Miami
Vice: Season 5 (1988-89)
Universal
Cast:
Don Johnson, Philip Michael Thomas, Rita Moreno, Pam Grier.
Rating:
NR
Run
time: 17 hrs, 38 mins.
Genre:
TV
Verdict:
Beautiful
(see rating
system)
With
kick-ass Dolby 5.1 surround sound, loads of action, the bad
and the beautiful of Miami locations and strong performances,
fans will love this collection of all 21 episodes from the
final season of Miami Vice.
An
Emmy-award winning detective show, Miami Vice racked up 114
episodes over five seasons from 1984-89. As with hit crime
shows from earlier generations like The Streets of San Francisco
(Karl Malden and Michael Douglas), Miami Vice featured great
chemistry between the two leads. Don Johnson played local
vice cop Sonny Crockett with insolent charm, casually dressed
to the point of sloppiness, while Philip Michael Thomas brought
a quiet dignity and strength (not to mention a keen sense
of dress style) to the role of his partner, Rico Tubbs, a
former New York detective.
Miami's
underworld drug culture provided many storylines for the show
and the first two episodes of the series - Hostile Takeover
and Redemption in Blood - are prime examples. With Crocket
suffering amnesia as the result of an accident, he's forgotten
his police past, joined the bad guys and is rising through
the ranks with calculated ruthlessness.
Thanks
to a drug war between rival gangs, Sonny soon finds himself
top dog and negotiating multi-million-dollar drug deals -
and trying to stay one step ahead of the cops. But when Tubbs
comes calling disguised as a Jamaican drug kingpin, a glimmer
of recognition dawns. There's just one problem - Sonny has
killed a cop and tried to also kill Tubbs.
Joe
Santos, who played Sgt. Dennis Becker in The Rockford Files
a decade earlier, does a great job here as a ruthless drug
lord.
From
tracking down the killers of prostitutes to protecting a valuable
witness, Crockett and Tubbs have their hands full in every
episode. The music, from the likes of U2, Guns N' Roses and
The Cure, is fabulous, there
are staggeringly beautiful women in every episode and the
action rarely flags.
And
did I mention those famous high performance cars?!
A
shame this excellent set doesn't include some extras, like
cast interviews.
