"Actor: David Anderson"

• The X Files: Season 5 | DVD | (14/10/2002) from £22.98   |  Saving you £12.01 (34.30%)   |  RRP £34.99

  The fifth season of The X-Files is the one in which the ongoing alien conspiracy arc really takes over, building towards box-office glory for the inevitable cinematic leap in The X-Files Movie (1998). The series opener "Redux" begins with Mulder having been framed for everything going. Scully finally sees a UFO ("The Red and the Black") before being presented with a potential daughter (the two-part "Christmas Carol" and "Emily"). By "The End", there's an enormous tangle of threads for the big-screen adaptation to unravel (or not, as it turned out). Cigarette Smoking Man is being hunted, playing every side against the middle, as well as chasing after information on Mulder's sister. Krycek is back, too, as is an old flame for Mulder in the shape of Agent Diana Fowley. If that wasn't enough to goad viewers into the cinema, there was the Lone Gunmen's 1989-set back story ("Unusual Suspects", with Richard Belzer playing his Homicide: Life on the Streets character), a musical number in the black and white Frankenstein homage "Post Modern Prometheus", and scripts co-written by Stephen King ("Chinga"), William Gibson ("Kill Switch"), and even Darren McGavin (who had inspired the show as Kolchak: The Night Stalker) in "Travellers". On the DVD: The X-Files, Season 5 extras include Chris Carter's commentary over "Post Modern Prometheus", which reveals the decision making behind shooting in black and white as well as the problems it caused. A second commentary is from writer/coproducer John Shiban on "Pine Bluff Variant", where he openly admits the influence of The Spy Who Came in from the Cold. Across the six discs (only 20 episodes because of the movie of course) you get credits for every episode, their TV promo spots, deleted and international versions of several scenes (some with commentary from Carter), and a couple of TV featurettes. The best of these is "The Truth About Season 5", talking to an excited Dean Haglund (Langly) amongst other crew members.--Paul Tonks

• X Files Season 4 Boxset | DVD | (22/04/2002) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £89.99

  In Season 4 of The X-Files, Scully is a bit upset by her on-off terminal cancer and Mulder is supposed to shoot himself in the season finale (did anyone believe that?), but in episode after episode the characters still plod dutifully around atrocity sites tossing off wry witticisms in that bland investigative demeanour out of fashion among TV cops since Dragnet. Perhaps the best achievement of this season is "Home", the most unpleasant horror story ever presented on prime-time US TV. It's not a comfortable show--confronted with this ghastly parade of incest, inbreeding, infanticide and mutilation, you'd think M & S would drop the jokes for once--but shows a willingness to expand the envelope. By contrast, ventures into golem, reincarnation, witchcraft and Invisible Man territory throw up run-of-the-mill body counts, spotlighting another recurrent problem. For heroes, M & S rarely do anything positive: they work out what is happening after all the killer's intended victims have been snuffed ("Kaddish"), let the monster get away ("Sanguinarium") and cause tragedies ("The Field Where I Died"). No wonder they're stuck in the FBI basement where they can do the least damage. The series has settled enough to play variations on earlier hits: following the liver vampire, we have a melanin vampire ("Teliko") and a cancer vampire ("Leonard Betts"), and return engagements for the oily contact lens aliens and the weasely ex-Agent Krycek ("Tunguska"/"Terma"). Occasional detours into send-up or post-modernism are indulged, yielding both the season's best episode ("Small Potatoes") and its most disappointing ("Musings of a Cigarette-Smoking Man"). "Small Potatoes", with the mimic mutant who tries out Mulder's life and realises what a loser he is (how many other pin-up series heroes get answerphone messages from their favourite phone-sex lines?), works as a genuine sci-fi mystery--for once featuring a mutant who doesn't have to kill people to live--and as character insight. --Kim Newman

• Night To Remember - Limited Edition, All-Region/1080p | Blu Ray | (08/07/2022) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  Classic documentary drama based on Walter Lord's book about the sinking of the Titanic in 1912. Told from the perspective of Second Officer Charles Lightoller (Kenneth More), the story follows the supposedly ˜unsinkable' ship as she embarks on her maiden voyage and ultimately founders in the North Atlantic Ocean.From Veteran British director Roy Ward Baker.Product Features1080p High definition presentationNEW Video Interview by critic Matthew SweetNEW Interview with film historian Jo BottingThe Making of A Night to Remember documentaryTheatrical TrailerLimited Edition slipcase on the first 1500 copies with unique artwork.More features to be announced .

• Fireball XL5 - The Complete Series | DVD | (20/10/2003) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £39.99

  Languishing in the vaults for decades, during which time it became a semi-legendary show among TV fans of a certain age, Fireball XL5 (1962) was Gerry Anderson's second puppet-animation science fiction series, the direct forerunner of Stingray (1963) and Thunderbirds (1964). This is the show on which Anderson established the formula for his later classics: a pseudo-military organisation engaged in desperate Earth-saving adventures against overwhelming odds; superb model work; puppets with very obvious strings but endearing personalities; iconic music by Barry Gray; and absolutely massive explosions. Colonel Steve Zodiac pilots the coolest spaceship then seen on British TV, the titular Fireball XL5, and is joined by medical officer Venus, a forerunner of Lady Penelope voiced by Sylvia Anderson, and comedy relief Prof Matt Matic (David Graham). Along for the ride is Robert the Robot, a thinner version of Robbie the Robot from Forbidden Planet (1956), a character who would soon turn up in Lost in Space (1965). The plots are ridiculous, with typically Cold War-era aliens routinely bent on planetary destruction for no reason, and there's zero attention to even rudimentary astronomy or anything else approaching actual science. Yet the gadgets, vehicles and puppetry are first-rate and the fast-paced, action-filled episodes are relentlessly entertaining. It's a cult just waiting to be reborn, and essential viewing for all Anderson fans. On the DVD: Fireball XL5 is presented with all 39 episodes (they run 25 minutes each) on five discs. Despite the colourful packaging, the episodes are all black and white, and the 4:3 picture is generally fine, though there are occasional instances of over-compression, which results in artefacting on smooth walls and the like. Some shots look a little soft, but detail is usually strong, making the models and puppets look better than ever. The mono sound is fine, if unremarkable. There are no extras beyond optional subtitles. --Gary S Dalkin

• The X Files: Deadalive | DVD | (06/08/2001) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £15.99

  This release consists of two episodes--"This is Not Happening" and "Deadalive"--of the eighth series of The X-Files spliced together into a feature-length story. With David Duchovny contracted only to do a certain percentage of shows this year, Robert Patrick was brought in as Agent John Doggett, partnering Gillian Anderson's Agent Scully while Duchovny's Mulder is off being tortured by alien-abductors in what looks like an industrial dentist's chair. This story comes about two-thirds of the way through the arc and sets up Duchovny's return to the show--though he literally has to die and come back to get back on the case. It's an unfortunate paradox that most X-Files stand-alone releases concentrate on the dreary alien-abduction/conspiracy episodes which carry the greater storyline of the show, giving the misleading impression that the series is a drearily solemn, badly plotted, straight-faced but stupid sci-fi soap opera. Always skipped over are the far more interesting, entertaining and impressive stand-alone supernatural mysteries or strange comic exercises. Though Duchovny is mostly lying in a hospital bed with oatmeal all over his face, Anderson--whose character is pregnant this series, another dull sub-plot--still gives an amazingly committed performance and gets terrific support from Patrick, whose character has shaken up a lot of what was settled or stale about the show, and the always-underrated Mitch Pileggi as Assistant Director Skinner. The story features several wild-eyed UFO guru types (including Roy Thinnes, once star of The Invaders) and returned abductees transformed into un-killable alien zombies. It's as well made as ever, with ominous shadows and the odd smart line, but you need to have been paying very close attention for seven years to understand what's going on. With Duchovny a potential escapee and Anderson perhaps in line to follow, this episode brings on the excellent Annabeth Gish as Agent Monica Reyes, a specialist in bizarre rituals, who is being effectively set up to partner Patrick in a post-Mulder-and-Scully X-Files that might well keep the franchise going on forever Star Trek-fashion. --Kim Newman

• BAT 21 | DVD | (16/07/2007) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £9.99

  After his reconnaissance plane is shot down behind enemy lines in Vietnam Lt. Colonel Hambleton (Hackman) a career soldier who's used to calling the shots from behind a desk must now figure out a way to survive in the jungle! Luckily for him he manages to establish radio contact with an Air Force pilot Bird-Dog (Glover) who makes it his mission to save his stranded comrade. To plan the dangerous rescue the two soldiers communicate by secret code. But when the enemy intercepts their messages it's only a matter of time before the code is broken...leaving both men at risk of being caught and imprisoned.

• The Shepherd | DVD | (01/09/2001) from £6.35   |  Saving you £-4.36 (N/A%)   |  RRP £1.99

  Welcome to a world where freedom is forgotten. The inhabitants of this future world have a choice to follow the rules or follow The Shepherd. In this world their destiny is dictated by militant cults and those who stray will be 'cleansed' by The Shepherd. Soon The Shepherd becomes the hunted and he must fight for his survival and that of his new flock.

• The X Files - Complete DVD Collection | DVD | (30/10/2006) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £199.99

  Now you can own the entire adventures of The X-Files in this bumper DVD box set. every episode from all 9 seasons of this multi-award award-winning show are available for the first time in this exclusive Collector's Edition. Don't miss the opportunity to see how the phenomenon all began back in 1993 and how it came to a close 9 years later!

• Cowboys & Zombies | DVD | (01/08/2011) from £14.55   |  Saving you £1.44 (9.90%)   |  RRP £15.99

  It's 1849 and an outlaw wanted in the old west's Jamestown gets more than he bargained for when he finds the town over-run by zombies - victims of a virus unleashed by a meteor found in the gold rush. Cowboys and native Indians unite to fight the undead horde as guns blaze and mutants growl in this showdown for survival in the weird wild west.

• Please Sir! - The Best Of Please Sir! - Vol. 2 | DVD | (03/02/2003) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £9.99

  The Sporting Life: The sports master has resigned and guess who they get to replace him! Unfortunately Bernard's swimming classes descend into chaos as Duffy's terrified of water and Dunstable just can't seem to keep those unusual swimming trunks on. Norman's Conquest: 5c decide to adopt an animal after watching a wildlife preservation programme. The adopted pet is named after Norman but what exactly is it and will it survive 5c? X Certificate: Determined that 5c will not just be the tea boys this Open Day Bernard and the class make a film about the school. It impresses no-one until a second interpretation catches the attention of a passing journalist...

• William Burroughs: A Man Within | DVD | (26/12/2011) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £14.99

  A portrait of one of the 20th century's most influential cultural icons, with testimonies from artists, musicians, writers and friends. William Burroughs is now regarded as a huge influence over late 20th century fiction and cultural life. This documentary features previously unseen footage of Burroughs in conversation, as well as footage of him at many of his infamous readings, where he brought to life his writing, in front of audiences the world over.

• Please Sir! - The Best Of Please Sir! - Vol. 4 | DVD | (03/02/2003) from £4.28   |  Saving you £6.97 (230.79%)   |  RRP £9.99

  Out Of The Frying Pan: Mrs. Savage has a rather unorthodox attitude towards lunchtime as she forces all of the school to eat in the local pub then resigns much to the confusion of Cromwell - but then he's never tried her cooking! Mixed Doubles: Abbott narrowly avoids a fight with a local yob but still manages to land a brick through a shop window. Maureen confesses her role to Bernard but will he do the right thing and tell the shopkeepers?

• Please Sir! - The Best Of Please Sir! - Vol. 1 | DVD | (03/02/2003) from £20.97   |  Saving you £-10.98 (-109.90%)   |  RRP £9.99

  They're Off: Bernard's class is taking his teaching methods a little too seriously when they place a bet based on what he told them in class. Appalled Bernard has to cancel the bet or the school will cancel him! Common Law: Bernard plays detective after Sharon is molested in the park on the way home from school. Prepared to be surprised because you'll be shocked at the identity of the culprit! Panalal Passes: By The first Parent Teacher Association meeting is a failure when only the parents of the new boy Panalal turn up. But when Bernard organises a second PTA meeting it's not the parents who are too lazy to turn up it's the teachers!

• DVD/BLU-RAY - DEATHDREAM (AKA DEAD OF NIGHT) (LTD) (1 DVD) | Blu Ray | (28/11/2017) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

• Joe 90 - Vol. 5 - Episodes 25-30 | DVD | (27/01/2003) from £13.05   |  Saving you £2.94 (22.53%)   |  RRP £15.99

  Joe McClaine is a seemingly ordinary 9 year old boy. However his father has developed a marvellous method of transferring special brain patterns into his son's mind that allows Joe to acquire incredible skills. Soon Joe becomes an agent for the World Intelligence Network and uses his extraordinary enhancements to serve justice around the world... Another stunning Supermarionation series from the Gerry Anderson team that brought you 'Thunderbirds' 'Captain Scarlet' and 'Stingray'.

• Baywatch - Pamela Anderson | DVD | (01/11/2010) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £2.99

  Baywatch: The Best Of Pammy

• Please Sir! - The Best Of Please Sir! - Vol. 3 | DVD | (03/02/2003) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £9.99

  The Decent Thing: When Bernard spends a night with Sharon's mother he doesn't bargain on the consequences such as Sharon telling people that her mother is in the club again. Is Bernard about to have his first nervous breakdown? The Generation Gap: Class 5c becomes socially aware and take to promoting care in the community amongst the older residents. Unfortunately it's not necessarily the students who have to be co-operative as Potter finds out with Mr. De'Ath. The School Captain: The newly founded House system at Fenn Street runs into a few teething problems with election rigging and uncooperative students all whilst Bernard is trying to maintain his own reputation as Housemaster.

• Joe 90 - Vol. 2 | DVD | (30/09/2002) from £14.83   |  Saving you £1.16 (7.82%)   |  RRP £15.99

  Joe 90 was Gerry Anderson's penultimate puppet show of the 1960s, following Captain Scarlet (1968) and preceding the little-known The Secret Service (1969). In 2112 professor Ian McClaine has invented the BIG RAT (Brain Impulse Galvanoscope, Record and Transfer), a machine for copying knowledge and experiences from person to person. WIN (World Intelligence Organisation) uses this to prime their top undercover agent before sending him into the field on missions which range from foiling international terrorists to recovering a nuclear weapon from beneath the polar ice. So far so good, but in perhaps the most mind-boggling concept ever to reach children's TV, that agent is McClaine's nine-year-old adopted son, Joe. Somehow even as it stays true to the Gerry Anderson techno-fantasy formula of secret organisations, gadgetry, and action-packed adventure full of spectacular explosions and violent death, Joe 90 remains blithely unconscious of its own implications. The missions are as globe-trotting as anything in Anderson's classic Thunderbirds series, and sometimes Joe does save lives, performing a risky brain operation or rescuing trapped astronauts. Yet even then his criminally irresponsible father brainwashes the lad each episode before placing him in a highly dangerous adult situation. Though the production values remain way ahead of anything else being done on British TV at the time, the question remains how did this ever seem like a good idea? On the DVD: Joe 90, Volume 2 contains the second set of six 25-minute episodes presented, as usual with Gerry Anderson DVDs, behind a lovingly crafted menu. As expected the 4:3 picture quality is superb and the mono sound is full, detailed and without a trace of distortion. There are also several pages of character biography and background information on the show, a photo gallery and a variety of other extras. --Gary S Dalkin

• The X Files - Series 1 | DVD | (18/06/2007) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £9.99

  Featuring a few tasty morsels from X-Files: Season 1! Ideal for people who want to give the unknown their first try. You won't be disappointed by the sci-fi thrills of The X-Files. And don't forget; the truth is out there...

• Thunderbirds | DVD | (19/09/2005) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £99.99

  Featuring all 32 'Thunderbirds' episodes ever made plus a bonus CD this strictly limited edition box set is the collection of the classic TV series to own! Episode Titles Trapped In The Sky Pit of Peril Perils of Penelope Terror in New York City Edge Of Impact Day Of Disaster 30 Minutes After Noon Desperate Intruder End Of The Road The Uninvited Sun Probe Operation Crash-Dive Vault Of Death The Mighty Atom City Of Fire The Impostors The Man From MI5 Cry Wolf Danger At Ocean Deep Move and You're Dead The Duchess Assignment Brink Of Disaster Attack Of The Alligators Martian Invasion The Cham Cham Security Hazard Altantic Inferno Path of Destruction Alias Mr Hackenbacker Lord Parker's Oliday Ricochet Give or Take A Million.