The eight-episode series of “The Philanthropist” comes to DVD, but lacks of special features. You can read a review here, another herehere.

• The Philanthropist (2009) » Screencaptures: 1×06 San Diego
• The Philanthropist (2009) » Screencaptures: 1×07 Kashmir
• The Philanthropist (2009) » Screencaptures: 1×08 Haiti

Gallery Links
The Philanthropist (2009) » Promotional: 1×05 Kosovo
The Philanthropist (2009) » Promotional: 1×06 San Diego
The Philanthropist (2009) » Screencaptures: 1×05 Kosovo

Episode Synopsis: Teddy, Philip and Olivia travel to Paris on business, where Olivia stumbles upon an old friend who is ensnared in a sex-trafficking ring. Teddy’s investigation uncovers a widespread operation, and he sets out to free the captive young women.

TV Guide has posted some promotional of this episode, and I’ve added to the gallery. Thanks Manu for the heads up!

The Philanthropist (2009) » Promotional » 1×03 Paris

The Philanthropist (2009) » Screencaptures » 1×02 Myanmar

Also, I want to install a media session here, for videos, but I don’t know what should be better: display the videos for download or like “Youtube”, to watch it online. What do you prefer?

Episode Synopsis: The Maidstone-Rist Company is outed by a human rights organization as having ties to businesses in Myanmar, also known as Burma, where there is oil and gas exploration using forced labor. Teddy (James Purefoy) decides the only way to conclude whether to continue their business activities in the country is to get advice from Daw May Lin Wai, a revered Burmese democratic leader who has been under house arrest in the country for nearly two decades. During his search for Lin Wai, Teddy meets a young girl, desperately in need of a kidney transplant. The girl’s father is a suitable donor but he’s being kept at a forced labor camp and it is feared that he won’t get to his daughter in time to save her life. Back in New York, Philip (Jesse L. Martin) and Olivia (Neve Campbell) desperately try to explain Teddy’s behavior to an irate board of directors. Michael Kenneth Williams also stars.

Charity does not begin at home. As it has for a lot of rich and powerful people of late, it begins in Africa. Teddy Rist (James Purefoy), the playboy tycoon hero of “The Philanthropist” on NBC, is negotiating an oil deal in Nigeria when a near-death experience tears away his smug complacency. Up to a point.

Teddy risks his life to rescue a small boy and finds that even after he returns to New York, he cannot settle back into his routine as a billionaire bon vivant. After a few manic moments and a meltdown on CNBC, Teddy returns to Nigeria, intent on hand-delivering food and supplies to the boy’s village.

Teddy has found a calling — benefactor without borders — but he hasn’t changed overnight. He is still a restless, egotistical show-off who drinks too heavily and womanizes too much.

The pilot, which will be shown on Wednesday, was shot on location in southern Africa and is dazzlingly filmed; the cinematography alone stands out. But it’s the hero’s duality — he’s a good Samaritan with a flawed personality — that helps make “The Philanthropist” an unusual and exhilarating network series.

It’s not an easy balance. The line between sensitivity and sanctimony is thin in Hollywood, particularly when the subject is famine and disease in Africa. Future episodes take him to Kashmir, Myanmar and Kosovo.

Gravity has a way of pushing scripts way over the line into “Touched by an Angel” bathos. It takes rigor and imagination to avoid cultural clichés and mawkish sentimentality. It’s not clear how this show will navigate the treacherous shoals of human kindness over time. Teddy has a personal tragedy that explains, too neatly, some of his demons. A few scenes dip into the Oprahesque. But the pilot of “The Philanthropist” has a dash and a voice quite unlike that of any other current drama.

It helps that Mr. Purefoy, who played the memorably randy Mark Antony in “Rome” on HBO, was cast as the lead: Teddy’s quicksilver charm dissolves into petulance, arrogance and, at other times, genuinely affecting grief. The actor finds a range of hues in a character, who in less talented hands (say, Benjamin Bratt’s of “The Cleaner”) could too easily be a cardboard hero.

The rest of the cast isn’t half bad, either. Jesse L. Martin, formerly of “Law & Order,” is Teddy’s business partner, Philip Maidstone, and Neve Campbell is Olivia, Philip’s wife and Teddy’s old flame. And Teddy’s bodyguard, Dax, is played by Michael Kenneth Williams, who was Omar Little on “The Wire.”

Even after Teddy returns to Africa intent on doing good, he behaves badly. He meets with a Nigerian doctor who cannot retrieve cholera vaccine from a corruptly run customs warehouse. But he wants to act, not listen, and figures that bribes will solve the problem. He interrupts her to summon a waiter. “Do you have anything other than Jim Beam?” he asks. “Like something maybe from civilization, you know?”

The doctor (Bonnie Henna) has no patience for this rich man’s burden. “This isn’t about helping me or anyone else, is it?” she says. “This is about you playing the role of the charming rich businessman who travels the world, getting his hands just dirty enough to go back home and tell his American friends how meaningful his life is compared to theirs.” He knows she is right and sets out to prove her wrong.

The episode hits its stride, and its sense of humor, when Teddy brings some of his worst qualities to bear on the vaccine problem, which includes enlisting the assistance of a local drug lord and pulling strings in the highest places, even the White House. Everything that can go wrong, does, and Teddy finds inner ingenuity at overcoming the insurmountable. So, at times, do the writers. Teddy’s quest is so noble and his adventures are so exotic that a linear narrative could easily become insufferable. The script adds some static to the storytelling by having Teddy recount his tale in flashbacks to a tough-talking waitress in a small town bar west of nowhere. The waitress, like many viewers, is incredulous and dismissive, but keeps listening despite her cynicism.

Africa doesn’t get a lot of attention on television dramas — it’s usually a blank canvas where doctors prove their dedication, as Dr. John Carter of “E.R.” did by working in Darfur, or counterintelligence agents get caught up in proxy wars, as Jack Bauer did in “Redemption,” the prequel to the seventh season of “24.”

Even though it is about humanitarian relief work, “The Philanthropist” tries hard not to be condescending or cartoonish. There are corrupt officials, but also straight ones, and there is more to Nigeria than oil and poverty. But sometimes, the filmmakers strain a little too hard to do it justice.

When Teddy’s chauffeured car is stuck in a traffic jam, surrounded by crowds and a man who thumps angrily on the roof, Teddy gets out. He wanders into a shantytown and discovers, in the middle of dust, shabby corrugated huts and rusting car parts, a group of men and women in traditional costume enacting a tribal rite of passage. Teddy rapturously joins in, marking his own passage from bad boy to good citizen. It’s beautifully shot, but heavy-handed, and more than a little righteous.

Any show about a globetrotting do-gooder runs the risk of piety and self-importance. When “The Philanthropist” tries to have a little fun with its own seriousness, it is all the better for it.

1×01 Pilot – A wealthy philanthropist’s life is changed when a hurricane hits the Nigerian town he was visiting. During the storm the billionaire rescues a young boy. These events lead him to pursue his new found passion for helping those in need.

The Philanthropist (2009): 1×01 Pilot Screencaptures