VIII Giftset Artwork Released News Posted by John Hoare on 19th January 2006, 17:34 Hooray! At all good online retailers now. It looks very similar to the V Giftset, but, erm, orange and with a skutter. It’s obviously a mock, as evidenced by the fact that the skutter piccy used is the same as this one, but it looks professional enough to be a proper BBC one. March 27th can not come soon enough. Sadly, with VIII still not listed on any of the USA or Australia online shops, we can’t tell whether the Giftset going to be a UK-only release or not yet. Oddly enough, whilst browsing Amazon researching this, I also found the BBC Cosmic Comedy Collection – a Region 1 boxset containing Series III-VI of Dwarf, and Hitchhiker’s. Released on the 24th (that’s this coming Tuesday), it seems a bit of an odd package (the middle four series? I mean, why?), but good value if you’ve not got any of the DVDs I suppose. Anyway, the set is clearly missing Come Back Mrs Noah. (Note: that was a cheap joke, I’ve never even seen the show, and I actually suspect it’s really good given the pedigree, but I just couldn’t resist it.) Oh, and: what the ‘eck’s this? Released February 14th. Frankly, what with false products littered all around Amazon, I wouldn’t expect it to be ANYTHING AT ALL, but I just thought I’d mention it… UPDATE (22/1/06): Friday’s TOS update reveals that the the skutter giftset will be making it to Regions 1 and 4 – and that the skutters themselves are currently winging their way to distributors now. Hooray!
At last! The time is approaching :) Our baby is due around the 27th of March too, I guess I’ll have to tell our lass its a present for him instead ;)
“Frankly, what with false products littered all around…” Well you’ll be gutted if it turns out they’re releasing series one of Dwarf in audio form, frankly.
Nice mockup. I guess it’s about time for Andrew to break American hearts by announcing that region one will be skutterless.
John, you do realise you have put all the latest news up before TOS managed to? Thats quite an achievement! (I can see Andrew cursing you right now lol)
John’s not the only psychic one. See amazon.co.uk for the following series VIII review: 1 of 1 people found the following review helpful: **** A good way to end one of the best comedies ever, January 15, 2006 Reviewer: Stuart McArthur from Largs, Scotland Red Dwarf 8. Like series 7, many fans dislike it even though it makes an attempt to take the show back to its roots. However thisis a fantastic series which sees the return of Rimmer, albeit not as a hologram, Holly as a main character and a return to the Red Dwarf. Although this series isn’t as good as most of the other series’, it does hit the spot. The driving force in this series is Chris Barrie, who gives a commanding performance as Rimmer and he is well supprted by the rest of the cast, especially Craig Charles and Robert Lewellyn, although you can’t help but feel that Kochanski and the Cat are just there for quickfire one liners and aren’t used as well as they were in previous series’. The special features on this DVD as usual, are FANTASTIC. The commentary is brilliant as per usual as are the smeg ups and deleted scenes. The full length documentary is brilliant and gives an informative and funny insight into how the show was made. The absence of Rob Grant is still very apparent, but alot less than it was in series 7, which is pleasing as he brought a great personal touch to the programme. Menus are still brilliant and the easter eggs are still worth looking for.However if you are a first time watcher of the programme then do not start with this DVD, go to one of the first 6 series. Still this is probably just for the hardcore dwarfers, however still well worht buying though. The one dissapointing aspect of the episodes is the still unresolved cliffhanger of the last episode, but this leaves it open for another series or the long awaited film. Was this review helpful to you? Answer to that final question is, of course: “No it wasn’t – fuck off premature DVD review fuck.”
If there’s one thing I’m looking forward to about the series VIII release, it’s the menus. I want to see what the RD ship has become like outside and inside, and how the menus and introduction are similar and different to the first 5 releases.
So the artwork is final in the mock up and America and Oz do get to have the Skutter… Interesting TOS update on the Japanese sell out DVD’s as well…
> Well you’ll be gutted if it turns out they’re releasing series one of Dwarf in audio form, frankly. Not happening. Was discussed a couple of years ago, but no plans to date. > John, you do realise you have put all the latest news up before TOS managed to? Thats quite an achievement! (I can see Andrew cursing you right now lol) *shugs* Happens all the time. Partly because can only update weekly, and partly because, when stuff is being done outside the GNP office, sometimes (in fact OFTEN) it gets out witout our knowledge. > If there’s one thing I’m looking forward to about the series VIII release, it’s the menus. Update on these pretty soon. They look amazing. And there’s one Easter Egg this time that I expect people to really struggle to find. God forbid, I may actually have to provide instuctions this time! > Pity they can’t spell Skutter on the side of the box though. Oops. Box-mock is genuine, that one spine shot is from the dev version. We’ll fix it. That said, I hope 2 ent didn’t go with it for final print…!
Brilliant. Also Andrew, by the way, might I recommend you keep the silver foil lettering beyond the series III set, and that you alternate between standard and large text on the spines of odd and even DVD releases?
> Also Andrew, by the way, might I recommend you keep the silver foil lettering beyond the series III set, and that you alternate between standard and large text on the spines of odd and even DVD releases? I get the text-size reference, but don’t follow you on the foil thing. Series I-VIII are all silver foiled, and were always meant to be. (Save Oz series I, which was a time issue and totally out of GNP control.) My mistake on the skutter box image, BTW. Dev art was corrected, and the site image has been replaced.
There’s nothing wrong with a premature amazon DVD review, as long as it only talks about the series itself and doesn’t say stuff like ‘the commentary is great’ when we haven’t even heard it. The comments about the series in that review are fairly valid.
I thought a while ago there were some discussions about whether after series III the silver foil lettering should be dropped or not. Some felt the silver wouldn’t work well with the beige and that alternatives might be a red-foil version or a simple non-foil colour version as per the spine image. This change would be justified by the shift from “original” series to “complete” series on the bottom of the covers. I wasn’t sure whether this was GNP asking for advice or just us lot having throwing some nonsense about, but I seem to remember some mock-up cover pictures showing what the beige cover with non-foil logo might look like. Anybody else? Or did I dream all this?
Ah yes, I remember. (Christ that feels like so long ago!) Yeah, you’re absolutely right – it was debated whether or not to have foil for IV (just IV, it would have gone back to silver after that, probably, so had nothing to do with ‘original’/’complete’), and the mock-up appeared on the site before the decision had been taken. Thankfully, it worked fine and was left as-was. Can’t believe we even considered it now!
My mistake on the skutter box image, BTW. Dev art was corrected, and the site image has been replaced. Hurrah! Reminds me of Doug moaning in the Series VIII Script Book about the designers managing to spell everyone’s names wrong, despite having them given to them on a bit of paper beforehand…
“(Save Oz series I, which was a time issue and totally out of GNP control.)” Oh yes I never saw this before: http://shop.abc.net.au/browse/product.asp?productid=719362 Yuck. I didn’t know that anything like the horrible series 1 cover on play.com had actually been *released* somewhere in the world. Poor Oz.
It hasn’t – that’s the same early mock-up. This is the Oz art: http://www.reddwarf.co.uk/archive/images/live_from_australia_2.jpg
>Just a quick update on the hotly-requested topic of skutters abroad. Fans in the USA and Australia have been craving the little buggers, and who are we to disappoint? Ohhhh Andrew. Whether you had anything to do with this or not, I’m naming all my puppies after you.
Bear in mind that whilst I might have posted both stories first, I didn’t have the two vital bits of info – that the Skutter Giftset was being released in Regions 1 and 4, and that the two extra discs on the Japanese release are Smeg Ups/Outs…
>>Oh yes I never saw this before: http://shop.abc.net.au/browse/product.asp?productid=719362 Yuck. I didn’t know that anything like the horrible series 1 cover on play.com had actually been *released* somewhere in the world. Poor Oz. What in the name of FUCK is that monstrosity?! I assure you that my Series 1 DVD is nothing like that.
>>I get the text-size reference, but don’t follow you on the foil thing. Series I-VIII are all silver foiled, and were always meant to be. (Save Oz series I, which was a time issue and totally out of GNP control.) Oh, is THAT why the writing is different? Well, that’s one mystery solved.
>> Well it’s horrendous. Lose ?30. No, it looks OK when you see the DVD in person. Incidentally, we use dollars, not pounds. (And by the way, the Red Dwarf DVDs over here are usually about $40. That’s equivalent to about ?15 or so. Whoever’s selling your DVDs is overcharging you.)
Oh I see. Well I was just being random, to be honest, not talking about pounds v australian dollars or the price of your average Red Dwarf DVD. “Lose ?30” seemed like a good monopoly-style punishment for someone who’d not really done something wrong except in my head. The daftness of the situation seemed to fit. BORING AND POINTLESS EXPLANATION THERE.
WHEN WILL THE SERIES VIII MENU UPDATE ON TOS HAPPEN? There should be a box set of all eight series in the UK in the shape of RED DWARF ITSELF. It will happen and all because of me. I am very brilliant.
