The Young Ones: 25th Anniversary Complete Series 1 and 2 (3 Discs)

Some of the other reviews state that these are the full, unedited episodes. I'm sorry to say this isn't quite true. Several scenes were cut from the previous DVD releases, many of which (including the incidental Beatles music) have been reinstated. Ken Bishop's Nice Twelve are all present and correct, but a scene from "Nasty" (the one with the two teddy bears on Rick's bed) is cut. Other than that the DVD set isn't bad at all, the episodes are a bit clearer and the menus are a lot prettier than the previous release. The documentaries on the third disc are a little uninspiring but worth watching once. Obsessive compulsives like myself will still be disappointed, but considerably less so than the last time we bought the Young Ones on DVD.

At last! A proper DVD release of the young ones, here is what the website says -
"Phoenix Film and Television proudly announce their selection to produce the documentary extra's for 2 Entertain's release of the Official 25th anniversary edition of "The Young Ones.
The whole project was the brainchild of Phoenix's MD Anthony Caulfield and 2 Entertain's Tim Payne who both felt that the anniversary of such a comedy classic should not pass by without a release. Anthony and Tim along with other fans of the show (which spawned two series 1982 & 1984) have long been disappointed with "The Young Ones" DVD prescence which have simply consisted of a standard series 1 & 2 release a few years ago and contained no extras of any kind. Anthony spoke recently of this;

"Being a fan of the show myself I felt more could have been done with the previous release and knowing the anniversary was coming I brought it up at a meeting with Tim at 2 Entertain that a re-release was very long overdue and as it turned out he'd been having exactly the same thoughts!"

Tim then asked Anthony to go away and come up with what could be done if a re-release went ahead.

"I thought first of all there had to be a full 'making of' documentary featuring as many people involved in the original series as possible. Also we're planning a couple other docos as well, one is about the comedy revolution of the late 70's early 80's leading to the inevitable explosion onto our mainstream screens, another is about all the guest stars that appeared on the show, because a remarkable fact of The Young Ones was how a very large percentage of the guest talent that appeared on the show went on to become the cream of not only British comedy but also award winning acting talent and we felt it had to be acknowledged. And finally we're going to produce a short featurette simply called "reunion" in which we will film the original cast and a few others as they meet at the voice-over studio to record their commentaries for the DVD, and we'll just have to see what happens with that one, as I have absolutely no idea! Of course there will be other commentaries as well as we want to examine not just the performance side of the show but also "The Young Ones" from the Production and Writing angles as well. There are some other surprises planned but I'm not going to give it all away just yet!"

"The Young Ones" 25th anniversary boxset will be a 3 disc set containing all episodes from both series and a disc dedicated to all the extras and is due for release later this year!"

Again another series that has been previously available singularly, 80s anarchic sit com "The Young Ones' benefits from the same 'complete' three disc box set release as had been seen with "Fawlty Towers". Although you have the same gatefold packaging inside the slip case the content, for me at least, falls short of its 70s sit com predecessor. Just two commentaries are offered, disc one has the Season One opener "Demolition" and disc two has Season Two's final story "Summer Holiday" with directors Paul Jackson and Geoff Postner offering their thoughts. Flicking over to the third 'bonus features' disc and the contents of 'Alternative Rebellion', 'The Making of...' and 'The Guest Stars of...' weighs in at a fairly meagre seventy-four minutes. However despite that I for one still believe this is an excellent complete package of a classic, rather unique (anarchic humour matched with surprise music provided by some of the most popular acts of the time (e.g. Madness (twice) and Dexys Midnight Runners) BBC sit com that's certainly well worth adding to your collection.

I've only done this to point out that there are only 2 episodes with commentary by the producers, and that the cast commentaries promised on the Phoenix website and another review here have failed to materialise.

The documentary is fine and all the episodes are there, unedited and with all the music intact, even the Beatles at the start of Boring.

So 5 stars anyway, it's just a shame that Phoenix led us to expect a lot more.

After watching many hillerious episodes of bottom the young ones seemed entertaining untill i watched it every last second of this so called comedy was painful to watch i hated the characters and the show was nothing but a bunch of curse words you would get more entertainment from squishing ants