Okay, I've started Wyrd Sisters with Varma, Nighy, and Serawhatsis and while she's a huge improvement on Imrie ...

You can't beat Planer's characterizations. I just love love love him. I also really liked Tony Robinson's (swallows in frustration) abridged versions (auggggh! the evil abridgements!) which were unfortunately abri- erm, too quiet.

Stephen Briggs did a good job taking up where Planer left off and I'm glad I heard him first or, as with Varma, anything after Planer would be disappointing. Planer had his flaws. He occasionally gave Granny's voice where it should be Nanny and at one point his off-hand comment about needing a retake was left in.

But he's just so brilliant. Also love him in other things: Gloomsbury (once or twice replaced by the now late Roger Lloyd-Pack), the whole series available on audible. I do have trouble picturing him as anything other than his character on "The Young Ones."

Planer also appears in two of the Discworld films as minor characters. He'll always be my Rincewind. David Jason is ... okaaay.

I've gone off on a tangent - sorry.

I find the separate voices of Death and the Footnotes a distraction. Especially the "music" signaling the footnote. "Footnotes are Pratchett's voice" be damned. All the narrative is Pratchett's voice. I do like Nighy. But I think Varma would have been capable of doing it all herself.

Of course, the point was using some current high-caliber or well-known celebs to help justify a new version. Planer was recorded in mono? Who cares? I'll probably "buy" these just because I love Pratchett so much. Campanellas of Hecate, I've got some of them in German just to enjoy them in a whole new way.

Hoellengloecken. Had to look it up. My German professor is rolling in his Grab.

Deutscher Humor (German Edition)

Haha, "German Edition." Hahahahaha!

My old prof.