Red Dwarf

[Slim]

I quite enjoyed my daily journey through The Phil Silvers Show last year and this year I've set myself an easier task - the 74 episodes of Red Dwarf.

There are twelve series and in my opinion it peaks around about the fourth or fifth, then goes badly downhill after that.

I:1 The End

I've seen this one four or five times, now. It was first shown in February 1988. Establishes the context of the series. We see the Red Dwarf in its usual mode as a highly populated mining vessel. We see Lister as a likeable, irreverent slob and Rimmer as officious, petty and small-minded.

Quite interesting to see Lister smoking in a few scenes. And I laughed at the references to modems and "speaking slide rules". Few people would have known what a modem was in 1988 when this was first shown, although I owned one myself. I used it to transfer Pascal programs to a Teesside Poly minicomputer over the telephone system.

There's also a reference to sending photos to be processed in a lab, even though this is supposed to be set in the late 21st century. Until Lister emerges from stasis, when it's set three million years in the future.

Famously, Clare Grogan is in this one. She was also in Mortimer and Whitehouse Gone Hogmanay Fishing the other night, thirty-five years older of course.

I really like this first series. It has a simple, low-budget, sitcom charm and this very first instalment is a good one.

[Slim]

I:2 Future Echoes

Lister seems to be adapting nonchalantly to life as the only human aboard Red Dwarf.

The idea of the cat being the last of his species aboard the ship at the exact same time Lister is recovered from stasis is a bit problematic, to me - especially since the cat people don't seem even to have tidied up the ship, let alone made changes to it. But it's best not to scrutinise a sci-fi sitcom too carefully.

Having said that, the plot in this one is based on the idea of strange echoes from the future interacting with the present and it's quite imaginative. We learn that Lister will eventually have two baby sons. Is that ever resolved in a later series? I can't remember.

The dialogue between Rimmer and Lister is priceless and these early episodes are much more about that than the later stories.

Hadn't seen this one for many years.

[Slim]

I:3 Balance of Power

Lister tires of Rimmer's petty authoritarianism which, interestingly, has survived his reincarnation. He's clearly in charge of the ship, though that may have more to do with the fact that he knows where the cigarettes are hidden than his status as the more senior technician of the two (and, as Lister points out, "the man who changed the bog rolls was higher than us").

We find that Holly specifically chose Rimmer to bring back in hologrammatic form to keep Lister sane. The ship can only support one hologram. But Lister wants to go on a date with the hologram of Kochanski..

Clare Grogan's in this one again (in a flashback of course).

[Slim]

I:4 Waiting for God

Damn, Chris Barrie looked young in 1988.

I don't think there's a single episode of Red Dwarf in which Lister is more slobby than this one. His shirt is extravagantly covered in grubby marks and stains. The intention, I think, is to juxtapose the real Lister with his role as the most holy deity of the cat people. For this is the one in which we learn that Lister is their god - and so he should be, since he was the owner and saviour of the original pregnant cat from which they evolved.

The cat is a lot dumber and more random than in the later series.

Holly has some belting one-liners in this one.

There's that odd scene I'd forgotten about, in which we meet one of the priests of the cat people just before he dies, in the cargo hold. It's all very surreal.

[Slim]

I:5 Confidence and Paranoia

The one where Lister contracts a disease from going in the officers' quarters before it's been decontaminated. Because his disease has had a few million years to mutate, his hallucinations manifest themselves in physical form. No, it doesn't make a lot of sense but it's best not to submit a sci-fi comedy to excessive scrutiny.

Must have seen this a couple of times, but I only vaguely remembered it.

Craig Ferguson is in it, playing a physical manifestation of Lister's confidence. Despite that, it's not a bad one.

There are a few exterior views of the ship. The first few series were remastered with enhanced effects and CGI but I think the iPlayer, which is where I'm watching these for convenience despite owning the DVDs, has the originals. I prefer that anyway. The rubbish models are just part of the charm.

There's a nice setup for the next episode right at the end.

[Slim]

I:6 Me Squared

Rimmer has had a second hologram of himself made. He can't wait to share a cabin with himself.

Lister is overjoyed to have their old quarters to himself. The Rimmers are delighted to be moving into new quarters together. Predictably though, they start to fight - presumably because deep down, Rimmer hates himself.

Good one to finish off Red Dwarf I, which was first broadcast in early 1988. It's interesting to see how well developed Rimmer's character is, this early on - the small-mindedness, the resentment, the lingering sense of failure.

[Slim]

II:1 Kryten

And on to Red Dwarf II!

The one in which the boys from Red Dwarf meet Kryten, after answering a distress call from another spacecraft, crashed on an asteroid.

Holly is rendered differently in this second series. Not heavily pixellated. More like a photorealistic human head against a dark background, which of course makes more sense for a computer manufactured in the late 21st century. When the remasters were done in the late '90s, they got Norman Lovett in to redo some of the Holly footage from the first series, without the pixellation.

This is the one that contains Holly's memorable remarks about dog's milk. Brilliant.

Kryten in this episode was played by David Ross. He was intended as a one-off character for this episode only. He returns in the third series played by Robert Llewellyn, with a different personality, as a regular member of the cast.

Why Rimmer's excited to be meeting the three women reported to be aboard the crashed spacecraft when he's not capable of interacting physically with people or objects, I'm unsure.

Some very witty dialogue in this one and members of the studio audience - presumably composed of fans of the first series - squeal with delight in places. Am I misremembering or do some of the later series dispense with audience reaction? Anyway we'll come to that in a couple of weeks.

Very good start for the second series.

[Slim]

II:2 Better than Life

A post pod arrives from Earth, having tracked the Red Dwarf for three million years. It includes a "total immersion video game" called Better than Life. And a letter to Rimmer from his mother, to tell him that his dad has died.

Despite the fact that Rimmer already knew his dad was dead - it's three million years since his mum wrote the letter - he takes it badly.

Rimmer, Lister and the cat have a go at Better than Life - it's next level virtual reality, with their brains connected via electrodes. Actually come to think of it even the term "virtual reality" hadn't been invented when this episode was first shown.

Some of the special effects are unbelievably crap, but they're all just part of the fun.

Of course, the dark recesses of Rimmer's psyche get the better of him in the game.

This is a brilliant one. It gets some fantastic laughs out of the various personalities of the cast members, as exaggerated and explored in their time in the game. Very good premise to get off the ship as well, the virtual reality sequences (so to speak) are set on Earth.

[Slim]

II:3 Thanks For the Memory

The boys from the Dwarf visit a planet with a breathable atmosphere for a quick barbecue. I don't quite get how Lister, who used to maintain the ship's soup dispensers is able to pilot a shuttlecraft to and from Red Dwarf while it's in orbit, but hey.

They wake up the next morning, but it's four days later. Lister's foot is in plaster. Four days have been torn from his diary. And his jigsaw puzzle has been completed.

Similar in a way to the last episode in that Rimmer's psyche spoils what is, in a sense, a sort of virtual reality experience. He has false memories implanted, perhaps an idea nicked from The Running Man which was made about a year before this.

At one point Rimmer refers to the year 2044, in the context of life before the drive plate accident and the three million years Lister spends in stasis. That must have seemed a lot more futuristic in 1988 than it does now.

Quite an imaginative one.

[Slim]

II:4 Stasis Leak

Begins with a flashback of Rimmer reporting Lister to Captain Hollister for spiking his breakfast with hallucinogenics. A couple of the other crew from before the drive plate accident also feature.

A stasis leak has opened a portal to the past, three weeks before the crew were wiped out. This gives Rimmer and Lister an idea, but of course there's a conflict of interests.

Clever one, this. Based on an idea that would work well in straight sci-fi, but it morphs into a very funny farce.

I think I must only have only seen this one once, I barely remembered it. There's a scene from Lister's future (in which Clare Grogan makes a welcome return appearance); I'm not sure it ever gets resolved in a later episode. I'll find out in a few weeks.

Morwenna Banks makes a brief appearance.

It occurred to me that Red Dwarf uses a theme that's common to some of the great British sitcoms - two people who have nothing in common trapped in a relationship because they rely on each other, or just by circumstances. Steptoe and Son, The Likely Lads, One Foot In the Grave, Rising Damp, Till Death Us Do Part. If you think about it, Rimmer and Lister are a sort of 21st century Bob and Terry. Or 30,000th century, depending how you look at it.

[Slim]

II:5 Queeg

The cat is listening to music with headphones on in the first scene, and he has a CD jewel case in his left hand. I like these little anachronistic anomalies in sci-fi, like the CRT screens in Star Trek. Or Red Dwarf, come to that.

Holly's increasingly unreliable performance as ship's computer suggests that he's gone a bit computer-senile. So the ship's backup computer takes over.

I'd been looking forward to this one. This is, assuredly, one of the all-time great Red Dwarf episodes. Definitely top ten.

The term Artificial Intelligence is used a few times. It's never been more prominent in the public consciousness than it has this last year or so, but it was a thing even in the '80s. Actually the term was first coined in the '50s.

How have I watched 11 of these already?

[Slim]

II:6 Parallel Universe

Opens with the cat performing Tongue Tied, accompanied by Rimmer and Lister dancing in red dinner suits - the excuse being that it's one of the cat's dreams.

Later we see Rimmer on an exercise bike. Given that he can't interact with physical objects, I didn't quite understand this. But he's wearing a very natty and compact Cinelli cycling helmet.

Anyway - in this one, Holly invents a special hyperdrive that's supposed to be able to transport the ship to any point in space simultaneously. I mean - I know it's a comedy, but this was a bit of a stretch.

But at least it doesn't work. Instead it propels them into a parallel universe, where they meet female versions of themselves.

I'd remembered this as a sub-par one in which the joke about the opposite sex versions of the main cast is stretched too far but actually it's laugh-out-loud funny. The female Rimmer works as a brilliant parody of male chauvinism. And of Rimmer. Genius.

[Slim]

III:1 Backwards

And we're back with a third series. Red Dwarf III is quite a different proposition from the first two series. It has a bigger budget. Holly is now female (played by Hattie Hayridge). Rimmer has a different uniform. The ship's interior looks different. The cat is a bit more coherent and human. And Kryten has returned, with a different personality and a slightly different look.

Most of this is explained with some introductory text scrolling Star Wars style into the distance set against the blackness of space. However it goes past very fast, so I think you'd have had to have been recording it on your VCR in November 1989 to stand a chance of reading it, assisted by careful use of the pause button. I used much the same technique on the iPlayer.

The Red Dwarf boys travel through a time hole to Earth. But it's an Earth where time runs backwards. I remembered this one well.

I wasn't able to watch this series when it was first shown, because I had to pick up my girlfriend from her Institute of Personnel Management course at Leicester Uni on Tuesday nights. Fortunately it was repeated a year later.

[Slim]

III:2 Marooned

Another absolute classic. Lister and Rimmer are marooned on a freezing moon in Starbug (Or "Starbug 1", actually there are supposed to be two of them). It's mostly a two-hander between the two, set on Starbug. The dialogue is brilliant and there's a genius gag about Lister's Les Paul copy.

What a joy to see this again.

A couple of anomalies: Rimmer tells Lister how he lost his virginity, even though he's already told him in one of the Red Dwarf II episodes and it's a different story this time.

And Lister asserts that "everyone remembers where they were when Cliff Richard was shot". Considering the last human isn't supposed to be have been born yet, Sir Cliff clearly makes it to a very ripe old age. He's 83 at the moment.

[Slim]

III:3 Polymorph

Opens with a warning that it's unsuitable for people of a nervous disposition.

A polymorph manages to make it aboard the ship. A what? A non-human lifeform that can change shape into any object, and thrives on the negative emotions of its prey.

There's some absolutely superb, farcical physical comedy in this one. It gets shrieks of laughter from the audience, and rightly so. But it's very clever as well.

The polymorph creature borrows heavily from Alien, to brilliant effect.

This is next level from the first two series; we're hitting Peak Dwarf now.

This is the first episode of the third series to be set mainly on Red Dwarf, but it's a very different look from the first two series. Darker and more industrial. A bit claustrophobic. To be fair I think it's set mainly in the cargo bay, but I don't think we see the grey, minimalist sets from the first two series again - until one of the later series possibly, when they bring the old crew back. I wasn't fond of that idea. But we'll get to that.