The main difference between the R2 Network UK releases and the Mill Creek's R1 is that Mill Creek's Season 1 release uses pretty good public domain type episodes, that have some extras, like original commercials and sponser placements, "brought to you by" voiceovers, the CBS eye logo at the end, and a card that says the episodes were flown to the US from the UK.
Mill Creek's Seasons 2 and 3, (and probably Season 4 too), seem to be the same licensed source prints that the Network UK DVD's used based on a couple of electronic pauses and or picture break-up problems that appear in the same spots on the same couple of episodes in both the R2 and R1 DVDs.
The greys, darkness, and detail levels of the picture look about the same to me on both the R2 and the R1, with the Mill Creek's looking slightly sharper than the R2s, to my eye.
The Network UK sets used 5 DVDs per season for S1,S2, and S3, and 3 DVDs for Season 4. Mill Creek used 3 DVDs for S1, S2, and S3. I don't know how many MC used for S4.
Robin Hood fans should also pick up Vol. 10 of the Alpha release of "The Adventures Of Robin Hood" to get an alternate version of the S1 episode "The Knight Who Came To Dinner".
This second version of "The Knight Who Came To Dinner" was probably made for the US. The evil Abbot character in the original version was removed from the show and replaced with a secular bad guy in refilmed sequences and other parts of the episode were redubbed to remove any Abbot references.
I think CBS censors had the Abbot character removed because his demeaner was similar to that of Bishop Fulton J. Sheen, who had an inspirational TV show on around that time.
An easier call for R1 vs R2, with the R2 version being the clear winner,would be "The Adventures Of William Tell".
The "Tell" Network UK R2 set has all 39 episodes plus a more detailed picture in the darks. The Timeless Media R1 release only has 30 episodes and a picture that lost some detail in the darks.
