As a fan, it's nice to see Fox continue to preserve the X-Files seasons on the DVD format. Season Five originally aired in 1997-1998, and it's a real treat to be able to see them again in their original order and in widescreen, a first for the series. The mythology of the show is especially important to the X-Files and it is further explored in this season. Much of it becomes vital to fully understanding the plot twists in later seasons and the movie.

Episodes on the first disc reviewed here are: Redux, Redux II, Unusual Suspects, and Detour, though all twenty episodes are included in the box set.

Picture:
X-Files: Season Five is presented in 1.78:1 anamorphic widescreen. The transfers for all the episodes are clean, with no scratches, dirt, or marks to be found. However, there is some noticeable grain, though it is, for the most part, slight. Compression artifacts and edge enhancement are rare, but visible on occasion. Colors are well saturated throughout, with very few instances of smearing or bleeding, and flesh tones are natural. Blacks are mostly deep, detailed, and rich, though shadow delineation is a bit wanting in a few episodes.

Sound:
X-Files: Season Five is presented in Dolby Stereo Surround 2.0 in either English or French. The dialogue throughout the shows is crisp and clean with no distortion. Surrounds are active throughout, especially considering it's a television show, and the score, by Mark Snow, is fantastic. Subtitles in English and Spanish are also available.

Extras:
Since the sixth disc is home to almost all of the extras in the collection, we'll start there.

First up is the The Truth About Season Five, a continuation of the previous featurettes included in the first four seasons. A little shorter this time than the one included with Season Four, it runs about twenty minutes in length and features interviews with Chris Carter, Kim Manners, Paul Rabwin, R.W. Goodwin, Frank Spotnitz, Vince Gilligan, Daren Morgan, Dean Haglund, Veronica Cartwright, and Mimi Rogers. The participants talk about several episodes in particular, these being: Kill Switch, Unusual Suspects, Christmas Carol, Emily, Patient X, Post-Modern Prometheus, and The End. They also discuss how Season Five was the last to be shot in Vancouver and how the plot for Season Five had to be planned to tie into the movie, which had already been filmed.

Next, and probably the best extra in any of The X-Files Season Sets so far, is Inside the X-Files, a television special from 1998 that runs about forty-five minutes in length. It features interviews with almost every principal actor from the first five seasons, such as Duchovny, Anderson, Pileggi, Davis, Lea, Hardin, Williams, Holden, Haglund, Braidwood, Harwood, and Thompson. Carter is also present. The participants spend a great deal of time explaining the characters, recapping the important events from the first five seasons, exploring the mythology, and tying some of the revelations together. There are also some deleted scenes and bloopers.

Then we have X-Files: Behind the Scenes or, as it is titled in the menu, Season Five Featurette. This is entirely promotional and runs about three minutes in length. Basically, it is a commercial for Season Five and features lots of clips, as well as a few interview tidbits with Carter and Duchovny.

Also included are eleven short Behind the Truth segments that aired originally on the F/X network, each of which covers a specific topic. These are fairly interesting, as they mention things not covered elsewhere. Six deleted scenes are also present, which have optional commentary with Carter. Episodes that have deleted scenes are: Christmas Carol, Red and the Black, Post-Modern Prometheus (2), and All Souls (2). Then we have eight Special Effects Sequences with commentary by Paul Rabwin. These offer some insight into how they accomplished a few of the special effects in these episodes: Folie A Deux, Patient X, Red and the Black, Travelers, All Souls, Emily, and Chinga. Ten and twenty-second TV spots for each of the twenty episodes are also included.

However, not all the extras are on the sixth disc. Continuing the tradition of seasons three and four, two episodes again have screen-specific audio commentaries. Chris Carter comments on The Post-Modern Prometheus and John Shiban comments on The Pine Bluff Variant. A few of the episodes have International Clips, which allows the viewer to see brief sections of the episode in a foreign tongue. And the deleted scenes mentioned above are also available on the disc that has the episode, though the optional commentaries with Carter are only available on Disc Six.

DVD-Rom features include the interactive game Earthbound and a weblink to the X-Files webpage.

Summary:
Though Season Five runs six discs and not seven, like the previous sets, the MSRP remains a high $149.98. However, Season Five is the first to present the long-running series in anamorphic widescreen, which adds immensely to the presentation. Add that to the inclusion of some great extras, capped by the terrific Inside the X-Files featurette from 1998, and a purchase is hard to resist, despite the price. Highly Recommended.