Blu-ray Review – Mr. Selfridge: Season 2

ITV's "Mr. Selfridge" was always a thinly disguised take on the hit show, "Downton Abbey," trying to replicate the formula of the rich and the working class existing uncomfortably in the same expansive environment. However, "Mr. Selfridge: Season 2" has shed its inspiration and simply gone after the same dramatic arcs as its competitor. Vaulting forward five years so the fine personnel and customers of London's top department store, Selfridge's, can deal with the commencement and ongoing misery of WWI, the series becomes mimicry of the worst kind. Already a program of iffy performances, plots, and emotional discoveries, "Season 2" somehow makes all new mistakes, growing ambitious with limited resources, while giving in to the some of the worst melodrama I've seen in quite some time. Not that "Downton Abbey" is the epitome of refined scripting, but the second go-around for Harry Selfridge and the commerce gang reeks of desperation, eschewing thoughtful, significant conflicts to become a turn-of-the-century "Days of Our Lives." Read the rest at Blu-ray.com