Movie Review: Switched at Birth Volume One

Two babies are literally Switched at Birth and grow up in different families and situations until a blood test reveals the true parentage and resulting chaos of emotions that both families find themselves in.

Film making 22/25
Video 20/25
Audio 20/25
Bonus Features 0/25
Total 62/100

Vanessa Morano plays Bay, the rich girl with everything going for her and her life mapped out by her family’s better than average income from her father’s successful car wash business. Katie Leclerc plays Daphne, a deaf teen living with her single mom working hard to pay for the exclusive school Daphne attends.

The hospital where both girls were born switches the babies and only after Bay takes a blood test during a school experiment does the ensuing mess unveil itself. Both families are thrown together and after John, Bay’s father, finds out the situation Daphne, her mother Regina and grandmother move in.

Daphne lives in a poor part of town and attends a deaf school which also brings Marlee Matlin to the scene as the schools guidance counselor and the mother of Daphne’s best friend. Switched at Birth brings not only the confusion and emotional upheaval of a baby that is not yours but they also add a lot of dating and boyfriend/girlfriend mixing which adds to the emotional drama.

Daphne’s best friend Emmett winds up dating Bay but also is interested in Daphne, Liam is a boyfriend of Bay’s but was a friend of Daphne before the girls met their biological families. The characters pass not only friends but problems between them quickly when Bay’s family asks Daphne’s to move into the guest house on their property instead of living in the low income neighborhood they used to live in.

Switched at Birth not only brings the emotional drama of the hospital’s mistake to the screen but the choices both families have to face like suing the hospital or just moving on. The series does have a unique twist but everything really boils down to common family drama of relationships and other problems like gambling and alcohol addiction.

Switched at Birth started out as a unique and oddball series but really switched things up with the relationship mixing and odd twists in plot but this is not a bad thing at all. Characters come and go much quicker than I expect for a series like with Bay’s friend Liam who after being a close friend of Bay’s then a love interest of Daphne is totally missing from the series.

Switched at Birth does a few quick dramatic switch ups with the plot using love and serious friendships as the main turning points but even main themes like who knew what and when becomes main plot points. Suing the hospital over the switch becomes a focal point for some while others stand their ground and say what happened has happened and move on.

The series does bring a lot of unique interplay and real world drama dealing with the deaf daughter and all the issues that topic brings. The series has really delved into the deaf issue well with lots of help from Marlee Matlin as well as the actor playing Daphne.

Switched at Birth is a fun yet serious drama about teenagers just coping with a new and unique twist in their lives but not all that different from other shows. The writing and actors are what sets this series slightly apart from many others and is well worth watching just to see how they deal with all the new twists the writers shove at them.

The series has been released as the first half of the first season on DVD with some pretty good video and audio quality but like many other shows only released on DVD it lacks the higher definition Blu-ray quality. Video looks crisp and clear almost all the time with well-done colors and great clarity and really only has a few lower than normal looking scenes.

You do get some lower quality shots in scenes but overall I had no problems viewing and nothing really stood out to me while watching that was memorable about quality either good or bad. Audio did stand out to me as being typical for dramas and family type series with great Dolby Digital 5.1 sound but surround is lacking as you would expect.

Switched at Birth is more of a family series and lower key drama so there is not a lot of pulse pounding action to use for surround. Audio and video are both very good, great to put it into one word but nothing spectacular or really noteworthy stood out. Extra content however is lacking totally which by past experiences of partial season releases is not at all surprising.

There is no extra content on the DVD release for Volume One and like other series released by half a volume the second volume or the full season will include all the bonus content. Switched at Birth is a great series and well worth watching or even owning but I would simply wait for the full season release that will be out sometime after the first season has wrapped.

Switched at Birth @ ABC