Discovery Channel: Nasa's Greatest Missions

This is a great Discovery Channel documentary series from 2008 on the American space program. With a running time of almost 9 hours, you get loads of footage and information about the main NASA missions from the last 50 years. Each disc contains two, one-hour long episodes covering a different set of missions and developments and some bonus footage. Original footage from the space program is interlaced with present-day interviews from Astronauts including: Glenn, Young, Carpenter, Borman, Armstrong, Aldrin, Collins, Cernan, Duke etc. In their absence, other Astronaut's achievements are discussed by their surviving colleagues and wives. Other key NASA personnel are also interviewed including legendary flight director Gene Kranz. Aside from some understandably grainy archive footage of early mission control films, picture quality is very good and frequently excellent. For instance, the first spacewalk by Ed White which is astounding, or the first ever Gemini rendezvous which I'd never seen before. I did read a critical review of the soundtrack and narration of the films, but I thought it was generally quite good. Narration is by American actor Gary Sinise and for the most part the orchestrated soundtrack helps the documentary move along building tension and drama. It's worth considering this series if you're interested in the history of the space program and I found it vastly more entertaining than any recent release at the cinema; there are no actors or computer graphics in these films and the spaceships are real too... Summary of Disc contents: Disc One Episode 1. Ordinary Supermen (the first seven) Episode 2. Friends & Rivals (Mercury & Gemini missions) Disc Two Episode 3. Landing the Eagle (Apollo missions) Episode 4. The Explorers (Apollo 13) Disc Three Episode 5. The Shuttle (development, testing, tragedies) Episode 6. A Home in space (International Space Station & Hubble) Disc Four Bonus Disc/Original NASA films. Freedom 7 Friendship 7: John Glenn Proud Conquest: Gemini 6 & 7 Apollo 8 Debrief The Flight of Apollo 11 ---

Fantastic...all the programmes you saw on Discovery with none of the ad breaks!! The set also contains some original NASA films about John Glenn's Mercury mission, Apollo 11 mission, Alan Shepherd's Mercury mission and many other bonus clips. An added selling point is the lack of narration by Sean Pertwee!! The narrator provided was perfectly fine. Not the most indepth series but for the money it's brilliant.

What you see is what you get with this set. I ordered this set as I wanted a nice set of DVDs covering NASAs biggest highs and lows, and that is exactly what you get with this set, at a great value price. I like the packaging, featuring individual slimline DVD cases within a cardboard outer, it sits nicely within the others sets and being slimline doesn't hog too much shelfspace! The set covers the from the first in space, to orbits, the space race, men on the moon, Apollo 13, the Shuttle Era (including the low points of the disaster), Hubble and Skylab. The four disc set covers a lot, probably not as in depth as others but well enough for most-which also keeps it interesting and moving along fast. Interviews with Astronauts throughout with their viewpoints and feelings are a great feature as well. Highly recommended for anyone wishing to have a good set of historic moments in space flight and America's space program.

The first thing I can say is wow - the footage is amazing. THen the dissapointment kicks in as you listen to the narration as one would think that there would be a glut of information on the missions. This is, however, the Readers Digest version of events. If you want to know more about the NASA missions you would be better served reading the books by the astronauts themselves, for example Moon Shot - which was written by Alan Shepard and Deke Slayton - Mercury 7 astronauts and later NASA brass who were involved with every manned mission from the first American in space to Skylab and Apollo / Soyuz. If, however, you want lots of lauch footage as well as space and moon walks, sound byte interviews with astronauts and ground crew and some pretty hokey but informative NASA documentaries (in the bonus material) then this DVD set is well worth it.

I own many documentaries about space. Some are good, and some are simply dreadful. Since I always preferred the whole story of a mission, the nearest one would come to this goal, is to buy the relatively expensive "Spacecraft Collection" editions, issued in the United States, which include the full television, 16mm films and air to ground communication recordings of the time in which such missions took place. All, naturally digitalized and highly polished. But for those who are not such "nuts" about space and just want a swift synopsis to what happened when and how, including witnesses and protagonists of such magnificent feats, this collection is one of the best on the Market these days. Originally titled "When We Left Earth" and repackaged in the UK as "NASA's Greatest Missions" (go figure why?), this is the very same product with a different cover. It contains four DVDs individually packaged in slim cases. Each DVD contains 2 different programs with NASA bonuses added to each of them. I enjoyed them very much, even if I already know every missions by heart. They include the essential information needed to know about where NASA has been and where NASA will go. It can easily be considered as a suitable "starter" for all those who either missed-out on previous missions (especially younger generations), or simply have forgotten how it all started and how difficult such missions have been and still are. In any case, for a celebration, this is the right tool and I can only recommend it. I still watch it as a compendium to other similar products...

A few months ago, before all the summer rain and cloud obliterated the night sky, my 12-year-old niece asked me if I knew the names of the two bright "stars" she'd seen. It was at the time that Venus and Jupiter appeared very close to each other, and they were sparkling beautifully. The display was made all the more spectacular by a glorious moon. Having answered my niece's question, I added that when I was her age I used to look up at the moon when 12 famous men flew there in rockets and walked on it. She looked at me, incredulous, and remarked: "you're weird". So I guess no-one had yet told her about Messrs Armstrong, Aldrin, Collins, Conrad, Cernan et al. Yet at the time, I had been so fascinated and excited that I can still today recall and recite all the NASA Mercury, Gemini and Apollo astronauts, and who flew on which mission. (Blimey, I'm beginning to sound like a trainspotter, or a geek! Actually, I just happen to have a very good memory.) I hadn't seen this series when it was aired, and although I presumed this DVD collection wouldn't tell me much that I didn't already know, I thought my niece might enjoy watching a few minutes' footage of the Apollo 8 orbits, the subsequent first landing, and the lunar car's excursions. She was utterly captivated by the story. And there were some new facts (and recollections) for me. I'd recommend this DVD to anyone who's interested (primarily) in the missions to the moon but who wasn't alive to watch the live telecasts. I believed it then, and now... so I hope that none of the conspiracy theorists out there are ever proved right! As Charles Duke once remarked: "Why would we fake it nine times?"

Six episodes of about 48 minutes each, chronicling NASA's key space programs: Mercury, Gemini, Apollo, Skylab, Shuttle, ISS. Combines familiar footage with other footage never before seen, all remastered from source material as best as possible, which given the 5 decades it spans and different recording formats, is hit-and-miss but also no mean feat. Extensive interviews are also incorporated from key individuals: famous and not-so famous astronauts, plus flight directors and engineers, recounting what it really felt like to be part of the space program. It's a fascinating series worth your time and money. If I was to be critical, I'd have enjoyed even more detail, plus side-by-side chronology of the Russian space missions.

A great documentary .