Rating summary

Movie		3.5
Video		4.5
Audio		4.0
Extras		2.5
Overall		3.5

Manhattan: Season One Blu-ray Movie Review

The Big Bang Theorists.

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman April 6, 2015

Most people have heard of nuclear winter (whether or not they’ve really wanted to), but what about nuclear Winter? That capitalized word is actually the surname of a focal character in Manhattan, an absorbing if somewhat overheated dramatization of events surrounding the creation of the atom bomb, and while it’s probably just a slightly whimsical formulation on the part of show creator Sam Shaw, there’s little doubt that Dr. Frank Winter (John Benjamin Hickey) presides over (or maybe more appropriately within) a rather devastated emotional landscape. The fact that Shaw has created a fictional character to be the dramatic doppelganger of a real life scientist named Seth Henry Neddermeyer is perhaps just one indication of a problem confronting this series—so much of the Manhattan Project is still so bathed in mystery that many people have only an inkling of who was involved and what actually happened. While that might initially seem to be a positive boon for the series, affording a wide open canvas upon which to paint all sorts of interactions and dramatic developments which may or may not be based in actual fact, the upshot is that it divorces the series, at least in part, from the very history it’s attempting to examine. While a number of “real life” characters such as J. Robert Oppenheimer (Daniel London) or Secretary of War Henry Stimson (Gerald McRaney) wander through any given episode, a lot of Manhattan’s at times pretty florid sensibility is built around resolutely fictional characters and incidents that are occasionally seemingly only tangentially related to the development of what was at that time the biggest bang imaginable.

While Sam Shaw’s name may be relatively new to a lot of viewers (he wrote several episodes of Masters of Sex: Season One before moving on to Manhattan), real credits loving aficionados may find the best clue toward understanding Manhattan’s ensemble sensibility when the name Thomas Schlamme flits by in various roles throughout the first season. As both an Executive Producer and director for this first season, Schlamme invests the show with the same sort of labyrinthine, interlocking story arcs that made The West Wing so memorable, though curmudgeons may complain that Schlamme’s reach exceeds his grasp, making this series perhaps equally as reminiscent of somewhat flawed Schlamme produced entries like Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip or Pan Am.

A rather ungainly amount of featured characters are on hand throughout Manhattan, a choice which certainly provides a lot (as in a lot) of soap operatic subplots, but which tends to keep the throughline of the development of the bomb repeatedly at bay throughout this first season. While Frank and his wife Liza (Olivia Williams), herself a famous botanist, are the emotional anchor of the series, much of this first season tends to be told through the eyes of a newcomer to the desert “city” built up in Los Alamos to support the research and development process of the bomb. That newcomer is idealistic young (Jewish) physicist Charlie Isaacs (Ashley Zukerman), who comes to the barbed wire surrounded encampment without much of a clue as to what he’s getting himself into. The mere fact that an iconic scientist like the enigmatic but charismatic Reed Akley (David Harbour) wants him on board is more than enough to whet his curiosity. It doesn’t hurt that Charlie is one of the few to be able to immediately discern what a bunch of projected formulae Akley shows him means—an atomic bomb is the big “secret,” known euphemistically as The Gadget, that Akley and his team are working on.

Some of the initial conflict of this first season involves the competing theories of Winter and Akley. Akley is a proponent of the so-called Thin Man design, something that (as history buffs will know) turned out to be unworkable as research continued. Winter on the other hand champions the so-called implosion technology, but for most of the first season is consigned to a definite “second string” position as the powers that be throw their funding and star talent (like Isaacs) behind the “gun type” technology that was Thin Man’s hallmark. Playing out against this kind of politico-scientific controversy are several interlocking subplots, including some involving a Chinese-American scientist, a female scientist, the Winters’ petulant young daughter, Isaacs’ lonely wife and (just for good measure) a health crisis for Frank himself.

Manhattan gives passing lip service to still debated issues like the morality of developing this particular weapon of mass destruction, something that is handled in a probably too pat way to ever resonate as emotionally as it might have. While that historical aspect is fascinating (albeit more intellectually than anything), Manhattan takes repeated stabs at more contemporary issues like NSA-esque government “oversight” (as in eavesdropping), secret “renditions,” black ops centers that specialize in torture, and more decidedly 21st century elements that sit somewhat uneasily up against what is admittedly one of the more evocative recreations of a historical milieu ever attempted for series television. In fact it’s this show’s immaculate production design that helps to establish a feeling for time and place much more so than some of the too contemporary seeming characters and plot machinations.

Performances are by and large compelling, with Zukerman a real standout as Isaacs, an idealistic kid who makes a number of boneheaded decisions during the first season, leading to an impossibly melodramatic “cliffhanger” wrap up (one actually involving Frank). Hickey is good in a somewhat more mannered performance, but the creative staff’s decision to have Winter tooling about with a perpetual five o’clock shadow all the time just gets annoying after a while. We get it—Winter is a driven, compulsive character who just doesn’t have time to shave. Williams does great work as Liza, a woman who is conflicted herself about her husband’s “work” (which she, like most of the spouses at the site, isn’t completely up to speed on, for security reasons). Daniel Stern is great as an elderly scientist who was Winter's main mentor, and West Wing alum Richard Schiff is on hand as a natty "enforcer" who goes after some suspected informants.

Manhattan struggles at times to really deliver on its historical foundations, taking probably too many detours into family dysfunction and a kind of silly recurring emphasis on various espionage activities (both within and without the fenced environs of Los Alamos). As history, therefore, the series is a bit of a bomb itself. As soap opera, though, it packs a certain atomic punch that may well be able to manage a half life of a few more seasons.

Manhattan: Season One Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Manhattan is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of Lionsgate Films with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 1.78:1. While the ramshackle enclave the scientists call home isn't exactly beautiful, the series' exterior footage can often be surprisingly breathtaking, full of wide open vistas that exploit the almost surreal looking landscape of the American Southwest (see screenshot 5). A lot of the series takes place in rather dim, and often brown toned, interiors, but shadow detail remains surprisingly strong, and fine detail often rises to exceptional levels in extreme close-ups (see screenshot 8 for an example of both dim lighting and well above average fine detail). Some sequences have been color graded, with some outdoor moments being just slightly desaturated or tipped toward a kind of retro feeling sepia end of the spectrum. There are also some brief moments of CGI involving elements like dreams (see screenshot 4), moments which can look just slightly soft in comparison to the bulk of the typically sharp, precise looking presentation. There are no issues with image instability, and no overt compression artifacts were noticed in preparation for this review.

Manhattan: Season One Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Manhattan's lossless DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 mix isn't quite as complex or involving as the series' visual element, but it gets the job done with good if at times inconsistent surround activity. The windswept, dust filled environs of the encampment are brought vividly to sonic life in the outdoor sequences, while the interior scenes, which tend to be largely quieter dialogue driven moments, are also offered clearly and cleanly. There are some very good uses of directionality and ambient differentiation in little elements like the sound from neighboring rooms seeping through to wherever the action is currently taking place (the "paper thin" walls of the living quarters are a recurrent issue as the show goes on). Fidelity is excellent, though dynamic range is rather restrained, especially for a show built around the development of a bomb.

Manhattan: Season One Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

Disc One:

• You Always Hurt the One You Love - Audio Commentary with Thomas Schlamme and Sam Shaw

Disc Two:

• The Second Coming - Audio Commentary with Daniel Stern and Dustin Thomason


• Ground Zero: Bringing the Bomb to the Screen (1080p; 14:45) is a standard issue EPK, replete with interviews and scenes from the series.


• P.O. Box 1663: Creating a City That Didn't Exist (1080p; 10:09) is a more interesting piece on the series' impressive production design.

Disc Three:

• Perestroika - Audio Commentary with Thomas Schlamme and Sam Shaw


• "Now I Am Become Death": J. Robert Oppenheimer (1080p; 9:57) is a decent generalist overview of this iconic character.


• Recreating an Era: Manhattan Costume Design (1080p; 10:01) is a companion piece to Disc Two's featurette on production design.

Manhattan: Season One Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Manhattan is probably not "da bomb" (to use current day vernacular), but it similarly isn't a bomb (to use that old school terminology). Still finding its sea (and/or desert) legs, the show has a lot of potential, but it needs to rein in its florid soap operatic tendencies and deliver more on the intrinsic intrigue of the actual history. Performances are generally fantastic here, but it may be indicative of the pluses and minuses of this show that it's the incredible production design that really makes an impact when all is said and done. For those who like large ensemble dramas with a tinge of supposed "real life" poking in from the edges, Manhattan comes Recommended.