★★★★☆

The Last Enemy one time when those Web shopping suggestions actually paid off for Barnes & Noble. Like most guys I don’t “shop.” I go to a Web site to buy exactly what I’m looking for. I’m not surfing around looking for suggestions, especially not on the Internet where nothing can be trusted. In this particular case I went to obtain every season of “Sherlock” on DVD. It is quite a phenomenal show. Thankfully some PBS stations run the show as well so those who won’t pay for cable or satellite can still see great television.

Masterpiece Theater really lived up to its name with The Last Enemy miniseries. I am so glad I bought it! I’m so glad I donated to WILL AM 580 this year and took as my thank you gift “The Complete Downton Abbey” as well. It seems that only England is willing to invest in truly spectacular writing and then put even more spectacular actors in charge of interpreting the script. Benedict Cumberbatch does an unbelievably good job in this film.

The Last Enemy is a completely believable story line set in the here and now about using a vaccination to inject each person on the planet with a personal tracker which can neither be removed or altered. Oh, forget about a device, they’ve already done that. Devices can be removed, altered, then replaced. This was a living biological tracker which once injected, became part of your being. There was only one problem . . .

No, I’m not giving any more away. I have already given too much.

I must say they went all out for this show. Even the smaller ensemble roles will filled by highly gifted actors doing some of their best work. This is one to watch over and over.

The packaging

Perhaps it is how the DVD was organized, but my only criticism was each episode didn’t have an intro. At the beginning of each disk there is an actor with a monologue setting the story up with current events then introducing the first episode. This really helps build the story and it helps get you into the second disk if it has been a few days since watching the first. Both the dialogue and delivery are compelling. I simply wish each episode had it. Perhaps the other intros are squirreled away in the bonus features or some other such place? I have yet to look at that stuff.

As far as drama goes I put this on par with or slightly above “Downton Abbey.” I’m torn there because Downton was a period piece trapped by the behaviors of the time so it had an “other worldly” quality to it. This is more modern and directly relatable.