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« The Joy of Sets
Have Yourself a Merry Little DVD Gift Guide!
Space 1999 - 30th Anniversary Edition Megaset courtesy A&E Home Video
On the third day of my Holiday Gift Guide
I showed more love of DVDs
Three sci-fi classics
Two horror remakes
And an FX drama you have to see!
Stargate SG-1 – The Complete Series Collection — Oh lord, I don’t know if you should watch it or bench press it, because this set is ginormous! 54 discs and 9900 minutes of interstellar space-and-military action from the effects bonanza that currently holds the record for the longest-running sci-fi series ever. Not too shabby, considering that the Richard Dean Anderson vehicle first blasted off on Showtime before jumping over to the Sci Fi network after five seasons. Throw in a few cast changes, about a gazillion warring alien races and knockout features on everything from the sets to the sci-fi convention culture and you have the sort of collection that could honestly consume an entire month. Not that there is anything wrong with that!
Buy it now!
Space: 1999 – The 30th Anniversary Megaset — So it’s 1975, I’m 6 years old and the idea that lunar condos and smart jumpsuits could happily co-exist by the year I turned 30 has me crazy pin-wheel-eyed. Wha-wha-wha?! The moon is going to become a toxic dump? The couple from Mission: Impossible will still be together? We’ll all have laser guns? TV dealt this guy a major blow when I finally made it to 1999 and none of this stuff had come true! But I’ve recovered and rediscovered the glory of Gerry Anderson’s British answer to Star Trek. Fare less corny than our Enterprise peeps, the show’s 48 episodes gathered here are (for their time) pretty damn lavish. Plus, Barbara Bain is a fox!
Buy it now!
Space: Above and Beyond — I don’t blame you for not remembering Fox’s blip of a series since I always thought they forgot about the show, too. Rescheduled more times than most of my dentist appointments (shut up, they never stop at just a cleaning!), the net roped The X-Files’ Glen Morgan and James Wong into whipping them up something to cash in on the Mulder-Scully-inspired sci-fi frenzy of 1995. But it never found its footing, nor did it ever interest me…until I saw the DVD set with a blurb by my awesome colleague Matt Roush. If he dug it, I knew it was time to check it out. And guess what? Matty was right! Set in like 2063 or something, the story of embattled U.S. Marines hunting the aliens who went all nuclear on one of Earth’s colonized planets is jammin’ with splashy effects, a cast—particularly the always underrated Rodney Rowland—that puts some other space operas to shame and a very now feel with its “is war the answer?” ideology. If Stargate is Trek with cryptic Egyptian motifs, S: A&B is Combat for the Quark crowd.
Buy it now!
And now for the Stocking Stuffers specials!
Rob Zombie’s Halloween — Trust me, I am a John Carpenter purist. There is nothing better than Jamie Lee Curtis in high-waisted bellbottoms and peril, OK? But this grisly reimagining from the Devil’s Rejects dude was, well, kind of killer. Far more visceral and cerebral than the original, we get a ton more insight into Michael Myers’ messed-up psyche and just as many screams. And while Malcolm McDowell is no Donald Pleascence, he does bring a certain ickiness to our good Dr. Loomis that leaves you wondering if maybe he didn’t have something to do with the masked maniac’s rampage.
Buy it now!
Black Christmas — Want a little Six Degrees of Sets? This remake of the 1974 slasher shizz pile was directed by S: A&B’s creator Glen Morgan and costars his wife Kristen Cloke, who just so happened to star in (wait for it) Space: Above and Beyond! Much like Halloween but not as cool, it’s all about an escaped nutjob who returns home on a holiday to get his kill on. That it also stars all-grown-up jailbaiters like Party of Five’s Lacey Chabert and Buffy’s Michelle Trachtenberg is just gravy for you horror pervs. Still, a fun entry in the Seasonal Scares department.
Buy it now!
Dirt: The Complete 1st Season — If you skipped out on this sordid little Courteney Cox cable drama last summer, here’s what you need to know: it just came out on DVD, it has one of the sexiest publicists ever and it’s must-see before the second season starts on FX this winter. Oh and you would be best served to just ignore whatever nastiness you may have heard about it. Sure, things start out a little too much, but by mid-season, you totally forget Monica Geller ever had any friends as Cox’s L.A. tabloid editrix Lucy Spiller beds a source, sells out a starlet and stands by her schizo photographer. And those are just the tame parts! There is also some serious skin on display (you will never look at Melrose’s Grant Show or his ass the same way again) and a finale twist that’s both startling and heartbreaking. Call me trashy, but that’s the sort of show I break plans for, you know?!
Buy it now!
OK, that’s it. Gotta go help my gal Bizzy find a man-melting holiday-party ensemble. Next week: What Santa had better have under the tree for me if he plans on seeing another Christmas.
Until then, don’t hog the remote and remember, whenever you hear a bell ring, Pepito the Wonder Chihuahua gets his tummy scratched!
OH! And go vote for Clash of the Choirs' Team LaBelle , aaight? Bring it, Philly!
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Dec 19, 2007 11:57 AM
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I have become increasingly alarmed by the news that Blu Ray Disc is becoming the be all and end all of playback devices.
Years ago, when the mini-series CENTENNIAL was on, I taped (VHS) the entire series - But, of course, in those days I taped in SLP mode and, also of course, all of the original commercials were still on the tape.
A few years later, I noticed that there was a professionally recorded VHS set available. Even though the set was expensive, I purchased it because I wanted to see the episodes WITHOUT commercial interruptions.
Then the 'new technology' of DVD became all the rage. While visiting the electronics department of a local department store, I realized that the store was carrying fewer and fewer VCR's. And, about the only way I could be sure to get a VCR was to buy a new TV with a built-in VCR. And even those were being 'closed out' by the department store. It is now no longer to find ANY kind of VCR for sale at that particular department store!
I purchased a VHS to DVD recorder and began transferring everything I had on VHS to DVD so that I would at least be able to continue playing back my favorite movies and TV programs.
Of course, because of the copyright, I could NOT transfer the VERY expensive, professionally produced VHS copy of CENTENNIAL to DVD. But I COULD transfer my originally taped copies of the series to DVD - even though the original had been taped in SLP speed and was littered with commercials.
I felt like I had been had because I had made such an expensive outlay to have the professionally produced VHS set of CENTENNIAL - and, with every passing day, it became closer and closer to a time when it would be impossible for me to be able to find a VCR to be able to play back the professionally produced VHS set of CENTENNIAL.
More recently, I HAVE learned that the Big Wigs had FINALLY released CENTENNIAL on DVD. Naturally, of course, the DVD set is VERY expensive! But I am reluctant to fork over that much cash for yet another EXPENSIVE copy of CENTENNIAL if the DVD technology is going to become like the buggy whip -- AND, in a few years' time, the advance of technology would have made both the DVD AND the DVD player so obsolete that it would STILL not be possible to playback the CENTENNIAL episodes which I enjoyed MUCH more the first time around than I am currently enjoying all of the dark screens and talking heads from the networks who rarely, if ever, get a chance to take up space on my new 55-inch, HD ready TV.
TRUST me on this one - CENTENNIAL looks like Shakespeare compared to the lackluster drivel currently being shoveled by the network nitwits!
In the meantime, of course, we are barely noticing the strike of TV's so-called 'writers.'
Of course, I guess the UP-side of all of this is that, eventually, the entertainment industry will price itself OUT of the market. I still have a very NICE library stocked with VERY nice books and I do NOT need any expensive-but-soon-to-be-obsolete electronic devices in order to be able to READ the books. The library EVEN includes a very INEXPENSIVE copy of CENTENNIAL -- imagine that!
Sincerely, Estrelita
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Jan 8, 2008 12:07 AM
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