by Jon Partridge
Starz has been building up some steam for a few years now with its original content including Spartacus, Outlander, and the new Ash vs. Evil Dead series, but perhaps the one to have made the biggest splash (no pun intended) is Black Sails.
The show was created by Jonathan E. Steinberg (Jericho, Human Target) and Robert Levine (Touch) and executive produced by Michael Bay (that guy who blows things up), and his Platinum Dunes partners Brad Fuller and Andrew Form. It serves as a prequel series to the beloved novel Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson.
Set roughly twenty years before the events of Treasure Island, during the supposed Golden Age of piracy, the show follows the gathering pirate captains and their crews, based out of the port of New Providence Island, a settlement called Nassau, offering safe harbor and trade opportunities for their bounty. Their growing success in the West Indies incurs the wrath of multiple nations, notably the British, who begin to organize reprisals against them.
The first season took some time to gain momentum, seemingly physically and narratively locked in place at the impressively constructed New Providence Island sets. After five episodes or so they seemingly got their money’s worth and were finally able to head out to open waters and imbue the show with a little more excitement. This was aided by a plotline driving various pirates together to hunt for the lost Spanish treasure galleon Urca de Lima. The first season also had the show locked into a lot of dialogue-heavy scenes, setting up the political maneuverings of the various Captains. As such it got quite bogged down at times in spite of solid production values and a well assembled cast.
Season two picks up this plotline and demonstrates a far greater success in balancing the dialogue and plot with the action and entertaining character interactions. The show draws from a lot of legends as well as real life pirates being represented such as Anne Bonny, Benjamin Hornigold, Jack Rackham, Charles Vane, Ned Low, and old Blackbeard himself. It’s a great blend of fiction and non-fiction that gives the show plenty of scope as well as inspiration.
Toby Stephens is a gritty lead as Captain Flint, and his developing relationship with young (Long) John Silver (Luke Arnold) is at the core of the show, as is his relationship with Eleanor Guthrie, the ruler of the Nassau settlement, played with steel by Hannah New. Together with Jessica Parker Kennedy as Max and Clara Paget as Anne Bonny, the show successfully manages to showcase some strong and fleshed out female characters, impressive in such a male dominated era. Toby Schmitz is another standout as Rackham, but the best aspect of season two is the introduction of villain Ned Low, played by Tadgh Murphy, who offers a far more affecting threat than an anonymous British navy ship.
THE PACKAGE
The show looks great, transfer being of a high quality showcasing the dirt and grime of the era in detail. The only issues come in some of the scenes that are obviously using more CGI, the hi-def showing off the weakness of this aspect of the show in some washed out images.
The set contains all 10 episodes spread across 3 discs with a host of extras. In addition to a Ultraviolet copy, there are several episode commentaries from cast and crew and a number of featurettes that total a run time of about an hour. Inside The World Of Black Sails, The Man O’ War, Expanding Worlds, High Seas Action and History’s Influence touch on production, special effects, and set design as well as the incorporation of fictional and non-fictional elements to the show.
THE BOTTOM LINE
Overall Black Sails is a great looking show with a fantastic cast coupled to intriguing, adventurous, and at times brutal storytelling. It’s worth checking out, and this Blu-ray release offers the perfect opportunity to jump on board.
Black Sails: The Complete Second Season is available on DVD & Blu-ray November 3rd and returns for a third season January 2016.