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March 28, 2024, 10:29:17 AM

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Red Dwarf rewatch

Started by Lemming, September 12, 2020, 07:09:51 PM

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idunnosomename

It's good prop though. It could've been just a square of MDF painted, but it's pretty accurate

https://mobile.twitter.com/mr_clark/status/1248382450008379393

frajer

I liked The Promised Land a fair bit, but gags like that (and the wild audience reaction) always make me think "that's exactly what Red Dwarf Live would be."

purlieu

Quote from: idunnosomename on April 20, 2021, 11:15:01 AM
It's good prop though. It could've been just a square of MDF painted, but it's pretty accurate
The level of detail in the sets and props on Red Dwarf shows what a labour of love it is for everyone involved. Matthew Clark's Twitter is a goldmine.

H-O-W-L

 I think the giant floppy disk would have worked as a legitimately funny gag if Red Dwarf had actually remained stuck in a shit eighties vision of the future and hadn't massively leapt forward in technological structure as the years have gone by, honestly. But as it stands, RD has had far more advanced in-universe data container shit appear so it just seems like a crap CBBC gag. It doesn't really work when you think about it and it only really works on a Dom 'Cunt' Joly level of "HAHA THING BUT BIG!" whereas if it had been an immensely thick floppy disk in a world that was previously established to use standard sized floppy disks for general data it might've worked.

In a world with shit like the hard-light bee the floppy disk just kinda falls apart. Even in the old days of RD they weren't using shitty eighties/nineties technology like cassettes and tapes (at least, not consciously -- as a biproduct of being made in the late 80s they might've just shown up as general non-designed props), they were using advanced shit. They have a fucking hydrogen scoop on their ship -- something that's still a cutting-edge power concept nowadays. The tech level is already beyond this. The only reason any of Dwarf's tech seems "eighties" is because that's when the show started and that era of sci-fi had a very homogenous aesthetic. It was never retrofuture/contemporary future in its era. It was a visual product of its time, and the Dave series (and of course the shitty late nineties series) sped beyond that, massively. Back To Earth's version of the Dwarf doesn't even LOOK like the same one that started in the eighties.

Probably only Lemming will grok what I mean when I say this, but it's like the original System Shock. It isn't contemporary in its technology, it is actively trying to be futuristic, and merely constrained conceptually and artistically by its era. It isn't trying to emulate its origin point, it's trying to go beyond that and always has been. Such is the folly of sci-fi.

Though you wanna hear my opinion? In a perfect world where Dwarf has used eighties Alien style tech... have it just be thousands of fucking floppy disks, like real-world computer games and large-filesize software had dozens of in the eighties and nineties. Lister opens the backup cupboard and there's just sixteen bastard shelves crammed to fuck with floppy disks. Fucking acres of them mate.

Replies From View

Quote from: H-O-W-L on April 20, 2021, 10:28:12 PM
I think the giant floppy disk would have worked as a legitimately funny gag if Red Dwarf had actually remained stuck in a shit eighties vision of the future and hadn't massively leapt forward in technological structure as the years have gone by, honestly.

Really?  A huge floppy disk, written on with giant handwriting?  It works as an indication that the cast have all shrunk, but as something large in the real world it has no logical basis.


Quote from: H-O-W-L on April 20, 2021, 10:28:12 PM
Even in the old days of RD they weren't using shitty eighties/nineties technology like cassettes and tapes (at least, not consciously -- as a biproduct of being made in the late 80s they might've just shown up as general non-designed props), they were using advanced shit.

What do you think of the triangular video cassettes that appeared in series 2, out of interest?

H-O-W-L

Quote from: Replies From View on April 21, 2021, 01:05:46 AM
Really?  A huge floppy disk, written on with giant handwriting?  It works as an indication that the cast have all shrunk, but as something large in the real world it has no logical basis.

I didn't say it would be a good joke, just that it would probably have worked as a sort of guttural laugh inducing one. I also made it clear I think the joke could be overall refined. As it stands it is completely illogical, as you said.

Quote from: Replies From View on April 21, 2021, 01:05:46 AM
What do you think of the triangular video cassettes that appeared in series 2, out of interest?

Series 2 was made in 1988. The triangle tapes were clearly an attempt at making weird sci-fi technology. Do note that they use compact discs (a legitimately advanced tech at the time since they were still not massively used for data or computing uses --  they had some but they weren't ubiquitous for data until the mid-90s due to a LOT of factors) in that same episode. I don't think they sat down and went "Right, let's use VHS-based tapes because they're contemporary." I think they went "Surely magnetic tape will still be used in the future? It's great for storing data! It'll only be made smaller!".

The problem came when real-world tech marched on. Instead of making a concerted effort to keep RD at its 1988 tech level, the 1990s and 2000s RD episodes advanced the technology forward along with the set-dressing, so you ended up with shit like fucking nanobots being introduced into a setting where an awfully stiff and clunky looking robot like Kryten is not considered a total shitheap.

The justification for this is ultimately that RD takes place millions of years forward etc etc and yes it does, but the ship itself doesn't. The ship itself is several million years old, yet everything onboard -- all the environs -- advance in a way that would be fine if the conceit of the setting didn't require jokes around the technology and equipment of the ship. There's several points where the Dwarf is made to be a shitheap with outdated tech even for its original era, then episodes right alongside those jokes where the Dwarf is a technical marvel. It doesn't gel.

JamesTC

The absurdity of the seeing such a large floppy disk did make me laugh initially. What kept me laughing was Danny John-Jules screwing up the line and Craig Charles getting more and more frustrated as they had to carry it out and back in.