Promotion Prospects – Series II Features Posted by Ian Symes on 30th April 2003, 23:00 The Series II promo was free when you bought the Daily Mirror on Wednesday April 30th 2003, over two and half months since the DVD itself was released. It was part of a week-long promotion, which involved the Mirror, Woolworths and the BBC, in which a promo of a classic show was given away each day. Frankly, on Red Dwarf day it was worth paying 32p, and the paper did include some pictures of minor celebrities in a jungle, so it was a fair deal all round. Accompanying the voucher needed to obtain the disc was the following paragraph: Roam deep space with ace slob Dave Lister and hologram Arnold Rimmer today when you take your chance to pick up an episode of sci-fi comedy Red Dwarf on DVD for FREE. Not too sure about the phrase ‘ace slob’, but that’s basically the gist of the series. The episode in question was Kryten, a fine episode, and one that doesn’t require a thorough knowledge of the characters and the situation in order to get laughs. Perhaps it was also chosen to quell the myth that Robert Llewellyn was in Series II; which was a mistake that a shocking amount of reviews and retailers made. Being a DVD, the quality is perfect, although the fact that they omitted the subtitles and commentary track grates. For a start, the commentary track would be a great advert for the series – Chris Barrie opens by hailing it, quite rightly, as one of the best ever. The cover doesn’t feature the graphics problems of the first disc; the only nasty bit being the red rim around Lister, but that’s on the proper DVD too. There is an error on the back cover though – it says that Red Dwarf II is available on video and DVD, but the video releases were discontinued years ago. Included on the disc are two deleted scenes and a static menu, which is a still from the main DVD menu, with a white border containing the selection options. The deleted scenes are, unsuprisingly, the two from Kryten, although seeing that the DVD is aimed at non-Red Dwarf fans, I’m not sure what they’d make of the Androids sequence and a scene where one of the characters is silent.
