I picked Roswell up for 20quid in HMV because I knew I had nothing better to do than watch tv on bank holiday monday. I quite enjoyed watching the series right up until the last ten minutes or so of the final episode when the exposition became rather silly.

The concept is fun, Romeo and Juliet with species rather than families being the separator. However like with Romeo and Juliet, the love-struck pair are fairly insipid and irritating and it’s the sidekicks that make the series better. While I find Michael, Isabel and Maria interesting and diverse characters, I find Liz overly whiny and Max just plain boring. Alex and Kyle had the potential to be interesting but they were ridiculously underused, really not appearing in enough episodes to rate more than recurring slots. The sheriff continually stole the show by being the grown up, both in terms of acting and, towards the end of the season at least, by being most sensible.

It’s a fun spin on the US high-school standards, although there’s a noticeable lack of much school work. The setting is well used, the Crashdown diner and UFO centre fitting well into the Roswell mythos and the scenes in the desert are often beautiful. I think the only real let down in the series are the lead characters, particularly Max, who just seems content to amble along.

DVD Special Features
There’s an entertaining selection of commentaries, which avoid becoming repetitive by each covering different areas – direction, writing, plots and acting are all covered. Be warned though the actors give away some spoilers for season 2. The featurettes are also interesting, particularly the interview with the original creators of the books the series is based on.