The Walking Dead: The Complete Fifth Season

The Walking Dead, AMC's survival drama set in the aftermath of a zombie apocalypse, is the highest rated show on commercial cable TV, posting larger numbers than many successful network shows. The fifth season opens with Rick (Andrew Lincoln) and his group fighting to escape from a compound where a culture of cannibals are luring survivors in and systematically slaughtering them. It may be the most gruesome and brutal episode to date, but it's also about loyalty, the drive to survive, and the commitment to remain human in an inhuman world. Like earlier seasons, the fifth season is split into two eight-episode segments that focus on different characters (some of whom will die). The final half season finds the group invited to make a home in a genuinely benevolent walled community that is being run as an idealistic commune—a set-up that Rick, Daryl (Norman Reedus), and a newly badass Carol (Melissa McBride) view with guarded suspicion, given the failed promises of earlier seasons. Tovah Feldshuh guest stars as the community's maternal leader and the final episodes are as much about her education concerning the realities of threats both outside and inside her walls as it is about Rick believing that this can be a real home for his survivalist family of followers. Compiling all 16 episodes from the 2014–15 fifth season, extras include episode commentaries, behind-the-scenes featurettes, and deleted scenes. Recommended. (S. Axmaker)