Owl-Stretching Time

Yet again the proper release of MONTY PYTHON'S FLYING CIRCUS on DVD has been delayed.

This has become something of a bugbear for Digi-Cream Times (just for a change), but I'm afraid it just defies belief that a series as imperial as this has yet to receive a decent, all-flags-flying, whistles-and-bells DVD treatment.

The latest twist in what is probably an implausibly long and tiresome story appears to be that the versions of the show which are advertised as being available to buy at the end of this month are the episodes and nothing but. In other words, no extras, no special features, no lovingly assembled treats, no astutely chosen bonus rareties. Fuck all, in fact.

This isn't what DVDs are for and not what Monty Python is for. Yet you can bet these forthcoming releases will be exhaustively promoted and flogged all over the place in much the same way as Spamalot, and with equally tedious gimmicks.

Look out for advertising straplines that run something like "funnier than the last time you bought them - and more expensive!" or "0.000001% new footage!" or "the complete series - except for all the missing bits".

There's a whole lexicon which must be deployed when anything Python-esque is being publicised, including generous use of the word "Python-esque". As noted elsewhere in TV Cream Towers, it's like the way anything to do with Comic Relief is always the Great Big Stupid this or the Amazingly Incomplete Silly that or, latterly, so and so "does" so and so. Lazy words for lazy efforts.

Overall, things don't look good. I can't see why Monty Python doesn't seem able to get the same loving treatment as, say, RIPPING YARNS, the DVDs for which are packed with superb extras. Ah well. If you've enjoyed reading this blog half as much as I've enjoyed writing it, then I've enjoyed it twice as much as you. Goodnight.