[NON-U.S. FORMAT (PAL) Region 2 U.K. Import - This will not play on U.S./Canada DVD players or those from most other countries outside of Europe. You would need a "multi-region" or "region-free" PAL compatible DVD player or computer.] REVIEW: Originally broadcast in 2001, Dr Terrible's House of Horrible is a 6 part pastiche of 1970s Hammer Horror from Steve Coogan's production company. Each episode is topped and tailed by Coogan beneath a mass of prosthetics in a high-back leather chair as the avuncular, flatulent, faintly debauched Dr Terrible. "That was truly diabolical", he concludes of each show, a verdict with which one or two critics unfairly concurred. Coogan also stars in each as 6 different characters. In "And Now the Fearing...", for example, he plays rat-faced, unpleasant millionaire Denham Denham; in "Frenzy of Tongs"--a mickey-take of the Fu Manchu films--he's the insufferably suave Nathan Blaze, a Jason King-a-like; in "Scream, Satan Scream", meanwhile, he superimposes a parody of Peter Sellers over a lampoon of the Vincent Price film Witchfinder General. Although most episodes are elaborate period pieces and genuine care has been made to render them as scary as possible, the real period detail was in recreating the luridly quaint, over-acted, hammy feel of the 70s productions to which these episodes pay affectionate homage. Although hardly a perfect series, the camped-up daftness of the entire enterprise, a star-studded cast including Honor Blackman, John Thompson and Ronnie Ancona, some nice scripting and Coogan's versatility all make for a programme that's hard to dislike. DVD EXTRAS: "An Appointment with Terrible", a behind-the-scenes look at the making of the show, much of which was shot in the studio hangars where the original Hammer horrors were made; dry audio commentary by cowriters Graham Duff, Henry Normal and director Matt Lipsey; and "Behind the Screams" a mock-70s film journal ("only 10p!") reflecting on the making of one of the episodes.
