Star Trek: First Contact Special Collector's Edition

Despite what director/actor Jonathan Frakes' claims (during an interview in one of the behind-the-scenes docs) about this project being offered to several high profile directors and being turned down, the eighth film in the series is still one of the strongest outings of the latter half of the Star Trek film franchise. Why? Namely because it brings the crew of the Enterprise face to face again with the most interesting of their enemies: the Borg. And this time the confrontation takes place on the Federation ship, as the Borg struggle to transform it into a mechanism that can alert others of their kind to their situation. A situation that includes having their vessel destroyed before they could complete their mission of travelling back to mid-21st century Earth to sabotage the launch of Earth's first warp-capable ship so that the all-important "first contact" would never be made, leaving Earth wide open for assimilation. This two-DVD set delivers a lot more than just the film. Disc one offers the movie and three commentary options: audio commentary by Jonathan Frakes, alternate audio commentary by screenwriters Brannon Braga and Ronald D. Moore and an optional text commentary by Michael and Denise Okuda. But it is the second disc that contains the gold, with menu options broken down into four themes: "The Star Trek Universe," "The Borg Collective," "Scene Deconstruction" and "First Contact Production." Each of these categories houses a minimum of three related mini-docs or behind-the-scenes peaks (complete with a wide array of cast interviews). Additionally, the second disc serves up storyboards, trailers and a photo gallery, making the collection a veritable deluge of information for the average fan while understanding that rabid Trekkies demand nothing less. This will be the last Star Trek: First Contact disc you'll ever need to buy; there are some other television franchises that could learn much from what Paramount is doing. (Paramount)