Cold Feet-Complete 2nd Series (1999)

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General		Extras
Category	Comedy	Main Menu Audio & Animation-The Meaning Of Love
Rating
Year Of Production	1999
Running Time	294:55 (Case: 300)
RSDL / Flipper	RSDL (26:52) Dual Disc Set	Cast & Crew
Start Up	Menu
Region Coding	4	Directed By	Declan Lowney Mark Mylod Nigel Cole Tom Hooper
Studio Distributor	Time Life Video & TV Shock Entertainment	Starring	James Nesbitt Helen Baxendale John Thomson Fay Ripley Robert Bathurst Hermione Norris
Case	Amaray-Transparent-Secure Clip
RPI	$34.95	Music	The Other Two

    This very popular television series from the 1990s has had a slightly strange history on DVD. The first series was originally released 4 years ago by Universal. The review from then can be found here. At the time many were annoyed by the fact that subsequent series were not released. Now in 2006, the first series has been re-released by Shock/Time Life along with this second series. A release of the third one has also been announced. One assumes the other series will follow. An excellent summation of the concept and characters can be found at the link above, so I won't go into that in detail here.

    This second season was made in 1999 and to my mind is a step up in quality from the first season. The first season really started to hit its straps in the last two episodes and this season continues that fine work. This season starts 6 months after the end of Season 1 and none of the other characters have heard from Rachel in that time. Adam is depressed and pining for her. The other couples start having their own problems right from the start of the first episode. There are 6 50 minutes episodes included in the season, spread over two discs. The episodes are:

1. (49:00) - Jenny wants Adam to start dating. David gets made redundant and there are big revelations for all three couples to contend with.
2. (48:57) - There is fallout and recriminations for all three couples. Adam gets caught up with a difficult girlfriend.
3. (49:19) - Jenny & Pete are working on patching things up. Adam is looking for a girlfriend and Rachel goes back to work.
4. (49:26) - Karen is re-evaluating her life. Pete & Adam are invited to a school reunion. Rachel gets involved with a work colleague many years her junior.
5. (49:13) - David's brother Nick visits unannounced and takes a shine to Rachel. Bad news for Adam.
6. (49:00) - All six adults (plus Ramona) and the kids go away together to a remote castle to see in the new millennium.

    This is high quality television and this second season has not dated as badly as the first. Recommended.

Video

    The video quality is better in most respects than the first series, however, is at the wrong aspect ratio and has obviously been pan and scanned.

    The feature is presented in a 1.33:1 aspect ratio non 16x9 enhanced which is not the original aspect ratio. I believe that would have been 1.78:1. As per our site policy I will deduct one star for this. The cropping is obvious when the Dolby Surround logo is shown at the start of each episode and is cut in half.

    The picture was a bit better in sharpness terms but still nothing special. It is still quite grainy. The shadow detail is a little better than season 1. I didn't see any particular examples of low level noise.

    The colour was certainly better with less issues and better saturation than Season 1.

    Artefacts were also generally improved although I did notice some edge enhancement which I didn't notice in Season 1. There was still some minor aliasing around.

    There are no subtitles except some occasional burnt in ones for Spanish.

    The layer changes occur at 26:52 in Episode 2 and 24:30 in Episode 5 and were well done.
    

Video Ratings Summary

Sharpness
Shadow Detail
Colour
Grain/Pixelization
Film-To-Video Artefacts
Film Artefacts
Overall

Audio

    The audio quality is decent.

    This DVD contains an English Dolby Digital 2.0 stereo soundtrack encoded at 192 Kb/s.

    Dialogue was mostly clear and easy to understand and there was no problem with audio sync. Some accents and a bit of mumbling made some lines of dialogue hard to decipher. Subtitles would have been a great help.

    The score of this series is by Mark Russell which is reminiscent of the era without being overly dated.

    The surround speakers added some mild atmosphere when played with Pro Logic II.

     The subwoofer was not used.

Audio Ratings Summary

Dialogue
Audio Sync
Clicks/Pops/Dropouts
Surround Channel Use
Subwoofer
Overall

    None.

Menu

    The menu included music, quotes from the dialogue and motion plus the ability to select episodes and scenes.

    This series is available in both Region 1 and 2. This Region 4 version of this series (when compared to Region 1) misses out on;

• 16x9 enhanced widescreen video presentation (1.78:1) NTSC
• Behind the scenes featurette
• Photo gallery
• Cast & crew filmographies

    The Region 1 version of this disc misses out on;

• 1.33:1 video presentation PAL

    Region 1 is the pick here.

    The video quality is better than Season 1.

    The audio quality is decent.

    No extras.

Video
Audio
Extras
Plot
Overall