TV Gold

Looking for something new to say about the 'crimson short one' I hit on the idea of mentioning the reviews that the marvellous extras packed DVDs gained from the pages of TV Zone Magazine.

So let's kick off with what was said regarding Season One where in Issue 157 reviewer Darren Knight offered these thoughts...

Just as Doctor Who was finishing in the late Eighties, the BBC was launching a new sci-fi series – albeit one with a comic edge. This was Red Dwarf – very definitely a comedy first, and sci-fi second, claim the show’s writers Rob Grant and Doug Naylor on one of the discs interviews. The first season was met with a cautious reaction in 1988, and its easy to see why – this isn’t classic stuff, but the character interplay between Lister (Craig Charles) and Rimmer (Chris Barrie) is enough to see most episodes through. It would tae another couple of years to get the comedy and sci-fi balance just right… The best episode on this collection is probably the clever Future Echoes, which uses Time distortions to good comic effect, Waiting for God and Confidence and Paranoia are fairly weak quite frankly, but the other episodes have their share of good moments.
The BBC had pulled out the stops for the release though: Charles and Barrie are joined by actors Danny John-Jules (Cat) and Norman Lovett (Holly) for a commentary on all six episodes. Among the interesting titbits here is the story that Charles was reluctant to go to the audition having never acted before in his life! Photos, outtakes, interviews, music scores and frankly, everything you could want on a DVD of this sort, all add up to make this a very attractive package. 7

This ties in nicely with the review I posted this morning here... http://www.play.com/DVD/DVD/4-/102660/Red-Dwarf-Complete-Series-1/Product.html

Now turning my attention next to Season Two and in Issue 160 of TV Zone Magazine it is Darren Knight once more at the keyboard who said...

The second, and possibly best, series of Red Dwarf comes to DVD, and, by and large, it’s a pretty impressive package. The episodes themselves don’t have a dud among them. Opening with Kryten which saw the introduction of the eager-to-please android (here played by David Ross rather than Robert Llewellyn who inherited the role from Year Three onwards), the series started as it meant to go on, by changing the surroundings a little more often than in the first series. Hence in Better than Life we see the crew playing a video game in which all their fantasies are fulfilled. The outstanding Thanks for the Memory is told mainly in flashback, with the crew having lost their memories, they try to piece together what has happened to them – this several years before ST:TNG’s similarly-themed Clues, as Patrick Stewart recalls in one of the disc’s extra features. Thanks for the Memory is probably one of the highlights of the entire run, imbuing Rimmer with some real pathos, rather than portraying him simply as a figure of ridicule.
Queeg is a fairly one-joke comedy, albeit a very good joke, Stasis Leak is a chance to re-visit the crew of Red Dwarf before the accident, and Parallel Universe is a well-observed satire on sexual attitudes. It also, of course, features the stunning ‘Tongue-Tied’ song and dance routine!
As with Season One, a commentary is provided by the entire cast, who are clearly enjoying themselves re-living these episodes. Other extras including The A-Z of Red Dwarf, originally shown as part of 1998’s Red Dwarf Night – including such dated items as ex-pop group Eternal wishing the show a happy 10th birthday! There are a few outtakes included on the disc, which are slightly more interesting than those on the last release, plus model shots, a photo gallery, isolated music cues… in fact pretty much everything you could want on a Season Two set! If a mark has to be deducted for anything it has to be for the bizarre blue packaging. Hello? The show is called Red Dwarf! 9

Newly posted review from me should be up here... http://www.play.com/DVD/DVD/4-/111247/Red-Dwarf-Complete-Series-2/Product.html

It's Season Three and this time it's the turn of TV Zone Magazine reviewer Paul Spragg to offer his opinion of this title in Issue 170...

Still holding up impressively well after 14 years, Red Dwarf III was the year everything got revamped and upgraded, and includes a lot of fan favourite episodes, partly because it was here it became more mainstream. Curiously, it’s the high-concept stories such as Backwards that show signs of wear and tear, while the character-based and too often overlooked Marooned and, to a lesser extent, Timeslides, produce bigger laughs. It’s still a strong season, though, with some fantastic ideas, wobbly but passable effects, and a lot of the show’s most quotable dialogue.
Once again the DVD extras are impressive in number, if less so in quality. The undoubted highlight is an 80-minute documentary with key cast and crew members looking back over the year, which provides many fascinating stories. The commentaries featuring the cast are less worthwhile, with too much laughing and pointing out jokes they liked rather than commenting on how it was put together.
The other extras are much as we’ve come to expect: a clips featurette, this time on food, audio book material, weblinks, enjoyable out-takes, model shots, a couple of dodgy-looking trailers, and behind-the-scenes photos. The only other notables are 20 minutes of deleted scenes, of which only Holly’s opening jokes – originally planned to open the episodes, as in previous years raise much of a laugh, and the chance to watch Backwards forwards. It’s a fun idea, but all it reveals is some dialogue that came captioned anyway, Arthur Smith’s rant, which has appeared on video before, and how easily confused you can get trying to work out which button fast-forwards through it. 7

For a review of this title from me clink on this link... http://www.play.com/DVD/DVD/4-/126341/Red-Dwarf-Complete-Series-3/Product.html

Next up is Season Four we find TV Zone Magazine reviewer Tom Spilsbury offering the following Issue 174 thoughtful words on this 2 disc title...

Season Four of Red Dwarf is something of a zenith for the series. The budget had been increased; the stories and plots were getting more complex; but the humour was still at a high. From here on after, the budget carries on upwards, and the humour level starts to drop alarmingly. What we have here are six very clever little parables – kind of like ST:TNG, but with more knob jokes. Like Data, Kryten aspires to become Human and in DNA, he gets his chance. In Camille, the android even gets to go on a date, but just as in In Theory, you know it won’t end happily. Rimmer, like Riker, meets an alternative version of himself who got a different break in life (Dimension Jump). Series Four might not consciously be trying to be a TNG spoof, but it’s a wonderful antidote to the sometimes rather anodyne Trek series.
There’s a marvellous array of extras assembled for this release. The commentary with all five regulars is fun, but rather upstaged by a comprehensive 75-minute documentary on the whole season. Meanwhile there’s a Can’t Smeg, Won’t Smeg special from Red Dwarf Night, which would surely be more at home on a Season Seven release, plus trailers, deleted scenes, special effects footage and music cues. Some of the other extras seem rather more superfluous, included to pad the disc out, consisting of clips from the episodes (eg the Ace Rimmer featurette and the ‘Lurve’ compilation), while ‘Smeg Ups’ have mainly been seen on previous VHS releases. But all of this will be new to some, so we shouldn’t complain. A comprehensive package. 9

If you're interested I've popped a new review here... http://www.play.com/DVD/DVD/4-/145453/Red-Dwarf-Complete-Series-4/Product.html

We move on to look at Season Five and thumbing through TV Zone Magazine's review pages of Issue 184 we find David Miller saying the following...

For its fifth season, Red Dwarf appeared to have had a bit more money spent on it and the result was an attempt at grander, more cinematic plots and effects. The cast members work together superbly, and this is arguably the show’s finest season with some of the most memorable episodes. There’s a complex time paradox in The Inquisitor and there are outrageous alter egos in Angels and Demons and the first appearance of the Cat’s dorkish persona Duane Dibbley. Every episode has the now-standard uproarious cast commentary, plus a fan commentary.
A second disc is full of extras, including a documentary on the fifth season, featuring the cast and new director Juliet May, who admits that she had trouble with the series’ effects and SF concepts. Doug Naylor is frank about how he and Rob Grant ultimately replaced May as director. There’s some enjoyable, technically informative behind-the-scenes video material by Mike Tucker, featuring the making of various monsters and miniatures at the (now sadly defunct) BBC effects department.
Dwarfing USA looks at the hopeless attempts to make an American pilot of Red Dwarf – with Jane Leeves as the computer and Craig Bierko as a tall, handsome Lister – and it’s bitterly honest about the fundamental flaws that crippled the series’ US debut. There are 48 minutes of deleted scenes, Raw Effects Footage features all the model shots, including some ultimately unused (the Holoshop ‘folding’ and Rimmer’s self-loathing beast towering over the Starbug), Smeg Ups collects together fluffed lines and malfunctioning effects, and BBC2’s scutter idents. It’ll make a Red Dwarf fan of the hardest heart.

My new review for this should be found here... http://www.play.com/DVD/DVD/4-/181748/Red-Dwarf-Complete-Series-5/Product.html

Hope to come back soon with the same type of treatment for Seasons 6, 7 & 8 in the near future!

Time to have a look at what was written about Season Six and looking through the reviews section of TV Zone Magazine Issue 186 you'll find reviewer Paul Spragg saying the following...

There are signs of wear and tear in Red Dwarf by this point; while the imagination, inventiveness and comedy is certainly still present in spades (most notably in Gunmen of the Apocalypse), it’s starting to feed on past glories (the recurring Space Corps Directive jokes, Ace Rimmer, Duane Dibbley) and with the upgrading of the effects some of its charm is lost. It’s not a bad season, but the band it ends with in Out of Time seems more like a whimper.
Extras-wise, the usual impressive selection is here. A comprehensive 74-minute overview features the cast and crew talking about Season Six and there are cast commentaries on every episode, plus a fan one on Gunmen which sadly ends up more like a trivia-spouting competition.
The deleted scenes feature a few scattered good gags and a lot of very sensibly cut material, and the Smeg Ups are very funny although probably seen before by those who bought the videos of them years back. Howard Goodall is given half an hour to discuss his work on the music for the show, but he’s a little long-winded and dull in places, there are isolated music cues, a ‘Sick’ featurette detailing crew illnesses, the usual model shots run-through, and some brief behind the scenes footage that is an interesting curiosity but nothing to write home about. A fun little addition is clip from radio series Son of Cliché featuring Dave Hollins, Space Cadet, which demonstrates Grant and Naylor’s knack for the ridiculous and love of the genre. A mixed bag, then, much like the season itself, but certainly enough bonus material to keep anyone happy. 7

...and I've popped a new review this morning here... http://www.play.com/DVD/DVD/4-/581725/Red-Dwarf-Complete-Series-6/Product.html

For Season Seven the product review for this release crops up in Issue 196 of TV Zone Magazine where Anthony Brown said this...

This is the run of Red Dwarf that many fans thought would never happen, partly because of the time Craig Charles was unavailable while on remand, facing charges that were ultimately proved false, and partly because Red Dwarf VI had left many feeling that the show had run its course, and had become over-reliant on variations of the same catchphrases, jokes or set-pieces.
So, it’s goodbye to co-creator Rob Grant, with a handful of jobbing guest writers joining Doug Naylor in a less than entirely successful attempt to mimic the American writers’ room system. Chris Barrie, having become increasingly frustrated by the lack of rehearsal time on the last series, also drops out after two episodes and a few cameos, with Chlor Annett joining as an alternate reality Kochanski (in the process abandoning the last remnants of the show’s original concept – no women, just two guys who hate each other). Gone too, at least for some of the time, are the award-winning FX team, unwisely replaced by distinctly primitive CGI. On the other hand, original director Ed Bye returns, brining with him audience-less recording and (unfortunately) the abomination that is ‘filmized’ video.
It’s only a borderline success – the cast swaps go as well as could have been hoped and there’s something rather wonderful about Ouroboros, but for every area that’s been an improvement, there’s a balancing weakness (Blue and Beyond A Joke both settle too easily for lazy jokes and set-pieces). But there’s no complaints to be made about the massively comprehensive extras – there’s the previously released ‘Xtended’ versions of three episodes, an option to watch versions of Tika to Ride with new and better CGI, a full show of all six of the cast for the commentaries… documentaries, promo spots from Son of Cliché. Plus, Chris Barrie performs an abandoned script, complete with storyboards. An average season then, but a class package. 10 (for the extras)

I've added a new review to the others people have put here...http://www.play.com/DVD/DVD/4-/718781/Red-Dwarf-Complete-Series-7/Product.html

Rounding off these 'pless clippings you might of missed' postings with one for the eighth and final season and looking in the pages of the 200th Issue of TV Zone Magazine Paul Spragg said the following...

For final series Red Dwarf VIII remaining writer Doug Naylor took a leap of faith and made the radical step of completely resetting the show’s entire premise, bringing the ship and crew of Red Dwarf back from the dead. It works well – to a point. Naylor’s perfectly capable of writing solo and VII seemed hindered, not helped, by the input of others. With most of VIII done partner-less, the results are better, and with the return of much of what made the show great, such as Holly and the Lister/Rimmer double act it’s trying hard, even if the re-use of the luck virus and Duane Dibbley seem a bit desperate. Its main flaw is budgetary, with both Back in the Red and Pete stretched and half-hearted, and unnecessary cliffhanger finale Only the Good… just poor. The highlight is the self-contained character drama of Cassandra, which demonstrates the imagination ad humour of the show at its best.
The extras are the usual comprehensive selection, with an extensive 90-minute ‘making of’ documentary, smeg-ups, a barrage of deleted scenes, commentaries on every episode and a look at the model work along with storyboards. Of particular interest are some excellent US idents, a 1998 Children in Need sketch and BBC1’s Comedy Connections instalment on the show. A fantastic package and a season worth revisiting. 8

As before I've joined other reviewers by offering my thoughts here... http://www.play.com/DVD/DVD/4-/852147/Red-Dwarf-Complete-Series-8/Product.html

Happy May Bank Holiday to one and all!