The Time Tunnel: The Complete Series [Blu-ray]

Over the decades I have gone from recording The Time Tunnel on audio cassette in the 1970s (tinny little condenser microphone next to the television speaker) to videotaping it in the 1980s, then owning it on DVD in various formats in the 2000s. I say various formats because, despite the show’s popularity in the UK being arguably greater than in its home country, for quite a while The Time Tunnel was only available as a Region 1 release. While I found ways to view those DVDs this was not an ideal situation and I was glad when Revelation finally released the episodes in Region 2 format – well, I was until I discovered what a mess they’d made of it. Having won kudos for releasing Land of the Giants in production order rather than by airdate, the bods at Revelation decided to do the same with The Time Tunnel. The problem was that this necessitated removing the teasers for the following week’s episode and, sadly, that editing was less than skillfully achieved (the ending of ‘One Way to the Moon’ was particularly badly butchered). As a Time Tunnel ‘purist’ (or ‘idiot’ as my wife would put it) I was so irritated that after one viewing I decided I couldn’t watch this set again and so went out and bought the French release instead. Well, finally, Au coeur du temps can now also be put aside as The Time Tunnel has been released on Blu-ray.Though it’s taken a while to arrive (the Blu-ray release was first announced in 2013), with this set Revelation have made up for their earlier blunder - and then some. The Time Tunnel has never looked better. The picture, for the most part, is crisp and clean, while the soundtrack is sharp and clear. However, I’m not sure how much restoration work has actually been done as parts of ‘The Kidnappers’ episode still look a little ropey and the penultimate episode, Raiders from outer Space’ still has the very obvious print damage that has plagued it since the 1980s (for a while the episode was withdrawn from repeats/reruns as not being of acceptable quality). Having seen what can be achieved cleaning up and mending damage to old episodes of Doctor Who, I’m surprised no one thought it worthwhile fixing and removing the lines running through certain scenes in Raiders. As for the extras, they remain pretty much the same as the DVD release with the dreadful 2002 remake pilot (that thankfully went nowhere) and Irwin Allen’s own ‘The Time Travellers’ TV movie still present. The stills section is a bit of a let down as it seems to be made up of poor quality JPEG images that I’m guessing have been pulled from the internet (wish I’d known, I have a pretty good collection of Time Tunnel stills that I would have been more than happy to scan and donate). Still, despite those very minor quibbles, I have to say that this Blu-ray set is good value for money and well worth adding to your collection, especially for us ye olde fans who remember watching The Time Tunnel on BBC1 on Thursday nights back in the 1960s.

This is one of my favourite TV shows of all time. I was bought up on the Irwin Allen TV series with 'Lost In Space' being another favourite of mine. I am now nearly 60 years old & remember BBC 1 showing seven of the Time Tunnel episodes between July and October 1968. I was hooked even back then. Then ITV (London Region only) showed 11 episodes in a Sunday afternoon run from July 1970. Successive runs in 1973 & 1974 eventually showed all 30 episodes. The series had still not played in all ITV regions until ITV picked up the rights, again, in 1989. It has also been shown on Channel 4. I have owned the series in all video formats over the years - have still got the old VHS copies that I recorded from the run on Channel 4. I have the region 1/NTSC DVD collection brought out several years ago by 'Pioneer DVD' of Japan. The image quality of these DVD's is excellent (some of the best DVD mastering ever) so I was sceptical as to whether or not these Blu Ray episodes, from Revelation, would be an improvement. I decided to take the plunge (like all fans of this show would) and bought it. The result is absolutely superb - the image quality is far better than the DVD set, which I thought would not be possible. However 'Revelation' have done a great job with all the episodes - EXCEPT ONE! This brings me back to the title of this review - the persistent flaw. Episode 29 (Raiders from Outer Space) still has the very obvious print damage present for all to see!! The damage displays itself as multiple vertical black lines which persists for almost 10 minutes (time frame 8mins 30 seconds through to 18mins 27seconds). We are not simply talking about small speckles/blemishes here and there - it is really bad! This damage has plagued this episode since the late 1970's - unsure how it happened - but it is so severe that, understandably, some TV channels omitted it from their re-runs as they deemed it of such poor quality as to be not suitable for broadcast - for them to do that it had to be bad - and believe me it is! It is very distracting on what is, unfortunately, one of my favourite TT episodes. The move to Blu Ray actually (rather sadly) makes the print damage worse/stand out more than before. It really is a shame that 'Revelation' did not make any attempts to clean up/correct the print damage on this episode which is what I was hoping for on this Blu Ray release - but I was sadly disappointed!! So if you are a purist/nerd regarding this series be warned this 'fatal' flaw in episode 29 really takes the gloss off what is a superb Blu Ray outing for this cult Irwin Allen series. Could have been perfect - but it is not. This is a great opportunity missed!!

Loved it. A great memory trip.

Took me right back to my childhood, a bit dated today but ahead of its time when first shown, really enjoyable to re visit.

For the past few years i have been in a sort of deja vu as far as old tv shows have been concerned and i must admit that i have purchased a number of them usually made in the 60s & 70s i guess it must be my age (47) .So i decided to buy The Time Tunnel and so far i have not been disappointed i say so far as i have just started watching them. I can remember the show from way back when i was about ten years old and how the historical stories stimulated me into finding out more about the different periods in which they took place,The discs themselves arrive in a cool oddly shaped case.The quality of the transfer onto DVD is very good considering the age of the material . I have seen a couple of reviews which said that they were disappointed that the episodes were not in order of transmission and this is true but to be honest it dose not make any difference as they work as stand alone episodes anyway. If you wanted to watch them in order why not download the sequence of transmission from the Irwin Allen site as i did .The series is of its time but is done with intelligence if some slight disregard for historical accuracy, but so what its good Science fiction.

This is a tremendous Blu-Ray set, with great audio/video quality and lots of extras, but I was pleasantly surprised to find that the discs played perfectly on my regular Region A Blu-Ray player. I had assumed that the discs would probably be Region B locked, which wouldn't have been an issue for me because I do have an all-region Blu-Ray player, but even though the packaging has a Region B logo on it the discs appear to be all-region. Fans of "The Time Tunnel" shouldn't hesitate. My wife was thrilled!

Lost amid the popularity of Star Trek, the Time Tunnel deserves more recognition as a quality science fiction series in the 1960s. The lead scientists actual talk and behave like scientists. The series is well cast, but would have benefited from more intelligent dialogs about the dilemmas of time travel. For those who are science fiction fans, you'll love drama and action of this series. I highly recommend The Time Tunnel.

Toppie Toppie serie.

Ich habe Teile der Serie als kleines Kind gesehen und war damals stark beeindruckt!Jetzt, über 50 Jahre später, nochmal und in Originalsprache und vor allem vollständig!Die Serie selber ist nach heutigen Gesichtspunkten extrem altbacken und zum Teil lächerlich. Aber mir ging es vor allem um den nostalgischen Aspekt und deswegen hat es mir sehr viel Spaß gemacht!Mein Fazit:Für Leute, die diese Serie Anfang der 70-ger Jahre gesehen hatten und mochten, sehr empfehlenswert!Für jüngere Leute höchstwahrscheinlich eine Enttäuschung!

Bellissima serie tv. Peccato che sia durata una sola stagione. Avrebbe meritato una seconda chance....