NOTE TO SHOWTIME: Love Dexter, hated the DVD menu
581823
I am in total agreement with other reviewers who were angry about Showtime's HORRIBLE promotional montage at the start of each and every disc in this 4-DVD set. I am not a fan of network montages to begin with (they're just tacky and overly-obvious and as a consumer I don't get much out of them) but usually you can skip past them and get to the menu of the show you're watching, no biggie.

Not this time.

For some reason, Showtime and/or the DVD manufacturers decided to bake the Showtime promo into their menu in such a way that there is no way to skip it -- you can't fast-forward, you can't skip to "next", you can't go to Menu, and you can't even hit "stop" and then start again to get to the Menu functions.  That sucks.  As a consumer THE VERY, VERY, VERY, VERY LAST THING I WANT IS NO CONTROL OVER MY VIEWING EXPERIENCE.

I had planned to give this a DVD a decent review, the four or five stars it deserved on content alone. But then I saw that other customers had blasted it for the DVD menu, and since the real reason I wanted to review this disc was because I wanted to complain about the forced montage viewing, I realized that an "unfair" one-star review was more appropriate: this is a protest vote. If DVD sales are impacted by these low, negative reviews, and if that's what it takes to get Showtime's attention, so be it.

Dear Showtime: if you have a good product -- a well-written, well-produced, well-acted show -- then people will buy it. But if you treat customers like babies and force them to watch lame promotional videos that NO ONE WANTS TO SEE, then you will alienate your fans. I am a fan. I like DVDs, not downloads. But if in the future every Showtime series has a forced-viewing feature like this, you will lose my business. Just saying. (Axton)
4844689
The movie is just as I remembered it... very nice, and a preview of the sort of thing that Rodenberry had had in mind when he created Commander Data for Star Trek: The Next Generation.  HOWEVER... the actual DVD leaves a lot to be desired. It's a very crappy interlaced encoding, and it's extremely picky about the devices on which it will play. I had to play it in a virtual machine with Windows 7 installed. Order at your own risk.
2853688
Let me start by saying that I am an enormous CSI fan. I own all the seasons, it's just an all-around great show. Despite the loss of many main characters, the show is still going strong. Catherine has always worn the pants, so it's no surprise that she's the supervisor now that Grissom left. Don't listen to people who say "CSI's going downhill" and all that because it isn't true. Just watch "Turn, Turn, Turn" and tell me that this isn't one of the best seasons around! There's also a lot of other great episodes, and if you're a fan of the Miniature Killer from season 7, she comes back for an episode in this season. I would have given this DVD set 5 stars, but there's one thing I hate...

What I am most disappointed about is the packaging for this season! The discs fall out all over the place and the plastic holding cases are totally worthless! All the other seasons had very good packaing, but they really didn't care much about making this one nice. Oh well. I'm gonna buy the blu ray version and see if that's any better. What a disappointment, though.

C.S.I. Rocks. End of story. So, just have a little faith. Get the 9th season. You'll enjoy it.
537502
I ordered this in spite of the warnings about the product packaging because DAVID TENNANT OMFG SQUEEEE!!! And when it arrived, in good time and in good condition, the thing was definitely designed poorly.  I believe "WTF" was my first reaction.

The DVDs are fine, mind you, and once I figured out WHERE the DVDs were actually located, all is good as long as you're careful. (Hint: The "pages" have two DVDs on BOTH sides.  It took me a while to figure that out, and I have three college degrees, ferkryinoutloud.) But yeah, whoever designed this packaging really needs to buy one him/herself and see how difficult it is to get the DVDs out.  It's just like, the heck???
2193226
The original disc with all of its edge enhancement and plastic-looking skin tones was replaced this summer by Paramount.  They posted an address where you could send disc one of the original blu-ray. After waiting four months and sending a couple of emails the end result is I'm out the original blu-ray and never received the replacement disc.  I will avoid Paramount discs in the future as the way they handled this entire exercise was a mess.
234943
When this show came out, I had caught the tail end of the 1st Season and didn't know that the show had continued. A few years ago, I came across the DVD set and watched all three Seasons. Season 1 and 2 were definitely my favorites. I had watched the DVDs SO much that they wouldn't work anymore. I bought this Blu Ray and am VERY happy. The picture and sound are vivid. Unfortunately, the extras that were included with the DVD are not to be found on the Blu-Ray. This is unfortunate because the DVD included bloopers and cut scenes. It also included the history/science behind the mutants and their powers.

As for the show, the actors, and their characters, had a chemistry that couldn't be beat. However, Season 3 was a little disappointing. It appears that the writers were attempting to insert a new character that would be able to "hit the ground running." Unfortunately, she comes across as arrogant, obnoxious and petulant. And by Season 3, Episode 5, I just wanted the character to die.

With all of that being said, I love the show and am sad that it ended.
4326478
I just got a BD player a month or two ago, to go along with my Samsung 67" 1080P TV. I bought WALL-E, LOST S4 and the Dark Night as soon as they were available. AMAZING experiences, all of them. BD really makes a difference on a big screen. I also rented a number of recent releases, and each one of them stunned me in clarity and color and contrast. So after all that, I assumed that all BDs were amazingly superior to their DVD counterparts. Given that assumption, I was so excited when 28DL came out on BD. I LOVE that move, and I have it on DVD. I wanted so bad to see it in glorious HD. WHAT A COMPLETE JOKE! If anything, this BD looks WORSE than the DVD. How can they get away with selling this on BD?! I wish I'd read the reviews before purchasing this turd.

I did learn a valuable lesson though: not all Blu-Ray disks are created equally. Read some reviews before purchasing a BD, assuming it will be better than DVD -- or in this case, VHS.

What a complete rip-off. Avoid it like the plague. (snicker... I made a pun)

NerveBag
549994
The Modern Universal Logo intro is 25 seconds long. It plays when you insert the disc and at the start of every episode and you can not skip it. That means that by the end of the box set you're going to have watched the intro about 300 times, totaling about one and a half hours. And that does not include all the warning messages. I think that is totally outrageous and annoying. Other have complained about forced commercials on other discs. I'd rather watch it on TV. The universal logo is at the end and it's the older, quieter version. Corporate greed and stupidity shouldn't be rewarded.
498481
Season 6 is one of the best seasons of Dexter. However, this DVD will ruin your entire Dexter experience.

There is an un-skippable commercial for Showtime at the beginning of each DVD, which shows a clip of the last 30 seconds of the last episode of Dexter Season 6. It gives away a huge plot twist that you deserve to anticipate for an entire season.

Absolutely absurd.
737655
Looks great. The menu system, like many overly-produced blu-ray menus, is a drag. Most annoying, though, is that there are 4? 5?? pre-disc (or maybe even pre-per-episode, I admit I forget) screens to view before each one. I do not mean previews, but things that automatically play before the disc gets started, that doesn't include the FBI copy warning. Some message about blu ray complexity, etc. I think every single disc has the same message from Moore about how he meticulously went over the content of each to make sure the blu-ray was perfect, etc.

So, in short - the important stuff is great, but you have to jump through silly hoops to get to it.
3353123
Just like the last commenter...my family and I love the show! We were introduced to it by Netflix streaming (first 6 episodes) and could not get enough! (All of the first 6 episodes were presented in WIDESCREEN.) I also found that NickToons streams a few newer episodes online (all in WIDESCREEN) and we decided we like the show enough to buy the complete first season.

Well, we ordered this DVD of the complete first season and...it is in FULLSCREEN!!!
The back of the box says:
"STANDARD VERSION PRESENTED IN A FORMAT PRESERVING THE ASPECT RATIO OF ITS ORIGINAL TELEVISION EXHIBITION"

What does that mean to you? Well "standard version" may well mean FULLSCREEN but the rest of the statement seems intentionally misleading. This was clearly created originally in WIDESCREEN and cropped for this DVD. Was it presented in FULLSCREEN in April 2009 when originally aired? Hard to say but I guess it is possible. Regardless, this is intended to mislead. Since the discs themselves actually say FULLSCREEN, why was the studio not willing to put that on the outer box? Instead, they came up with this ridiculous statement to intentionally mislead.

This just infuriates me. If you buy episodes from iTunes or Amazon, they are in WIDESCREEN. Amazon lists this as WIDESCREEN. Why would Vivendi Studios create the DVD in FULLSCREEN?

Here is my thought:
It is also available on BluRay and my bet is it is presented in WIDESCREEN there. Can anyone confirm? Seems like Vivendi Studios wants to create "premium" value for their BluRay product by not allowing WIDESCREEN on their lower tier DVD product.

Note to other studios: Do not follow suit unless you want to hasten the death of the DVD. People will just move to streaming and legal & illegal downloads before they are forced into BluRay.

Note to Amazon:
Update this listing. This product is not WIDESCREEN!!!
524473
The version I got had a long intro that could not be skipped. DVDs like this intended for kids should just start playing the actual content as soon as the disk is put in the drive. No warnings, no menus, and especially no 2 minute long previews for other stuff that you cannot skip past. Content is fine, same as on PBS.
3053661
Loved the series but was frustrated by the number of bad DVDs in the set.  Two in season 7, one in season 8, three in season 9, three season 10. Failed on computer, in stand alone DVD Players, and Blu-Ray players.  Because I did not have multiple hours per day to watch the series, by the time I got to season 7 it was too late to return and the seller would not replace.  I ended up having to buy the bad DVDs as best I could, which greatly increased the price.
2286883
Love this show enough to have bought Season Two - but now I'm concerned that I won't be allowed to buy Season Three without buying a subscription to Showtime, which is otherwise pretty worthless to me.

I hope I'm wrong about that . . .
41947
Loved the show but hated this DVD copy.
I finished watching all of Season 1. The problem was that on every disc, only the first two episodes would play. The remaining episodes would either freeze or the DVD player could not read it. To be fair, I have four DVD Players and tried the Disc's on all four players. It had the same problem on all of the players. I probably will wait to see if Warner Brothers releases Season 2. It's my fault, I should have read some of the reviews before I purchased this item.
4785866
Love the show; the discs, however, are another story. Theyre duel-sided and prone to freezing up, blocking out entire scenes and loosing your place in the show. Frequently, it would stop 10 minuets before the end. Terrible. The whole series needs a redo to disc.
997648
Good show, best season, no complaints there.  But beware: the third (and only the third) disk in the set, contains over two minutes of Buffy-unrelated advertisements before the menu comes up.  I didn't know I was BUYING ads.  When the second season is released, I'll definately inquire about this before I spend any money.