Comic Strip Presents - Complete Collection [DVD]

This would have been the DVD-release of the decade to me...
until I compared some of the episodes to my old tapes.
I haven't checked the old Channel 4 films yet, but a lot of the later episodes
have been heavily edited and messed around with. Many longer scenes are shortened,
but worse: some of the funniest dialogue is missing!!
I could only check a few shows and discovered these cuts:

SOUTH ATLANTIC RAIDERS 1 - about 2 minutes cut: a lot of the dialogue in Max' house is cut,
including the classic "My cousin's just been let out of a Lancashire cotton mill and the
Southern air and the Chateau Mignon 54 has rather gone to his Northern head";
the airport & prison escape scenes are shorter; some very funny dialogue between Billy
and Stan dressed as his mother is cut)

SOUTH ATLANTIC RAIDERS 2 - about 5 minutes (!!!) cut, too many cuts to mention, the worst are:
the whole intro sequence before the titles; most part of the flashback scenes when Stan tells the story;
some great gags in the airplane; a very funny scene, when Cathy wants to be alone with Stan and Billy
doesn't really get it; the whole dialogue between Stan & Frances, when he tells her he was wrong & loves her;
Cathy & the dead General (she originally says "Sieg heil, my darling!"); the whole scene when Billy
seems to be shot; the monologue from the Newsreporter is shortened; ...
To make matters even worse, the remaining pieces of the episode are messed around with.
The scene where Cathy goes to Frances with an axe is placed after Stan has arrived at the cottage,
which makes it look like a very stupid continuity error. Has the editor been totally drunk??!!

WILD TURKEY - 1 min. cut: the whole intro, where Ruby Wax writes Xmas cards;
the dancing scene ("have you kissed a turkey before?"); when the turkey leaves,
they hug & kiss ("I wish you were a turkey, Sue!") - you can clearly see the sloppy cut!

FOUR MEN IN A CAR - 1 min. cut: dialogue between Jennifer & Peter; the scene where Rik
tries to steal the motorbike is shorter.

GREGORY: DIARY OF A NUTCASE - I don't have an original to compare, but you can see a very sloppy cut!

Shame on the publisher for this unneccessary butchering !!!

Oh man, this is quite a marathon, I purchased this when it first came out back in 2005 and it has taken me a quite while to sit down to view them all.

Sure the film quality isnt clean and crisp but who really cares, does that matter? Take into consideration the films at your local box office, a fair few are rubbish right? well, you dont sit there and say "sure, that film was bad, but wow, what picture clarity!" no you dont, so please dont bag this wonderful show. Peter Richardson is a God and there's a stack of jems in this treasure box of laughter. Sure, ok, there is the odd dud but nonetheless great viewing.

I am old enough to remember all the classics from Five Go Mad right up to Mr Jolly Lives Next Door and More Bad News but sadly I never got to view anything pass a certain date as they never aired the latter shows in NZ. Watching all the shows I never saw from the late 80s through to just a few years ago was fantastic and there are some really great moments, such as Robbie Coltrane playing Charles Bronson in GLC, starring as the mighty tour de force ramboesque Ken Livingstone, or Adrian Edmundsen as John Major in Red Nose of Courage. Brilliant. Plus The Bullshitters returning to form in Detectives On The Edge Of A Nervous Breakdown!

The total list of shows are:

DISC 1. Five Go Mad In Dorset / War / The Beat Generation / Bad News Tour / Summer School / Five Go Mad On Mescalin.

DISC 2. Dirty Movie / Susie / A Fistful Of Travelers' Cheques / Gino - Full Story and Pics / Eddie Monsoon - A Life?

DISC 3. Slags / The Bullshitters / The Supergrass (feature movie) / Consuela

DISC 4. Private Enterprise / The Strike / More Bad News / Mr Jolly Lives Next Door

DISC 5. The Yob / Didn't You Kill My Brother / Funseekers

DISC 6. South Atlantic Raiders / South Atlantic Raiders Pt II / GLC / Spaghetti Hoops / Oxford

DISC 7. Les Dogs / Red Nose Of Courage / The Crying Game / Wild Turkey / Detectives On The Edge Of A Nervous Breakdown / Space Virgins From The Planet Sex

DISC 8. Queen Of The Wild Frontier / Gregory - Diary Of A Nutcase / Demonella / Jealousy / Four Men In a Car / Four Men In a Plane

DISC 9. The Comic Strip Presents - A Retrospective / First Laugh on Four Pt 1 / First Laugh on Four Pt 2 / The Comic Strip (Julien Temple)

Difficult to imagine in these days when we get a new TV channel every couple of days that in 1982 we only had three and that the first night of Channel Four would be an important cultural event. The one programme that I had been looking forward to was `The Comic Strip presents...Five Go Mad in Dorset' a perfect parody of the Enid Blyton's `Famous Five' books. It was an absolute scream and has coloured my television viewing ever since, from `The Young Ones', `The New Statesman', `French and Saunders', `Happy Families' and `Bottom' on to this weeks `Teenage Kicks'.

The remainder of the first series carried on the success with the brilliant ensemble piece `War', the fantastically clever `The Beat Generation', the classic heavy metal parody `Bad News Tour' and the brilliantly observed `Summer School'. The first three films were written by the Peter Richardson and Pete Richens partner ship while `Bad News Tour' was the brain child of Adrian Edmondson and `Summer School' was written by Dawn French.

The second series raised the bar even further with it's precursor of a second `Famous Five' film, `Five Go Mad On Mescalin' which built on the first film. Second up `Dirty Movie' is a brilliant visual comedy from the pen of Adrian Edmondson and Rik Mayall which works well with Rod Melvin's organ accompaniment. `Susie' is a brilliant love story parody from the Richardson Richens axis with Dawn French brilliant in the lead. `A Fistful of Travellers' Cheques' has Rik Mayall collaboration with the core writing team to create a perfect pastiche of the Dollars trilogy. `Gino' is a brilliant film with Keith Allen in the lead and is without doubt my favourite of all the Comic Strip films.
Edmondson's `Eddie Monsoon' and Jennifer Saunders `Slags' close the series and show how all the writing had improved.

`The Bullsh*tters' is now considered a Comic Strip film although as a collaboration between Allen and Richardson it was originally released without the familiar title so as to give Allen equal status as the creator of this perfect parody of Seventies TV detectives `The Professionals'. Other stand alone episodes at this time where Edmondson's brilliant `Private Enterprise' and `Consuela' a perfect French and Saunders parody of Daphne Du Maurier's `Rebecca' which was the template for the shorter film parodies that would later be the centre pieces of their own TV show.

The next film was the cinema release of feature `The Sugergrass' which was Peter Richardson's directing debut and does perhaps drag in areas and would possibly have been better served to have been edited to a hour as part of the next series which kicked off with the brilliant `The Strike' which was the first of many films to parody Hollywood and it's most famous sons through films within films of very English political films, in this case a sexing up of the miners strike. The next film was `More Bad News' which continued in a similar vein to its predecessor. Edmondson's and Mayall then gave us `Mr Jolly Lives Next Door' which is a film prototype of the duo's later sit com `Bottom'. The Next film was Allen's `The Yob' which mocks Allen's own football yob persona and parodies `The Fly' in a brilliant film which was the first film not to use the bulk of the original ensemble. This is continued with Alexi Sayle's film `Didn't you Kill my Brother?' and Nigel Planer's `Funseekers'.

The fourth series of films saw a move to the BBC and a return to the half hour format but continuity was guaranteed with Trouble from `Traveller's Cheques' and Max from `Gino' as well as the full ensemble appearing in two parter `South Atlantic Raiders'. `GLC' was a sequel to `The Strike' with Robbie Coltrane playing Charles Bronson as Ken Livingstone in the story of the abolition of the Greater London Council. `Oxford' features special guests Lenny Henry and Leslie Philips while `Spaghetti Hoops' and `Les Dogs' featured less of the regulars, the latter been a particularly weird piece.

Three specials came from the Comic Strip staple the first of one being the brilliant `Red Nose of Courage' which parodied British politics with Adrian Edmondson being a worryingly good John Major. `The Crying Game' was another Allen Richardson collaboration twisting the Paul Gascoigne story with a politically correct twist. `Wild Turkey' was a Christmas special featuring a gun toting turkey questioning our Christmas traditions.

The fourth series started strongly with Allen and Richardson's `Detectives on the Edge of a Nervous Breakdown' expanding the `Bullsh*tters' to parody all TV detectives with a few song and dance numbers. `Space Virgins from Planet Sex' was possibly the last great film with a B-movie pastiche blending with a wonderful James Bond parody in a way only the Comic Strip could pull off. `Queen of the Wild Frontier' saw Richens and Richardson move towards straight films but had none of the charm of the older films. `Gregory' was an accurate parody of `The Silence of the Lambs' whilst `Demonella' and `Jealousy' outlined that the Comic Strip had indeed had its course.

The original cast re-assembled on Channel Four five years later with the brilliant `Four Man in a Car' the success of which was almost repeated in 2000 with `Four Men in a Plane'. This DVD was released before the last Comic Strip film `Sex Actually' was produced but a further release will no doubt see this been added.

Although the bonus documentaries offer very little insight the original Julian Temple film of the initial stage revue at least fill in the gaps of a brilliant box set of a truly bench mark TV show.