Taken: Season One Blu-ray Movie

Rating summary

Movie		2.5
Video		4.0
Audio		3.0
Extras		0.5
Overall		2.0

Taken: Season One Blu-ray Movie Review

Homeland Alone.

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman September 22, 2017

Taken worked, at least for those for whom it did work, due to a certain economy of both premise and execution (no pun intended, given the film’s body count). Co-writer and producer Luc Besson, a filmmaker not exactly known for his restraint, was in fact admirably lean and mean in this film, giving just enough information to set the paper thin plot into motion. There was very little if any context or back story given about the film’s focal character of Bryan Mills, played memorably by Liam Neeson, other than that he had some kind of background which had granted him “a very particular set of skills”, skills which in turn allowed him to wend his way through that aforementioned body count to save his kidnapped daughter. That was it, really, and the film generated its undeniable tension and force from the way Mills marauded through a series of suspects to get to his offspring. Both Taken 2 and Taken 3 struggled mightily to maintain the same level of visceral excitement, failing pretty spectacularly in the process (even if box office receipts continued to pour in). As I mentioned in my Taken 3 Blu-ray review, one of the issues with that particular film is that it in fact tried to color in some of the background of the character of Bryan Mills, ending up injecting an almost soap operatic aspect into a supposed franchise built on bone crunching action. Unfortunately, those continued box office receipts may have given the wrong idea to Besson, namely that people were really interested in Mills’ backstory, something that informs at least the early going in this awkward and never very convincing television series. Though purportedly a “prequel” in that it offers Bryan Mills as a younger man, now played by Clive Standen, but perhaps due to production cost concerns the timeframe seems to be resolutely contemporary, suggesting that time travel might be among Mills’ “very particular set of skills”.

Did Liam Neeson’s version of Bryan Mills really seem that conflicted about the violence he wreaked on various people? Part of the “fun” of the first Taken at least is that Mills basically became a machine, moving almost automatically from target to target to get to his ultimate goal. Taken the television series wants to invest this character with a supposedly tragic history that really only comes off as feeling forced, without even the benefit of being so properly manipulative that it actually evokes some kind of emotional response. In an opening vignette which seems to be based on the August 2015 attack on a high speed train in France (one thwarted in part by a soldier from my home state of Oregon, I’m proud to remind folks), Bryan is seen with his little sister Cali (Celeste Desjardins). The two are evidently on their way to their parents’ fortieth anniversary celebration, at least as evidenced by a homemade card Cali is working on. When two suspicious characters board the train, Bryan takes matters into his own already very particularly skilled hands, taking out two evident terrorists, but not before Cali is fatally shot. When another passenger hands Bryan the anniversary card Cali was working on as Bryan kneels over Cali’s corpse, it’s supposedly a cathartic emotional moment, but instead it comes off as kind of ridiculous.

There is one moment of genuine emotion surrounding the ostensibly tragic death of Bryan’s sister, and that’s from Bryan’s mother when he goes back for Cali’s funeral. But Taken wants to have its psychologically angsty cake and eat it, too, detailing Bryan’s roiling psyche concerning Cali (with a number of “flashbacks” intruding in his everday life for a number of episodes), while also shunting his family off to the sidelines after some momentary lip service. Instead, the series starts to go the Homeland route, maybe with just a touch of Narcos thrown in for good measure) by having the train incident not be a random attack, but instead linked to Bryan’s (fairly recent) past as an undercover operative who was involved in the attempted takedown of a terrorist and drug kingpin named Carlos Mejia (Louis Ferreira).

Bryan’s past and his success in stopping the train attack brings him to the attention of an intelligence officer named Cristina Hart (Jennifer Beals), who recruits Bryan to join what amounts to her version of the Impossible Missions Force from Mission: Impossible fame. Taken briefly details Bryan’s troubled training regimen before going off on a number of tangents which involve both “traditional” terrorism and the illicit drug trade, dotting to and fro without much through line and certainly without Homeland’s (or Narcos’, in fact) organic qualities.

There are a number of well utilized Canadian locations in this first season, as well as some decent set pieces involving Bryan’s advancing “skill set”, but there’s a derivative and kind of listless feeling wafting through this series. A number of people, myself included, wondered why Taken was developed into a supposed franchise to begin with, and that wonderment may only be increased with this kind of odd television take on the material. It’s perhaps indicative of some restlessness on the part of the series’ creative team that a lot of the cast and even some of the behind the scenes talent exited the show at the end of the first season, even though NBC picked Taken up for a second year.

Taken: Season One Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Taken is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of Lionsgate Films with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 1.78:1. This is a perfectly workmanlike if rarely inspiring set of transfers based on some kind of generic HD digital capture (I haven't been able to track down authoritative data on exactly which cameras were utilized). Detail levels are routinely excellent throughout the first season, though in what seems to be an unavoidable technique for thrillers, a lot of the show has been graded toward ice cold blue tones, something that can tend to diminish fine detail levels. A couple of other sequences have been kind of interestingly graded, but on the whole the series boasts a relatively naturalistic palette that pops reasonably well. Occasional establishing shots for supposed overseas locations look like they may have been sourced from lower res offerings, and some of the material shot POV style from within cars (often during chases) also looks somewhat lower res, perhaps culled from a Go Pro or smaller rig.

Taken: Season One Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Kind of shockingly for a Blu-ray release this far into this format's maturity, and especially for a show that touts its action adventure aspects, Taken: Season One offers only lossy Dolby Digital audio on this release. The 5.1 track has generally reasonable and in fact at times rather well done immersive qualities, but there's a somewhat anemic feel to the low end of the track, something that's immediately apparent in effects laden sequences where LFE isn't particularly forceful and even some cues don't resonate with much power. That said, there is consistent surround activity, and elements like dialogue are presented cleanly and with good prioritization. But lossy audio in 2017, especially on a release like this featuring a show with a fairly active sound design, may cause some Blu-ray consumers to feel that they're being "taken".

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

• Taken: On Set (1080i; 4:33) is standard issue EPK fare, with interviews and behind the scenes footage.

This sole "real" special feature is located on Disc Two of this two disc set. Disc One's supposed "Special Features" amount to trailers and bookmarks.

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

In his Taken 2 Blu-ray review, my colleague Casey Broadwater stated he wasn't overly impressed with the film, but added, "I can at least say this—it's not actively bad." Much the same could probably be said about this television iteration, aside from a few patently bad choices like that aforementioned moment with the anniversary card. The series has some decent action adventure elements, but it may be the television series of equivalent of "TMI" — Bryan Mills may be one of those characters whose effectiveness is based at least in part on not knowing a lot about him. The series on Blu-ray boasts generally competent if never overwhelming video quality, but the lack of lossless audio is a detriment.