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Oz: The Complete Third Season

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Finally, season 3 of OZ will be released early next year. This is by far the most fantastic tv show ever made. It's the best thing ever made.

If you're reading this, you've probably watched all seasons of OZ, or at least a few of them so I won't have to tell what it's all about. All I can say is, I'm in love with OZ. Tom Fontana is a genious, what he has created is magical, the characters are so alive and realistic, you feel for them, you start to love them no matter what crimes they've committed, you understand why they do what they do, you realize that everything they say and do is a part of survival, they have to survive in Em City, in OZ, no matter what it takes...

O'Reily, responsible for pretty much every murder in OZ, including the riot, Beecher, the extreme transformation, rivality with Schillinger and love for Chris Keller, Said, always keeping his faith, at least in this season, Hill, Rebadow, Schillinger, Adebisi, Pancamo..... I could go on and on.

My favorite characters of the inmates are Toby Beecher, Chris Keller - I find their love/hate relationship interesting. You don't have to put a label on it saying "Beecher and Keller are the two gay guys", it's far beyond that. As Tom Fontana said: "It's two men or two people struggling to find and maintain love in an environment that completely works against them." There are sad moments, good moments, Schillinger who constantly tries to get between them and destroy Beecher. And no matter what happens in Toby's and Chris's relationship, even if they're not together at the time, you know that they love each other, more than they'll ever love anybody.
Tobias "Toby" Beecher goes through the most extreme transformation I've ever laid my eyes on, it's amazing to watch him, from the beginning of his time in OZ until he finally makes his revenge on Schillinger in season 1, lands in the hole and comes out as a new man.
Chris Keller who first came to OZ as one of Schillinger's men, making friends with Toby, making Toby fall in love with him, then broke his bones and totally ruined everything they had togehter. And when Toby lands in the hospital, you see Chris back in their pod, his hands on Toby's bunk, touching Toby's pillow with a remorsefull look on his face - a 5 second sequence that makes me chill, no words can describe that scene.
In season 3 we follow his attempts to make Toby understand that he really does love him.
The chemistry between the actors, Lee Tergesen and Christopher Meloni, is brilliant, sparkling and convincing. And perhaps since they're good friends in reality, they know how to work so well together.

My other favorite is Ryan O'Reilly, the man nobody can trust. Always up to something and usually gets what he wants, O'Reilly is one of a kind. Played by Dean Winters, who I think is a very talented actor. The way I feel when I watch Winters is, he doesn't seem to be acting at all, and I mean that in a good way. He's tough, he's smart, he doesn't trust anyone, he is responsible for many of the murders commited in Em City, and since he's got a great brain he manages to stay out of trouble during the investigations. Also, there's not only a cold hearted side of O'Reilly. He backs up the weaker inmates, he stood by Beecher's side when he just got to Em City, and even though he made Beecher addicted to heroin, he was there when no one else was. And there's always Ryan's love for his brother Cyril, who he'd do anything for.

For the OZ fans that yet don't know - Season 4 will preliminary be out October 5 2004.

I don't spring for the pay channels, so I'm one of those that missed the show's entire run and only heard how great it was. I also heard how harsh it was, so when the DVD's started coming out I was hesitant to buy them, afraid that I'd hate the show and end up stuck with the DVD's. Luckily that wasn't the case. Yeah, it's harsh. VERY. But it's also one of the best-written shows I've seen in a long time. Beats the heck out of most network junk. I just wish the 'seasons' had been longer. I didn't want them to end. There's not a lot of extras on the DVD set, but I don't really mind that.

My request to HBO: get the DVD's out FASTER. Considering that each season is only 8 episodes, it's ridiculous that people have to wait so long between releases.

"Oz" is the BEST show on HBO. The writing is very sophisticated, the cast is superb, and the storyline is excellent.

I only have one problem. How come HBO is releasing this DVD series slower than a snail crawls across the road. Come on, HBO, if you can release "Sex and the City" and "Sopranos" faster than I can write this review, you, the people at HBO can certainly release "Oz" DVDs a bit faster!

..there were 6 seasons of Oz, only ending last year (2003). Each consisted of 8 episodes with the exception of the fourth season which was broken up in two parts and had 16 episodes in it. There were a total of 56 episodes. I'm personally glad they ended it when they did, as the plots were getting a little thinned out--they'd pretty much done all they could do with the series. What I'm not glad about is the frequency of the series being released to DVD. Every Sopranos season is already on DVD and they come out about six months after that season ends. With Oz we've had one DVD set per year for the past two years. Thankfully, they're releasing season four in November (?) I believe.

First of all, this review is really for the first three seasons of Oz, not just the first. I have to say that I never watched a single episode of Oz in its six year run on HBO. But one day at the video store, I couldn't find anything to rent, so I picked up a couple of discs of the first season of Oz. I was hooked within a couple of episodes. A story about life in a prison doesn't sound very entertaining, but it is. The cast is one of the biggest you'll see and since it's a prison, characters are getting added pretty much each episode while others exit from time to time (usually with the "help" of other prisoners). So it always seems to stay fresh for me.

The cast is a good one. Standouts for me are Lee Tergesen as Beecher, Chris Meloni as Keller, Eamonn Walker as Said, Terry Kinney as MacManus, Edie Falco (in a role she did before the Sopranos) as Wittlesey and the guy who plays Adebisi (won't even try to spell his name!) But the other cast members all seem to fit well and there are usually 4 to 5 stories going on at one time.

My only qualm about this show is that some of the story lines are just hard to believe. For example, if you were a female doctor at a prison and a prisoner fell in love with you and arranged to have your husband killed so that you would be free to give your affaction to the prisoner, would you still want to work at said prison? This doctor barely lets it bother her. There are many others that have made me say "Yeah, right", but all in all, the freshness makes it worth it.

I wish HBO would issue these shows faster.

In the third season of Oz the place has had a name change to Oswald State Correctional Facility and things are obviously coming to a head, although what the explosion will be and the final body count is up in the air. Gov. James Devlin (Zeljko Ivanek) is not around to cause as much trouble as usual, but not for lack of trying. A managed health care company is given control of Oz's infirmary to the detriment of Migeul Alvarez (Kirk Acevedo) and the disgust of Dr. Gloria Nathan (Lauren Velez). Meanwhile, Warden Leo Glynn (Ernie Hudson) is still trying to find out who assaulted his daughter and EM City Administrator Tim McManus (Terry Kinney) has caught the fancy of new corrections officer Claire Howell (Kristin Rohde). Another new C.O. is Clayton Hughes (Seth Gilliam), the son of a Oz guard who was killed on duty and died in Glynn's arms. But of course the real story here has to do with the inmates.

As I watched the power struggle on "Oz: The Complete Third Season" I kept thinking that the machinations among the inmates was like a metaphor for international politics. Vern Schillinger (J.K. Simmons) and Tobias Beecher (Lee Tergesen) are still trying to get the better of each other, but with Cyril O'Reily (Scott Winters) still having nightmares about being raped by Schillinger, Ryan O'Reily (Dean Winters) has his own plans for revenge. Kareen Said (Eamonn Walker) proves his power in Oz when he starts a hunger fast after McManus rejects his request for food in his cell while he fasts during the holy season. But the most dangerous one of all turns out to be the inmate everybody is dismissing as crazy, Simon Adebisi (Adewale Akinnouye-Agbaje), who finds a way to bring down Antonio Nappa (Mark Margolis) and is eyeing people even higher up the food chain. Meanwhile, prison psychiatrist Sister Peter Marie Reimondo (Rita Moreno)'s sessions with various prisoners, including Chris Keller (Chris Meloni), are having repercussions and the prison sponsored boxing tournament continues and you just know the finals are going to end badly.

For me the key character on "Oz" has always been Beecher because he was the one I most identified with at the start (i.e., the person who would be sent to prison and would be dead meat the minute he stepped through the gate). Of course, Beecher has gone places I would have never been able to go and the third season offers up some of the twists and turns we know to expect from the series as the character manages to go too far in two completely different directions. Meanwhile, McManus has become just another player in the big game, which is a major development because his character reflected what idealism there was in the Oz experiment (which is long gone by this point).

The third season is also marked by a more creative use of Augustus Hill (Harold Perrineau) as the show's narrator (my favorite was as pharaoh), which involves a bit more metaphor to go along with the necessary exposition. By now we are deep into this world and there are plans within plans within plans. Adding to the power of these stories is that by now you know that any of these characters could end up dead (I was going to say that this adds to the realism of "Oz," but with the body count from this season alone I would think that in the real world the warden and a lot of others would be long gone). With the completion of the third season, we are now halfway through the series. But it is a good thing that HBO is spacing out these seasons on DVD because you really need to spend some time in between to feel clean enough to want to descend back under the rainbow.

By the time the third season of HBO's highly volitale and excessively violent prison drama Oz debuted, it was clear that Tom Fontana and Barry Levinson had truly created something special. Not special in a way that other HBO series' like the Sopranos and Deadwood were, are, and have become; but something that makes this show compulsively addictive viewing. As the season begins, we find Beecher (Lee Tergesen) nursing injuries inflicted by Aryan Brotherhood leader Schillinger (J.K. Simmons), and a heart broken by the betrayal of Keller (Christopher Meloni). Meanwhile, Alvarez (Kirk Acevedo) seeks redemption after blinding a guard in the previous season, while Simon Adebisi (Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje) has a few tricks up his sleeve. Ryan O'Reilly (Dean Winters) has revenge on his mind after the rape of his brother Cyril (Scott William Winters) by Schillinger, while Kareem Said (Eamonn Walker) begins a hunger fast that proves to prison reform activist McManus (Terry Kinney) and warden Leo Glynn (Ernie Hudson) how powerful he really is. With all the different storylines going on, it should also be mentioned that there is a prison sponsored boxing tournament going on that you just know is going to end badly. The cast does nothing short of brilliant work, from Simmons, to Walker, to Akinnuoye-Agbaje, to the Winters brothers, to Kinney, to Rita Moreno; but where the show really shines is when it focuses on the bizarre, savage, yet somehow heart wrenching affair between Beecher (Tergesen) and Keller (Meloni). It's undoubtadly some of the best original material you'll ever see on HBO, just be warned if this is your first trip on the other side of the rainbow.

haven't seen the dvd's but I know the series is amazing, jaw-dropping (sometimes literally) thought-provoking and heart-wrenching. Also- the first kiss between Beecher and Keller may be the sexiest moment ever caught on film.

My main purpose of the review is to have people compare prices. Each individual dvd for seasons 1-3 is being sold by Amazon at $48.74 each. The 3 pack is being sold at $175 and change. Buying each one individually seems to be the better bargain.

Just a thought.

This season features the acting talents we have come to love in the Oz series. Racial relations have never looks worse than in this make believe prison. Tragedy befalls everyone, even the slightly more virtuous caretakers of the prisoners. The sad fact that they choose to come to the prison every day verses the prisoner locked in for crimes horrible and violent, makes their lives seem rather sad in themselves. Dean Winters still acts viciously, though with a stilted delivery, as the Iago of the Prison. Lee Tergesen, recovers and gets hurt and recovers while contributing/committing two murders. Beacher's slippery slope of ethics, gets worse, while Keller tries to regain his trust. Said's arcing story feels better this season because his pompous dialogue and rage against the system is toned down when he loses his control over the Muslims and "shockly" holds hands with a white girl. The obligatory season cliff hanger feels less like a cliff hanger than a nod to the fact that life goes on. Another riot is set to happen and we'll just have to get the forth season DVD set to find out what happens.

After a somewhat disappointing second season, Oz came back with a vengeance for its third go-round, finally making good on the promise of its excellent first season. The show does, as usual, contain its share of implausibilities (although not to the extent that the fourth season does), but its insight into people and the institutions they create, along with its odd mix of realism and sensationalism, more than make up for any gaps in credibility. Its murderer's row of a cast is in fine form once again, even with characters frequently coming and going, and the volatility of the characters and storytelling is, as usual, cranked to the max. The show's disturbing violence gained it a good deal of notoriety, and this season does feature some truly imaginative (and imaginatively filmed) murders, but the killings, maimings, and beatings are just one manifestation of its pedal-to-the-metal intensity and visceral impact.

Its intimate, pressure-cooker setting gives Oz an ideal platform for developing characters and constantly shifting interpersonal dynamics, and this season sees the further development of several lingering plotlines from the first two seasons, along with plenty of new shocks to be found. Essentially, Oz examines prison life from three perspectives-the groups that dominate life among the inmates, the unfortunate few who have to find a way to survive without the protection of a prominent organization, and the staff who have to try to keep a lid on everything-and all three end up getting plenty of attention this season. Fontana has said that Oz was intended to be a microcosm of the world at large, and this season certainly fulfills that goal, partly with its frequent and savage outbreaks of violence, but more in its penetrating examination of the varied and contradictory sides of human nature. Above all else, it's the self-contained universe Oz establishes that makes it such an addictive show-an environment where violence, greed, and racism are nothing less than survival mechanisms and anything even resembling a virtue can be turned into a weakness. In Oz, even a prison boxing tournament designed to provide the inmates with a release turns into the focus of endless intrigue and division, not to mention murder.

The third season's main focus, especially in its last few episodes, is on the mounting racial divisions in Oz, which are handled in a surprisingly organic manner, with a series of seemingly unrelated incidents serving to divide the inmates almost completely by skin tone. Naturally, the race-based tensions are exploited by the show's leading villains: Nigerian-born drug lord Simon Adebisi and Nazi hatemonger Vern Schillinger, both of whom belong in the hall of fame for memorably evil TV characters. Played in career-making fashion by Adewale Akkinuoye-Agbaje, who's as physically imposing as Shaq and a much better actor, Adebisi is a smirking, menacing presence, the sort of magnetic villain you can't help but enjoy watching even as his machinations reach new levels of deceit and depravity. For his part, the glowering, sadistic Schillinger always manages to couch his actions in the rhetoric of rightneousness, but he seems less concerned with improving the fortunes of the white race than with brutalizing and terrorizing any fellow inmates he sees fit, regardless of color. That said, J.K. Simmons always manages to make Schillinger believable and even occasionally human, never more so than when his son gets sent to Emerald City and quickly finds himself in over his head.

Now, since I'm not quite out of things to say, here are a few bullet points regarding this season:

-The second season established a set of fractured relationships among the inmates, but they're really developed to their fullest extent in the third season. Sometimes the show's plotlines can admittedly veer a bit into soap-opera territory, but in the most compelling character arcs-the ongoing comingling of love, distrust, and violence between Beecher and Keller; Ryan O'Reilly's stewardship of his brain-damaged brother, which walks a fine line between protection and exploitation; and of course the severed bond between Schillinger and his son-there's a rawness to the emotions of those involved that few shows can match.

-It's on this season that Kareem Said becomes a pantheon TV character, right up there with the likes of Tony Soprano and Vic Mackey. Said was a fierce, galvanizing figure from the show's beginning, and as the third season progresses it reveals more of the internal conflicts and unshakable convictions that end up costing him dearly even among the other Muslims. Eammon Walker really gets inside Said's character this season, lending him new levels of complexity with practically every facial expression and line of dialogue, turning Said into a figure who's unflinchingly principled but far from bloodless or unrelatable.

-In spite of all the betrayal, murder, and everything else, it's not all doom and gloom in Oz. As in real life, there is the occasional tender moment, such as elderly lifer Rebadow finally getting to meet his grandson, and loads of offbeat humor, especially with the introduction of children's TV host and inmate lust object Miss Sally. Plus there's the ongoing saga of creepy death-row inmate Shirley Bellinger, which adds little to the show but does take some interesting twists towards season's end.

And yeah, that's pretty much it. If you liked the first two seasons of Oz, the third season offers everything that was good about them and plenty more. All fans of fierce, intelligent TV owe it a look.