Travis Pastrana is a whirling dervish of activity - In fact, I'm convinced that the phrase "adrenaline junkie" was created just for him as he started to leave his mark in the X Games industry - He's willing to try anything. He cut his teeth on motorcycles, did back flips in mid-air, and is widely regarded as legendary in freestyle motocross. He's become an accomplished driver of rally cars, winning four consecutive Rally America titles. With some of his friends, he's been doing stunts as part of the Fuel TV show Nitro Circus for a couple of years, but this is the first season that it's been on MTV.

For those unfamiliar, the show features Pastrana and some of his friends as they perform a variety of stunts. However, his buddies aren't all lackeys and yes men. In fact, not all of them are even male; Jolene Van Vugt is a Canadian motocross champion. The rest of the cast include former motocross racer Andy Bell, current professional skier Erik Roner, and Pastrana's longtime friend, current mountain bike racer Jim DeChamp. Rounding out the bunch is Tommy Passamante, a short pudgy guy better known in the show as "Street Bike Tommy." He earned this nickname for attempting to flip a street bike into a foam pit, but completely messed the trick up.

Jeff Tremaine and Johnny Knoxville are among the show's producers and since both have been associated with the MTV hit show Jackass, it would be easy to assume that this is nothing more than "Jackass 2.0," but it's a little more than that. Jackass was about stupid people doing stupid stunts. Nitro Circus has people who seem to know what they're doing, and while a couple of stunts are stupid, most look pretty damn fun to this guy, and I get nosebleeds if the attic window is open.

What the show does rather subtly is to shine an ever-so-small light onto Pastrana's personality. He and Bell get into a game over about who can complete a back flip on a big wheel. Pastrana is so irked by Bell completing the trick first, that he goes to a large ramp in California to complete the trick on a bigger and longer ramp. If someone completes a flip or trick before him, he's compelled to try it almost immediately. Whether or not it's a gamesmanship thing or not isn't the point; Pastrana sees the fun that someone has and wants to be part of it. It helps that the show manages to go to different locations (Season One filmed in Jamaica, the Grand Canyon and Las Vegas, to name a few. They do a variety of things, like flipping a motorcycle into the Grand Canyon, base jumping out of a Vegas hotel, and setting/breaking almost 50 Guinness Book of World Records on a cool Utah day.

I wound up being surprised by what Nitro Circus brought to basic cable in its first season of life. It's different in that you do manage to relate to that feeling of fun and adventure, and you get an idea of what these people are like. While I may be a big baby who might not want to take part in all the stunts on the show, I certainly get a contact high from the rush of fun radiating from Pastrana.

I know this hasn't changed from other Jeff Tremaine-produced shows, but this non-anamorphic picture box video presentation of this show and others is getting a bit annoying. The footage is clear, with loads of helmet-mounted cameras so you get in-depth with the stunts, good and bad. But Jeff, Rick (Kosick, frequent cameraman) and gang, can you get some form of production value in here, please?

The show comes to DVD in a two-channel Dolby stereo presentation. As is the case with the Tremaine-produced Fantasy Factory, some sequences include the original music from the broadcast episode, while others feature a similar yet generic song. I know securing musical rights for a large mix of music can be a little cumbersome, but I'd suggest that future musical opportunities are chosen wisely in the future, so as to avoid complaints.

Seeing the extras on this two-disc set leaves me feeling a little hollow. There was one episode that MTV aired that looked at some of the more memorable moments of the season and explored some behind the scenes of others, but it's not on this set. That exclusion is both curious and disappointing because there's not much else here. Disc One has a video (4:02) of the Dropkick Murphys' "State of Massachusetts," which serves as the show's introduction in each episode. Disc Two starts off with some bonus stunts (27:25), some of which are funny, like one of the Guinness World Record attempts, and one scene where the cast rattles off the injuries occurred during the show.

Next is a series of interviews (39:34) that were filmed for jackassworld.com. More on the injuries are discussed, along with some of the memorable moments. The smaller subplots, like the big wheel duel and DeChamp's dinosaur arms are explained here too. Pastrana relays some hilarious stories about his Dad here in this portion of bonus material and overall, the interviews are entertaining. Some additional footage from the website is here (25:35), and this is the most enjoyable portion of the supplements - which include Executive Producer Jeremy Rawle as he displays his nunchuk "skills" in one segment, and is shot by a child's dart gun in another. There's another sequence involving a prank ambush that is enjoyed, well, a little too much. Interviews for the MTV website are next (15:45), but they're repetitive and not all that educational. An outtake reel winds things up (7:51), but it's more cute than funny.

Nitro Circus is good old-fashioned fun, done by people who actually seem to have the qualifications to pull it off. Travis Pastrana and his friends are nice kids who do crazy stuff both for the sake of doing it and because no one's ever done it before, and that may be the best part of the show. Technically the show lacks in the audio/video departments, and is a disappointment on the supplemental side, but I'd encourage everyone to check out an episode or two on TV.