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Review Paramount Home Entertainment / Star Trek Voyager - Vol. 4.8 (Hunters/Prey) [1996]
Actors & Directors
  • Ethan Phillips
  • Robert Picardo
  • Kate Mulgrew
  • Allan Eastman
  • David Livingston
  • Roxann Dawson
  • Robert Beltran
Release date: 1998-08-10
Run time: 88 min.
RRP: £5.99
Price: £14.99

Review Star Trek Voyager - Vol. 4.8 (Hunters/Prey) [1996] / Paramount Home Entertainment:


Review Playback / Battlestar Galactica - Vol. 6
Actors & Directors
  • Richard Hatch
  • Vince Edwards
  • Lloyd Bridges
  • Anne Lockhart
  • Lorne Greene
  • Christian I. Nyby
  • Dirk Benedict
Release date: 2000-07-24
Run time: 140 min.
RRP: £12.99
Price: £1.24

Review Battlestar Galactica - Vol. 6 / Playback:


Review Paramount Home Entertainment / Star Trek The Next Generation [1990]
Actors & Directors
  • Jonathan Frakes
  • Brent Spiner
  • Patrick Stewart
Release date: 1997-09-29
Price: £34.99

Review Star Trek The Next Generation [1990] / Paramount Home Entertainment:

In 1987, some 20 years after the original series had ended, Star Trek: The Next Generation was launched into a decade renowned for its materialistic greed, but also for its hesitant steps towards a more unified world order. Creator Gene Roddenberry revised his vision of humanity's future accordingly, shifting the Trek timeline 80 years on and reinventing the new Starship Enterprise as an Ark-like exploration vessel full of families, schools, soothing recreational facilities and a maternally pacifying computer voice (Roddenberry's wife, Majel Barrett). The Next Generation crew were not soldiers, but scientists and diplomats. Unlike the fiercely individualistic Captain Kirk, Patrick Stewart's patrician Captain Jean-Luc Picard was a model team leader: no matter how desperate the crisis, he ensured that everyone got to sit round the Conference Room table and talk it over. And in a true late-1980s touch, a key member of the Bridge crew was psychoanalyst Counsellor Troi, always on hand to discuss everyone's feelings. Season Two saw the welcome introduction of the cybernetic horror that was the Borg. Originally a powerful symbol of technological misuse in an otherwise technologically utopian universe, ultimately their hive-like existence served to reinforce the message that everyone would be much happier as a team player. Even renegade super-entity Q (John De Lancie) relied on Picard as much as his fellow god-like playmates; Data followed Pinocchio and Spock in a quest to discard what made him an individual; and there was even an episode that rationalised why all aliens basically looked alike (we're all one big family). Even the slogan change to "Where no one has gone before" acknowledges that there's no "one" in a team. But for all its earnest political correctness and an over-reliance on "technobabble", good stories played by an appealing ensemble cast were at the heart of the show's success. [+]
After seven successful seasons, "All Good Things" finally came to an end. Until Deep Space Nine, Voyager and Enterprise, that is. -Paul Tonks.

Review Adv Films / Bubblegum Crisis - Tokyo 2040 - Vol. 11
Actors & Directors
  • Satsuki Yukino
  • Hiroki Hayashi
  • Rio Natsuki
  • Hiroko Konishi
  • Yu Asakawa
  • Kiyoyuki Yanada
Release date: 2001-07-02
Run time: 50 min.
RRP: £12.99
Price: £8.99

Review Bubblegum Crisis - Tokyo 2040 - Vol. 11 / Adv Films:


Review Network / Space Patrol - Vol. 3 - Episodes 9-12 [1963]
Actors & Directors
  • Ysanne Churchman
  • Murray Kash
  • Frank Goulding
  • Ronnie Stevens
  • Libby Morris
  • Dick Vosburgh
Release date: 2001-07-16
Run time: 100 min.
Price: £6.99

Review Space Patrol - Vol. 3 - Episodes 9-12 [1963] / Network:


Review Cinema Club / Highlander - The Animated Series - The Last Of The MacLeods / A Taste Of Betrayal [1994]
Actors & Directors
  • Paolo Barzman
  • Gérard Hameline
  • Yves Lafaye
  • Jerry Ciccoritti
  • Jorge Montesi
  • Werner Stocker
Release date: 2002-07-22
Run time: 44 min.
RRP: £2.99
Price: £1.66

Review Highlander - The Animated Series - The Last Of The MacLeods / A Taste Of Betrayal [1994] / Cinema Club:


Actors & Directors
  • Walter Sande
  • Anthony Eastley
  • Michael Hoey
  • Edward Faulkner
  • Bobby Van
  • Pamela Mason
Release date: 1995-04-17
Run time: 64 min.
RRP: £9.99
Price: £9.95

Review The Navy Vs The Night Monsters / First Class Films:


Review Contender Entertainment Group / Farscape Vol. 1.10 - 1.21 Bone To Be Wild / 1.22 Family Ties [1999]
Actors & Directors
  • Tony Tilse
  • Ian Watson (II)
  • Geoff Bennett (II)
Release date: 2000-10-30
Price: £12.99

Review Farscape Vol. 1.10 - 1.21 Bone To Be Wild / 1.22 Family Ties [1999] / Contender Entertainment Group:

An international co-production of Jim Henson's Creature Shop, Australia' s Channel 9 and Hallmark Entertainment, Farscape is genre television at its most ambitious, inspired both by the cult appeal of Babylon 5 and the continuing success of the Star Trek franchise. Making extensive use of CGI, prosthetics and state-of-the-art puppetry, Farscape takes a visual leap beyond previous shows. Admittedly, the basic premise may be borrowed from Buck Rogers (American astronaut catapulted to far-flung galaxy populated by strange aliens), while the crew have something of Blake's 7 about them (a motley bunch of escaped convicts pursued by a relentless foe), and ideas like the living ship are borrowed from Babylon 5, but the Farscape concept has a freshness that makes it look and feel completely original. The production design is all bio-mechanical curves and the script never takes itself too seriously (fart jokes and double-entendres pop up when you least expect them). It must have been expensive to make, but it certainly looks (and sounds-in Dolby Digital 5. 1) like every penny made it to the screen. In true Buck Rogers style, Ben Browder plays leading man John Crichton as an all-American astronaut, although with a more believable sense of bewilderment; the supporting cast is a mixture of Australian and British actors, mostly disguised under heavy make-up. On this tape: Two more episodes from Season One: "Bone to be Wild" and "Family Ties", plus a profile of the Australian Creature Shop. -Mark Walker.

Review Contender Entertainment Group / Farscape - Vol. 2.1 - 2.01 Mind The Baby / 2.02 Vitas Mortis / 2.03 Taking The Stone [1999]
Actors & Directors
  • Ian Watson (II)
  • Tony Tilse
  • Geoff Bennett (II)
Release date: 2001-03-12
Run time: 135 min.
RRP: £12.99
Price: £3.67

Review Farscape - Vol. 2.1 - 2.01 Mind The Baby / 2.02 Vitas Mortis / 2.03 Taking The Stone [1999] / Contender Entertainment Group:

Farscape is genre television at its most ambitious, inspired both by the cult appeal of Babylon 5 and the continuing success of the Star Trek franchise, but taking a visual and conceptual leap beyond those shows. Making extensive use of CGI, prosthetics and state-of-the-art puppetry, (courtesy of Jim Henson's Creature Shop), the Farscape concept has a freshness that makes it look and feel completely original. The production design is all bio-mechanical curves and the script, which is peppered with post-modern pop culture references and movie in-jokes, never takes itself too seriously. It may be expensive to make, but it certainly looks (and sounds-in Dolby Digital 5. 1) like every penny made it to the screen. Ben Browder plays leading man John Crichton as a latter-day Buck Rogers, but with an entirely believable sense of bewilderment, not to mention loss; the rest of the living ship Moya's crew also have plenty of difficult issues to deal with, allowing Farscape's writers licence to develop their characters in often unexpected ways. The result is episodic TV sci-fi that continually pushes at the accepted boundaries of the format. On this tape: After the nail-biting cliffhanger at the end of the first series, the second series gets off to a shaky start in "Mind the Baby", as all the loose plot ends have to be gathered and resolved. Crais apparently has a change of heart, and Scorpius takes his place as Crichton's new nemesis. In "Vitas Mortis" D'Argo falls for a lonely Luxan, with catastrophic and barely plausible results for Moya. [+]
"Taking the Stone" showcases Chiana's grief in an episode that manages to be even more confusing. -Mark Walker.

Review Warner Home Video / Mad Max 3 - Beyond Thunderdome [1985]
Actors & Directors
  • Frank Thring
  • Adam Cockburn
  • George Miller (II)
  • Mel Gibson
  • Bruce Spence
  • Tina Turner
  • George Ogilvie
Release date: 1995-08-21
Run time: 102 min.
RRP: £5.99
Price: £0.01

Review Mad Max 3 - Beyond Thunderdome [1985] / Warner Home Video:

Although Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome, the third part of George Miller's post-apocalyptic Mad Max trilogy, is certainly the least of the bunch (Mad Max 2: The Road Warrior is the undisputed masterpiece, and maybe the best action movie ever made), it has still got a good share of imaginative industrial-wasteland-pastiche imagery. And casting Tina Turner as Aunty Entity, the queen of Bartertown, was a masterstroke. Mel Gibson's character Max is pitted in a battle to the death against the bizarre Master Blaster in the Thunderdome, flying around on rubbery straps inside a sort of gigantic overturned colander with bloodthirsty spectators clinging to the outside. Miller's producing partner, Byron Kennedy, was killed in a helicopter crash while scouting locations for this film. Miller was devastated, only agreeing to direct the action sequences-and, somehow, you feel his heart wasn't entirely in it. -Jim Emerson.

Review Marquee Pictures / The Silencers [1996]
Actors & Directors
  • Jack Scalia
  • Carlos Lauchu
  • Richard Pepin
  • Lucinda Weist
Release date: 2000-02-22
Run time: 96 min.
Price: £4.99

Review The Silencers [1996] / Marquee Pictures:


Review Paramount Home Entertainment / Star Trek: Enterprise, Vol. 1.1 [2002]
Actors & Directors
  • John Billingsley (II)
  • Anthony Montgomery
  • James L. Conway
  • Dominic Keating
  • Jolene Blalock
  • Scott Bakula
Release date: 2002-04-01
Run time: 83 min.
RRP: £13.99
Price: £1.45

Review Star Trek: Enterprise, Vol. 1.1 [2002] / Paramount Home Entertainment:


Review Paramount Home Entertainment / Star Trek : The Original Series - Vol. 1.6 - The Menagerie Part I / Menagerie Part II / Shore Leave [1969]
Actors & Directors
  • Perry Lopez
  • Robert Sparr
  • George Takei
  • Oliver McGowan
  • Leonard Nimoy
  • William Shatner
  • Robert Butler
  • Marc Daniels
Release date: 1996-10-07
Run time: 144 min.
RRP: £5.99
Price: £10.48

Review Star Trek : The Original Series - Vol. 1.6 - The Menagerie Part I / Menagerie Part II / Shore Leave [1969] / Paramount Home Entertainment:

One of the most popular and influential shows in the history of television, for many viewers the original Star Trek (1966-9) defines good science fiction: however much it tries to be about the future, it cannot help but reflect the values of its own time, and Star Trek's vision was very much a product of creator Gene Roddenberry's 1960s' liberal-humanist idealism. Conceived at the height of the Cold War and during the escalation of the Vietnam conflict, his was a radical vision of a world where national and racial differences have been put aside and all people work together. With a policy of non-intervention in the affairs of other civilisations, and violence only as a last resort, Star Trek embodied a lost dream, a fantasy of what America could have been had John F. Kennedy not been assassinated in 1963. Captain James Tiberius Kirk (William Shatner) had the middle name of a Roman emperor, but otherwise shared his initials with the late president, and both were young, good looking, womanising, charismatic popular heroes. If Kirk didn't uphold truth, justice and the American way from the White House, a big white starship was the next best thing. There was even a Russian, Mr Chekov (Walter Koenig), on the bridge, and the show delivered network TV's first inter-racial kiss between Kirk and Uhura (Nichelle Nichols). Even though there was a white American male in control, it was still all a bit much for 1960s' mainstream TV, hence the voyages of the Starship Enterprise, boldly going on its five-year mission to explore strange new worlds, only lasted three seasons and 72 episodes before being cancelled in 1969, the year Man first walked on the moon. While the once-ground-breaking special effects now look routine, and the then-radical politics have now become part of the politically correct global mainstream, Star Trek retains an enduring popularity due to its strong storytelling-the show employed such top science fiction writers as Robert Bloch, Harlan Ellison, Richard Matheson, Norman Spinrad and Theodore Sturgeon-and admirable characters. Spock (Leonard Nimoy), McCoy (DeForest Kelley) and Scotty (James Doohan), Sulu (George Takei), Kirk, Chekov and Uhura remain icons for a world short of real heroes: loyal to the end, honest and utterly dedicated, these were the friends and colleagues who week after week trusted each other with their lives. [+]
Devoid of cynicism and self-interest the crew of the USS Enterprise never, ever let anyone down, and ultimately that is a very big reason for Star Trek's enduring popularity. -Gary S Dalkin.

Review Paramount Home Entertainment / Star Trek The Next Generation - Vol. 3.4 - The Defector / The Hunted / The High Ground [1990]
Actors & Directors
  • Michael Dorn
  • Robert Scheerer
  • Gates McFadden
  • Patrick Stewart
  • Cliff Bole
  • Jonathan Frakes
  • LeVar Burton
  • Gabrielle Beaumont
Release date: 2000-06-05
Run time: 131 min.
RRP: £5.99
Price: £8.80

Review Star Trek The Next Generation - Vol. 3.4 - The Defector / The Hunted / The High Ground [1990] / Paramount Home Entertainment:

In 1987, some 20 years after the original series had ended, Star Trek: The Next Generation was launched into a decade renowned for its materialistic greed, but also for its hesitant steps towards a more unified world order. Creator Gene Roddenberry revised his vision of humanity's future accordingly, shifting the Trek timeline 80 years on and reinventing the new Starship Enterprise as an Ark-like exploration vessel full of families, schools, soothing recreational facilities and a maternally pacifying computer voice (Roddenberry's wife, Majel Barrett). The Next Generation crew were not soldiers, but scientists and diplomats. Unlike the fiercely individualistic Captain Kirk, Patrick Stewart's patrician Captain Jean-Luc Picard was a model team leader: no matter how desperate the crisis, he ensured that everyone got to sit round the Conference Room table and talk it over. And in a true late-1980s touch, a key member of the Bridge crew was psychoanalyst Counsellor Troi, always on hand to discuss everyone's feelings. Season Two saw the welcome introduction of the cybernetic horror that was the Borg. Originally a powerful symbol of technological misuse in an otherwise technologically utopian universe, ultimately their hive-like existence served to reinforce the message that everyone would be much happier as a team player. Even renegade super-entity Q (John De Lancie) relied on Picard as much as his fellow god-like playmates; Data followed Pinocchio and Spock in a quest to discard what made him an individual; and there was even an episode that rationalised why all aliens basically looked alike (we're all one big family). Even the slogan change to "Where no one has gone before" acknowledges that there's no "one" in a team. But for all its earnest political correctness and an over-reliance on "technobabble", good stories played by an appealing ensemble cast were at the heart of the show's success. [+]
After seven successful seasons, "All Good Things" finally came to an end. Until Deep Space Nine, Voyager and Enterprise, that is. -Paul Tonks.

Review Paramount Home Entertainment / Star Trek : The Original Series - Vol. 3.8 - The Savage Curtain / All Our Yesterdays / Turnabout Intruder
Actors & Directors
  • Leonard Nimoy
  • William Shatner
  • Marvin J. Chomsky
  • Herb Wallerstein
  • Herschel Daugherty
Release date: 1998-03-02
Run time: 144 min.
RRP: £5.99
Price: £10.95

Review Star Trek : The Original Series - Vol. 3.8 - The Savage Curtain / All Our Yesterdays / Turnabout Intruder / Paramount Home Entertainment:

One of the most popular and influential shows in the history of television for many viewers the original Star Trek (1966-9) defines good science fiction: however much it tries to be about the future, it cannot help but reflect the values of its own time, and Star Trek's vision was very much a product of creator Gene Roddenberry's 1960s liberal-humanist idealism. Conceived at the height of the Cold War and during the escalation of the Vietnam conflict, his was a radical vision of a world where national and racial differences have been put aside and all people work together. With a policy of non-intervention in the affairs of other civilisations and violence only as a last resort, Star Trek embodied a lost dream, a fantasy of what America could have been had John F Kennedy not been assassinated in 1963. Captain James Tiberius Kirk (William Shatner) had the middle name of a Roman emperor but otherwise shared his initials with the late president, and both were young, good looking, womanising, charismatic popular heroes. If Kirk didn't uphold truth, justice and the American way from the White House, a big white starship was the next best thing. There was even a Russian, Mr Chekov (Walter Koenig), on the bridge and the show delivered network TV's first inter-racial kiss between Kirk and Uhura (Nichelle Nichols). Even though there was a white American male in control, it was still all a bit much for 1960s' mainstream TV, hence the voyages of the Starship Enterprise, boldly going on its five-year mission to explore strange new worlds, only lasted three seasons and 72 episodes before being cancelled in 1969, the year Man first walked on the moon. While the once-groundbreaking special effects now look routine, and the then-radical politics have now become part of the Politically Correct global mainstream, Star Trek retains an enduring popularity due to its strong storytelling-the show employed such top science fiction writers as Robert Bloch, Harlan Elllison, Richard Matheson, Norman Spinrad and Theodore Sturgeon-and admirable characters. Spock (Leonard Nimoy), McCoy (DeForest Kelley) and Scotty (James Doohan), Sulu (George Takei), Kirk, Chekov and Uhura remain icons for a world short of real heroes: loyal to the end, honest and utterly dedicated, these were the friends and colleagues who week after week trusted each other with their lives. Devoid of cynicism and self-interest the crew of the USS Enterprise never let anyone down and ultimately that is a very big reason for Star Trek's enduring popularity. [+]
-Gary S Dalkin.

Review Paramount Home Entertainment / Star Trek Voyager - The haunting of deck twelve & Unimatrix zero - Volume 6.13 [1996]
Actors & Directors
  • Roxann Dawson
  • Kate Mulgrew
  • David Livingston
  • Allan Kroeker
  • Robert Beltran
Release date: 2001-01-22
Run time: 88 min.
RRP: £5.99
Price: £13.95

Review Star Trek Voyager - The haunting of deck twelve & Unimatrix zero - Volume 6.13 [1996] / Paramount Home Entertainment:

Star Trek: Voyager, the first Trek spin-off to be made without any input at all from Gene Roddenberry, made its debut in 1995 and quickly established itself both as markedly different from cosmic cousin Deep Space Nine and as the successor to The Next Generation. Despite a lack of originality in its premise (Lost in Space anyone?), Voyager has been a bigger ratings success than any of its predecessors. Catapulted unwittingly to the far-flung Delta Quadrant, the crew of the Federation vessel Voyager must try somehow to get back home. The ghost of Katherine Hepburn lives on in Kate Mulgrew's forceful Captain Janeway. Until the fourth season, the fan favourite was the straight-funny man role of Robert Picardo's nameless Doctor. Then, with the brave Borg storyline "Scorpion Part 2", a serious improvement in the show's behind-the-scenes thinking introduced actress Jeri Ryan as Seven of Nine, who immediately upped sex appeal and viewing numbers. -Paul Tonks On this tape: Told in retrospect to the Borg children by Neelix, "The Haunting of Deck Twelve" involves Voyager enduring a complete power shut-down while passing through a nebula. "The Haunting" of course isn't a ghost but a non-corporeal-living-nebula-creature that manifests itself in a series of malfunctions throughout the ship. Like other "ship malfunction" stories it can't create enough drama to sustain an entire episode. "Unimatrix Zero" takes another twist on Borg individuality by creating a "dream realm" for their individual minds to inhabit when regenerating. [+]
Seven of Nine infiltrates the group but the Borg aren't far behind. The use of the Borg Queen as the adversary devalues the collective quality that the Borg maintained throughout earlier episodes. It's familiar ground, especially when the last two-part Borg episode, "Dark Frontier", had already dealt with the Voyager crew invading the Borg and it seems that the majority of this episode is a build-up to the cliff-hanger final scene that ends the season. -Colin Neal.

Review Paramount Home Entertainment / Star Trek The Next Generation - Vol. 3.4 - The Defector / The Hunted / The High Ground [1990]
Actors & Directors
  • Gabrielle Beaumont
  • Gates McFadden
  • Robert Scheerer
  • LeVar Burton
  • Jonathan Frakes
  • Michael Dorn
  • Patrick Stewart
  • Cliff Bole
Release date: 2000-06-05
Run time: 131 min.
RRP: £5.99
Price: £8.80

Review Star Trek The Next Generation - Vol. 3.4 - The Defector / The Hunted / The High Ground [1990] / Paramount Home Entertainment:

In 1987, some 20 years after the original series had ended, Star Trek: The Next Generation was launched into a decade renowned for its materialistic greed, but also for its hesitant steps towards a more unified world order. Creator Gene Roddenberry revised his vision of humanity's future accordingly, shifting the Trek timeline 80 years on and reinventing the new Starship Enterprise as an Ark-like exploration vessel full of families, schools, soothing recreational facilities and a maternally pacifying computer voice (Roddenberry's wife, Majel Barrett). The Next Generation crew were not soldiers, but scientists and diplomats. Unlike the fiercely individualistic Captain Kirk, Patrick Stewart's patrician Captain Jean-Luc Picard was a model team leader: no matter how desperate the crisis, he ensured that everyone got to sit round the Conference Room table and talk it over. And in a true late-1980s touch, a key member of the Bridge crew was psychoanalyst Counsellor Troi, always on hand to discuss everyone's feelings. Season Two saw the welcome introduction of the cybernetic horror that was the Borg. Originally a powerful symbol of technological misuse in an otherwise technologically utopian universe, ultimately their hive-like existence served to reinforce the message that everyone would be much happier as a team player. Even renegade super-entity Q (John De Lancie) relied on Picard as much as his fellow god-like playmates; Data followed Pinocchio and Spock in a quest to discard what made him an individual; and there was even an episode that rationalised why all aliens basically looked alike (we're all one big family). Even the slogan change to "Where no one has gone before" acknowledges that there's no "one" in a team. But for all its earnest political correctness and an over-reliance on "technobabble", good stories played by an appealing ensemble cast were at the heart of the show's success. [+]
After seven successful seasons, "All Good Things" finally came to an end. Until Deep Space Nine, Voyager and Enterprise, that is. -Paul Tonks.

Review Adv Films / Neon Genesis Evangelion - Part 13
Actors & Directors
  • Tomokazu Seki
  • Kôichi Yamadera
  • Tsuyoshi Kaga
  • Masahiko Ôtsuka
  • Yûko Miyamura
  • Kazuya Tsurumaki
  • Hideaki Anno
  • Junko Iwao
  • Hiroyuki Ishidô
  • Tetsuya Iwanaga
Release date: 1999-01-18
Run time: 50 min.
RRP: £12.99
Price: £5.49

Review Neon Genesis Evangelion - Part 13 / Adv Films:


Review Paramount Home Entertainment / Star Trek : Deep Space Nine - Vol. 6.12 - Profit And Lace / Time's Orphan
Actors & Directors
  • Michael Dorn
  • Allan Kroeker
  • Rene Auberjonois
  • Cirroc Lofton
  • Avery Brooks
  • Alexander Siddig
  • Terry Farrell
Release date: 1998-12-07
Run time: 88 min.
RRP: £5.99
Price: £1.40

Review Star Trek : Deep Space Nine - Vol. 6.12 - Profit And Lace / Time's Orphan / Paramount Home Entertainment:

From the outset, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine was about conflict. Producers Rick Berman and Michael Piller challenged the utopian ideals of Gene Roddenberry's Star Trek universe to create something totally different from its predecessors. This meant no familial camaraderie, squeaky-clean Federation diplomacy or beige décor. Instead they wanted interpersonal friction, ruthless enemies (Gamma Quadrant Imperialists-The Dominion) and rebellion at every turn. The DS9 concept was originally facilitated by introducing the Cardassian/Bajoran war during The Next Generation's final days. After a muted first reception fans gradually came to accept the new look, but no one liked Star Trek without a starship and eventually the producers capitulated to viewers' wishes by introducing the USS Defiant (an apt name) in Season 3. Relying far less on technobabble than TNG, DS9 was unafraid to focus on matters of the spirit demonstrating a gutsy independence from its parent shows. Taking up the gauntlet thrown down by Babylon 5, improved CGI space battles also became a fan favourite. Throughout the increasingly serialised story arc there were rebellious factions within the different establishments: Kira had belonged to the Shakaar resistance cell; The Maquis was Starfleet vs. Cardassians; Section 31 was a secret Starfleet group; The True Way was a Bajoran group opposed to peace; the Cardassians had their Obsidian Order and the Romulans their Gestapo-like Tal Shiar. [+]
Yet for all its constant bickering and espionage (even Bashir got to be James Bond) there was always some contemporary social commentary lurking: the Ferengi were used as a comedic foil to frown on materialistic greed; drugs were looked at via the Jem'Hadar foot soldiers' addiction to Ketracel White. Perhaps Sisko summed up the real heart of things: "Bajor doesn't need a man, it needs a legend". A future vision that retains a place for religion and spirituality turned out to be Deep Space Nine's first best destiny. -Paul Tonks.

Release date: 2000-10-16
Run time: 798 min.
Price: £59.99

Review The Ray Harryhausen Collection / Sony Pictures Home Entertainment:

The Ray Harryhausen Collection is a limited edition video box set of eight movies featuring classic stop-motion animation by the man who single-handedly turned the technique into an art. Though not his feature debut, the earliest film here is It Came From Beneath the Sea (1955). Made at the height of the 1950s monster movie boom, the "it" of the title is a giant octopus or-given that budget restrictions means the creature has six rather than eight limbs-perhaps "hexopus" would be a better word for the creature. Whatever "it" is, as his beast destroys San Francisco's Golden Gate Bridge, Harryhausen pays homage to his own inspiration, King Kong (1933). Next is the much more spectacular Earth vs. the Flying Saucers (1956), one of the most underrated of all 1950s sci-fi B pictures. Obviously inspired by The War of the Worlds (1953), and essentially remade as Independence Day (1996), Harryhausen delivers a tremendous amount of bang per buck, zealously trashing Washington's most famous landmarks in a fashion still gratifying today. The Seventh Voyage of Sinbad (1958) proved a major turning point in Harryhausen's career, for not only was this big budget Technicolor feature a huge hit, but it proved that the animator's true talents were better served by fantasy than science fiction. Not only a true classic, this is essentially the movie which invented the modern special effects blockbuster. Though not in the same class, Mysterious Island (1961) is still good entertainment. [+]
Based on the novel by Jules Verne, it unofficially continues the story of Captain Nemo beyond the end of Disney's 20 000 Leagues Under the Sea (1954). More importantly, it delivers some splendid battles with the various giant creatures on Nemo's titular island. Jason And The Argonauts (1963) is Harryhausen's masterpiece. An exhilarating reworking of Greek mythology, the film is a succession of great set-pieces, including an iron Colossus coming to life, and a final battle with a troop of skeleton warriors. The Mummy (1999) paid homage to this sequence recently but Harryhausen did it first, and without a single computer. Not only that, but Jason and the two previous films come complete with fabulous Bernard Herrmann musical scores. The First Men in the Moon (1964) marked a rare return to sci-fi, Harryhausen adapting HG Wells' classic adventure about a Victorian lunar expedition. The result was an entertaining movie, one much better than its unfairly tarnished reputation suggests. With later projects proving less successful, Harryhausen eventually returned to the Sinbad mythology in The Golden Voyage of Sinbad (1973) and Sinbad and the Eye of the Tiger (1977). The films aren't as good as his earlier ventures into fable, though both contain several highly accomplished action sequences. The Harryhausen Collection is completed by a genuinely fascinating 87-minute documentary, "The Harryhausen Chronicles" (re-edited from material included on the Seventh Voyage and Jason DVDs) and a specially filmed greeting from Ray Harryhausen himself. For any fantasy or animation fan this release is an essential slice of cinema history, while just about anyone who loves the movies can revel in the unique craftsmanship and artistry of Ray Harryhausen, one of cinema's most distinctive creative talents. -Gary S. Dalkin.

Models & Brands:
Star Trek Voyager - Vol. 4.8 (Hunters/Prey) [1996], Battlestar Galactica - Vol. 6, Star Trek The Next Generation [1990], Bubblegum Crisis - Tokyo 2040 - Vol. 11, Space Patrol - Vol. 3 - Episodes 9-12 [1963], Highlander - The Animated Series - The Last Of The MacLeods / A Taste Of Betrayal [1994], The Navy Vs The Night Monsters, Farscape Vol. 1.10 - 1.21 Bone To Be Wild / 1.22 Family Ties [1999], Farscape - Vol. 2.1 - 2.01 Mind The Baby / 2.02 Vitas Mortis / 2.03 Taking The Stone [1999], Mad Max 3 - Beyond Thunderdome [1985], The Silencers [1996], Star Trek: Enterprise, Vol. 1.1 [2002], Star Trek : The Original Series - Vol. 1.6 - The Menagerie Part I / Menagerie Part II / Shore Leave [1969], Star Trek The Next Generation - Vol. 3.4 - The Defector / The Hunted / The High Ground [1990], Star Trek : The Original Series - Vol. 3.8 - The Savage Curtain / All Our Yesterdays / Turnabout Intruder, Star Trek Voyager - The haunting of deck twelve & Unimatrix zero - Volume 6.13 [1996], Star Trek The Next Generation - Vol. 3.4 - The Defector / The Hunted / The High Ground [1990], Neon Genesis Evangelion - Part 13, Star Trek : Deep Space Nine - Vol. 6.12 - Profit And Lace / Time's Orphan, The Ray Harryhausen Collection

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