MacGyver: The Complete First Season (Blu-Ray)

Blu-Ray Reviews | Nov 16th, 2018

MacGyver Season 1
Image used with permission for review purposes.

Starring: Richard Dean Anderson, Dana Elcar, Bruce McGill, Teri Hatcher
Created By: Lee David Zlotoff
Studio: Paramount / CBS
Buy On Amazon.com

The (original) man with the swiss army knife, a pack of gum and a duct tape has made his debut on Blu-Ray. If you already own Season 1 on DVD, well time for an upgrade because this is worth the purchase!

I’ve already reviewed this season on DVD back in 2005 but it was great to re-watch the show again. It’s been on Netflix but nothing like this. This has to be one of the best remastering for a show in the 80s that I’ve seen. I really hope Paramount continues this for the rest of the seasons but for their other shows as well, like for Wings. Another Paramount/CBS show that I absolutely love. The Blu-Ray video quality for this is so sharp, I keep forgetting that this was from the 80s. Sometimes there’s noticeable grain or something from the original film but for the most part, this restoration is really great. Of course it would be nice having this in widescreen but the show was never shot that way.

The one negative of having this show be so crisp and clear now is how awful some of these green screen shots look now. In episode 6 (“Trumbo’s World”), he’s riding a boat with a guy on it and it looks really bad. Like college kids learning final cut pro for the first time bad. You can pick out stunt men pretty easily too and even in episode 8 (“Hellfire”), you can see someone pushing over a box of explosives in slow-mo as the wood cabin thing explodes. Hilarious stuff. That’s still part of the allure of MacGyver though. Watching these obviously outdated shows and still enjoying the hell out of the episodes. I tried to watch an episode of the new show and I just can’t get over it that it’s not the same thing as this.

Sadly, there’s no extras on this Blu-Ray set, just like the DVDs. I also wish there was a digital HD code for this Blu-Ray set, considering that is a digital standard. Maybe they will save that for the next re-mastering format? Then again, Paramount isn’t apart of the Movies Anywhere agreement right now so you wouldn’t be able to watch on all platforms. But that’s for another discussion on another day. At least they should have done some type of retrospective of MacGyver with cast members and crew?

If you loved MacGyver back in the day and still do, then this set is for you. Ditch the first season DVD and upgrade to this. MacGyver hasn’t look any better than it does on Blu-Ray! I just hope Paramount sees this through and completes the Blu-Ray seasons to the end…and add Wings to the mix for Blu-Rays next too!

Features:
None

Video:
Resolution: 1080p
Aspect ratio: 1.33:1
Original aspect ratio: 1.33:1

Audio:
English: Dolby Digital Mono (192kbps)
French: Dolby Digital Mono
German: Dolby Digital Mono

Subtitles:
English SDH, French, German

Bottom Line: Excellent remastering of MacGyver’s first season
Running Time: 1045 mins
Rating: NR
Extras Rating:
Overall Rating:

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