Hi. Deep Space Nine is (along with TNG) my favourite Trek series, but I do not currently have a way of watching it and am really itching for my first re-watch in years. What's the best option for watching/buying the show? First up, I'm an Australian, so that's Region 4 for dvd. I saw that both America and UK/Europe have very cool, sleeker, more modern looking designs on recent(ish) Complete Set re-releases, but as far as I can tell, Australia (Region 4) still only has the old-school, chunky, 90's looking Complete Set. Am I correct? Will Australia be getting any redesigned release anytime? I don't really want to buy the old-style box set, but the only other option I can think of is Netflix, which is ok, but I would prefer to own the show. I really would've loved DS9 to get the TNG Blu-ray treatment (I bought every season as they came out), but from what I've read that's dead in the water for the foreseeable future. Any advice would be appreciated!
If your DVD player is multi-region, you should really go for the US DVD set. The Aussie ones have censorship cuts to two episodes. ...And if your DVD player isn't multi-region, they can be had for cheap.
Ok, I'll have to look into if mine is multi-region. Does seem like the US set is the one to get. Thanks for your help!
No worries. Also, I forgot to mention that if extras are more important to you than the two cut eps, Aussie/UK is a better choice as they contain the extra bonus featurettes that were store exclusives in the US. It's not much, but it's worth mentioning.
Ah, ok. Was there much cut? If it's hard to notice, then maybe I'd go with the UK version for the extra features.
To the Death is missing just a moment, a quick neck break is edited around and the sound effect minimized. Sons and Daughters is missing about 30 seconds. Some stupid UK ruling about sharing blood, even though there are multiple similar scenes in other eps. And as usual, Australia ends up with the scraps, inheriting the UK cuts because it's easier than making new product.
That’s expensive for a DVD player! I’ve seen them for $25 at the local Walmart, and that’s for an upconverting DVD player! And an upconverting DVD player will give you better quality than Netflix or other download sites.
I would go with the Netflix option unless you want the extras. I have the original R4 DVD’s in the chunky cases and Netflix is slightly better quality. Also I have heard the Latter seasons on PAL aren’t as good quality as the NTSC versions even though PAL has higher resolution 576 vs 480 but you have PAL speed up. I checked https://www.movie-censorship.com/report.php?ID=1307 and https://www.movie-censorship.com/report.php?ID=1357 And the version on Aussie Netflix is the same on the Aussie DVDs and I watched them several times. So the Aussie versions are not censored.
Checked online you can buy the New R4 box set for around $150 or get the plastic editions for $10-$20 a season on eBay. The boxes look better as well. https://www.play-asia.com/star-trek-deep-space-nine-dvd-perfect-collection-premium-box-lim/13/701evx
You do realize that DS9 was edited in NTSC composite, so any PAL source (DVD, Broadcast) would need to be converted from NTSC to PAL, unlike SeaQuest DSV where the PAL masters were sourced from 35mm masters or Babylon 5 where the live-action parts were converted to PAL from 35mm.