The Merchandise Guide
DVD Bonus Disc Review
Compiled by Martin Willey

The A&E bonus disc was initially released with their "MegaSet" of 16 volumes, as an exclusive for the US store Best Buy. Eventually A&E themselves began to sell this version of the MegaSet, and in March 2003 A&E finally sold the Bonus Disc separately. It is packaged in a plain white paper sleeve, even when sold separately.

The A&E first series DVDs were the poorest of the various DVD releases of the show, with obvious visual problems in some episodes and relatively sparse extras. However, as I pointed out in my original review, the quality was still far superior to any previous release and overall this was an exceptionally good release. With the second series DVDs, A&E rose to the standard set by Carlton in the UK and TF1 in France. With their bonus disc, A&E returns to correct three of the most flawed episodes, and excels with the quality of their bonus features.

Remastered episodes

The three episodes are Death's Other Dominion (which suffered from motion- smearing on set 3), Dragon's Domain (correcting the distorted colours of the original) and The Testament Of Arkadia (fixing contrast changes and overly dark picture from volume 8). There are other episodes that suffered from similar problems, but these were probably the most obviously flawed. The UK and French releases did not have the problems with Death's Other Dominion and The Testament Of Arkadia (although the latter is a little dark). The Dragon's Domain colour problem is common to all the releases, so it is particularly welcome to see the good colour balance here.

Bonus Features

The Bonus Features are led by Message From Moonbase Alpha, the fan produced short feature that won much admiration since its debut at the 1999 Los Angeles convention. It has appeared before, on the French TF1 Bonus Disc, but not on the Carlton UK release. This version benefits from the addition of Barry Gray's music (TF1 had problems getting clearance for the music).

Audio commentaries are one of the best features of the DVD format, and A&E must be commended for making them for this disc. None of the three commentaries actually discuss the episodes themselves or what is taking place on screen, which isn't a bad thing (some DVD commentaries can be descriptions of the on-screen action, like a particularly redundant sports commentator). In effect these commentaries are one hour lectures about the first series, full of fascinating anecdotes and opinion. Scott Michael Bosco (a fan who advised A&E on the release) discusses the religious and moral themes of the first series episodes. It is a challenging approach to take, probably of more appeal to the fans than the wider audience, but Bosco is a fluent speaker with some insightful comments. Writers Christopher Penfold and Johnny Byrne have a typically warm and engaging discussion on the concept of Space 1999 in their commentary. Producer Sylvia Anderson delivers an entertaining and gossipy commentary, revealing how she had to deal with the egos of the directors and stars (especially Martin Landau). The one annoying thing about these commentaries is that the episode soundtrack is too loud. Sometimes you struggle to follow the commentary over the dialogue and music.

The vintage Keith Wilson interview is included (it was seen with the other interviews on the Carlton volume 24 but missing from A&E's volume 16). There is also an "alternate edited version" of a sequence from Collision Course. Some shots in the five minute sequence are noticably poorer quality than others, probably due to the source, and towards the end the sound does not synchronise with the image. On close inspection, the only difference I found is that one line of Arra's dialogue is cut. The photo gallery has some unusual shots, and the quality is good throughout.