Michael Stonebridge (Philip Winchester), Damien Scott (Sullivan Stapleton), and new boss (of Section 20) Rachel Dalton (Rhona Mitra) scour Africa for some stolen nuclear triggers taken by Knox (Charles Dance), a supposed man of peace and a man of influence.   They face obstacles from the South African government, other governments, the CIA, and mercenaries hired by Knox as they race to stop nuclear weapons getting into the wrong hands like a terrorist or a third world country.   Stonebridge complicates the mission due to wanting revenge on Craig Hanson who killed someone close to Stonebridge.   STRIKE BACK is a thrilling action series than reminds me of other action thrillers like 24 and SOF: SPECIAL OPS FORCE/ SOLDIER OF FORTUNE.   South Africa works as a great shooting location for this series while Rhona Mitra proves she can be a beautiful bad ass.   Section 20 knows how to be mobile and I loved how this British special ops force could be mobile and still be resourceful when their resources could be limited.  Every character has their emotional scars and pasts.   Scott has a twisted relationship with a female CIA agent who promises him that he can go home to the USA without consequences.  The season long story format works for STRIKE BACK like 24 episodes worked for one day on 24.  A great cast play characters you either want to watch as you wait to see how each cliffhanger ending will get resolved.  I can’t wait for season 3 on blu-ray (actually it is season 4 and season 2 of Cinemax is season 3 since there was one season of STRIKE BACK before Cinemax picked up the show).   I just wish they re-release Cinemax Season 1 at a lower price point instead dof the highly priced Blu-ray/ DVD combo pack.

SPECIAL FEATURES:

Audio commentaries for episodes 14,15, 18, 20 with actor Philip Winchester, actor Sullivan Stapleton, director Julian Holmes, Lyne Renee, director Michael J Bassett, and Shane Taylor

I wish they had some making-of featurettes that go behind-the-scenes instead of the audio commentaries.

Digital Copy for all episodes included in this set which you go online to hboselect.com to download.

FINAL ANALYSIS:  STRIKE BACK is full of lots of action and provides enough cliffhangers to get you hooked to see the next episode.  It makes me want to go check out the season before this one as I can’t wait for Cinemax Season 3 comes out on Blu-ray.

This review is (c)8-30-2013 David Blackwell and cannot be reprinted without permission.  Send all comments to feedback@enterline-media.com

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