G&TV: Craig Charles on All Star Squares (1999) Features Posted by Ian Symes on 8th January 2021, 17:22 Welcome to Season 2 of G&TV, our monthly trawl through the world's television archives for any interesting Red Dwarf-related nuggets. Following our accidental break, we return with an exciting adventure in internet archaeology. Thanks to his ubiquity on our screens at certain points during the 90s, a large number of the videos we come across involve Craig Charles popping up in unexpected places, either as the host of a one-off programme, or a guest on an established show. This month, we bring you the latter, but in an unexpected twist, it's the short-lived Australian version of a much-travelled format. Read more →
The G&T Review of the Year 2020 Features Posted by Ian Symes on 31st December 2020, 13:03 What a very strange year. It seems to have lasted for several millennia, but 2020 is finally over, pending any last minute shenanigans, which we can't entirely rule out. By now you'll have already read a dozen depressing round-ups cataloguing what a horrible anus it's been for the world at large, so let's focus instead on our small corner of it. The trials and tribulations of Red Dwarf may seem insignificant in comparison to the fucking atrocious circumstances we find ourselves in, but it feels more important than ever to find distractions and positives wherever we can, and it's actually been a pretty busy year for a show that's rapidly approaching its mid-thirties. Let's go through some of the highlights, and inevitably some massive lowlights, topic-by-topic, starting with The Promised Land, which yes, really was only this year. Read more →
DwarfCast 125 – Book Club #7: Better Than Life (Part Four) DwarfCasts Posted by Jonathan Capps on 24th December 2020, 15:24 Subscribe to DwarfCasts: RSS • iTunes We did it, everyone. Almost an entire year of consistent podcasting and all it took was a global pandemic and stay at home orders to make it happen. I even bought a proper microphone. So, in a very nice accident of timing, we are rounding out the year with our final book club for Better Than Life, Part 4: The End and After. Danny, Ian and Cappsy gather round the virtual yule log to discuss the shit out of 12 whole pages, before fully embracing the Christmas cheer with some truly awful parsnip waffles. Read more →
Please proceed to the Drive Room News Posted by Ian Symes on 22nd December 2020, 20:23 We bring you news of an excellent thing. Kris Carter, who’s been a regular fixture here for as long as I can remember, and one of my favourite creative people in Red Dwarf fandom ever since I first saw his comic strips in Fan Club magazine Better Than Life over twenty years ago, has launched a fanzine. Drive Room takes a look at each episode in as much depth as you’d possibly need, starting unsurprisingly with The End, covering the plot, guest stars, behind the scenes details, adaptations, visual effects and publicity photos, along with profiles on both Chris Barrie and Arnold Rimmer. Lovingly adorned with cover art from Kriss’s fair hand and beautifully laid out, issue one is available to download from Chris’s blog now, and best of all – it’s free. It can’t have escaped your attention that we’ve been rather slack with the written content since The Promised Land, so it’s brilliant that Khris has stepped up to the plate and delivered something even more meticulous and in-depth than we usually manage. And how wonderful that Red Dwarf is still inspiring new and original fan endeavours after nearly 33 years.
DwarfCast 124 – Can of Worms Commentary DwarfCasts Posted by Jonathan Capps on 18th December 2020, 13:29 Subscribe to DwarfCasts: RSS • iTunes It's time for our DwarfCast commentary for the final episode of Red Dwarf XI, Bag of Shite: Polymorph 3. So, before I open the particular can of worms of what we thought about this episode a little too much, please go and listen and find out for your selves what our general feelings towards this episode 4 years after its initial broadcast are. As ever the sentient soundwaves that make up Ian, Cappsy and Danny are present as we put series XI to bed, while digging into their own tasty bedtime snack of waffles. Read more →
DwarfCast 123 – Book Club #6: Better Than Life (Part Three) DwarfCasts Posted by Jonathan Capps on 9th December 2020, 14:04 Subscribe to DwarfCasts: RSS • iTunes I know we said we'd be back soon but just count yourself lucky we only made you wait an extra week and not almost 40 years. As we get very close to finishing Better Than Life, join the pale, waxy figures of Cappsy, Danny and Ian as they enter The Book Club Time and are after feasting on Part Three: Garbage World. What are the long term narrative implications of Garbage World? Is Polymorph a show to book conversion too far? What could possibly be next for the poor giraffe? For those of you not of a nervous disposition, listen on and find out. Read more →
DwarfCast 122 – Krysis Commentary DwarfCasts Posted by Jonathan Capps on 20th November 2020, 12:59 Subscribe to DwarfCasts: RSS • iTunes It's time for a new DwarfCast so grab the keys to your new sports car, leave your partner for someone younger, buy a new wardrobe of designer clothes, spend too much money on sunglasses, trade in your sports car for a motorbike, give an unsolicited shoulder massage to an acquaintance, tell everyone about your eclectic music taste, retweet Emma Kennedy, get a tribal tattoo, have your bits pierced, be a sex tourist in East Asia, trade in your motorbike for a different sports car, stick a deck chair up your nose, go see Ricky Gervais stand-up, sit alone at a nightclub bar, launch an ill fated music career, vote Lib Dem, place your best cloche on your head and listen to our commentary for Krysis... Read more →
DwarfCast 121 – Book Club #5: Better Than Life (Part Two) DwarfCasts Posted by Jonathan Capps on 13th November 2020, 11:02 Subscribe to DwarfCasts: RSS • iTunes Sit down, get comfy, put on your favourite Paul Robeson track and blow the dust off your, er, dust covers because we're back with another Book Club! Join the emaciated husks of Danny, Ian and Cappsy as they tackle Better Than Life Part Two: She Rides and discuss the first ever instance of the show stealing from the books as well as the very meaning of relative time dilation in an amazingly compressed space. And giraffes. Read more →
ROB GRANT WRITES NEW RED DWARF SCRIPT News Posted by Ian Symes on 6th November 2020, 17:41 It's a genuinely strange feeling for me (as indeed it would be for the rest of the remaining G&T team) to report on Fan Club activity from an outsider's perspective. I'm still not used to finding out what they're up to via official channels, rather than half-listening to their remote team meetings taking place at the other end of the sofa, worrying about what duties I'm going to be volunteered for. But today's announcement is quite a big one, as the sensationalist and yet entirely accurate headline demonstrates. Via TOS, the Fan Club have unveiled a two-day online convention called Holly Hop, taking place on the most recently cancelled dates for DJXXI, the 6th & 7th February 2021, to tide us over until the proper convention hopefully happens in September next year, deadly pandemic permitting. So, it's a Hop for a skipped Jump, providing "guest Q&As and behind-the-scenes discussions, as well as a few surprises along the way". Read more →
G&TV Halloween Special Features Posted by Ian Symes on 31st October 2020, 08:45 This month's G&TV contains scenes which are unsuitable for younger viewers and people of a nervous disposition. You have been warned. Well, it doesn't really, but then neither does Polymorph, so it's fair game. Anyway, when we noticed that the latest edition of this feature would coincide roughly with a notable date in the calendar, we decided to run with the theme. The Red Dwarf cast and crew haven't had a great deal of crossover with the horror genre over the years, other than a couple of notable and obvious exceptions, which we'll come to. We couldn't find much in terms of full-length programmes that are not commercially available (and so therefore we feel comfortable linking to off-air recordings of them on YouTube), which is the usual remit for G&TV. So instead, we present a thrilling compendium of terror, with four short clips relating to each of our main cast members, which fit the theme with varying degrees of contrivance. Read more →
