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AUDIOBOOK REVIEWS
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31st October 2007 Happy Hallowe'en! BLU-RAY NEWS I've added details of a number of Blu-ray titles to the Incoming database, including all the titles listed in the recent Fox press release (which you can find below, now with added links to each Incoming record), and Sony's November titles. You can find a list of forthcoming Blu-ray titles here. HD DVD fans - fret not. If I receive any press releases from the HD DVD companies, I'll add the info to the database, too. BOOK NEWS
The first is Smallville: The Official Companion Season 5, which boasts a foreword by Smallville star John Glover. The book will feature "exclusive interviews, unseen photos, behind-the-scenes secrets, a complete episode guide and a stunning full-colour sixteen-page portrait gallery". It also features "excerpts from the Smallville Ledger and the Daily Planet, as well as the Central Kansas University paper The Tomahawk". The RRP is £12.99. Amazon have it for £8.57. The second is 24: The Official Companion Season 5, in which author Tara DiLullo offers a detailed episode guide, with unseen pictures and episode stills. It also contains "an in memoriam section, a presidential profile, plus in-depth sections on the Emmy-award winning production departments", as well as "exclusive new interviews with the cast and crew, including Jack Bauer himself, Kiefer Sutherland". The RRP is £14.99. Amazon have it for £9.89. EVENT NEWS Here are details of what promises to be a very interesting afternoon with veteran script-writer / editor Terrance Dicks... Terrance Dicks: Three Decades in Television and Beyond National Media Museum, Bradford Saturday 24 November, 1.00pm, Cubby Broccoli Cinema Tickets £6 (concs £3.30) Box office: 0870 7010200 www.nationalmediamuseum.org.uk Former Doctor Who script writer and author Terrance Dicks is set to attend an event in honour of his career at the National Media Museum in Bradford – Terrance Dicks: Three Decades in Television and Beyond. Coinciding with the anniversary weekend of the original Doctor Who series and the publication of a new book about Doctor Who novelisations, the event will cover all three decades of Dicks’ work for television and his later work as a children’s author. Terrance Dicks is probably best known as script editor of Doctor Who throughout the Jon Pertwee period of the programme and as the author of over 70 books based on the series. His work in television stretches from scripts for The Avengers and Crossroads in the early 1960s through to producing the BBC’s classic Sunday serials of the 1980s. The event starts with an on-stage interview with Dicks which will be illustrated with rare photographs from the Museum’s own collection and clips from shows like The Avengers, Moonbase 3, Space: 1999, Jane Eyre, Oliver Twist, Vanity Fair, and Doctor Who. After the interview there will be a screening of all four episodes of Dicks’ 1980 Doctor Who story State of Decay, starring Tom Baker. If you're wondering what the "new book about Doctor Who novelisations" is, check out the Telos website's News page. The Telos News page has details of two more events being held to launch The Target Book, in this message posted by Telos MD David J Howe. Telos Publishing is celebrating the publication of The Target Book, the history of the Doctor Who Target Book range with a signing event in East London. All are welcome to come along to meet authors David J Howe and Tim Neal, along with top Target scribe Terrance Dicks, plus as many Target cover artists, editors and writers as we can cram into the venue including Andrew Skilleter, Nigel Robinson, Tony Clark, Colin Howard, Jeff Cummins and hopefully many more. The venue is Mr Pickwick's, 70 Leman Street, London E1 8EU. Nearest Tube stations are Tower Hill and Aldgate East. The event starts at 3pm on Saturday 3rd November. David J Howe will also be signing copies of the book, alongside fourth Doctor Tom Baker, and actress Nichola McAuliffe (Vivien Rook in the Doctor Who episode The Sound of Drums) on Monday 5th November at The Stamp Centre, 79 Strand, London WC2R 0DE. The signing event starts at around 10:00am. AUDIOBOOK NEWS Here are some photo's from Elisabeth Sladen's appearance at Borders on Saturday. Lis was signing copies of the two new Sarah Jane Adventures audiobooks, The Glittering Storm and The Thirteenth Stone.
29th October 2007 ZETA MINOR NEWS Many newly-announced titles have been added to our forthcoming releases database, Incoming, this week, as well as additional details for many titles, and many more etailer links. Please use the links to support Zeta Minor! DVD NEWS The DVD version of the modern-day adaptation of Frankenstein, which aired on ITV recently, will feature a Director's Cut that's fifteen minutes longer than the transmitted version. The transmitted version will apparently also be included on the disc. The full press release can be found in the disc's Incoming record. BLU-RAY NEWS Twentieth Century Fox has formally announced the release of fourteen new UK Blu-ray releases, as the high definition format war enters what may well be it's most decisive couple of months. Here's the press release:
14 UK Titles To Debut Packed With
Soon-to-Be-Announced Fantastic Four - Rise of the Silver Surfer and Die Hard 4.0 To Debut Day-and-Date on BD/DVD -- Blu-ray Out-Performing HD DVD 2-to-1 At Retail in 2007 -- Twentieth Century Fox Home Entertainment (TCFHE) has unveiled an aggressive global Blu-ray Disc release strategy including 14 new release and “must-have” catalogue titles before the end of the 2007 calendar year in the UK. Among the many highlights of the impressive slate are two day & date BD/DVD new theatrical releases from Fox including the $241 million worldwide box-office family favourite Fantastic Four - Rise of the Silver Surfer and the $335 million worldwide box-office action powerhouse Die Hard 4.0, plus twelve more ‘must-have on BD’ films from the TCFHE library. The only high-definition packaged media universally supported by the film, music, gaming and computer industries, BD is the #1 selling high-definition packaged media. In fact, on a worldwide basis, BD is averaging nearly 70% market-share per week of all high definition titles sold this year. “Given that Blu-ray has consistently outsold HD DVD all year, and this is the case for any titles released by any studio in both formats, we believe that the time is right for us to accelerate our activities and help convert the nearly 60 million high definition households worldwide into Blu-ray households,” noted Mike Dunn, President Worldwide, Twentieth Century Fox Home Entertainment. “By the end of this calendar year there will be expansive availability of technically vibrant releases featuring never-before-seen, advanced BD-J interactivity as well as a broad offering of playback devices at attractive prices that will prove to any doubting consumers once and for all that Blu-ray is the only way.” Among the BD industry ‘firsts’ from the Studios’ upcoming global release slate are picture in picture capability, enhanced viewing and surround sound modes with the ability to mix and match picture and sound, direct access to in-movie features through one of the four coloured buttons on the BD remote and the most technically vibrant BD-Java interactive multi-player challenge and trivia games to date. The Studios’ slate also takes full advantage of BD-Live functionality this fourth quarter. Internet-connected consumers will enjoy unique, title specific “web-enabled” interactive features and games and “web-exclusive” downloadable content with the ability to connect and interact with other broadband BD users worldwide. Cementing its leadership position within the industry - previous BD releases Night at the Museum, X-Men - The Last Stand, Rocky Balboa and Eragon rank in the UK Top 20 best-sellers - the vast majority of the Studios’ upcoming global slate will be presented on 50 GB dual-layer discs with advanced BD-J interactivity and feature numerous Blu-ray exclusive high-definition bonus materials that further realizes BD’s incredible potential. Consumers will enjoy the superior video and audio elements of AVC encoding and Lossless HD audio on many of the coming titles as well as enhanced and integrated menus, personal scene selections, search indexing, trivia and other title specific games and high-definition bonus materials. Upcoming BD-J features exclusive to priority catalogue titles from Fox and MGM include an "Alien Scavenger Hunt" (Independence Day) that challenges players to earn points by identifying the correct number of aliens in selected scenes to unlock additional bonus features; a “Global Warming Trivia Track” (The Day After Tomorrow) where users must correctly answer questions about global warming to keep the Earth’s temperature from rising and being destroyed; and a historical and geographical pop-up map (Master and Commander) that tracks the location of Captain "Lucky" Jack Aubrey and his enemies. Listed below are the upcoming 2007 Blu-ray Disc releases from Fox excluding new theatrical day & date BD/DVD releases.
EXACT TITLE CONFIGURATIONS TO FOLLOW IN THE
COMING WEEKS. 28 Weeks Later: OCT 29 Sunshine: OCT 29 Die Hard: NOV 12 Die Hard 2 - Die Harder: NOV 12 The Hills Have Eyes: NOV 19 From Hell: NOV 19 The Simpsons Movie: DEC 10 Edward Scissorhands: DEC 24 Pathfinder: DEC 24 Master and Commander: DEC 31 The Day After Tomorrow: DEC 31 Mr and Mrs Smith: DEC 31 Independence Day: DEC 31 Blu-ray Disc is a next generation optical disc format developed for high-definition video and high-capacity software applications. A single-layer Blu-ray Disc holds up to 25 gigabytes of data and a dual-layer Blu-ray Disc holds up to 50 gigabytes of data. This greater storage capacity enables the Blu-ray Disc to store over six times the amount of content than is possible with current DVDs, and is particularly well-suited for high definition feature films with extended levels of additional bonus and interactive material. Blu-ray also features the most advanced copy protection, player backward compatibility with the current DVD format, connectivity and advanced interactivity. Fox takes advantage of the next generation format’s high definition technology and advanced functionality to present its titles with the highest quality audiovisual elements. Showcasing picture quality with six times the resolution of DVD and theatre quality “uncompressed” audio for the purest digital sound, the cutting-edge discs also feature enhanced and integrated menus, games, high-definition bonus materials and Java-encoding for more dynamic and sophisticated interactivity. The Studio’s commitment to emerging technologies is dedicated to enhancing the consumer experience of its products and providing for backward compatibility with their existing home entertainment libraries while also aggressively protecting its intellectual property from piracy. The Blu-ray companies fully embrace the Studio’s steadfast commitment to the fight against piracy and the preservation of the integrity of its properties. Twentieth Century Fox is a member of the Board of Directors of the Blu- ray Disc Association. Note that Die Hard: With A Vengeance isn't on Fox's schedule, because the film was distributed in the UK by Buena Vista, and they own the home video rights here. All four films in the series are being released on Blu-ray in the US. Last week's Zeta Minor News can be viewed here. Previous Zeta Minor News entries can viewed here. |
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Titan
will release two more of their Official Companion books on November the
23rd. 
