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Rating: 
Summary: Almost worth the cost, if you've got a discount...
Review: This collection of four NASA films marks the beginning in this series of something watchable. After watching the previous volumes in this set it's obvious that NASA has come a long way in improving the quality of a lot of the space footage. The background music also reflects a less mundane approach."Opening New Frontiers," "We Deliver," "Launch and Retrieval of Satellites" and "Satellite Repairs" show the early Space Shuttle program, but neglect the R & D phase which really should be included in the series. The insistence on using only NASA films leaves a hole here. Sure, R & D is not too compelling, but none of this material is gonna keep you glued to your set. In spite of that there is a lot of decent material here. Shuttle launches, satellite deployments and rescues, interior shots, all are much better than NASA's earlier years. Did you know that "by the mid-80s" we should be enjoying two shuttle launches per month? This is according to the first film, which focuses on the first four launches. It seems we're a bit behind schedule. Madacy has included "extras" which should have been left behind. The bios of two of the four astronauts, as well as the page on Skylab and the summaries of the three Skylab missions belong on Volume 3 which covers Skylab. This disk is devoted to the shuttle, folks! It doesn't matter much, because the print is too small to read unless you're good friends with your set. The "challenging" trivia game is not worth the time to find your way back to the main menu. The film clip, laughingly called, "A Montage of Soviet Mission Clips" has never been seen by the person who invented its title. It is actually a bit more than a minute showing an Apollo launch and first stage separation. The obviously non-Soviet radio exchange mentions "Apollo 11." While I realize that much of this material is boring, I would have hoped that someone at Madacy would have stayed awake long enough to get their facts straight. Also, someone was asleep at the switch in the edit room, because there is a moment at the end showing the narrator frozen as if the pause button on their VCR was pushed just a bit too late. But, regardless of the title, this clip has nothing to do with the subject matter on the disk. It should have been included with Volume 3 instead. As with other Madacy releases, the scene access is unusable. Eight selections and not one leads to the beginning of a film, and all but two drop you off in the middle of a sentence. There is no chapter and time information available on screen, as should be with a properly produced disk. And speaking of time, the 120 minutes indicated on the jacket must have been approximated using a sundial. It's almost a half-hour short. This disk is almost worth having by itself. Almost. But it certainly is ONLY for those interested in NASA films and space flight history.
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