Doctor Who Returns in the 50th Anniversary Special in:

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Wednesday, 17 July 2013

Eccleston, Tennant and Smith All In One High Definition Boxset?

A Limited Edition Blu-ray Gift set has appeared over-night on Amazon.com as a pre-order. It features Series 1-7 released on Blu-ray alongside a universal Sonic Screwdriver Remote Control and totals at $314.98. It contained this release description:

For the first time ever, BBC Home Entertainment is collecting the complete new Doctor Who together on Blu-ray plus an amazing assortment of additional items including the totally unique Doctor Who Universal Remote Control Sonic Screwdriver and more! The collection includes Series 1-4, featuring Ninth Doctor Christopher Eccleston and Tenth Doctor David Tennant, making their Blu-ray debut in newly remastered versions at full 1080p resolution, plus Series 5-7 featuring Eleventh Doctor Matt Smith, also on 1080p high definition Blu-ray. Catch up with the complete new Doctor Who in high definition just in time for the historic 50th Anniversary Special this fall.
  Given the last sentence, it is clearly expected that the release date to be during or before September.

This release has already worked up people's interest on the internet. Questions such as "Will this be available in the UK as well or just the USA?" and "What about separate releases of each series set?" are the clear obvious ones that none of us have any idea about.

Among the more technical issues for this release is the picture quality for the episodes shot in Standard Definition (Rose to The Next Doctor). While there is no doubt that the picture quality will be better (what with professional upscaling and far improved codecs), the case boils down to how much better will it be than the DVDs? Will it be worth it for the majority?
 The Standard Definition content was shot on digital and not film therefore, it is not possible to produce note-worthy transformations to HD. (If it was, Classic would have tons more HD releases rather than just Spearhead from Space.) Because of this, people have criticised the presence of "newly remastered versions at full 1080p resolution" in the description as this can easily confuse people.

On the positive side, this would give the BBC a chance to reauthor the discs and add content that was not previous there and to fix things that were there (i.e. the correct Born Again) and, as unlikely as it may be, having the complete Doctor Who Confidentials added.

Finally,  We are not completely sure of this as, while the box cover looks rather good (and plausible), there are no other sources to confirm anything about this release.

1 comment:

DAVID WALSTON said...

MUST HAVE!