Dawson's Creek is a teenage melodrama that comes off a bit too fictional for me. I reviewed the fourth season and found it to be fairly entertaining, enough that I had trouble setting it down, but not enough to make me want to watch the entire season again. For those unfamiliar with the series, please refer to my season four review. This fifth season moves ahead in a much different light than season four and tends to be even more dramatic. For some television dramas that can be a good thing, because it hooks its viewers with intrinsic and intriguing stories. Unfortunately, this is not the case with season five of The Creek. In fact season five gets a little too melodramatic and tends to move far from reality. Quite frankly, I found it was hard to stomach in large doses.

In comparison to the earlier seasons of the series, season five starts off very different. In the end of season four, Dawson and all of his friends graduated from high school. Dawson was able to pursue his dream at the USC film school, while everyone else stayed in Massachusetts to go to college in the Boston area. The change of setting becomes a big change in season five, but at the same time, it is not much of a change. The reason is despite Dawson is on the west coast, he finds several reasons to find his way back to his friends in Boston. The ending effect, the change from high school to college makes very little impact upon the show, which I think could have been an interesting dynamic. Instead the show flows similar to the past season, but gets a lot more dramatic and quite unreal.

The season opens with Dawson in California and he had to break a promise to Joey. He was supposed to visit her for the weekend. The story then becomes about their relationship and the two finally realizing that maybe they are not meant to be. Eventually, Dawson ends up living between Capeside and Boston, but of course, not until after a very tragic event that rocks the world of The Creek. In the end, the entire cast is brought back together, despite their very different paths in life.

In a way the season starts to become slightly odd, because some old friendships and relationships are brought back to life and past regressions are dismissed and ignored. I, for one, would think a few of the characters in the series would not be as chummy as they constantly are, i.e. the Pacey, Joey, and Dawson love triangle from season three and four. There are also some relationships that take a turn for the worst. Jen and Dawson start dating, which pretty much kills any chance of Joey and Dawson being together. Jen and Jack's Will & Grace-like relationship goes haywire when he joins a fraternity. Jack himself becomes a bit of an ass, which is slightly odd because he becomes what he never wanted to be. The season also has a new character Audrey (Busy Philipps). She is Joey's college roommate and she repeatedly makes an appearance as a loud, obnoxious, spoiled brat that you can't help but like.

As mentioned, the relationships the characters develop and endure in this season are constantly full of nonstop drama. I found it very hard to appreciate or even accept. The relationships were off base and didn't seem to fit on a realistic scale. In effect, the overly dramatic tone became a little too much to handle. At times, I had to take long breaks. Something else that adds to making the series unrealistic is the dialogue. I made a similar compliant in my season four review. The cast typically speaks in a mannerism that is far too mature for the roles they are filling. And the oddest part is that their action rarely back up that maturity. Typically, a character or two will do some pretty stupid things, but speak like a wise old man.

Overall, I wasn't nearly as entertained with this season as I was with season four. I feel the overly dramatic tone did not fit very well and the characters and setting did not work. This season is clearly a sign that it started to head down hill. This season box set is probably best reserved for the fans.

The DVD

Video:
The video is given in its original television aspect ratio 1.33:1 full frame color. The picture quality probably could have been a little better. There's a noticeable grain in the picture. There are a total of 23 episodes that are spread across 4 DVD-9s, with six episodes crammed on three of the discs and one with five episodes. As a result, the picture quality suffers slightly from problems associated with video compression. There are also some points during the episode that have low frame rates and slight color distortions. However, the problematic issues seem fairly rare, with the exception of the grain in the picture. In comparison to other TV on DVD releases, the quality looks fairly average and is easily viewable.

Audio:
The audio track in this DVD release comes in English 2.0 Dolby digital stereo sound. It's your basic TV on DVD release audio track. It's fairly flat, because it consists mostly of dialogue. The music comes off fairly rich. The sound quality is very clear, with no noticeable flaws. Overall, it sounds great for this release, much better than broadcast or cable television. However, at the end of the fifth episode, the music gets distorted, with an awful crackling noise. There are subtitles in the Portuguese and Spanish languages. As well, this release is closed captioned enabled for the hearing impaired.

Extras:
Unlike previous DVD releases, this season release has no extras supplied with it.

Final Thoughts:
Dawson's Creek is not what I would consider to be good television. The series has a very strong melodramatic approach, which sometimes works. However most of the time it does not work well. This fifth season was a good indication of how a television season can be entertaining, yet at the same time slightly repulsive. I enjoyed my season four experience, but season five was a lot of work to get through. I think this season is best reserved for the fans. However, the show is not completely terrible. In small doses it works. I think for everyone, except the fans, this could make a decent rental.