7.4 | / 10 |
Users | 0.0 | |
Reviewer | 3.5 | |
Overall | 3.5 |
Dr. Helen Magnus is a beautiful and enigmatic scientist who seeks out all manner of monstrous creatures. Aided by her protege, forensic psychiatrist Dr. Will Zimmerman, and her fearless daughter Ashley, the Sanctuary team tracks down, studies and protects the strange and often terrifying creatures that secretly populate our world.
Starring: Amanda Tapping, Robin Dunne, Christopher Heyerdahl, Ryan Robbins, Agam DarshiSci-Fi | 100% |
Mystery | 8% |
Crime | 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
English: Dolby Digital 5.1
English SDH
50GB Blu-ray Disc
Four-disc set (4 BDs)
Region A (locked)
Movie | 3.0 | |
Video | 4.0 | |
Audio | 4.5 | |
Extras | 2.5 | |
Overall | 3.5 |
For those not up to speed on the labyrinthine world of Sanctuary, reviews of the previous three seasons can be
found here:
Sanctuary:
The Complete First Season Blu-ray review
Sanctuary: The Complete Second Season Blu-ray review
Sanctuary:
The Complete Third Season Blu-ray review
The first time travel movie or television series I probably watched were old broadcasts of George Pal’s The Time
Machine (a film whose “sixties” elements were already hilariously out of date by the time I saw them) or an
afternoon rerun of that great old Twilight Zone episode where Gilligan’s Island’s Professor (Russell
Johnson) journeys back to try to prevent the Lincoln assassination. (Interestingly, the first reboot of Twilight
Zone featured a remarkably similar episode dealing with someone attempting—successfully, at least for a moment—
to prevent the Kennedy assassination.) While The Time Machine was a bit like a temporal travelogue, more or
less dropping in on various moments in time without really doing much other than observing, outings like that
Twilight Zone episode or the late, great Irwin Allen one season wonder The Time Tunnel frequently
worked in stories where time travelers actually tried to change something. Those early efforts rarely got into
the “nuts and bolts” of time travel paradoxes or “changing the timeline” (though, again interestingly, the ramifications
of having changed the timeline was part and parcel of that Kennedy assassination Twilight Zone episode),
elements which have become increasingly utilized in time travel storytelling since at least the 1980s, in everything from
the Back to the Future trilogy to Star Trek: The Next Generation. But there’s a point where emphasis
on time travel paradoxes can tip the scale into whatever the time traveling version of jumping the shark is, and
Sanctuary’s fourth season, which starts out with a convoluted time travel escapade, comes perilously close to
that tendency. When it’s working on all cylinders, Sanctuary has delivered some sterling science fiction stories
over the course of its previous three seasons, but the show has also had a proclivity toward filler material, as well as
oddball tangents that repeatedly threaten the very existence of Helen Magnus and her “abnormal” protection squad,
only to have things work themselves out at the last moment, with a collective “never mind” as about the only follow up.
Sanctuary is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of Entertainment One with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 1.78:1. As has been discussed in reviews of the previous seasons of this series, Sanctuary is digitally shot utilizing the Red system, and a lot of the series has the sort of shallow, texture free ambience of high definition digital video, a look that some people absolutely love and others can't stand. The general image here is very sharp in sequences that don't depend on a lot of green screen compositing. Unfortunately a lot of this series utilizes both green screen and ubiquitous CGI and as with previous seasons a lot of those elements simply have a sort of soft quality to them (as well as bizarre anomalies like people seeming to be "walking in space" when they're obviously traversing a green screen territory that has had an environment added to it later). Generally speaking, considering the fact that the creative team churned out this season's episodes on a fairly tight timeline, and with a relatively constrained budget, things look rather nice, and I'd personally rate this season as at least a tick or two higher than previous seasons in general sharpness (unfortunately I'm only able to score in half point increments, and this minor uptick doesn't quite warrant a 4.5 score). Colors are often intentionally filtered and desaturated, and contrast is similarly tweaked repeatedly, but fine detail is quite pleasing throughout the season.
Sanctuary boasts a very aggressive and nuanced lossless DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 mix that quite ingeniously works in not just basic sound effects, but 'bridging" sonic elements that surround the listener with various "whooshes" and "zings" as scenes segue into each other. Surround activity is remarkably consistent and varied throughout this season, not necessarily relegated to the many action sequences (though of course it's on full display in those segments). Fidelity is top notch and virtually every episode has at least one (usually several) bombastic moments of very impressive LFE. Dialogue is cleanly and clearly presented, and the series' score is utilized effectively (even if the lamentable "Fugue" episode proves that no one involved in this show is going to be making their Broadway musical debut anytime soon). The mix is very well prioritized and Sanctuary delivers a very satisfying sonic experience that should easily please picky audiophiles.
Sanctuary saw a rather precipitous decline in its viewership in its fourth season, and there's probably good reason. The show goes off on too many tangents that repeatedly are amped up to be The End of Everything, only to have it all just work out peachy keen in the end. The cast and crew does seem to be continuing to take chances, and several episodes here, notably the two part season finale, are as good as anything Sanctuary has ever done. This is still by and large a very interesting series, despite its ever more apparent flaws, and you simply can't do better than the wonderful Amanda Tapping as Helen Magnus. There's still no denying that this fourth season is at least a relative step down from the general high of Season Three, but for fans this Blu-ray set offers superior video and especially audio and comes with some nice supplementary materials. For fans if for no one else, this release comes Recommended.
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Definitive Edition
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Theatrical & Unrated Cuts
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