Archer's Goon on DVD
Jun. 14th, 2006 12:19 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
fenchurchHappy Flag Day!!
A little over a week ago, someone on the Diana Wynne Jones Yahoogroup mentioned that the BBC mini-series production of "Archer's Goon" was available on DVD in Japan (don't ask me why they haven't released it in the UK, but have released it in Japan, because it makes no sense to me). Anyway, I checked a few different Japanese DVD sites and eventually just ordered it from Amazon Japan (it's also available from Play Asia).
It arrived today!!! It has what I would describe as early 1970's Doctor Who production values (perhaps not even that good, really) with horribly cheesy theme music, but I don't care... it's just so much fun to see a favorite book brought to life like this, even if the characters don't always mesh up with how I'd imagined them, they're close enough. I actually already had it on VHS, but it was a copy of a copy of a copy I picked up from someone online years ago. Technically, it was a really BAD copy of a copy of a copy... as to be almost impossible to see (to the point that watching the DVD now feels pretty much like watching it for the first time).
If you're a DWJ fan and have a DVD player that can handle multiple regions, I highly recommend picking it up... it's great fun and seems to be sticking really closely to the book (at least so far, I'm only about three episodes in). If you've never read Archer's Goon, then you need to track down a copy, because it's still my favorite Diana Wynne Jones book (I always describe it as being like a cross between Zelazny's Nine Princes in Amber and the Bagthorpe novels by Helen Cresswell), which is saying a lot, since I love everything I've ever read by her.
ETA: D'oh! I think I may have figured out why it got released on DVD in Japan and not necessarily anywhere else. It was released in November of 2005... and "Howl's Moving Castle" (the Miyazaki movie based (somewhat loosely) on the DWJ book by the same name) came out on DVD in Japan in, you guessed it, November 2005. I'm guessing they did get quite a lot of carryover business, since I remember seeing "Howl's Moving Castle" on the list of "people who bought this, also bought that" items.
EATA: Hee!! Shine is being played by the same actress who played Margaret Blaine on the first season of the new "Doctor Who" (she's the Slitheen character who shows up in several episodes).
A little over a week ago, someone on the Diana Wynne Jones Yahoogroup mentioned that the BBC mini-series production of "Archer's Goon" was available on DVD in Japan (don't ask me why they haven't released it in the UK, but have released it in Japan, because it makes no sense to me). Anyway, I checked a few different Japanese DVD sites and eventually just ordered it from Amazon Japan (it's also available from Play Asia).
It arrived today!!! It has what I would describe as early 1970's Doctor Who production values (perhaps not even that good, really) with horribly cheesy theme music, but I don't care... it's just so much fun to see a favorite book brought to life like this, even if the characters don't always mesh up with how I'd imagined them, they're close enough. I actually already had it on VHS, but it was a copy of a copy of a copy I picked up from someone online years ago. Technically, it was a really BAD copy of a copy of a copy... as to be almost impossible to see (to the point that watching the DVD now feels pretty much like watching it for the first time).
If you're a DWJ fan and have a DVD player that can handle multiple regions, I highly recommend picking it up... it's great fun and seems to be sticking really closely to the book (at least so far, I'm only about three episodes in). If you've never read Archer's Goon, then you need to track down a copy, because it's still my favorite Diana Wynne Jones book (I always describe it as being like a cross between Zelazny's Nine Princes in Amber and the Bagthorpe novels by Helen Cresswell), which is saying a lot, since I love everything I've ever read by her.
ETA: D'oh! I think I may have figured out why it got released on DVD in Japan and not necessarily anywhere else. It was released in November of 2005... and "Howl's Moving Castle" (the Miyazaki movie based (somewhat loosely) on the DWJ book by the same name) came out on DVD in Japan in, you guessed it, November 2005. I'm guessing they did get quite a lot of carryover business, since I remember seeing "Howl's Moving Castle" on the list of "people who bought this, also bought that" items.
EATA: Hee!! Shine is being played by the same actress who played Margaret Blaine on the first season of the new "Doctor Who" (she's the Slitheen character who shows up in several episodes).
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Date: 2006-06-14 10:52 pm (UTC)