Bodysnatcher Background

Shades of Grey - by Andrew Ellard

14 September, 2007

The Bodysnatcher Collection - available now to pre-order - represents the final step in the Red Dwarf series collection. So far as we're concerned, this DVD boxset belongs with your Series I to VIII sets.

Which explains why the artwork has been designed this way.

The background, as ever, has been created by Chris Veale, following on from his backgrounds for the regular series - still available to download as wallpapers. It's like an alternative version of the Series IV cover. That showed the off-white modern bunkroom, this goes back to the original series incarnation. Chris did do one concept sketch that showed the talking toilet in place of the sink, but we thought that might have been asking for trouble reviews-wise!

That said, we have cheated a little - having the grey bunks, walls and floor rendered as 'metal' rather than 'painted wood'. The sterling job done here shows Series I's overall look in an interesting light - the production values may have been low, but the design concept was pretty good...

The back cover, meanwhile, is dense with content information - to the point where an intended episode quote had to be removed when we needed the space. (Rimmer's brilliant "People who say they aren't afraid of death - they're never the ones who've actually done it", which appears in both Bodysnatcher and The End: The Original Assembly, yet never made it to a finished episode.)

There's the traditional Lister-painting-the-hull image on the back, a spine image showing the main cast circa Series III. The spine's a little bigger to accommodate the wider plastic DVD case we'll be using this time around, that's all. Oh, and should you like such things - and they do add a little touch of class - there will also be a cardboard slipcase.

As you'll recall from our recent content breakdown, we're theming each disc to an element of the series, and this is reflected in the onbody art. You'll find the remastered Series I, II and III on the Red Dwarf, Blue Midget and Starbug discs respectively (styled after original series releases), and the first disc, the Bodysnatcher disc, holds... well, Bodysnatcher amongst other things.

Next time - the menus!

More DVD Details will follow soon...

Red Dwarf: The Bodysnatcher Collection will be out in the UK on October 22nd, and in Australian in December. Pre-order now!