Product Details

• Actors: Jennifer Saunders, Joanna Lumley, Julia Sawalha, Christopher Malcolm, Wolf Christian
• Directors: Bob Spiers
• Writers: Jennifer Saunders, Dawn French
• Producers: Jon Plowman
• Format: Closed-captioned, Color, DVD, Full Screen, NTSC
• Language: English (Unknown)
• Region: Region 1 (U.S. and Canada only. Read more about DVD formats.)
  
• Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1
• Number of discs: 1
• Rating: NR (Not Rated)
• Studio: BBC Warner
• DVD Release Date: March 13, 2001
• Run Time: 180 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 4.9 out of 5 stars See all reviews (13 customer reviews)
• ASIN: B000056WK1
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #64,754 in Movies & TV (See Bestsellers in Movies & TV)

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  Movies & TV > Comedy > British > Absolutely Fabulous

• For more information about "Absolutely Fabulous - Complete Series 2" visit the Internet Movie Database (IMDb)

• This is item 2 in The Absolutely Fabulous Series.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com
Everyone knew that Jennifer Saunders was funny from her years of comedy specials with Dawn French as French & Saunders; but who would have thought that Joanna Lumley, previously best known as Patrick Macnee's girl-spy sidekick on The New Avengers, was such a bang-on comedienne? In the second series of Absolutely Fabulous, every appearance of human gargoyle Patsy Stone (Lumley, looking like the mutant love child of Keith Richards and Ivana Trump) is a comic tour de force--she slumps into a room like a marionette with its strings cut, unleashes a rotting-corpse grin or a reptilian scowl, supports Edina in every half-wit scheme and leaches off of her like an intestinal parasite. Series 2 is pretty bang-on throughout and manages to give the characters--Patsy, infantile p.r. agent Edina Monsoon (Saunders), Edina's long-suffering daughter Saffron (Julia Sawalha, Chicken Run), Edina's mother (June Whitfield, co-star of many Carry On movies), and Edina's dimwitted assistant Bubble (Jane Horrocks, Life is Sweet)--greater emotional range without losing an iota of scathing humor. Face-lifts, Morocco, alimony, rebirthing, and the death of Edina's father are all fodder for sharp, unflinching satire. But the core theme of the season is the unhealthily enmeshed friendship between Edina and Patsy, which sparks jealousy and backbiting but, when the chips are down (or the champagne and diet pills running low), an undying loyalty. Truly one of the richest and funniest Britcoms of all time. --Bret Fetzer

Product Description
The smashing misadventures of fashion femme fatales Edina and Patsy remains one of the most popular and talked about comedies in BBC history. The New York Post called it "Utterly original, utterly hilariousone of the best television comedies ever made." Episodes 7-12: "Hospital" - Patsy's upcoming photo spread with Hello Magazine has her thinking face lift. "Death" - Edina's father dies and we confront the eternal question ("Yes, but is it art?"). "Morocco" - The girls travel to Morrocco. "New Best Friend" - Edina's minimalist friends visit with their maximalist new baby. "Poor" - Edina learns to economise when her ex-husbands cut her off. "Birth" - Patsy nearly burns the house down.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

15 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars GET READY FOR A SECOND HELPING, DARLINGS!, March 6, 2002

By	Byron Kolln (the corner where Broadway meets Hollywood) - See all my reviews (TOP 50 REVIEWER)

Get ready darlings, because ABSOLUTELY FABULOUS continues in its second series on DVD, with all six remastered episodes along with a fair few extras.

HOSPITAL - Patsy Stone (Joanna Lumley) has got a week to look 35 for a Hello! Magazine photo shoot - cue a trip to the hospital for a face peel and eye rejuvenation.

DEATH - Edina Monsoon's (Jennifer Saunders) father is dead. But is it art?

MOROCC0 - Edina and Patsy jet off to Morocco for cheap drugs and underage sex, but with Saffy (Julia Sawalha) in tow, its going to be tough.

NEW BEST FRIEND - Lacroix and baby-spew don't mix, and Edina finds this out when old friends Bettina (Miranda Richardson) and Max (Patrick Barlow) decide to visit along with their new baby.

POOR - Harrods has stopped delivering! Call the stress guru! Edina is going to be poor, her two ex-husbands have cut her off, and Patsy is fuming. What the hell is a supermarket?!?

BIRTH - Saffy's is in love; her top button is undone and something in a blue kagool is hovering at the front door. Edina is armed with her Cosmo Sex Quiz for some long-overdue mother/daughter bonding.

With Jane Horrocks (Bubble), June Whitfield (Mother), Helen Lederer (Katriona), Kathy Burke (Magda), Meera Syal (Hari), Jo Brand (Treasure), Adrian Edmondson (Hamish) and Eleanor Bron (Patsy's Mother).

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Best Ab Fab Series?, February 20, 2003

By	Busy Body (London, England) - See all my reviews (TOP 500 REVIEWER)

After the incredibly successful run of six Series 1 episodes, Jennifer Saunders' genius creation Absolutely Fabulous was back for a much-hyped second series. The wait was more than a year, but definitely worth it when the Series 2 opener, Hospital, was shown on 27th January 1994. Series 2 is perhaps the best Absolutely Fabulous series of the lot, and portrays the mother/daughter reversal role the best of all the seasons. Jennifer Saunders is brilliant as ever as Edina Monsoon, as are Joanna Lumley and Julia Sawalha as Patsy Stone and Saffy Monsoon respectively. There's an increasing role for June Whitfield as Edina's crazy mother, yet with this good news there's the bad that Jane Horrocks as Bubble (Edina's brain-dead office assistant) isn't is Series 2 as much as Series 3.

Series 2 opens with Hospital. At the beginning of this superb episode, we see Patsy arrive at Edina's house being followed by the press after she's caught up in a sex-scandal. She's all over the papers and her reaction to the suggestion that she's 47 years old is hilarious! She goes mental! Hello! magazine want to do a photoshoot of Patsy, so she has to try and look 35; the result is rather unexpected...walking like a skeleton and eyes that appear to be closed are the highlights. Of course, Edina has to buy tons of new "things" for her living room after hearing Hello! are coming, including an eskimo papoose! Absolutely Fabulous constantly takes the mickey out of the stuck-up and snobby fashion world we live in today. The ditzy Hello! magazine interviewer who doesn't even know what she's doing is another side of the fashion world mickey-take by Jennifer Saunders - this being that most people who work in fashion have nothing to do. Death is the next episode, and probably the most disturbing one of all the series. Edina's mother tells her that her father is dead, and she just doesn't care! "What, did she finish him off?!" she says to her daughter Saffy about her mother. Edina takes a trip to an art store to buy some "things," saying that ...to the shop assistant. The episode is very funny, but a bit disturbing. In the episode Morocco, Edina and Patsy take a trip to Marrakech to get away from it all. A good episode, but not a highlight.

New Best Friend is another excellent episode in which Edina's old friends come to stay at her house. The last time she met up with them, they were incredibly minimalist - white rooms, white clothes, etc. Edina wants to makes her house look as tidy as possible for when her two old friends arrive, but Patsy's jealous and she falls out with Edina. Trying to act as if they have friends other than each other when they find themselves in a restaurant alone are the highlights. But now Edina's friends have a baby! Their lives have totally changed, and the mother is hilarious in the situation-type comedy scenes where everything that can go wrong do, especially when she hears her husband with Edina...you know, doing stuff on the baby monitor! Absolutely hilarious. Poor is a favourite episode for many fans of the show. Edina's ex-husband has threatened to stop his money income to support the family and she's furious. She has to cancel food orders from Harrods and is forced to go to a supermarket! She has no idea what one is, so you can expect the mayhem and chaos she and Patsy will cause when they have to drive themselves there! They get out of their car and hurl abuse at a driver who dares to hoot their horn at them, expect assistance at the supermarket, park their car on the pavement outside Harvey Nichols, and are forced to visit "The Car-Clamp Club" to try and get the damn thing off their wheel! The ending results with Edina and Patsy in court, facing charges of driving without a licence, driving without insurance, not wearing a seatbelt, having no tax-disc displayed, driving over the legal speed limit, driving under the influence of alcohol, allowing another person to drive your vehicle under the influence of alcohol, in the region of £5,000 of parking fees owing, £6,000 of damage to property, charges of assault and abuse, and shoplifting while the charges of attempted murder and robbery are dropped! Birth is probably the best episode of Series 2 - and a superb series finale! Saffy has a man coming round to her house, but she doesn't want Edina and Patsy to know. When the three are locked in the living room by Edina's insane mother, they are forced to put up with each other. In these desperate situations, Patsy's worse nightmare is confronted - she'd rather die than be locked in a room with Saffy. Edina and Patsy try to help Saffy with her "first sexual experience" with a Cosmo Sex Quiz - hilarity ensures. Edina tells Saffy about her birth and how beautiful it was. The news pleases Saffy, but of course it's a pack of lies. Patsy (telling that the first few years of her life, she was locked in a room!) and Edina's flashback to their births are also superb.

OVERALL GRADE: 10/10

I can't stress enough how superb Absolutely Fabulous is. This truly is the greatest British comedy ever. A lot of people love it, but some people think it's gross - because of its drugs, sex and drink references. But this is what real life is like - people live their lives like this and to ignore it would be ignorant. The DVD extras are not exactly amazing, but the "15 Minutes Of Out-Takes" is superb. Jennifer Saunders is a genius, and the acting in Ab Fab is amongst some if the best I have ever seen. Buy Series 2 of Absolutely Fabulous now - you won't regret it!

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Ab Fab!!, November 18, 2001

By	D. Feindel "bluebrit" (USA/England) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

There's no inbetween with this show. You either love it or hate it. Obviously I love it. At first, I didn't think my American friends would appreciate this dry humour but after viewing this DVD with them, I was proven wrong. This show is about two 'ladies' who don't want to grow up. It's a hysterical comedy show about two middle aged women still living in their pasts of drugs, sex and outrageous clothes. You have to have a strange sense of humour to enjoy this show which is probably why the British love it so much! (From a British person by the way).