It was better than I remembered.
Yes, Zaphod Beeblebrox’s second head is one of the all-time great special effects failures, made worse by the knowledge that they had genuinely hoped it would look cool. But apart from that, the special effects actually stand up rather well, when you remember that we’re talking about 1981 effects technology on a TV budget. And the Guide ‘animations’ are a triumph of design. I particularly liked how an epic space battle between vast fleets of warships was represented as an early-1980s video game.
It’s also true that Trillian was played as a ditz and dressed in Space Cheerleader uniforms. But hell, if anything it’s worse than that. Remember the original Star Wars trilogy’s infamous three female characters with dialogue? The trope recurs here, as apart from Trillian, the only woman with any lines at all is that female Golgafrinchan nincompoop in the final episode. Both are played by Americans, so we’ve got the oddity that we never hear a woman with a British accent at any point.
But of the show’s massively male-dominated cast, I have to say they generally did a good job, with David Dixon’s performance as Ford Prefect as the standout. (That said, I also liked Mos Def’s very different interpretation in the 2005 movie, so maybe I’m just a Ford fan.) Simon Jones makes Arthur assertive when he needs to be assertive, which is hilarious given that he has no control over anything that happens to him from the beginning of the story to the end. Marvin’s silly robot suit kinda grew on me, and I even came to appreciate the goofy, generic sci-fi look of many of the background aliens. Lots of silver reflective clothing and gratuitous goatees.
In the end, I appreciated the dark nihilistic black comedy of the whole thing. Other media -- the novels and the radio series -- continue the story, but as far as the TV show is concerned we’ve got these six episodes and that’s it. So we’re left with no reason to believe Marvin survives his fatal plunge into the sun. Arthur and Ford are going to spend the rest of their lives on prehistoric Earth, and do not appear too happy at the prospect. We’ve met a whale that achieved self-awareness just in time to smash into a planet, and a sentient head of livestock (played by the Doctor!) who cheerfully offered himself up as meat and then committed suicide off-screen.
All in all, a solid 3 hours or so of retro British TV.
