Sep. 20--The Mentalist was a bright spot for CBS in its first season, and the network is hoping for more big things in the second. It has moved the show to 10 p.m. Thursdays to create a major crime-busting bloc of The Mentalist and, leading into it, CSI: Crime Scene Investigation.

And, with its second season starting Thursday, The Mentalist: The Complete First Season (Warner Home Video, 23 episodes, six discs, $59.98) arrives on DVD two days earlier. In addition to some entertaining extras, the set illustrates both the show's virtues and its flaws.

The Mentalist stars Simon Baker as Patrick Jane, a man whose observational skills suggest some psychic power -- and make him useful to police investigations. But Jane is also damaged -- by the death of his wife and child and his fixation on finding Red John, the serial killer responsible. He can be brutally direct in dealing with people who evade and lie. (The series and Fox's Lie to Me, whose first season is also on DVD, are more than a little similar.) And, as the first season ended, whatever success Jane had was diminished by his unfinished quest for Red John.

The show has a compelling personality in Jane, well performed by Baker, an actor who's not afraid to be unlikable. The rest of the cast -- which includes Robin Tunney and Tim Kang -- also knows what it's doing. And the show has some very cool moments, such as the way the first-season finale used a skywriter to demonstrate Red John's presence.

On the other hand, the plotting and direction are at times less sure-handed. Again, in that first-season finish, one character chomped his gum so hard that he marked himself as suspicious to viewers long before the people in the show caught on. The Mentalist is OK entertainment but not yet great.

As for the DVD, there's a funny blooper reel (marked as "surveillance video"), a good making-of segment and an even better piece called Cracking the Crystal Ball: Mentalist vs. Psychic. It looks at some of the people doing in real life the same things as the show's fictional folks.

With the new TV season now arriving in a big way, Tuesday's DVD shelves will include several other sets of returning shows, among them Ghost Whisperer: The Fourth Season; Ugly Betty: The Complete Third Season; 30 Rock: Season 3; and Castle: The Complete First Season. There are also a couple of series wrap-ups: Brotherhood: The Final Season and Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles: The Complete Second Season, which proved to be the last for that series on Fox.