Customer Reviews
No tedious mucking about in hyperspace - By: Tealady2000, 02 Mar 2006 
I was a fan of the original radio series of HHGTTG & I was delighted to discover these CDs. This is a great follow-on from the first series, with even more sublimely outrageous scenarios as Zaphod survives the Total Perspective Vortex & Arthur discovers the remains of a civilisation based entirely on shoe-shops. There is no better way to pass a long car jorney - my kids love these CDs, & you can listen to them again & again. When Rula Lenska appeared on Celebrity Big Brother my boys knew exactly who she was - Lintilla (and her millions of clones). Luckily for Rula there was no Allitnilin the CBB house or she would have been neutralised instantly.......
The best series overall - By: , 23 Apr 2005 I strongly recommend this box set - it has given me hours of entertainmentin the car. I think though it is more disjointed than the first series its insights are better & far funnier. After all this contains the "Total Perspective Vortex", reveals to us the truth about the power of the Galactic President & let us know that reality "has gone on the blink again". And if that were not enough we have the revelation of the "shoe event horizon", & the anthem of the complaints department of the Sirius Cybernetics Corporation.
This is -in short - brilliant for anyone who is left wondering whether either they are mad, or whether it is the world around them that has taken leave of its senses.
The biggest incident in space since the big bang - By: , 29 Mar 2005 I remember when i first heard this on audio tape. i was young & i thought i would hate it but low & behold my opinion switched around. this is an absolutely great story with a good list of characters.
Arthur dent has had his planet blown up, & obviously he is not happy about it considering his only companion is an alien working on a book for space travelers. the hitch hikers guide to the galaxy. They are soon joined by zaphod & his female friend, trillian, & embark on a whole host of adventures including depressed robots, a planet making....planet & discover the horrifying truth that is the creation of earth.
The hillarity continues - By: , 04 Feb 2005 An absolute treasure
How someone cannot find it entertaining that ape creaturein a dressing gown finds himself talking to humans who have evolved into birds so they do not have to walk aroundin uncomfortable shoes is beyond me.
If you liked the first set of radio plays you will continue to love this!!
Good, but not as magnificent as the first series - By: Gavin Wilson, 02 May 2004 
The first radio series of Hitchhiker was utterly marvellous, & I believe will stand upin history as the 20th century's equivalent of 'Alicein Wonderland'. The second series never achieved the same zenith, for several reasons:
1. It was very much a follow-on to the first series, & thus it could never hope to be as devestatingly original.
2. Although there are one or two grand ideasin the second series -- such as the Platonic concept of a disinterested philosopher actually running the Universe, & Zaphod colluding with psychiatrists to destroy the Earth -- these don't permeate the whole seriesin the same way that the Earth-as-ultimate-computer idea held almost everything togetherin the first series.
3. In fact, apart from Zaphod feeling he must find Zarniwoop, our heroes wander fairly aimlessly through the second series, largely reacting to circumstances & just trying to survive.
4. The absence of Trillian means that there is no female protagonist until the three Lintillas arrivein episode 5. Quite apart from the benefit of a female perspective -- if Douglas was capable of writing from one -- a female voice gave additional colour to the first series. Until you've heard a couple of episodes, it can at times be hard to distinguish between the voices of Mark Wing-Davey, Geoff McGivern, & at times, even Simon Jones.
5. One of the many stars of the first series was the background music, which provided a wonderful selection of much of the best 'space' music of the 1970s -- Stomu Yamash'ta, Patrick Moraz, Terry Riley etc. In the second series -- perhaps for reasons of expense -- we get Paddy Kingsland's original music, which is nice enough, but was never going to win any awards or achieve commercial success.
6. Douglas Adams seemed to have used up many of his best philosophical ideasin the first series. At times you definitely feel that Peter Jones, as the Book, has been given a second-rate selection of observations for the second series. The second series contained one or two of Douglas's gripes about the late 70s -- e.g. the noisiness of discos, & the surplus of shoe shops on the high street -- but one wonders whether it was really worth making them a major theme of a sci-fi story.
7. The decision to broadcast episodes 8 to 12 on Monday to Friday of the same week was a mistake. It was just to much to takein so quickly. Perhaps the production team were unaware how the first series became such a cult: university students (particularlyin Cambridge) were taping each episode, & very quickly copies of copies of copies of the original broadcast were circulating around the colleges. You really needed to hear each episode at least three times to begin to appreciate all that had been put into it. With episodes coming every night, as they didin the second series, you never stood a chance of getting that familiar before the next episode arrived.
OK, that's all the negative criticism. There are many reasons for liking the second series almost as much as the first series. Stephen Moore is fantastically versatile here -- e.g. as Marvin, as the pupil, & as the disinterested philosopher -- & his achievement really deserved to be compared with Alec Guinnessin 'Kind Hearts & Coronets'.
