DVD Review: What About Brian The Complete Series

It seems the creators of Alias and Lost have fallen into a rut with the first being over and a scheduled ending in sight for the second. Unfortunately, What About Brian fell into that rut.

What About Brian is about a circle of ridiculously attractive friends and their problems. Brian love Marjorie and she might love him, but she’s engaged to Brian’s best friend Adam. Brian’s sister Nicole is trying to get pregnant but something tragic also happens. Their friends Dave and Deena tried to have an open marriage and now have to figure out how to handle the fall-out from that. Oh wait, they also have some friends, Ivy and Jimmy, who are secretly rich but hiding it.

The entire series of What About Brian is 24 episodes with the five-episode first season and an additional 19 for the second season. The core of the cast included Barry Watson (7th Heaven), Matthew Davis, Sarah Lancaster (Everwood), Rosanna Arquette, Rick Gomez (Band of Brothers), and Amanda Detmer (Boys and Girls). While the characters were interesting in and of themselves, they failed to carry the show. Without further development, What About Brian seemed to end up unrealistic with pretty people living in pretty homes with seemingly pretty problems that made the characters too hard to identify with to make the show appointment viewing. The show was pleasant; it just sort of got boring.

Figuring out where the Bonus Features were wasn’t as easy as most DVD sets since they weren’t listed on the cases of the DVDs along with which episodes are on each disc, but like most DVD sets they are on the last disc. The first is an unaired episode that was originally meant to be the last one of the first season. There is also a featurette is called “Calling All Friends: The Story of What About Brian” and is a behind the scenes look at the series from the eyes of the cast and crew. The last featurette is “What About 3: The Season That Never Was” giving a glimpse into what might have happened if the series had been around for a third season.

And last there is the Audio Commentary with writer/director Dana Stevens for the last episode of the series. The commentary is interesting in giving more insight on how the season changed with news that it was being cut to 19 episodes from the original 22 ordered and looking in hindsight that it is in fact the last episode of the series.

The series is presented in Widescreen format, enhanced for 16:9 televisions. What About Brian is in English Dolby Digital 5.1 with options for French and Spanish subtitles.

Ultimately, What About Brian wasn’t perfect television, but nothing was really wrong with the show either. It’s a charming look at friends and love, even if it isn’t all that realistic. The DVDs are certainly worth watching if you haven’t seen the show and want to watch a sweet, syrupy drama.