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Hitchhiker's Guide DVD to be released on January 28

Posted by chrisd on from the fakey-looking-second-head dept.

hitchhacker writes "It looks like The BBC series version of 'Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy' is being released on DVD January 28, 2002. 'disc set contains all six episodes from the classic BBC sci-fi comedy as well 10 minutes of additional footage which was cut to acheive the 30 minute run time. Also included are a few additional features - making of, deleted scenes, interviews and more.'" CD: Word has it that this is a region 2 dvd.

7 of 196 comments (clear)

  1. HGTTG Saved My Life by Agamous+Child · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I was a 5th Grader who had read a few things, you know read some books on cool stuff, had a z80 computer, the basic programming guide for the rest of us, etc. but I had little interest in school, I was a beach-bum loser. This friend of my Mom, he hands me this dog-earred paper-back book with a black cover and a little green sphere man sticking his tongue out at me... the guy, Dennis, tells me "Hey read this, you WILL like it." I was like, "sure, whatever".. I read the first few pages, and I couldn't stop reading.. I can honestly say I have about 4 copies of almost every other DA book, mostly first edition hardcovers. Big deal, everyone does? The thing was, this guy who gave me the book, pretty much the same day said to me that I should go to school more often, and I should really (in his words) "do something with your life." Maybe it was the book, maybe it was DA, maybe it was nothing, but certainly, it tied together and I started to go to school... I saw all of the HGTTG episodes on local PBS here in the states, and they are hilarious... I highly suggest them. They gave me a great cast to play out the rest of the books in my head with.. uh.. anyway.. I like them.. ALOT.

    --
    I had a sig, but /. ate it. My Web Site
  2. extras by Transient0 · · Score: 3, Interesting

    the list of extras is impressive, but it would have been really nice to see:

    1. text of the original novels.
    2. audio if the original radio show.

    The mini-series was alright, entertaining at least. The radio show on the other hand was brilliant.

    --
    lysergically yours
    1. Re:extras by ewhac · · Score: 4, Interesting

      ...it would have been really nice to see:
      1. text of the original novels.

      There is no "authoratative" version of the story. Douglas Adams kept making small changes to it every time it was published in a new medium. Even different BBC radio broadcasts were slightly different. I remember reading somewhere that he did this deliberately just to mess with the fans' heads, but I can't locate the reference. I daresay he would have insisted the DVD go out with yet another minor tweak to the story line.

      Here's a quote from the Introduction to The Original Hitchhiker Radio Scripts:

      "The people who heard the show on BBC World Service will have heard a slightly different version from the original BBC Radio 4 transmission. Those people who heard the BBC transcription service disc will have heard another version, and those who heard the commercial records will have heard another version again. Those people who saw the television show will have seen another different version, and those people who have read the books will have come across yet another different version."
      -- Geoffrey Perkins

      Schwab

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      Editor, A1-AAA AmeriCaptions
  3. why on earth? by neurojab · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Why would the the BBC region encode a circa 1990(?) miniseries? The purpose of region encoding is to ensure that a movie leaving US markets can be "staged" into foriegn markets, forcing DVD sales to be after film sales to avoid home viewing cutting into theater reciepts. Region encoding old TV material serves no purpose other than to simultaneously reduce sales and annoy customers. Why would the BBC want to stop sales of this DVD to the US? The math is simple...more sales means more money when there are no greater revenue streams to cut into. If the people at the BBC are half as smart as their accents make them seem, this DVD will be region-free ;)

    1. Re:why on earth? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Interesting

      The BBC may have sold the rights to Hitchikers for non-UK/Europe regions back in the 80s, which may stop them doing an R1 release currently.

  4. Re:Serves you right by LordNightwalker · · Score: 2, Interesting

    AFAIK, there is a region 1 version of Blackadder, and it's better than the region 2 version... Has more extras. One or two out of the series episodes and some historical stuff about the UK concerning the eras in which the four seasons of Blackadder are set... Stuff they didn't feel were necessary for the European release because they assume that the whole of Europe knows Brittish history, or so it seems...

    --
    Install windows on my workstation? You crazy? Got any idea how much I paid for the damn thing?
  5. It's only fair by Paul+Boven · · Score: 3, Interesting

    After all, it's the Americans and especially their movie-industry that came up with this insane region-system. And the main reason they got away with it is that their domestic audience would get the releases first anyway. So I think it's only fair that some Americans get to experience what it is like to be on the 'wrong' side of the region system, and I hope it happens more often. Who knows, they might even learn something from it. I mean, you can only get shafted by the big corporations so often in return for brown-nosing them, somebody is going to get the hint, right?

    I'm not trolling, I'm just bitter.