Rating summary

Movie		2.5
Video		4.5
Audio		4.0
Extras		2.0
Overall		3.0

Rookie Blue: The Complete Second Season Blu-ray Movie Review

Insert generic critique here.

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman May 23, 2012

It’s a commonly accepted truism that most television dramas are built around one of three careers: the lawyer, the doctor, or the policeman (or private detective). There have been occasional dramas that have come along that have seriously shaken up the status quo (one thinks especially of shows like Mission: Impossible, which was unlike anything that viewers had ever seen before), and there are of course fads that at least momentarily introduce new (or newish) elements, like the secret agent craze that swept films and television in the wake of James Bond and actually led to at least one police show being reborn as a secret agent outing (Burke’s Law become Amos Burke, Secret Agent, though the change wasn’t especially artful and the show was quickly cancelled). (We'll also put aside the favorite genre of late fifties and early sixties television, the western, as frequently it tended to focus on "policemen" of the wild west in the guise of sheriffs.) And so after seven decades or so of broadcast television it’s understandably hard to introduce new elements into well worn genres. That’s the basic problem with Rookie Blue, a series that is so generic that even its title is an amalgam of other cop shows, as was discussed in the review of the series’ first season. While there’s nothing horrible about Rookie Blue, the series is one of those middling efforts that coasts along on familiarity, some occasionally interesting characters, and the usual amount of interpersonal drama and shenanigans by each episode’s bad guys, but there’s nothing remotely new or exciting to be experienced here. The one element that may prove to be at least a little less well worn than the bulk of the series is its setting: Toronto, Canada, though even that ostensible selling point is dealt with in a generic way, never really exploiting any specificity that might come from actually acknowledging the city as its locale.

Stop me if you’ve heard this one before—well, never mind, I’ll stop myself, for any rudimentary recounting of any of Rookie Blue’s second season episodes is going to include plotlines that any self respecting television viewer will have seen countless times before. A cop unexpectedly shot down in what would seem to be a low risk situation? Seen it. (The cop survives, surprise, surprise.) Female cops “forced” to put on skimpy clothing to work undercover to bust thugs? Seen it. (They look fantastic, surprise, surprise.) A cop is taken hostage while a corollary investigation leads to discovery of a cover up on a previous case? Seen it. (The hostage situation is defused, and the cover up is, well, uncovered, surprise, surprise.) I know this brief litany may sound overly cynical and dismissive, but it comes from repeatedly forecasting where virtually every episode of this series is going to go from virtually the first moment of each episode.

So if the plots are often predictable, where does that leave the characters? Unfortunately not in much better stead. We have a typical assortment of types, many of whom seem to be have been cast for both their photogenic proclivities as well as (as cynical as it may sound) their ethnic backgrounds, or at least their perceived ethnic backgrounds. There are simply no characters here that haven’t inhabited other, better cop shows through the years, though the series’ relatively equal casting of men and women in the focal rookie roles is to be commended. A lot of the second season once again centers on rookie policewoman Andy McNally (Missy Peregrym), who in this season doesn’t just deal with little things like busting cops and perhaps getting shot at a time or several, but also the heartache of first promising to marry her boyfriend Luke (Eric Johnson), only to later get involved with Sam (Ben Bass).

In the increasingly frayed world of broadcast television, it’s sometimes alarming to see what shows thrive and which shows meet quick demises, even when they share more or less the same viewership and demographic leanings. Rookie Blue hasn’t exactly been a killer performer for ABC, but it’s been steady enough that it has earned successive renewals rather quickly (based in part on the shared production costs by Canada and the fact that the show is at least somewhat more popular up north). The series isn’t downright bad, but it’s so completely rote and predictable that it’s hard to see what the allure is, despite some attractive cast members and the putative innovation of seeing Canadian cops on the beat. This is the sort of middling filler material that seems to coast along on limited ambition and little else other than a basic competent mediocrity. Evidently that’s enough to guarantee an audience these days. That should be a crime.

Rookie Blue: The Complete Second Season Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Whatever one may think about Rookie Blue's drama (melodrama some would say), few will probably complain about its AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 1.78:1, offered on Blu-ray courtesy of Entertainment One. This is often a spectacularly sharp looking series that benefits from great location shooting in and around Toronto, and maintains a consistently high image quality even in studio bound scenes. Fine object detail is often exemplary, and since the series tends to exploit close-ups so much of the time, it's all the more obvious. Colors are nicely saturated and accurate looking, though the prevalence of the black or deep blue uniforms that are worn can tend to present very minor shadow detail issues in some of the most darkly lit scenes. There's very little if any artifacting to report here, other than some very minor shimmer on some of the establishing shots of the city (which may be sourced from library footage in any case). Overall, though, this is a very strong presentation that should easily please the series' fans.

Rookie Blue: The Complete Second Season Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Rookie Blue: The Complete Second Season features a lossless DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 mix (along with a standard Dolby Digital 5.1 mix). The soundtrack here is kind of schizophrenic, and audiophiles' reactions may well be similarly skewed. A lot of the series plays out in quieter dialogue driven scenes which offer little in the way of surround activity or immersive qualities. Then any given episode will erupt in a flurry of action (quite often involving gunshots or screeching cars), and the sound field comes totally alive, with extremely well placed discrete channelization effects and a very realistic sense of immersion. Even some of the non-action sequences, like the recurring bar segments, offer decent surround activity. Fidelity is excellent and there's some nicely fulsome LFE on tap in some of the action moments. Dialogue is clean and well prioritized and while this isn't a nonstop "wow" audio mix, it's well above average and represents the dual tack this series takes, exploring both the private (quieter) side of the rookies' lives as well as their on the job (louder) moments.

Rookie Blue: The Complete Second Season Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• Season 2: Every Day Is Still a First (1080i; 3:50) features some brief interviews where the actors talk about having spent the first season establishing their characters, and how the second season has allowed them to stretch out and explore a little bit.


• Shots Fired: Inside the Season Premiere (1080i; 3:48) takes a look at the first episode of the season, though it's a bit hard to take any of the hyperbole seriously when one of the actors bursts out laughing at an over the top description of how wonderful it all is. This actually focuses on the sequence that involves several shots being fired.


• Horsing Around (1080i; 3:22) isn't a gag reel, but a featurette about some of the actors learning to ride horses.


• Cops on Coffee (1080i; 3:13) is kind of a silly little piece focusing on everyone's favorite caffeinated beverage.


• Travis Talk (1080i; 3:13) is a montage of moments with actor Travis Milne.


• Disorderly Conduct (1080i; 1:40) is just a brief series of snippets of the actors acting like goofballs.


• Split Screen Behind the Scenes Footage (1080i; 12:30) takes a look at several sequences from various episodes, with final footage playing out next to behind the scenes shots.

Rookie Blue: The Complete Second Season Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Someone is obviously watching Rookie Blue, for the series' third season is just about to begin on ABC. But this is a show that is relentlessly generic in almost all of its plot and character dynamics. The press sheet accompanying this release hypes the show as "Grey's Anatomy with guns", and there's no denying there are a lot of incredibly attractive twenty-somethings involved in all sorts of over the top interpersonal melodrama that is very redolent of the Seattle set medical series. But the fact that the pull quote would directly address the derivative quality of Rookie Blue is indication enough that there's very little if any innovation in this show. Still, there are obviously fans for the series, and they should be very well pleased with this Blu-ray's stellar video and excellent audio, as well as some brief but enjoyable supplementary material. Everyone else would do better to watch reruns of Law and Order. That way you get cops and lawyers in one show (and even occasionally doctors, too).