The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (radio series)

Before the books, the TV series and the movie, there was a Radio 4 science-fiction comedy that first went out on March 8, 1978. Douglas Adams wrote it for sound, and it shows: the Guide's dry narration, voiced by Peter Jones, and stereo sound effects, then a first for BBC radio comedy, make jokes that every later version had to translate. Simon Jones plays Arthur Dent, the ordinary man swept off a demolished Earth, and the first two series are the essential listen. The later series, which Dirk Maggs adapted from the novels, the last of them from Eoin Colfer's continuation, are for completists; the original run still sounds fresher than most new comedy.