Cosmos (5 Discs)

I have always loved science related programming, astronomy in particular and this series has it all, scientific and astronomical , history, discover, experiments and told with a passion by the sadly missed Carl Sagan, It has sequences acted out as little historic mini-series's and astronomical. When this arrived in the 80's I was immediately hooked, I watched it the twice it played on UK TV, bought the book and eventually bought years ago I bough this series on VHS. For years after DVD came out I looked for this but could never find it so eventually had to buy it from the U.S in NTSC which had extra sequences added onto it but the picture quality on ntsc is not as good as PAL. I have now bought this set to replace it, I am so happy now that I have it with a nice picture (as good as can be expected anyway) and for a price almost four times cheaper than I had to pay for it from the U.S.

I saw this series in the 80s. Even if I had not come from a very 'astronomical' family, this series would have still provided the same mind-blowing inspiration that sparked such a huge scientific interest in my mind and went on to affect my life. The way the brilliant Carl Sagan conveys the ideas and concepts in a lyrical and easy to understand fashion seems to capture the imagination. Spread over 13 one-hour episodes, the journey takes us through the cosmos and into Earth's history and that of humanity and it's achievements, both good and bad. Carl Sagan is a true legend and, where he clearly is a brilliant scientist, he also displays an intimate awareness of the challenges that humanity faces. If you have never heard of Carl or seen this classic series, you have been deprived of a truly wonderful insight and should definitely add this to your DVD collection. My only complaint about this edition is that the episode titles are not listed either on the DVDs themselves or in the case notes. This is a little annoying, but I printed off a list from the Internet instead and keep it in the case. My advice is, buy it, watch it as many times as you can and enjoy it, as it is a masterpiece.