Information about new series from a cast member who's probably wrong, pt #87249

[cwickham]

So, has anyone else noticed that Robert Llewellyn’s changed his Twitter bio to read “soon to be in Red Dwarf XIII”?

Tweets by bobbyllew

Topic

[Dax101]

>I think you can argue that Holly *isn’t* a crucial part of the show, given that 45% of the episodes don’t have Holly in them.

Ok maybe crucial is the wrong word to use.

[Moonlight]

>Even in VIII he has really good moments when he’s actually being Holly, rather than just another character doing one-liners. The cell inspection joke is a series highlight.

You notice all the good Holly moments in VIII are when he’s one-on-one with Lister, actually providing information that only he can access.

[Ben Saunders]

i like the moon gag

[International Debris]

surely that should be the last four episodes?

Alright Mr. “Look at Me I Can Count”

You notice all the good Holly moments in VIII are when he’s one-on-one with Lister, actually providing information that only he can access.

I really like “you’re finished / bye”, firstly because it actually feels like a classic-era Dwarf joke, and secondly because it means Rimmer’s screeching is actually a feed line rather than just a really tedious series of Rimmer screeches.

But yeah, otherwise he works well with Lister in the cell and is pointless elsewhere.

[Ben Saunders]

Earlier in the thread International Debris (I think) mentioned one VIII Holly gag he enjoyed but which I didn’t understand, and was too afraid to ask about. By the time I worked up the courage to ask what the heck it meant I swear all reference to the joke had disappeared from this thread.

I like the rat-arsed gag

[bloodteller]

>I really like “you’re finished / bye”,

yeah, i really liked that joke too. there’s some really good gags in the first few minutes of Pete Part 2, imo- “there’s an old cat saying which has particular relevance here….we are all…gonna die.” as well as kryten’s “strangely enough ma’am, i don’t have that information in my database” when kochanski asks him for exposition made me laugh a fair bit.

[International Debris]

“strangely enough ma’am, i don’t have that information in my database”

“Dinosaur bowel movement frequency tables”, an all-time great line Doug snuck into the worst episode.

[Jonsmad]

If Holly is back on Dwarf full time for XIII, it will feel more complete to have him there for many viewers, and what’s strange about that fact is that we’ve never really had Norman, Craig, Chris, Danny and Robert together as the only core crew in a normal situational bunk room red dwarf ship setting ever in the previous twelve series.

[Pete Part Three]

meh.

[International Debris]

Am I right in thinking the only time Kryten and Norman’s Holly have ever interacted on screen is in Nanarchy?

[RickLee84]

Correct.

David Ross’s Kryten and Norman’s Holly appeared together in series II but I’m not sure if they even spoke to one another in the episode.

I’m not sure if Kryten and Holly even speak to one another or reference each others existence at all in VIII for that matter.

[cwickham]

They’re in the same scene in every VIII episode except Back In The Red Part Two and Cassandra, but the closest they actually get to interacting is on board the Manny Celeste in Pete Part One (although Kryten does mention him in BITR Part One).

[Moonlight]

>I like the rat-arsed gag

I can’t get over how un-Dwarf it feels to have Starbug flying up a CGI rat’s asshole. That, and it’s just another pointless detour in a six minute sequence that plays out so much better when trimmed down to the tune of 2-3 minutes.

[Ben Saunders]

I rewatcged Skipper last night and fucking hell Holly is funny in that, so I’m all for more of him. Do you think he’ll get another big round of applause for when he comes back in 13? Will he get one in every episode from people who are unaware he’s back?

[Moonlight]

I mean he’d probably walk out on the stage with everyone else at the beginning, and then the audience would flip shit because Holly has a body and flee the studio in a blind panic, trampling a skutter.

[Dave]

The entire first episode of XIII will just be Holly saying “alright dudes?” and then riding the wave of applause for a further 26 minutes.

[Ben Saunders]

Lol, I’d enjoy that. I do wonder how they’ll re-introduce him, though, if he’ll get a big Holly-plot or if they’ll just be like “oh Holly’s working again btw, alright mate, we’d love to chat and have a catch-up but we have to get on with the monster of the week plot, which btw it’s your cue to do the exposition on.

Also Mac is back because we love him but none of the rest of the crew are and no attempt whatsoever is made to explain this.

[Hamish]

> I can’t get over how un-Dwarf it feels to have Starbug flying up a CGI rat’s asshole.

I get you, but considering I grew up with VIII already being a thing, I don’t really have the luxury of thinking that way.

[Ben Saunders]

I was going to compare it with Lister’s space mumps exploding or something but honestly i cba. I’m in the same boat as Hamish.

[Dax101]

Hey could be worse, it was originally meant to be Frankensteins butt Starbug flew into and lister was gonna make a holiest of all holes joke.

Either ways somethings butt was gonna be penetrated.

[bloodteller]

>I can’t get over how un-Dwarf it feels to have Starbug flying up a CGI rat’s asshole

that seems a bit of an unfair statement. red dwarf is a show that’s rarely the same from season to season, so what exactly classes as Un-Dwarf? if you’re going to go down that road, then the posse driving about in Carbug down Coronation Street is “Un-Dwarf” as well, and the main characters doing a parody of the US presidential election in Mechocracy is “Un-Dwarf”.

[bloodteller]

you could easily write off well over half of XII as being “Un-Dwarf” due to it being packed with incredibly strange stuff and bizarre attempts at social satire

[Ben Saunders]

Rat-arsed is definitely a better gag than holiest of all holes.

It being Frankenstein doesn’t make any sense because she is not registered crew or part of the ship’s original design, therefore the nanos would not resurrect her… but, following that logic, they wouldn’t resurrect some random rat, either. Or did the ‘bots resurrect all organic life found on the ship?

Also why is there a rat on Red Dwarf? Did it escape from the science labs? It would have been identified as a non-human lifeform just like Frankie was.

Just how much of the logistics of BitR is it possible to nitpick?

[bloodteller]

>Also why is there a rat on Red Dwarf? Did it escape from the science labs? It would have been identified as a non-human lifeform just like Frankie was.

in The End, Holly identifies a non-human lifeform on the ship but can’t pinpoint its location.

therefore, if a rat escapes from the science lab then Holly doesn’t know- all he can ascertain is that the rat is still onboard the ship, and since lab rats are presumably registered animals there’s no need for him to alert the Captain about them

[Pete Part Three]

I’m not sure what’s worse about “rat-arsed”; the idea, the shit CGI, Norm’s delivery of the line or the reaction of the studio audience. Were it not followed by another 220 minutes of absolute shite, it would stick out.

>you could easily write off well over half of XII as being “Un-Dwarf” due to it being packed with incredibly strange stuff and bizarre attempts at social satire

Good point. Let’s do that.

[Me Own Stunts]

I personally don’t think it matters much if Holly doesn’t have many lines or direct involvement in the story. Others will disagree but for me what matters is the sense of this vast ship with Holly as an ever-present background ambience. Just having Holly there on background monitors reacting would be enough.

[Me Own Stunts]

> I’m not sure what’s worse about “rat-arsed”; the idea, the shit CGI, Norm’s delivery of the line or the reaction of the studio audience.

A little of each. For me I just don’t think “rat-arsed” is a very Holly-esque way of saying “drunk”. As with much of series 8 it doesn’t feel like the comedy is coming from the characters as it should; rather the characters are morphing around contrived scenarios that Doug deems to be hilarious.

[Dax101]

The contrast between series 7 and 8 is quite surprising really since it went from a more comedy drama-ish approach to more spoofy by 8.

[International Debris]

As with much of series 8 it doesn’t feel like the comedy is coming from the characters as it should; rather the characters are morphing around contrived scenarios that Doug deems to be hilarious.

Yes, the rat-arsed line is very much ‘Holly tells a joke’, which just seems completely inappropriate for the scenario. Although the characters do occasionally tell jokes, most of the verbal humour tends to come from a more sarcastic / exaggerated way of speech rather than literally throwing in one-liners.

[cwickham]

Danny has quit Death in Paradise, which he managed to do alongside X-XII just fine but may be significant in terms of filming dates for XIII onwards.

[International Debris]

This obviously means they’ll be doing a new series every year let’s celebrate hurray

[RamesesNiblickTheThird]

The whole rehearse and shoot in a week is going to change I think. They are after all in their 70s now. I can’t even remember which way to put my pants on and I’m only 22.

[International Debris]

They are after all in their 70s now.

Eh? Danny’s at least 94, and Bobby can remember WWI.

[RamesesNiblickTheThird]

Yes and Barrie was Napoleon’s Chief eunuch in the prequel to WW1.

[Ben Saunders]

Bobby can remember WWI despite curiously only being 99 years old and therefore never actually having lived in it. His vivid and often distressingly graphic descriptions of the horrors “he” faced behind enemy lines are so believable, however, that most people just assume that he must have been there. Craig Charles on yhe other gand was stationed in Italy for six months in 1917.

[Ben Saunders]

“on yhe other gand” is ye olde timey English for “moreover”

[Warbodog]

They should of called it ‘Grey Dwarf!’ Ha ha natural ageing

[Moonlight]

They’re too old to play the characters now. Whatever that means.

[International Debris]

In space nobody can see you age.

[bloodteller]

Arnold Zimmer

[Unrumble]

    
 
 
  

He will never need a zimmer!

[Me Own Stunts]

Here you are: https://www.comedy.co.uk/tv/news/3069/red_dwarf_series_13/

Also discussed is the suggestion that they are doing series 13 rather than both 13 and 14 because they want to do a live show at the O2 in between. For an idea of what Red Dwarf will be like when overacted for the sake of a sycophantic, raucous audience, please refer to series VIII.

[cwickham]

Is it fair to say the VIII audience are “sycophantic or raucous”? I imagine that any live audience sitcom seems funnier if you’re in the audience for it, and that that’s especially true of Red Dwarf.

[Ianjk78]

Not true. There is only Norman in his early 70’s. The next oldest is Robert early 60’s, and Danny and Chris late 50’s, with Craig Charles not even mid 50’s yet so they can do a few more years yet

[Dax101]

Well they can make the movie when Chris is 62 so thats not to bad.

[Me Own Stunts]

> Is it fair to say the VIII audience are “sycophantic or raucous”? I imagine that any live audience sitcom seems funnier if you’re in the audience for it, and that that’s especially true of Red Dwarf.

Yes, they are sycophantic and raucous in series VIII. This is compared to previous series of Red Dwarf, so it’s not a criticism of sitcom audiences more generally.

The problem might lie with the direction. Compare it with what Andy De Emmony said about Emohawk: Polymorph 2 in the series VI documentary, when he was discussing how Dwayne and Ace’s entrances originally got ridiculously over the top reactions from the audience. De Emmony was concerned about how such a response would play to audiences at home, so he got the actors to retake their entrances until the audience reaction was more muted. This was the correct thing to do.

For series VIII, it seems no such care was taken, and what you get is the audience delighted to be watching the show live, which is fair enough, but their response is far too raucous and this feeds into how the actors perform. The cast start overegging everything and making their performances too big for telly, and the whole thing plays like Bottom Live or some other show that’s intended for a large theatre audience rather than television cameras. You end up with something that was probably wonderful on the night, but is unwatchable in the format that it was being made for.

[Ben Saunders]

The audience reaction never really bothered me with VIII, i feel it’s gotten worse in XI and XII. Performances, again, over the top in VIII but bother me more now. It’s a shame because BtE proves they are good actors who can understate things if they want.

There ARE examples of pamtomimey acting in I-VI (jeep… sleep), but they are much fewer and father between.

[Dax101]

I always assumed with series 8 that they really wanted to show how much the audiences loved it since at least 2 episodes end with hearing the audience applause which I am guessing was chosen decision to include it.

[Pete Part Three]

The problem with weak material is that, when it’s retaken, the actor is informed by how it went down with the live audience and re-tailors their performance.

I remember the recording of the crappy “moves” scene for Dear Dave. It started off pretty broad, and it just got broader with each take, because the audience seemed to love it. And it was shit to begin with.

[Dale Coopers Doppleganger]

https://www.comedy.co.uk/tv/news/3069/red_dwarf_series_13/

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