International The Goodies Complete BBC (1 Viewer)

[bigshot]

I just got the complete Goodies box from Amazon UK. The restorations are fantastic. I projected it on my ten foot screen and both the video segments and the film segments looked great. I've only watched disc 7 so far, but the Rolf Harris safari episode is there and the Jimmy Saville gags are intact. A lot of the show involves references to British celebrities, but if you can take it like Monty Python ("Reginald Maudling's elbow"), it works for US audiences. The best part about the set is the subtitles. In the Kung Fu Ekky Thump episode, I turned on the subs and realized how much of the funny dialogue Bill Oddie was delivering that I was missing. Thick accents and rapid fire delivery can make it tough for an America viewer.

In any case, this set is great and it looks so good, I hope they can go back and restore other great series like this... Fawlty Towers and Monty Python in particular. I really like British sketch comedy and this set and the recent Spike Milligan's Q sets have opened my eyes to comedy that I never got to see back in the day.

 

[AndyMcKinney]

speaking of the subtitles, I think several British viewers of this set said there are many errors in them and some just gave up watchign the shows with them turned on!

You mentioned how The Goodies might play to a US audience. Although it wasn't distributed as widely as Flying Circus and Benny Hill were, some US stations (probably in larger markets) got to see this show in the '70s.

It should be noted there are a few edits (musical-related stuff, like the Beatles song in "Goodies Rule OK"), but Network made this set as complete as possible. Of particular good news was on the couple of black-and-white episodes, they restored the recently-unearthed censor clips, restoring those episodes to their complete running time for the first time since the colour tapes were wiped.

 

[bigshot]

The subtitles were fine on the shows I watched. My only complaint about them was that they said (Audience laughs) a few times, which wasn't necessary.

 

[Mr. Handley]

I loved The Goodies as a kid. As a young American, I couldn't always understand the dialogue, but the slapstick stuff sure translated!

BTW, is that UK set region free?

 

[AndyMcKinney]

I loved The Goodies as a kid. As a young American, I couldn't always understand the dialogue, but the slapstick stuff sure translated!

BTW, is that UK set region free?

It's probably coded Region 2. Since at least some of their blu-ray releases are Region B locked (Space: 1999 Year 2, I'm looking at you), I can't imagine that their DVDs wouldn't be coded Region 2 (or, at least, Regions 2 and 4). Also, don't forget, they're PAL format.

 

[Mr. Handley]

Yeah, looks like Region 2. Too bad.

 

[AndyMcKinney]

you could always buy a cheap player you could type a remote code into. I've seen easily-hackable Philips players selling for $10.00 on the secondhand market...