Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #460 in DVD
• Released on: 2005-07-04
• Rating: Suitable for 18 years and over
• Formats: Box set, PAL
• Original language: English
• Number of discs: 4
• Running time: 639 minutes

Amazon.co.uk Review
The remarkable first season of Deadwood represents one of those periodic, wholesale reinventions of the Western that is as different from, say, Lonesome Dove as that miniseries is from Howard Hawks's Rio Bravo or the latter is from Anthony Mann's The Naked Spur. In many ways, Deadwood embraces the Western's unambiguous morality during the cinema's silent era through the 1930s while also blazing trails through a post-NYPD Blue, post-The West Wing television age exalting dense and customized dialogue. On top of that, Deadwood has managed an original look and texture for a familiar genre: gritty, chaotic, and surging with both dark and hopeful energy. Yet the show's creator, erstwhile NYPD Blue head writer David Milch, never ridicules or condescends to his more grasping, futile characters or overstates the virtues of his heroic ones.

Set in an ungoverned stretch of South Dakota soon after the 1876 Custer massacre, Deadwood concerns a lawless, evolving town attracting fortune-seekers, drifters, tyrants, and burned-out adventurers searching for a card game and a place to die. Others, particularly women trapped in prostitution, sundry do-gooders, and hangers-on have nowhere else to go. Into this pool of aspiration and nightmare arrive former Montana lawman Seth Bullock (Timothy Olyphant) and his friend Sol Starr (John Hawkes), determined to open a lucrative hardware business. Over time, their paths cross with a weary but still formidable Wild Bill Hickok (Keith Carradine) and his doting companion, the coarse angel Calamity Jane (Robin Weigert); an aristocratic, drug-addicted widow (Molly Parker) trying to salvage a gold mining claim; and a despondent hooker (Paula Malcomson) who cares, briefly, for an orphaned girl. Casting a giant shadow over all is a blood-soaked king, Gem Saloon owner Al Swearengen (Ian McShane), possibly the best, most complex, and mesmerizing villain seen on TV in years. Over 12 episodes, each of these characters, and many others, will forge alliances and feuds, cope with disasters (such as smallpox), and move--almost invisibly but inexorably--toward some semblance of order and common cause. Making it all worthwhile is Milch's masterful dialogue--often profane, sometimes courtly and civilized, never perfunctory--and the brilliant acting of the aforementioned performers plus Brad Dourif, Leon Rippy, Powers Boothe, and Kim Dickens. --Tom Keogh, Amazon.com

Synopsis
HBO delivers another stunning, evocative drama in DEADWOOD. The channel has an impressive reputation when it comes to producing edge-of-your-seat television (THE SOPRANOS, SIX FEET UNDER), and DEADWOOD follows neatly in that tradition. Set in 1876, the story unfolds just two weeks after the defeat of Custer at Little Big Horn. The town of Deadwood is located in the Black Hills Indian Cession, and is populated largely by illegal settlers and miscreants looking to make a quick buck. Among them are Al Swearengen (Ian McShane), who owns the local saloon; Seth Bullock (Timothy Olyphant), a former law enforcer; and the infamous Wild Bill Hickok (Keith Carradine). Some awesome acting combines with intricate storylines, absorbing direction, and some impressive sets to make DEADWOOD another essential series from the HBO stable.

Customer Reviews

Fantastic!
I'm amazed this series didn't get as much exposure as the Sopranos. The acting is universally terrific, the plot is great, dialogue totally convincing, sets and production excellent. Ian McShane and Timothy Olyphant are stand-out stars, but everybody does a wonderful job.

I hate Westerns
***Spoilers***

I hate Westerns. I really do. But in a quixotic, or maybe masochistic, mood, I bought the first season.

Well blow me down. It was the best damn thing I'd ever seen - watched all 12 hours of it in two sittings. Every character is fleshed out; humanity bleeds from every episode - not just the red stuff, but poetry. All the characters are strong, including even the relatively minor ones. Watch out for the doc, the preacher, and Jewel, the crippled female sweeper-up at the Gem bar-cum-whorehouse. I'm not ashamed to say that she made cry; but equally, laugh with joy when she got her new boot from the doc and took him for a twirl on the dance floor.

Ian McShane plays Swearengen, the devious, evil and manipulative proprietor of the Gem in such a way that we can see that he too has humanity, even as he smothers the preacher to death as if in answer to the doc's prayer for his suffering to be ended. Sure, it's a twisted, awful humanity, but so artful is McShane's portrayal that somehow we can understand it. We can understand too his deeply flawed love for the whore, Trixie.

There are more intertwining plots and subplots than you can shake a stick at, and maybe they'd have been difficult to follow with week-long breaks in between, but viewed in megasittings, they're easy enough to follow. I was completely absorbed into the World of Deadwood, never bored, entranced as a child listening to campfire tales.

It may be historically inaccurate, there may be anachronisms, violence and scenes of a sexual nature, but frankly, my dear, who gives a damn? It is what it is, and in its own terms, wholly absorbing. I never thought I'd say this, particularly of a Western, but it was better than the Sopranos by a considerable margin, and that in itself is a five-star feast.

I've barely scraped the surface. There are dozens of other characters to love, hate or love and hate, and one of those is the town itself. I will definitely be buying the other two seasons and know I will watch them all again and again.

HBO does it again!
Where to start!well let me start by saying that this is another example of televison at its best,this is stunning work,simple in many ways but very effective,this is deadwood.
Deadwood is a show that charters the rise of the real location in dakota,america,the show starts not long after the birth of the place deadwood,an ungoverned,a town with no law and few morals,series one charts its development and the rise of a local governement within.
That is just the smallest detail there that i have given,this is a show that is very character driven,packed with historical figures and truths but given a licence to stretch the truth and bring violence and moments that may or may not have happened.
The shows figurehead is Al Swearengen,played by ian mcshane,a foul mouthed,bad tempered,violent so and so who runs an illicit club,with no law he is the closest thing to judge and jury,and his role is vital to the brilliance of the series,the show stands on its own when he isnt there of course,but when he appears he steals the scenes.
There is a very strong cast around him as well and the show burns bright but never outpaces itself,it is slow and deliberate and very focused,a great script adds to what exists and makes sure that boredom never peeks its ugly head.
Deadwood is a town of greed and gain,where life is cheap and nothing can be taken for granted,i will say no more than that except that once again and it really shouldnt surprise me,that america lights the way in terms of gripping,chilling,superb television.