My Two Cents

All right, we’re back with a news update today and we’ve got a bunch of reviews to share with you today as well. Sorry it’s taken a few days to get back to news coverage this week, but I had a bunch of stuff to deal with this week, including checking in with our industry sources but also clearing a few important items off my review stack, after having my mother visiting for about ten days earlier this month.

As such, I’ve recently reviewed Sony’s terrific The Karate Kid: Ultimate Collection in 4K Ultra HD, a 6-film Amazon-exclusive box set that includes all of the films in this series plus some nice extras and great swag as well. It’s definitely worth getting your hands on if you’re a fan of the series.

On Monday, I also reviewed our friends Jeffrey Morris’ excellent new Space: 1999-themed documentary The Eagle Obsession. That’s coming on Blu-ray and 4K Ultra HD in 2026, so we’ll cover it then too.

Meanwhile, Tim has reviewed more of Arrow’s Shawscope: Volume Two Blu-ray box set—specifically Chang Cheh’s Ten Tigers of Kwangtung (1980)—as well as Peter Medak’s The Odd Job (1978) and The Ghost of Peter Sellers (2018) both on Blu-ray from Severin Films.

Dennis has taken a look at Alice Wu’s Saving Face (2004) on Blu-ray from the Criterion Collection.

Stephen has offered his thoughts on Martin Scorsese’s Raging Bull (1980) as newly-released in 4K Ultra HD by the folks at Imprint Films, as well as Atsushi Yamatoya’s Inflatable Sex Doll of the Wastelands (1967) and Jiří Barta’s The Pied Piper & Jiří Barta Shorts (1986) both on Blu-ray from Deaf Crocodile.

And Stuart has reviewed Tōru Murakawa’s The Beast to Die (1980) on Blu-ray from Radiance. [Read on here...]

In September of 1975, a new science-fiction series appeared on British television. Created and produced by Gerry and Sylvia Anderson, Space: 1999 followed the trials and tribulations of the inhabitants of Moonbase Alpha, after the Moon is accidentally blown out of Earth’s orbit and sent hurtling out into interstellar space. Though the series only ran for two seasons, it picked up a loyal following thanks to a strong cast led by Martin Landau and Barbara Bain (Mission: Impossible), as well as compelling and high-concept storytelling. But one of the show’s greatest strengths was a production design aesthetic that seemed far more plausible and realistic than those of other sci-fi franchises. And no design from Space: 1999 exemplifies this more clearly than the show’s iconic spacecraft, the Eagle Transporter.

Science fiction has certainly shown us other examples of compelling spacecraft on TV and the big screen, including Star Trek’s USS Enterprise and the Millennium Falcon of Star Wars fame. But for anyone interested in spaceflight at the time, the Eagle Transporter—used by the Alphans to shuttle between the Earth and Moon, to travel around the surface, and visit alien planets—seemed like a vehicle that could actually be built, flown, and perform as depicted. That’s because its design has much more in common with NASA’s Lunar Excursion Module (LEM)—which in reality delivered astronauts to the lunar surface six times between 1969 and 1972—than the Enterprise, the Falcon, or any other spacecraft that sci-fi enthusiasts had seen before or since. It’s only natural then that the Eagle has gained a legion of fans over the years. In fact, the author of this review is one of them. [Read on here...]