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(aka "Planet Patrol (in USA)")

 

Created by Roberta Leigh
 USA 1963-1968

 

This is Earth the year 2100 and these are the adventures of cult hit Space Patrol! Newly remastered in High Definition from the original film elements for this Blu-ray edition, the series has never looked better!. 

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Remember the 1960s? Programs like Supercar and Fireball XL-5 created a huge market for children's SF, and even Gerry Anderson couldn't fill it. One of the programs that tried to bridge the gap was Space Patrol, a puppet show made by Frank Goulding, Roberta Leigh, and other defectors from the Anderson empire. Filmed on a shoestring in black and white, it had some interesting ideas that could have usefully been transferred to later series; spaceships used antigravity, not rockets, and took weeks to reach the outer planets, aliens weren't always humanoid and had their own languages and customs (and it took several days to program the translating computers), and gadgets took time to develop and tended to be reused once they'd appeared. There were even vague signs of a story arc occasionally, something singularly lacking in most of its rivals. It's an acknowledged source for several programs including Babylon 5 (whose director talks about the show in one of the extra features). For many years it was believed that most of the episodes had been lost, with the rest in very poor condition, but in the nineties Roberta Leigh found that she had a complete run of the series on 16mm film in her garage. Eventually the episodes were transferred to tape and later DVD. This set collects all of the episodes and includes all of the extras from the tapes; interviews with animators, cast, and fans of the show (most notably Joe Michael Straczynski), samples of the other programmes made by the company, advertising, and so forth. It's an extraordinarily complete archive. Today some of the ideas in the show seem a little odd - and some of the tricks used to save money, such as recycled footage and reused puppets which give the impression of a very small cast of actors. American buyers: This program was shown as "Planet Patrol" in the USA; it isn't the same program as the earlier American live-action "Space Patrol".

Excerpt from Amazon UK located HERE

Promotional

TV Broadcast: April 7th, 1963

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Review: Network - Region FREE - Blu-ray

Box Cover

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Distribution Network - Region FREE - Blu-ray
Runtime 10 (0:25:56.250)-Epiosdes = 4:17:07.291 X 4 Blu-rays        
Video

1.33:1 1080P Dual-layered Blu-ray

Disc One Size: 44,885,545,640 bytes

10-Episodes: 44,661,042,240 bytes

Video Bitrate: 15.36 Mbps

Codec: MPEG-4 AVC Video

NOTE: The Vertical axis represents the bits transferred per second. The Horizontal is the time in minutes.
Bitrate Blu-ray:

Audio

LPCM Audio English 1536 kbps 2.0 / 48 kHz / 1536 kbps / 16-bit
Subtitles None
Features Release Information:
Studio: Network

 

1.33:1 1080P Dual-layered Blu-ray

Disc One Size: 44,885,545,640 bytes

10-Episodes: 44,661,042,240 bytes

Video Bitrate: 15.36 Mbps

Codec: MPEG-4 AVC Video

 

Edition Details:

• none


 Blu-ray Release Date: October 8th, 2018
 Standard Blu-ray Case

Chapters 10 per BD

 

 

Comments:

NOTE: The below Blu-ray captures were taken directly from the Blu-ray disc.

Space Patrol (Planet Patrol in the US as there already was a 50's show of the same name broadcast in America) receives a Region FREE Blu-ray release from Network in the UK. It has the complete series of all 39 episodes from seasons one and two with 10 (roughly 26-minute) episodes on the first 3 dual-layered Blu-rays and nine on the final BD. So it's over 4-hours per disc and the black and white puppetry is not at the higher level of Gerry Anderson's Thunderbirds and its Supermarionation process although Space Patrol uses some animation in space sequences. The bitrate is quite modest but the higher definition is certainly capable of seeing visible wires in a few scenes. I'd say it looks a bit weak but probably very much in-line with the original broadcasts (although in 24fps not the 25fps PAL standard originally shown in the UK.).

The audio transferred via 16-bit linear PCM sounding authentically flat in the uncompressed. There is a score credited to Fred Judd (his only credit) which sounds occasionally hokey but clean and often effective in supporting the on-screen space action. There are no subtitles on this Region FREE-locked Blu-ray.

There are no extras - just the complete series in 1080P.

From a science fiction standpoint this was an influential TV show, released before Star Trek and some will see the similarities with blonde Marla (from Venus) Col. Raeburn secretary-cum-communications officer (comparable to Uhura) and Slim - an intelligent alien character (also Venusian) with pointed ears not dissimilar to Spock. If you give yourself over to this for a few episodes - it's hard not to embrace and appreciate the concept. Many of the episodes fit intriguingly into the genre with an asteroid collision course, robot rebellion, lost scientists on Jupiter, a shrinking disease, controlled weather, invisibility, a race of giants and much more. Network's Blu-ray is unique in bringing this historical television artefact to HD and it holds immense nostalgia value for fans.

Gary Tooze

 

Menus / Extras

 

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Box Cover

CLICK to order from:

    

Distribution Network - Region FREE - Blu-ray


 


 

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