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Not only that but each of the newer cassettes come with a card from the London Postcard Company! I pointed out to Richard that some of us had been disappointed with the physical quality of VG's cassettes (mine started to decay noticeably after just six or seven plays) and the quality of their master copies (scratchy, grainy old things!). Well this time round we are seeing crisp, sharp master copies!!! These have been freshly created by the holding company, British Independent Television Enterprises ("BRITE"), who have transferred all episodes to digital "D2" tape from an old set of LWT prints. To be clear on the matter, these eps have not been remastered as such but simply transferred to digital tape and cleaned up a bit. Whatever – the results are superb for most episodes. The only notable exception is 'The Madness of Mickey Hamilton', for which it looks as though LWT's "source" print was very battered indeed!
Anybody who watched the Granada Plus repeats will have noticed strange anomalies with the title sequence in the first-season episodes: they all had the later version except 'When the Heat Cools Off' for some reason. And the first two episodes had the Cowley voice-over yet with the later titles. Well unfortunately this is how BRITE have mastered the episodes, so we are stuck with them. Contender did consider using the master copies from Mark 1 Prods, which appear to contain the episodes in their original format, but unfortunately some of them turned out to be in pretty poor condition. A shame, really, as I think it would have been great to have seen at least one first-season episode with the original titles, logos, etc. The tapes are widely available in UK stores.
Although BRITE claimed their episodes were uncut, this is certainly not the case for 'Hunter/Hunted'.The entire pre-titles scene and an exciting motorway chase sequence were missing. The scissor job appears to have happened several years ago when LWT were "preparing" (ie editing down!) episodes for a repeat run and somehow this version erroneously found its way into BRITE's supposedly uncut archive. Unfortunately Contender accepted this copy in good faith and this is the version featured on volume five. BRITE eventually admitted their mistake and uncovered a full-length copy at LWT (probably locked away in the bottom drawer of a battered old filing cabinet in a dusty, disused cellar.... with a sign on the door saying "Beware of the Leopard"!) and transferred it to D2. Contender re-issued the episode in mid-2000.
A couple of recommended online order services for you: Video Shop. Fan Kris Adrian found their carriage costs to be reasonable and their delivery very reliable. Thanks for the pointer, Kris! ... and ... For vids/DVDs starring Martin Shaw, try here. ... For vids/DVDs starring Gordon Jackson, try here. ... For vids/DVDs starring Lewis Collins, try here. |
| Video covers reproduced by kind permission of Richard Bridgwood with kind assistance of Dean Harmer. |
Despite the folding of Video Gems in 1996 (having released 31 episodes), interest in the series continued to climb in the UK and another company has come to the rescue. Richard Bridgwood of 
Up until October 1998 the tapes contained the standard two eps per tape. From then on, there were three.
We also discussed the fact that, despite VG's claims of "complete episodes", in fact some of their tapes were slightly shorter than the proper fifty-plus minutes (most notably 
Richard also mentioned the possibility of releasing the episodes in DVD (Digital Versatle Disc) format. This is currently proving popular in the USA and there is high confidence that the UK will welcome it, too. Crisp, clean, non-deteriorating copies of our favourite series would be an answer to everyone's prayers! Currently Contender are aiming for early 2001.
Subsequent releases will each contain three episodes, have a new cover design (as pictured here) and, as mentioned above, include cards from the 