CSI Grave Danger

Cynics will take no time to point out that Grave Danger is a CSI marketing ploy and how better to promote the brand than show the Las Vegas pilot and the initial episode of CSI: Miami, the first breakaway of the franchise, before CSI: NY (too new to be included here)?

It has to be admitted, they are fascinating. William Petersen looks so young and has not adopted the rather camp, prissy style of later series. What is interesting is that the team in this pre-Season 1 try out is the same as in Grave Danger. Something must be going right at the Crime Scene Investigation HQ. These actors don't want to leave.

The CSI: Miami episode is the one with the famous air crash in the Everglades. Almost at once - in fact, absolutely at once - you can feel David Caruso's energy and commitment. You could say it is unfair to compare the original Vegas pilot with this absorbing, technically masterful piece of filmmaking.

Already, in the pilot, the formula is laid down - multi plotlines, flashbacks to the crime (imaginary and real), no personal life for the main players - and by the time CSI: Miami comes along, it has been honed to perfection, which gives the new franchise an added advantage.

However you look at it, look at it.

As an advertisement for a hugely successful TV crime series, this excuse for DVD extras is transparently self-promotional, but why worry when it knocks spots off the competition?