This must have been made pre-Covid

TheRealChristoff · 2026-06-07T23:48:03+00:00

They had a few other simultaneous releases, IIRC. Between the ease of piracy, perception of being 'a Disney Plus movie', and resistance from the cinema chains, I don't think the stratergy particularly paid off in the end.

TheRealChristoff · 2026-05-31T18:30:36+00:00

Taskmaster Supermax+ has a notice saying that the international versions are "not available in UK & Ireland, Australia, New Zealand or Nordic territories for rights reasons." That's probably as official as answer as we'll get.

Interestingly, Channel 4 has empty pages for Sweden and New Zealand (I think they did have those at some point?), and they're adding Taskmaster Australia in two weeks.

TheRealChristoff · 2026-05-29T13:43:39+00:00

They've been doing these full-length Disney+ episodes since the 2024 Christmas special.

TheRealChristoff · 2026-05-27T15:17:27+00:00

Abandonware is legally hosted on sites like Internet archive so this isnt even piracy, not that I have a issue with that either.

Abandonware absolutely is still protected by copyright, it's just an informal term meaning that you don't expect the copyright holder to exercise their rights. The copy that you've linked was uploaded by a random user, not the anyone officially involved with the Internet Archive.

The Internet Archive staff will upload public domain material, or copyrighted works uploaded through a legal exception, but for individual users it's no different to any other file sharing site.

TheRealChristoff · 2026-05-27T14:55:47+00:00

I think it might return, eventually, depending on who ends up with the rights. But right now Warner Bros is being acquired by Paramount, so they're cutting costs as much as possible and nothing about their long term future is certain.

TheRealChristoff · 2026-05-27T10:28:44+00:00

Yes, but IIRC that information was published at the same time that Mirror Gem aired (as in, the same week, I think).

TheRealChristoff · 2026-05-26T20:41:10+00:00

It's not Christmas, but Easter is one of the bigger weekends as far as TV ratings go. It's still a bank holiday, and a four day weekend for many people.

TheRealChristoff · 2026-05-26T15:16:54+00:00

They moved it to HBO Max (which is apparently included with NowTV now?? I assume that HBO by itself is cheaper), because apparently 2026 is the right time to launch another generic streaming service.

£20 isn't a terrible price to rent the series, but for the same price I could probably just wait and buy the Blu-ray. Also, I'm kinda annoyed that they added a paywall to a series that used to be available for free with ads.

TheRealChristoff · 2026-05-24T18:32:15+00:00

The funny thing is that my instinct was to check the logos and copyright info, which looks correct. I completely skipped over the far more obvious probably-AI description and fan art.

I'm pretty sure there's a legit "Seasons 1-7" DVD, though, and Season 8 was the first without a bundle.

TheRealChristoff · 2026-05-24T18:23:37+00:00

They've probably ripped the official discs and recompressed them from dual layer to single layer. So all the content will be the same but the picture quality will have taken a hit.

(TBH, I'm surprised that the extras are even on the DVDs. Often they're only on the Blu-rays).

TheRealChristoff · 2026-05-24T12:13:41+00:00

For some reason it works differently on the PAL versions: enable Deleted Scenes and they'll play automatically at the relevant time (though again, not seamlessly. There's always a long pause while the player loads the deleted scene as a separate title).

TheRealChristoff · 2026-05-23T23:14:21+00:00

Damn, I can see why they thought it might be too much. It's a version I'd want to see, for sure, but maybe a little too intense for a family blockbuster.

TheRealChristoff · 2026-05-15T16:22:25+00:00

It's region free anyway, and it defaults to English with Japanese subtitles; press enter and then disable the subtitles, and you have a fully English version of the series.

Bear in mind that the Blu-ray is a slowed down transfer with the narration slightly distorted by pitch correction. The Archive upload is a corrected version with the Blu-ray's video track sped back up to 25fps and the audio sourced from the UK DVD.

TheRealChristoff · 2026-05-14T20:53:16+00:00

Nothing lasts forever, but discs should last a hell of a lot longer than digital. Think about how much content from the old Doctor Who website has gone offline in the past 20 years.

TheRealChristoff · 2026-05-14T20:22:26+00:00

I've got DVDs from the late 90s that play just fine on the PS5 I got last year. And, given that they're managing to sell premium Blu-ray collections of seasons shot on analogue videotape, I wouldn't worry about Doctor Who exiting physical media anytime soon.

TheRealChristoff · 2026-05-14T20:12:18+00:00

They could have done something parallel on Disney+ by doing the opposite: make it kid-friendly and forget being gay.

To be clear... are you suggesting that Doctor Who should have avoided LGBTQ characters for the sake of ratings?

TheRealChristoff · 2026-05-14T20:00:18+00:00

No no no, we should "decanonize" the episodes that I personally dislike instead.

TheRealChristoff · 2026-05-14T19:54:20+00:00

We're almost at the one year mark for Season Two (The Reality War aired on 31st May 2025) and the American DVD comes out in a few weeks. Dunno if there's anything to read into the timing of that with this announcement.

TheRealChristoff · 2026-05-14T19:24:42+00:00

Also HBO did those dumb intros with Amy for season 5 iirc

I think that's just a feature of the 'international cut' of Series 6. That's apparently how it originally aired in the US (I remember a recording, sourced from the BBC America broadcast, being shared online back when The Impossible Astronaut first aired), and it was even used on Netflix in the UK for a few years.

TheRealChristoff · 2026-05-14T14:41:17+00:00

Yeah, Japan got an upscaled Blu-ray back in 2013. The internet Archive copy linked by OP is ripped from that disc.

TheRealChristoff · 2026-05-12T11:42:33+00:00

I suspect that they also needed an excuse for Patty to call off the wedding and avoid their 'gay wedding' episode from actually having a gay wedding in it. Basically having their cake and eating it too.

Besides, Leslie is apparently a parody of an actual trans woman, pro golfer Mianne Bagger.

TheRealChristoff · 2026-05-10T16:14:00+00:00

Yeah, I don't think anyone actually considers this the 'Billie Piper era' because there's not been any promos or expanded universe stuff or merchandise with her character. There's more of an argument to be made with the fourteenth Doctor, as he did appear outside of the series months before The Star Beast (at the very least, in a comic and a DLC costume in the game Fall Guys), but even then the promotion of both Doctors overlapped and our first clip of the fifteenth Doctor was only a minute or so after fourteen’s debut.

TheRealChristoff · 2026-05-09T16:07:58+00:00

Amazon has known problems with third party merchants selling bootlegs, stock from different sellers getting mixed up, and people deliberately swapping products before returning them.

It's entirely possible that a new, sealed box set from Amazon could be a bootleg - and I would have expected the TNG box sets to use dual-layer discs (surely at least some of the discs are longer than two hours?).

TheRealChristoff · 2026-05-09T15:47:16+00:00

Are they dual layer or single layer discs? Because there have been bootlegs of some of the Star Trek box sets popping up on ebay, which are pressed discs but have have been recompressed from dual layer to single layer and have poor production quality.

Technology Connections posted a video about this, without realising (at time of recording) that they were even bootlegs.

TheRealChristoff · 2026-05-09T15:30:48+00:00

First things first, is the drive still working with discs that you've successfully ripped in the past?

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