Longmire Season 1

DVD Wholesale Quick Overview:

Longmire, is another Columbo/ Sherlock Holmes! He always gets his man/woman. Netflix, has a hit here. To bad they are giving it the ax after 6 seasons. Contact Netflix, and give Your opinion on their cancellation. But sadly, it happens to all great epics!If You haven’t seen this series, do yourself a favor, and give it a view. You won’t be disappointed! My only beef is they only around12 episodes per season.-R P.

Watch this one! You will get hooked! Walt Longmire, played with perfection by rugged Australian Robert Taylor, is an honorable, somewhat spiritual man, filling the difficult job of policing a large, rural county. He is a lonely soul, shattered by the death of his wife, holding together mainly for the sake of his daughter (Cassidy Freeman) and out of a sense of responsibility. He gets through it all by re-reading the classics, drinking beer, and clashing with his loud-mouthed, hot-tempered, female Deputy (Katee Sackoff), his up-and-coming Deputy and competitor (Bailey Chase), and untried young Ferg (Adam Bartley). Ruby (Louanne Stephens) is the mother figure, running the office, and trying to keep everyone organized. Walt cares deeply about all of the members of his team, but would never admit it. Longmire is not a shoot-first type of cop, and is quite likely to use his fists in the process of keeping order in Absaroka County. His best friend, Northern Cheyenne tribal member, Henry Standing Bear, (Lou Diamond Phillips), helps to keep Walt centered, and acts as liaison with the Cheyenne culture encompassed by Walt’s county. Zahn McClarnon plays the Cheyenne police chief, often in conflict with Walt, and A. Martinez, Gerald McRaney and Graham Greene are the very fascinating and complex bad guys. Many fine Native American and Latino actors guest star.The story lines deal with realistic problems in thoughtful ways, and the writing is outstanding. The directing, cinematography and score are terrific. Beautiful New Mexico mountains and prairie substitute for rural Wyoming, the setting of Craig Johnson’s very popular books, upon which the series is based.

-ann a.

The Rocky Mountain West, including Wyoming, is a unique part of the country. It isn’t the Midwest, and it isn’t even remotely like the West Coast. Here, for better or worse, the old mountain man ethos lives on–the rugged individual, fighting alone, up against Nature Red in Tooth and Claw. The worst teeth and claws, though, belong to fellow humans.

Sheriff Walt Longmire is feeling a little old and tired, and he’s still grieving his wife’s death, but he keeps on because he’s driven to fight those evils and to protect the young, the weak, the vulnerable. His best friend, Henry Standing Bear, is a Cheyenne who owns and runs a bar–the Red Pony–out on the border of the rez. Henry keeps well in touch with his spiritual roots, and his laconic but peppery advice keeps Walt in line.

Then there’s Walt’s grown daughter Cady, a lovely–and pretty hot–lawyer; there’s Branch, the handsome, up-and-coming deputy who wants Walt’s job; there’s Victoria Moretti, the blonde, no-nonsense deputy from Philadelphia Walt trusts, and The Ferg, who is also a deputy and would like to be a good one when he grows up; there’s Ruby, the office manager who keeps him tethered to the community no matter how far he wanders into the wilderness of mountains or his own mind–the list of great secondary characters goes on and on.

The Western natural settings are authentic (though not actually shot in Wyoming), and the brooding wide open spaces join the cast in creating stories that blend the recent half-civilized past with the not-quite-civilized present. The actors are well-chosen for their parts, especially Robert Taylor as Walt, Lou Diamond Phillips as Henry, and Bailey Chase as Branch, and they all do a stellar job of portraying their characters. The dialog is NOT crisp–we westerners don’t talk that way–it’s real and telling.

If you like stories about the genuine contemporary West, or if you like character-driven mysteries, you will love these episodes. My only criticism, the eternal caveat of a reader, is that the filmed stories are not as good as the books that inspired them, even though author Craig Johnson was a close adviser. Enjoy the television episodes–and then find Johnson’s terrific books to really enter Walt’s world and get to know him and the other characters.

– Longtime Romantic

DVD Wholesale Main Features:

Actors: Robert Taylor, Lou Diamond Phillips, Katee Sackhoff, Cassidy Freeman
Writers: Craig Johnson
Producers: Greer Shephard, Michael M. Robin, Hunt Baldwin, John Coveny
Format: AC-3, Color, Dolby, NTSC, Subtitled, Widescreen
Language: English (Dolby Digital 5.1)
Subtitles: Spanish, Portuguese, French
Subtitles for the Hearing Impaired: English
Aspect Ratio: 1.77:1
Number of discs: 2
Studio: Warner Home Video
DVD Release Date: May 28, 2013
Run Time: 440 minutes