Review of Complete Chorlton And The Wheelies, The: Series Three

Introduction

"Jump in, we`ll take you for a spin and show you round the wheelie world...."

For the third and final time, Chorlton comes to DVD, with the last ever series to be made. It follows on from the two previous series and continues in exactly the same way.

So what`s it all about? Well basically a dragon hatches from an egg in Wheelie World, and befriends the Wheelies, helping them in their fight against Fenella the evil witch (who`s supposed to be Welsh, but the accent moves around a lot). And she has a book of spells that speaks with a German accent. Sounds mad but then again most television from this era was...

Video

As you would expect the picture is not reference quality, but it`s still reasonably good for its age, and seems to have aged better than some of the other TV shows from this period. There are some bad moments, with dirt and scratches on the print, and colours pulsing and changing, but on the whole it is perfectly watchable.

Audio

The original mono soundtrack, replayed over the left and right channels. Nothing to get over-excited about, but still good for its age. Again the soundtrack seems to have aged better than some of the other shows recently released on DVD, but there are some moments when it sounds a bit muffled. Most likely to be problems with the original material.

Features

Someone`s been listening to me and put some extras on! As well as that nostalgic Thames TV logo, we get an interview with Brian Cosgrove, one half of the creative partnership behind Chorlton and some other top programmes. He talks for about 10 minutes in total on various aspects of Chorlton and is interesting to listen to.

Conclusion

Yet another classic slice of television for the younger generation, from an age when they knew how to make it properly. The third and final series of this amusing Cosgrove/Hall classic to make its way on to DVD, so you can now complete your Chorlton collection.

As with the previous two series, if you remember it, you`ll probably want to buy it, and it`s a snip at £9.99 or less. You even get the added bonus of the interview with Brian Cosgrove.