Jane the Virgin: The Complete First Season

Adapted from a Venezuelan telenovela, the bright, witty, self-aware Jane the Virgin turns a screwball situation into clever comic melodrama. Gina Rodriguez stars as the titular virgin, an aspiring writer and devout Catholic who is saving herself for marriage but ends up pregnant after her gynecologist artificially inseminates her with a sperm sample meant for another patient. To complicate matters, biological father Rafael (Justin Baldoni)—a reformed bad boy millionaire—is Jane's boss at the hotel where she waitresses. Jane once had a crush on Rafael, which is reignited after he divorces his scheming wife (Yael Grobglas) and Jane breaks up with her fiancé Michael (Brett Dier), a cop who is investigating Rafael as a possible drug kingpin. Meanwhile, Jane's fun-loving single mother (Andrea Navedo) reunites with Jane's father, a narcissistic telenovela star. As the narrator notes, "Jane's life was now the stuff of telenovelas," and the series makes good on that claim, with mobsters and identical twins, murders and affairs, and loads of secrets. Set in sunny, colorful Miami, this was one of TV's breakout hits for 2014-15. Compiling all 22 episodes, extras include behind-the-scenes featurettes, deleted scenes, and a gag reel. Recommended. (S. Axmaker)