Topic: Red Dwarf rewatch

[Lemming]

No idea how to properly run a rewatch, so I'll just get started:

S01E01 - The End

Right off the bat, the opening scene is absolutely top-tier and does an incredible job of introducing Rimmer and Lister, as well as being funny as fuck.

When I was little I was always fascinated with the pre-disaster scenes in the early series, especially the first two thirds or so of this episode. You get a real feel for Hollister and Kochanski in the relatively brief time you see them, which I think makes their deaths (and subsequent mentions/appearances through the rest of the series) work much more effectively than they logically should, for characters who were only on screen for a few minutes each.

The post-disaster scenes are great because they pretty much set the tone for the whole first series. The direction powerfully establishes the desolation of the empty, moribund ship, and the true horror of Lister's situation becomes abundantly clear as he roams around the ship seeing the obliterated powder-corpses of the crew... but he's pretty chilled out about the whole thing and immediately bounces back into mindless optimism, befriends the Cat and decides to head straight back to Earth and make the best of it. That's more or less how he acts for the whole first series, as I remember it.

Every time I see the early episodes I forget how good the original sets are. In my mind they always kind of shift to looking a bit cardboardy and awkward, but they're actually way, way more striking IMO than the weird science ship designs that suddenly arrive from series three onwards. It's a boring, grey mining ship, full of industrial corridors and walkways. It looks unnerving even when fully staffed by a crew, but after everyone is killed, the giant empty rooms and dimly-lit corridors become downright scary. That fits the show far better, and I really love when they start decorating their quarters with anything they can find in series 2 and stick that huge inflatable banana on the wall just to have a break from the relentless grey.

Great start, anyway. They manage to establish a hell of a lot in a relatively short time. Didn't even mention that Cat and senile-Holly are both introduced to great effect all in the last 10 minutes or so of the episode. It's also got plenty of laughs despite the amount of setting and story information it has to include. Every conversation between Lister and Rimmer is funny, as is "what cat?", "everybody's dead, Dave", "I'VE BEEN EATING HALF THE CREW"...

[The Mollusk]

Great post. I’m gonna enjoy this thread a lot.

[mippy]

The 'get a couple of horses and start breeding goats and sheep' line really tickled me.

[Billy]

Series 7 and 8 are a bit like Seasons 11-12 of The Simpsons to me - they're often seen as the start of a decline, and that's probably right, but I really can't dislike them as the nostalgia attachment is absolutely huge, S7 especially which really takes me back to watching each episode with my Dad as an eight year old in '97 - I associate it with 'Crime Traveller' at the same time, which he also introduced me to as he was obviously a Chloe Annett fan.

In between 7 and 8 I discovered a local video store which had the Series 2 and 3 VHSes, which I absolutely adored and it's still my favourite era of the show today. For my final year studying drama back in 2012, we all had to pick a duologue from a film/show and perform it on camera with a fellow coursemate. I chose the Rimmer and Lister scene from Better Than Life where Rimmer talks about his father, we altered it somewhat to fit our personalities and make it less of a Craig/Chris impersonation (I was Lister) and it worked surprisingly well out of context, could be from any drama rather than something set millions of years from Earth in deep space.

I haven't seen Back to Earth yet, I was abroad when it was shown and I've never got round to watching it. I've never really got into the Dave era at all though, it's the howling/whooping audience treating every line like it's the greatest thing the characters have ever said ever that puts me off the most.

[JamesTC]

I can't really be objective about Red Dwarf so won't rear my head too much. It is my favourite TV show and even the "bad" series bring joy to me.

If any of you guys are wondering about the Blu-Ray set for it then I'd recommend it just due to it being exceptionally cheap. It has all the great content from the DVDs as well as the rare features from the Bodysnatcher set which includes the brilliant "lost" Series I episode animated with Chris Barrie narration, a Series I and II full length documentary and a version of the pilot which just uses the first night of recording (which famously went very badly leading to it mostly being re-shot).

In terms of the improvements in picture quality it is mixed:
Big Improvement: Series III and V - III has always looked terrible on VHS, DVD and streaming so this is the first time it has looked good. Series V at times looks proper HD (Holoship in particular looks amazing).
Improved: Series II, IV, VI - VI suffered on DVD and streaming with part of the picture being damaged at the bottom which has been repaired.
No Real Improvement: Series I, VII, VIII

Just be careful about buying it used. Series III and V were originally released with issues in the restoration. New copies from Amazon are the fixed discs. The fixed discs can also be requested from the BBC by emailing them with proof of purchase.

Doug Naylor is clearly fucked in the head but there's plenty of shit misogynistic """jokes""" in earlier series, too, the one that stands out to me being that Rimmer apparently raped Yvonne McGruder while she was concussed, which I think is in series two.

The novel Last Human goes to great lengths to try and twist the relationship between McGruder and Rimmer in a way that clearly shows that Doug Naylor is rather embarrassed by the way they did it seven years earlier. He basically makes it that McGruder and Rimmer both like each other but are both too nervous to do anything and then that is when McGruder has the head injury and in her daze has the one-night stand. Rimmer thinks she only liked him due to the head injury whereas she thinks it was all a dream. Not perfect but at least he tried to make it seem better without altering it too much from the established sequence of events.

Parallel Universe is ace, it's one of the best episodes, because in addition to explicitly undermining Rimmer's sexism when his own pitiful pick-up shit is turned against him, it also (accidentally?) makes a statement that's still very progressive today. It seems to imply that any perceived behavioural differences between men and women are entirely socially constructed and that, in a universe where the only difference to our own is that males had been historically oppressed on reproductive capability instead of females, everything would be exactly the same only with everyone's bodies switched, given that Deb Lister and Arlene Rimmer are the exact same people as in "our" universe. I always wondered, given the show's track record, if it was meant that way or if they were just going for a "LOL FEMALE RIMMER IS HORNY AND FEMALE LISTER IS GROSS!" thing and ended up writing something really cool by mistake. Or maybe the episode was Rob Grant's work, with Doug Naylor not contributing as much to that one? Who knows.

Parallel Universe is pretty poor characterisation. Lister is never as misogynistic (aside from one Series X line) as the female Lister is to him. Rimmer would never usually be as straightforwardly shitty with a woman (except maybe Series VIII Rimmer). If anything it paints the pair as more misogynistic than Krytie TV. At least in Krytie TV they point out that what Kryten is being forced to do is objectifying to women.

The intentions of the episode are noble but Rob and Doug's youthful naivety show through. Doug has certainly expressed embarrassment at the simplistic gender politics.

Series 8 is pretty terrible in general for portrayal of women, the whole running sexual attraction virus thing coming straight from an adolescent male fantasy.

Series VIII had to have two stories expanded and two episodes dropped due to overspends on Back in the Red and Pete. Funnily enough one of the episodes dropped was the most outrageously sexist of all from what I remember. Can't remember the planned plot but it was to be called Phwoar and I think involved some sort of pheromone gas. The other episode cut was to end the series and end with them crash landing on Earth.

[mippy]

Was looking to see if the books were available as ebooks now, and, um...https://www.amazon.co.uk/Pink-Dwarf-Infinity-Welcomes-Drivers-ebook/dp/B01IMJYUTM/ref=sr_1_8?dchild=1&keywords=Red+dwarf&qid=1600020708&s=digital-text&sr=1-8

[Lemming]

I can't really be objective about Red Dwarf so won't rear my head too much. It is my favourite TV show and even the "bad" series bring joy to me.

Objectivity not required! It makes things more interesting if there are people defending the "bad" series and pointing out their strengths.

Parallel Universe is pretty poor characterisation. Lister is never as misogynistic (aside from one Series X line) as the female Lister is to him. Rimmer would never usually be as straightforwardly shitty with a woman (except maybe Series VIII Rimmer). If anything it paints the pair as more misogynistic than Krytie TV. At least in Krytie TV they point out that what Kryten is being forced to do is objectifying to women.

The intentions of the episode are noble but Rob and Doug's youthful naivety show through. Doug has certainly expressed embarrassment at the simplistic gender politics.

I seem to remember Rimmer's bigotry is well-established in the episodes prior to Parallel Universe, but maybe I'm wrong - either way I don't remember thinking the way Arlene Rimmer acts was too at odds with the way Arnold Rimmer acts. I suppose the episode kind of forces Arlene into the position of being a mega-creep to drive home the point that Arnold's sexism is being turned back on him, and so he can learn his lesson by experiencing first-hand the sickening sinking feeling of being objectified/harassed, but you could probably reason it out if you were being overly-generous to the script. Maybe it's just down to Arlene making the first move, which upset Arnold because his "dominant" role was undermined and put him on the back foot, while simultaneously emboldening Arlene because her "dominant" role was fed into. Something like that. Plus, it's her universe, so she's playing on home ground - Arnold was already feeling alienated and upset by the portrayal of men on a magazine cover even before Arlene started going after him.

As for the way Deb Lister treats Dave Lister, the only thing that I can clearly recall is that she places the responsibility of birth control entirely on him and then hand-waves his potential pregnancy away with a "maybe you'll get lucky", which is pretty nasty but it doesn't seem totally incompatible with Dave Lister's character, especially since he's genuinely pretty gormless in the first two series. Looking forward to getting to Parallel Universe on the rewatch either way, should be interesting.

[Dead Soon]

Right off the pistol, ''The End'' is a fucking fantastic name for a series debut and ''Have you ever been hit over the head with a welding mallet'' is one of the greatest opening lines in any comedy series.

Lister's skepticism with Hollister about the 'treatment' of his cat is a surefire highlight,

''Lister! The cat will be dead''

''So with respect, sir, what's in it for the cat?''

I really love Lister's incongruously pissed off ''so that's it, on me own, it's just me'' reaction to finding out the sheer scale of his situation, as if he's merely discovered his co-worker's let him down again and he's covering the shift solo, complete with a huffy drag of his cig.

Rimmer's mentally anguished, insecure traits are established with effect quite early on, with his minor meltdown in the bunkroom prior to the voided exam. He is definitely someone Lister can bounce off and makes it virtually self explanatory as to why Rimmer was chosen as the holographic companion. That said, he's ballsier in this episode than in any later edition - he directly attempts to attack The Cat.

Apparently the scene with Kochanski went on for a punishing length of time and featured notched up flirting, but hasn't been aired even as a nugget on the extensive DVD packages because the acting from both camps was too painful for our eyes, according to those present.

[JamesTC]

Objectivity not required! It makes things more interesting if there are people defending the "bad" series and pointing out their strengths.

I'm not sure I can defend it particularly! I'd probably agree with many criticisms it is just I generally see past them.

I seem to remember Rimmer's bigotry is well-established in the episodes prior to Parallel Universe, but maybe I'm wrong - either way I don't remember thinking the way Arlene Rimmer acts was too at odds with the way Arnold Rimmer acts. I suppose the episode kind of forces Arlene into the position of being a mega-creep to drive home the point that Arnold's sexism is being turned back on him, and so he can learn his lesson by experiencing first-hand the sickening sinking feeling of being objectified/harassed, but you could probably reason it out if you were being overly-generous to the script. Maybe it's just down to Arlene making the first move, which upset Arnold because his "dominant" role was undermined and put him on the back foot, while simultaneously emboldening Arlene because her "dominant" role was fed into. Something like that. Plus, it's her universe, so she's playing on home ground - Arnold was already feeling alienated and upset by the portrayal of men on a magazine cover even before Arlene started going after him.

As for the way Deb Lister treats Dave Lister, the only thing that I can clearly recall is that she places the responsibility of birth control entirely on him and then hand-waves his potential pregnancy away with a "maybe you'll get lucky", which is pretty nasty but it doesn't seem totally incompatible with Dave Lister's character, especially since he's genuinely pretty gormless in the first two series. Looking forward to getting to Parallel Universe on the rewatch either way, should be interesting.

It was a very Star Trek opening (after Tongue Tied) which attempts to push the ideas early on and so shows Rimmer from a very exaggerated perspective with a fair bit less depth to him than before.

That said it is a bit muddled with Rimmer thinking more about it. Rimmer was more perceptive of Lisa's feelings in Thanks for the Memory than Lister was but also had a history of misogyny. I think they made a more concerted effort to soften Rimmer in Series II but Parallel Universe returns him to Series I Rimmer. Rimmer also seemed far more conservative than to have porn mags as he goes more for Morris Dancer Monthly and Fascist Dictator Monthly.

Lister is immature but I never got too much of a negative attitude to women from him in Series I/II. Certainly I never saw him as accusing a drunk woman of asking for it as Deb insinuates (and he does back at her).

All said, it is still very funny. The wormdo scene is an absolute classic. With a comedy show you do sometimes expect characters to be held secondary to the comedy itself.

My apologies for dragging you eleven episodes late here.

[JamesTC]

Apparently the scene with Kochanski went on for a punishing length of time and featured notched up flirting, but hasn't been aired even as a nugget on the extensive DVD packages because the acting from both camps was too painful for our eyes, according to those present.

A little more is in the original assembly (made up of the original recording night without the extensive reshoots) which is on the Blu-Ray and can also be found here.

[SavageHedgehog]

Series 7 and 8 are a bit like Seasons 11-12 of The Simpsons to me - they're often seen as the start of a decline, and that's probably right, but I really can't dislike them as the nostalgia attachment is absolutely huge, S7 especially which really takes me back to watching each episode with my Dad as an eight year old in '97 - I associate it with 'Crime Traveller' at the same time, which he also introduced me to as he was obviously a Chloe Annett fan.

In between 7 and 8 I discovered a local video store which had the Series 2 and 3 VHSes, which I absolutely adored and it's still my favourite era of the show today.

I never liked Series 8 (which I think I've only ever seen the once, despite owning the DVD and maybe even off-air recordings at the time) but aside from that I relate to a lot of this. I have a lot of affection for Series 7; I had seen some episodes before, but this was different, it was talk of the playground, I read the summaries in advance in Radio Times etc. The ending of Blue is probably still one of my biggest ever laughs.

Much of the rest of the series I caught through odd videos I found on sale, in second hand shops etc. Some of it even from off-site recordings some guy was selling in an indoor market! There are a number of scenes I first saw in blooper form on the Smeg Outs\Ups tapes.

Much of the first three series I mostly saw for the first time in those remastered versions, which added stupid CGI inserts at the expense of other scenes. Didn't complain at the time mind. In the case of The End I believe it was the funeral speech which was deleted.

[Phil_A]

A little more is in the original assembly (made up of the original recording night without the extensive reshoots) which is on the Blu-Ray and can also be found here.

Blimey, I can see why they reshot it based on the first few minutes. The audience aren't into it at all, are they - it's like it was recorded at a bloody wake.

Interesting that Craig hams it up a lot more in the episode as broadcast, which I always put down to inexperience as he was new to acting, but I now I see it could've been deliberate - his first attempt at Lister is very low key and it's not getting the laughs.

[Lemming]

Yeah that original recording is fascinating. Just watched the whole thing and, aside from the audience being catatonic and laughing about twice over the whole thing (despite some great performances and jokes), it feels a lot more grim than the aired episode. The first scene with hologram Rimmer put me on edge for real, especially the part where he just starts yelling at Lister. "MY ENTIRE FUTURE PLAN HINGED ON MY BEING ALIVE! IT WAS MANDATORY!" Then the part where he keeps trying to touch the table but eventually gives up and just puts his head in his hands, fucking brutal and not even played for laughs. Very wise to cut the scene down and make it more pacey and joke-heavy in the final cut.

[phes]

Yeah that was fascinating to see. The screened version has much better rhythm. What a difference cutting down and rewriting a few bits made. Definitely prefer the dynamic and energy with the slightly brasher Lister

[Jittlebags]

Something about the original Kryten creeps me out. He has a look that I would describe as leering. The voice as well, horrible.

Reminiscent of Klaus Nomi looks and dress wise, for me anyway.

[The Mollusk]

Parallel Universe is pretty poor characterisation. Lister is never as misogynistic (aside from one Series X line) as the female Lister is to him. Rimmer would never usually be as straightforwardly shitty with a woman (except maybe Series VIII Rimmer). If anything it paints the pair as more misogynistic than Krytie TV. At least in Krytie TV they point out that what Kryten is being forced to do is objectifying to women.

Surely a part of the reason that we have no prior knowledge of Lister or Rimmer displaying any sexist attitudes is that, aside from Lister’s brief flirtation with Kochanski in the flashback early on, neither of them are seen having any interactions with women (for obvious reason that everybody is dead Dave). It’s understandable that those tendencies are more likely to reveal themselves when they’re face to face with two women than when they’re alone.

I think it’s early enough in the show’s run to accept Lister and Rimmer’s relationship wasn’t quite close enough for them to want to discuss women that much, whether it be the subject of love or viewing them as some sort of conquest. And if I recall correctly, once Kryten arrives, doesn’t Lister direct most of his conversations about love and women to him?

Also, the situation is no doubt exacerbated since Deb and Arlene are their exact female doubles, so any opinion expressed by either of them is surely going to deflect with extra force and create immediate friction, so even if either character’s sexist leanings were only relatively minor, the provocation from either side would certainly stoke the fire considerably more.

[bgmnts]

It's absolutely terrible and in my opinion way near the top of the list of absolute worst Red Dwarf content. Utterly devoid of laughs or original ideas or... fucking anything across its 90 minute runtime.

Interesting to see series 6 getting off so lightly. 7 and 8 are unquestionably dire but you can see the rot starting to set in for a couple of episodes in 6, especially Emohawk: Polymorph II, not least of all for retreading old ground and the first return of Dwayne Dibbley. I also thought the series finale Out of Time was quite messy and ended on a pretty crappy cliffhanger. Legion is probably my favourite from 6. Yer titular man is well creepy and I thought the premise was solid, plus the physical comedy at the dinner table is great.

Gunmen of the Apocalypse for me. I think it won an Emmy or was nominated or something.

As for the misogyny, in the Better Than Life book, there is an entire section where Rimmer is put in the body of a woman during an escape from prison and is subject to shitty harassment and misogyny from his fellow escapees, and I think garners an empathy for women in general. So I have no idea where the shitty writing towards women would have come from, maybe Rob Grant was reining Doug Naylor in or maybe the new writers had an influence. 

[JamesTC]

The only woman I remember from Rob Grant's solo novel Backwards is the young woman who has her vagina reverse ripped by Cat's barbed penis.

[JamesTC]

Surely a part of the reason that we have no prior knowledge of Lister or Rimmer displaying any sexist attitudes is that, aside from Lister’s brief flirtation with Kochanski in the flashback early on, neither of them are seen having any interactions with women (for obvious reason that everybody is dead Dave). It’s understandable that those tendencies are more likely to reveal themselves when they’re face to face with two women than when they’re alone.

I think it’s early enough in the show’s run to accept Lister and Rimmer’s relationship wasn’t quite close enough for them to want to discuss women that much, whether it be the subject of love or viewing them as some sort of conquest. And if I recall correctly, once Kryten arrives, doesn’t Lister direct most of his conversations about love and women to him?

Also, the situation is no doubt exacerbated since Deb and Arlene are their exact female doubles, so any opinion expressed by either of them is surely going to deflect with extra force and create immediate friction, so even if either character’s sexist leanings were only relatively minor, the provocation from either side would certainly stoke the fire considerably more.

I think we are more than enough from Lister in Series I\II to see he has a relatively progressive attitude with women even taking into account his laddish behaviour and also despite being immature he isn't cruel. The way Deb treats Dave is cruel and shows no empathy.

Perhaps it plays into the Bodysnatcher\Me2\Rimmerworld thing of getting along with yourself. Maybe Lister has an element of self loathing to certain elements of himself\herself which makes Deb treat Dave the way she does.

[The Mollusk]

Perhaps it plays into the Bodysnatcher\Me2\Rimmerworld thing of getting along with yourself. Maybe Lister has an element of self loathing to certain elements of himself\herself which makes Deb treat Dave the way she does.

That would tie nicely into how misogyny is largely a result of macho insecurity and self-loathing, but I think we may be giving the writers far too much credit there and it's likely just coincidence, as mentioned earlier in the discussion. This is probably also true of my comment at the end of my previous post about the male/female versions deflecting strongly off each other (I had not long woken up, and now it does seem a tad over-analytical!).

[mrspangles]

I mean, comparatively - the Dave Dwarfs are far better than VII and VIII, and the special.

I would argue that the last three of series XII might be some of the best work Doug Naylor has done on his tod.

[JamesTC]

I mean, comparatively - the Dave Dwarfs are far better than VII and VIII, and the special.

I would argue that the last three of series XII might be some of the best work Doug Naylor has done on his tod.

He really knocked it out the park with the last three episodes. I guess with specials likely being the way forward, it was nice to end the standard 30 minute episodes in a high point.

That being said, he written 12 episodes in a row and the hit rate is high throughout XI\XII. Ignore Timewave (universally hated) and Can of Worms (mixed reviews, I really like it) and it is a really strong run.

[DrGreggles]

Series XII???

Have there been 4 series on Dave then?

[The Mollusk]

Series XII???

Have there been 4 series on Dave then?

Heh, yeah. Back to Earth and three successive series precede the Promised Land special.

[DrGreggles]

So is Back to Earth considered a series?

[JamesTC]

So is Back to Earth considered a series?

Pedantic People: No
Sensible people who wish to refer to the run between Series VIII and Series X as Series IX: Yes

[DrGreggles]

So, based on that, is The Promised Land series XIII?

[mrspangles]

He really knocked it out the park with the last three episodes. I guess with specials likely being the way forward, it was nice to end the standard 30 minute episodes in a high point.

That being said, he written 12 episodes in a row and the hit rate is high throughout XI\XII. Ignore Timewave (universally hated) and Can of Worms (mixed reviews, I really like it) and it is a really strong run.

I think you could cobble a very respectabe season/season and a half of the Dave ones that would stand up with the classics. Have thought of curating a short 'Dave era' list for friends who have never taken the plunge - or had to endure the hell of Taiwan Tony,Hoagie the Roagie or the blonde professor who got blasted into space.

From X: Trojan, Lemons, Entangled and maybe the last one.

XII had some broad concepts. The prohibition steampunk one. The psuedo justice world one where Dan Tetsell had a steamy affair.  Remember the kidney transplant one being quite good. The high concept but poor execution series. There's one that is basically a bad mashup of Rimmer's fantasy life from Timeslides and Better than Live, plus Rimmerworld, Me2 and Terrorform.  A well worn mess.

XIII has Hitler playing guitar (his third appearance in Red Dwarf by my count, fourth reference) and the one where they are all Krytens. As referenced, the last three I thought were really good. I liked the election one where Rimmer and Cat were campaign mates against Kryten and Lister, played with the character dynamics a bit and was a good satire on politics in general.

[JamesTC]

So, based on that, is The Promised Land series XIII?

They referred to it as the "thirteenth outing" in promotion. If there isn't a further series then it doesn't really need to be referred to as a series.

[g0m]

They can just call it Red Dwarf XIII, no "series", like how the blackadder Back and Forth DVD had a V on it