DVD Giveaway - Good Hair
Ends Feb 14, 2010
Chris Rock visits beauty salons and hairstying battles, scientific laboratories and Indian temples to explore the way hairstyles impact the black community. |
CD Giveaway - Rebecca Rippy, "Telling Stories"
Ends Feb 14, 2010
This North Carolina based Americana singer/songwriter has assembled a collection of what she considers to be her most personal material to date. Enter our contest for your chance to hear Rebecca Rippy Telling Stories! |
|
|
DVD Review: Kyle XY - The Complete First Season - Declassified
by R.J. Carter
Published: May 22, 2007
|
|
Rating: 
Country: USA
Release Date: May 22, 2007
Distributor: Buena Vista Home Entertainment
Cast:
· Matt Dallas
· Marguerite MacIntyre
· Bruce Thomas
· April Matson
· Jean-Luc Bilodeau
· Chris Olivero
· Kirsten Prout
· Nicholas Lea
Related Sites:
· IMDb: Kyle XY
Grade: A-
|
|
Somewhere in the woods outside of Seattle, a teenaged boy wakes up, naked and without any memories. Even the most basic of life experiences are alien to him -- things like eating and excreting. He has no speech. So naturally when he wanders into town, he's arrested and placed into a juvenile detention facility.
It is here that the boy -- dubbed Kyle (Matt Dallas) by one of the security guards -- comes to the notice of clinical psychologist Nicole Trager (Marguerite MacIntyre), who is intrigued not only by his amnesia, but by his generally exhibited brightness and aptitude for picking things up quickly.
And lets not forget the total absence of a bellybutton.
Having seen Kyle wake up, sans navel, and almost immediately exhibit an ability of dominion over the animals, it would be easy to believe God just got bored and went back into the spontaneous creation business again. Other people come up with other theories. Nicole's son, Josh (Jean-Luc Bilodeau), for instance, believes Kyle to be an alien, and does his best -- in his own Bud Bundy style -- to acclimate Kyle to life on Earth. Nicole's daughter Lori (April Matson), on the other hand, only sees Kyle as her mother's new pet project to be embarrassed about. More important to Lori is discarding her unwanted virginity to high school jock Declan (Chris Olivero).
The Wonder of it All. Kyle (Dallas) views the world with
the innocence and awe of the newly born.
|
Kyle's stay with the Tragers was only intended to be a temporary thing. Soon, however, even Nicole's husband Stephen (Bruce Thomas) doesn't mind having the young man around -- especially when his savant-like skills help Stephen rescue a customer's hard drive. Kyle makes a duplicate of the drive by watching the hexadecimal characters scroll by, then retyping them into another PC. Later, when Stephen has to take Kyle to work with him, a broken server is dismantled by Kyle -- to everyone's horror -- then reassembled, working, with design improvements, within a matter of just a few minutes.
The makers of Kyle XY have succeeded in creating a character who is eccentric, with a history (such as it is) full of intriguing clues and symbols. After ten days without sleeping, Kyle finally learns how to slow his mind down and relax -- but he can only do it by curling up in an empty bathtub; for some reason, it feels right. A night spent watching Kung Fu movies leaves him with some wicked martial arts moves and a smattering vocabulary of perfect Chinese. However, as smart as he is in these areas, he doesn't understand other things. Like the physical manifestations his pubescent body goes through when in close contact to the girl next door, Amanda (Kirsten Prout). Or why people lie.
My birth was unconventional at best.
Kyle (Matt Dallas)
|
The series has a very X Files feel about it -- bolstered by the regular appearance of X Files alum Nicholas Lea skulking about in the shadows. His character -- Tom Foss -- clearly knows more about Kyle than anybody else, but we're left to wonder until the very end whether Foss is the big bad or a guardian angel. And Kyle very much needs a guardian angel -- because there exists an agency that is very much looking for him. And the police are trying to tie him to a murder investigation -- and Kyle has been drawing photo-realistic pictures of the victim from his dreams.
As much as I enjoyed this series, when watched in its entirety it's easy to pick on some inconsistencies. One episode is devoted entirely to enrolling Kyle in school. The placement tests begin with history -- just the thing to give an amnesiac kid, a test all about names and dates he's never heard of. As Kyle learns to misinterpret the meaning of the school bells, he wanders into the cafeteria, makes a friend with a social outcast, and encounters the World Book Encyclopedia -- which he spends the rest of the afternoon reading. And he manages to wander into an advanced mathematics class between sessions and solve the year-long bonus problem written on the board, astounding the teacher. When the principal finally catches up to Kyle, there are 30 minutes left to the testing period -- only now Kyle knows the answers, and he finishes an entire day's testing with a perfect score. And the mathematics teacher can't wait to begin working with Kyle.
Goodbye. The Tragers and Declan watch as Kyle's family
drives away with him.
(L-R: Bilodeau, Matson, Olivero, MacIntyre, Thomas)
|
I say all that to say this: after setting up such an elaborate episode to create a new environment for Kyle... we never see him go to school again. So why go to all that bother, with all the interesting characters and infinite array of new social situations to put Kyle into? It's something you don't really notice until looking at the series as a whole, retrospectively. However, it's not enough to ruin my enjoyment of this very intriguing ABC Family show. The run of the season concludes by wrapping up several of the big questions just in time to open up some even bigger questions that lead us into the second season.
Bonus features on this boxed set include commentary on the pilot episode with Matt Dallas, Eric Bress, David Himelfarb and Julie Plec. Episode four also has an audio track with Dallas, Plec, and April Matson. The third disc of this three-disc set also includes an eighteen minute documentary, "Kyle Declassified", the first half of which is a condensed look at the first season, followed by interview comments with the cast about what is coming up in the second season. True Kyle-philes will be thrilled to also find here an alternate "Pilot" episode, and an extended version of the season cliffhanger, "Endgame".
Audio is available in English or Spanish, with optional subtitling in English, Spanish or French.
Previews on this set include "Ratatouille", Scrubs - The Complete Fifth Season, and a montage advert for ABC Family, including a sneak peek at Fallen.
Kyle XY
The Complete First Season: Declassified
|
|
Disc 1
|
Disc 2
|
01. Pilot
- commentary with Matt Dallas, Eric Bress, David Himelfarb and Julie Plec
02. Sleepless in Seattle
03. The Lies That Bind
04. Diving In
- commentary with Matt Dallas, April Matson and Julie Plec
|
05. This is Not a Test
06. Blame it on the Rain
07. Kyle Got Game
08. Memory Serves
|
|
Disc 3
|
|
09. Overheard
10. Endgame
Special Features:
- alternate Pilot episode
- extended Endgame episode
- "Kyle Declassified" (18:03)
|
|
|
|
