The Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy

This six-parter was first shown in 1981, based on Douglas Adams' original radio series and book. Hitch Hiker is brilliant. It is funny. It is poignant. It has lots to say about the human condition and even more about small furry green creatures from Alpha Centauri. Until Hitch Hiker's first incarnation on BBC radio in 1978, Peter Jones was probably best known as the star of The Rag Trade. Thereafter, the great man was fondly known as The Voice of the Book. He's joined in Alan Bell's TV production by Simon Jones, David Dixon, Mark Wing Davey, Sandra Dickinson and Stephen Moore, with cameos by the likes of Richard Vernon (as Slartibartfast), Jack May, Dave Prowse and Peter Davison as a talking cow. The series uses state-of-the-art 1981 technology, from the brilliant single-frame film animation that brings the book so vividly to life, to the dodgy second head of Zaphod Beeblebrox.