Brittassing In Action

The Brittas Empire ran for seven series on BBC One between 1991 and 1997, all of which were later released on DVD, alongside a limited amount of bonus content. And what they chose, and didn't choose, to include as special features is a bit odd.

The BBC Does Not Have Adverts But Some Programmes It Airs Originally Did: A Case Study

The BBC occasionally buys programming from other countries. And those programmes were probably originally made for channels with commercial breaks... which the BBC, as established in the rather eccentric title of this post, don't have. The solution was generally to edit out the fades or cuts to black where the adverts would originally go. But sometimes things would be a bit more complicated than that. What if the programme had something designed to lead in to an advert break - such as a cliffhanger, or a bit of leaning on the fourth wall acknowledging the gap? The Simpsons, which the BBC aired the first 11 seasons of between 1996 and 2004, is a good test subject for this, so let's take a look at what got cut.

Hypno-Digital-Versatile-Disc

A few months ago, in Edit Wars #5, I postulated that the original series of Robot Wars would be an excellent show to release on DVD because of all the lovely potential bonus content. So why not imagine what such content could look like with a series of fantasy DVD listings?

Broken Gamebooks #11: Midnight Rogue

Midnight Rogue, the twenty-ninth entry in the Fighting Fantasy series, is an entertaining change from the norm: you play an apprentice in the Thieves' Guild of Port Blacksand, and to be granted full membership of the guild, you must locate and steal a priceless gem known as the Eye of the Basilisk. It's a fun, punchy adventure with a unique plot, and also tries a few gameplay innovations not often seen in FF books; nothing groundbreaking, but I'm certainly glad it exists.

Right, that's that out of the way, let's errata the hell out of this thing. MASSIVE SPOILERS below the jump break, for the wary.

One Foot in the Genome

You know the drill by now, it's an article culled entirely from old Radio Times listings back in the day where producers got the chance to write their own, as found on the BBC Genome. The show under discussion is One Foot in the Grave.

Cliffhangerama

In 2007, Futurama returned four years after being cancelled by Fox, in the form of four direct-to-DVD movies. As part of a deal struck with Comedy Central, these movies would then be chopped up into four episodes each, creating a 16-episode season. There were a couple of differences between the movies and the individual episodes (which have never been released commercially), the biggest of which were the creation of twelve cliffhangers obviously not seen on DVD. Let's find out what they were, along with some assorted other trivia...

Cahiers Classiques d'Horreur

Image recycled from previous article owing to obscurity of subject matter

Way, way back in the first ever post I wrote for the blog, nearly two years ago, I reviewed the short-lived Horror Classic Gamebooks series by J.H. Brennan.

I have recently discovered several references on the Internet (primarily on TV Tropes) to an unofficial third book in this series. It appears that the two books in the original series were hugely popular in France, to the point that a fan wrote their own entry in the series and managed to get it officially printed. (One wonders if J.H. Brennan was ever aware of the existence of this; I suspect not.)

The book was entitled La Malédiction des Baskerville, which translates as "Curse of the Baskerville", and allows you to play as either Sherlock Holmes or... the Hound of the Baskervilles. (One presumes the author felt the 'villain' character should be a monster of some kind, following the lead of the two 'official' books, hence why it isn't Moriarty.)

If you happen to have any more information on this (especially if you know any way I could get an English translation of it), I would welcome it.

The Tell-Tale Edit

BART: And if you still want to tear apart this young Sunday School student as he stands on the brink of salvation, I await your wrath.
[The mob sounds moved.]
KRUSTY: Somehow, I don't feel like killing any more.

If you happen to watch the Complete First Season DVD's copy of the Simpsons episode "The Telltale Head", you will find those lines in the final scene. However, that is not how the episode was originally broadcast. But just what was aired, and when, and why were the changes made? We can reasonably confidently answer two of those three questions.