtrack with the thrum of the city, and the sort of ambient presence that creates a more enveloping New York, there isn't much more this particular lossless track could provide that it doesn't already. More ambition maybe, but as far as technical proficiency goes, The Complete Second Season sounds as good as it looks.
There's a successful show somewhere inside of How to Make It in America. It has all of the ingredients of a hit half-hour drama, talented young cast and all. It just lacks the drive and ambition a series, particularly one too easily dismissed as an East Coast Entourage, needs to thrive on HBO. Or any network for that matter. HBO's Blu-ray release of The Complete Second Season at least has a little bit of that drive. A little bit of that ambition. Not so much in the special features department (which maxes out at three commentaries and twenty minutes of featurettes), mind you. But where it counts: video and audio. I seriously doubt How to Make It in America will ever find a new home, regardless of how eager executive producer Mark Wahlberg is to keep it going. A failed show is a failed show, and no content provider is interested in sinking money into a series that couldn't even make it on HBO, where cancellation isn't a knee-jerk reaction to ratings. How to Make It in America has to figure out how to make it as a show before it can ever make anyone care how its young twentysomethings are making in in New York.
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