21 Jump Street Season One

The teen cop drama that you fell in love with in the 80’s is back in this newly released box set.

Officer Tom Hanson (Johnny Depp) is right out of the academy and finding the beat tough and full of cops that don’t think he can handle himself, but when the rookie cop finds himself in an altercation that leaves his partner with the loss of his trust and a broken nose, Hanson is placed into the Undercover Unit at Jump St, specializing in youth crime. With his new team consisting of Penhall (Peter DeLuise) Hoffs (Holly Robinson) Ioki (Dustin Nguyen) and their captain, Richard Jenko (Frederic Forrest) the unit is secretly placed in school after school uncovering drug deals, prostitution, hate crimes and arson. 

This is probably one the best series to come out of the eighties it spawned the careers of its main cast and was the first appearances of many others including, Jason Presley (90210) and Josh Brolin (MIB 3).  

21 Jump Street, season one, still holds up over the years, other than the fashion, the story lines contained in the series are still found written all over today’s news headlines. This gritty teen cop drama was well ahead of its time, there was nothing else like Jump St on TV, especially nothing that deals with such things like drugs, rape, murder and prostitution. I think that’s why its first few season were so popular, it was cool to watch. 

Johnny Depp was obviously its draw card, just about to hit the big time. The series gave him a boost as a teen idol, something he never wanted and hence the reason why, as the series went on past season 3 he became less and less involved, eventually being released from his contract and leaving the show by the end of season 4. But we are getting ahead of ourselves here. In season one Depp is at the top of his game, his charisma and attitude sells the show.  

One episode in particular that I rated above the others was “Gotta finish the riff”. The episode dealt with the death of the original Captain, Richard Jenko (before being replaced by Captain Fuller - Steven Williams) and a gang terrorising a local school and setting up a hostage situation. It’s one of the first episodes that really showed the true potential of 21 Jump Street as an ongoing series. The budget seemed higher, the action and suspense more intense. It was as if the series had a massive over haul for the better.

The video quality of the DVD Release seemed well below par, the colours are washed out and the DVD lacks the option of changing the aspect ratio to its original 4:3 ratio, meaning everything looks stretched. It’s almost as if the series was transferred directly from a VHS on to a DVD. 

The audio is roughly the same, but that I will blame that on the decade it was created in as they lacked stereo audio. 

The DVD also lacks any special features, which is a real shame as I know other releases of the same series have included interviews, commentaries and behind the scenes featurettes. 

While the show is amazing for its time, this DVD release lacks the quality and features that are readily available.