STUDIO: Paramount
RELEASE DATE: May 6, 2008
STARRING: Joel Gretsch, Jacqueline McKenzie, Patrick Flueger, Megalyn Echikunwoke, Conchita Campbell, Chad Faust, and Billy Campbell
CREATED BY: Scott Peters and Rene Echevarria
FEATURES: "The Great Leap Forward" (Director's Cut)
"Season IV: Factions at War"
"Jordan Collier: The Grey Man"
Season IV: Blooper Reel
Audio Commentaries
Deleted Scenes

It turns out that not ALL characters are welcome at USA any more. The number one network on cable and one of the few success stories in TV anywhere in 2008 saw an opportunity in the writer's strike and they cleared house of two of their more in-decline series, The 4400 and The Dead Zone. The once-fascinating The 4400 had grown a little stale by season four (and that's coming from someone who was once a hardcore fan) and with more adult-skewing (meaning less science fiction) shows like Monk, Psych, Burn Notice, and The Starter Wife breaking records, the strike was an easy time to say goodbye to Tom Baldwin, Jordan Collier, and the rest of the gang on The 4400.

I'll gladly vent about the amount of series that were canceled too soon from Carnivale to Jericho, but the cancellation of The 4400 (and its partner, The Dead Zone) made complete sense. Both once-promising shows had faltered in recent years with DZ spinning its wheels and 4400 not being able to grip the road, adding characters, plotlines, and cliffhangers without really resolving anything. The revolving door of a cast in the last two seasons was ridiculous and as soon as the writers would come up with an interesting plot thread, they'd drop it in favor of something new. If I didn't know what this show was once capable of in its prime and only tuned in for season four or bought the new DVD, I would have canceled it too. Having said that, I do hope the writers and cast come together for a rumored series of either cable or straight-to-DVD movies to tie up loose ends. With a known end-point in sight, I have a feeling those movies could be the best moments in the series' history.

If you already bought the first three seasons of The 4400, you simply have to close our your collection with the fourth. You're not a good TV-on-DVD collector if you don't. Paramount throws the final 13 episodes on four discs (begging the question why they couldn't squeeze them on to three but why quibble?) The video, in anamorphic widescreen, is a bit disappointing, showing more grain and dull spots in the dark shades than should really be acceptable, particularly for a show more likely to appeal to technophiles than, say, Army Wives. The sound is similarly dissatisfying with some of the dialogue coming out muffled. The 4400 should look and sound gorgeous on DVD to try and escape its basic cable budgetary trappings and it's a shame that Paramount didn't see that when they put together this technical treatment.

As they have in seasons past, Paramount does assemble a very nice collection of special features for 4400 fans, although none of it reflects the cancellation the way fans would hope that it would. If you're hoping that the director's cut of the finale ties up loose ends and concludes the series, you must remember that the team behind The 4400 thought the show was coming back for a fifth season when the episode was produced. What Season Four does include are several interesting deleted scenes and featurettes along with commentaries on a few episodes, including the director's cut of the finale. The special features, like the show itself and the average technical transfer, add to the competent package for last season of The 4400 but, like the cliffhanger that ended the show, let's all hope there's more life to this series on DVD and that this isn't the final word. Everyone involved deserves better. Especially the fans.