Re-packaging

The re-packaging (some might say exploitation) of The Ray Bradbury Theater continues. The original DVD box set of the series contained all the episodes, some of them with their rarely seen episode-specific Bradbury introductions, but with too many episodes crammed onto too few discs. The result: poor quality image and sound and way too many compression artefacts. Still better than most of my aged off-air VHS recordings of the show, however.

Retailers heavily discounted the box set, and stocks declined.

And so came a re-release, this time in a "collector's tin". What an honour for a writer to have his work presented in a tin!

Now comes a reduced version of the series: a mere sixteen episodes are included on the latest re-package. Looking at the list of episodes, it could be argued that they have picked the better episodes...but I've a feeling that any random selection of sixteen episodes could make a similar claim. What they clearly have done is pick the episodes with the biggest stars - and so Shatner, Goldblum, Nielsen and Barrymore get their 1980s faces on the cover, although Nielsen will probably not be pleased to see his name mis-spelled (click on image above for larger view of this typo).

What I would welcome is a new transfer of the episodes, and some DVD extras such as a making-of documentary. This new package offers none of that. I would recommend picking up a discounted (or used) version of the original box set, rather than spending good money on this reduced content re-box.

In lieu of a "making of documentary", you could read my pages on the making of the series...