Anyone know if the soon to be released Life on Mars in the UK will be region-free on Blu-ray? I am really looking forward to picking this up if it is.

Thanks!

oh I hope it is... I'm loving the US version.

strange that the bluray seasons are being split in two and not as one.

Any update on this? Would love to purchase these if they are.

The 1st disc of Series 1 at least is playable in Region A:
http://www.avforums.com/forums/blu-r...ml#post8082129

However, if you go back and read the rest of that thread, you'll see there's some controversy on whether or not the source is just upconverted SD. There's phrasing on the boxes for the sets along the lines of "This disc contains material which has been upscaled from the Standard Definition source." However, it's not clear if it's referring to the extras, certain visual effects shots in the show (Like with Firefly), or the show in its entirety.
http://www.avforums.com/forums/blu-r...ml#post7990428

I have the UK BD sets. They are region free and playable on US players.

I saw at least one claim that the extras do not play on US players. They do play on my Samsung BD-P1400.

The original source is SD and they are upconverted for the blu-ray. Thus it is not "pure" HD but it still looks very good. I haven't seen the SD discs but I suspect the BDs are superior. They have an appropriate "70s" look. Also, the BDs have Dolby TrueHD sound.

Amazon.co.uk has a pretty high price but I got them from sendit.com for a lot less, 12.89 GBP + 1.50 GBP shipping for each season.

Thanks for the information guys. Since the show isn't even available in the US, I thought the BD would be the way to go since the UK DVDs are region 2 and wouldn't play on any of my DVD players.

Sucks about the extras though. I imagine they won't work for me. I tried playing a region free PAL sourced DVD on my Sony BDP-350 and it wouldn't play.

Well, like I said, the extras play on my Samsung BD-P1400 and it does not have any PAL capabilities as far as I know. (I will check it tonight by trying to play an R2 DVD on it. I suspect I won't be able to.) My guess is that the extras are coded in HD.

R2 isn't the same as PAL. For example, NTSC Japanese DVDs are R2. To truly check the PAL playback capabilities, you'd need an R0 PAL DVD.

Yes, of course you're right. I knew that. To play an R2 (Europe) DVD, the player has to play R2 DVDs and convert PAL too. I know I have R2 NTSC discs (from Japan) and R3 and R0 NTSC discs (from Korea) but I don't think I have any R0 PAL DVDs., So I may not be able to test it.

Just got Season 2 blu-ray, and I can confirm that it plays in the US PS3. The extras won't play though (probably SD PAL).

Ordered both seasons at BlahDVD for £29.86 shipped. Each set is around £14 + shipping. That's about $43 total.

Can anyone else chime in on this release?

I read some reviews on Amazon in which some buyers mentioned this release had the frame rate slowed down?