Jokes you don't/didn't get

[bloodteller]

i know there’s the thing of “the joke isn’t funny if you explain it” but were there ever gags in Red Dwarf you didn’t get? and if so, what?

i never quite got what Cat’s “stan and ollie” line in White Hole was about, for example. nor did i get what “see you in ten minutes?” (repeat x10) from Pete was all about, and also Rimmer’s “steers and queers, which are you boy?” joke from Meltdown

Topic

[RunawayTrain]

I’m sure it’s been mentioned before, can anyone explain the Welsh Fish & Chip shop gag?

My interpretation of it is Fish and Chip shop in a rural Welsh village in the middle of nowhere, Wales not famous for its diversity (more so at that time) so the shop just sells what the locals like, which is … limited.

[Jonathan Capps]

I imagine it’d scan well across the pond.

[RunawayTrain]

My interpretation of it is Fish and Chip shop in a rural Welsh village in the middle of nowhere, Wales not famous for its diversity (more so at that time) so the shop just sells what the locals like, which is … limited.

:O noooooo I wrote a whole paragraph and now I remember that square brackets make it disappear – and now I’m too late to edit to get it back.

It was that my understanding of the joke may well be coloured by experiences of holidays past, arriving at the static caravan in the middle of nowhere late in the evening, Dad driving a mile or more to the nearest village and bringing back the last of what was available – 3 manky bits of fish, a battered sausage (as there weren’t 4 bits of fish nor anything else that anyone might eat, not even a pie!) with some grim dregs of the chips and being thoroughly disappointed.  But thankfully things seem to be rather better nowadays, or at least in the parts of Wales we’ve visited anyway.

[Ridley]

I imagine it’d scan well across the pond.

Let’s have a look at how this reference did …in America!

[pi r squared]

Isn’t it just one of those Red Dwarf non-sequiturs that have the beats, rhythms and delivery of a joke – so it feels funny and you laugh, but actually doesn’t make much sense when you unpick it? I put it in the same category as “a long time for an Albanian shepherd who’s allergic to wool” or “lucky you didn’t order a double cheeseburger!”

[GlenTokyo]

I think they just went to a lot of crap fish and chip shops in North Wales as kids, when you’re from Manchester you’re probably holidaying in Rhyl and such. 

Also being from Northern England, you’re spoilt at a chippy, everywhere else is crap compared to a chippy up North.

The Albanian one I think is purely rhythm, double cheeseburger I think is on size and complexity, being a more involved item than a milkshake and a crispy bar.

[Warbodog]

They recorded an alternate ‘Welsh shepherd who’s allergic to wool’ take (in the deleted scenes) and went with the more obscure one. Don’t need to fall back on tedious stock gags when they can come up with more creative observations. At least in the days before the ‘Mars bar living in Scotland’ gag.

[Frank Smeghammer]

Isn’t it just one of those Red Dwarf non-sequiturs that have the beats, rhythms and delivery of a joke – so it feels funny and you laugh, but actually doesn’t make much sense when you unpick it? I put it in the same category as “a long time for an Albanian shepherd who’s allergic to wool” or “lucky you didn’t order a double cheeseburger!”

I mean I think the Welsh Fish & Chip shop gag is in that category and I know exactly the sort of quickfire Red Dwarf gag you mean. Series VI is full of them.

I think those two I sort of follow though. Double Cheeseburger follows the line saying “I just ordered a milkshake and a crispy bar”. Lister is the one that refers to the size of the order as if that makes any difference to their peril. It wouldn’t have been as funny, but it perhaps would have been clearer if Cat said something more explicitly sarcastic like “oh, just a milkshake and a crispy bar, is that all? Well next time why don’t you order a double cheeseburger and finish us off much quicker?” It kills the joke to explain it like that but I’ve always followed that.

Albanian Shepherd allergic to wool does always make my ears prick as a bizarre thing to say, but again the joke adds up. To make the joke make sense properly, you sort of have to sacrifice the comedic timing. An Albanian Shepherd sounds like a lonely figure, and with a wool allergy, he can’t even get his rocks off the way other Albanian Shepherds do (it’s not a joke that aged very well when you extrapolate the stereotype it picks on) so even for that level of sexless man, 3 million years is a long time. The Psiren says its been a long time for someone of Lister’s sex drive. He responds saying that its a long time for even the most sexless man he can think of.

It’s best to just hear a lot of these jokes in the quickfire comedic timing they’re given in and not think about them too much.

[Stabbim the Skutter]

I see the previous post, yet I must ask; Lister’s missus’ name sounding like a footballer clearing his nose – why a footballer?

[Frank Smeghammer]

I see the previous post, yet I must ask; Lister’s missus’ name sounding like a footballer clearing his nose – why a footballer?

[Frank Smeghammer]

I see the previous post, yet I must ask; Lister’s missus’ name sounding like a footballer clearing his nose – why a footballer?

But serious response, I suppose footballers have a reputation for being a bit snotty, disgusting and unhygienic. Spitting everywhere, blowing snot rockets around, wiping their noses on their sleeves. I suppose it would be extra disgusting sounding to hear a footballer doing it

100% it doesn’t stand up to a lot of scrutiny though

[pi r squared]

An Albanian Shepherd sounds like a lonely figure, and with a wool allergy, he can’t even get his rocks off the way other Albanian Shepherds do (it’s not a joke that aged very well when you extrapolate the stereotype it picks on) so even for that level of sexless man, 3 million years is a long time.

I don’t think that quite works as the antithesis to Lister in the way you describe – in fact, I’d probably argue that the shepherd would be even more sexually frustrated than Lister after 3 million years given that he’s got the temptation of sheep in front of him all the time, where Lister has barely seen a woman. Not to mention that it hasn’t really been 3 million years from Lister’s perspective, even if that time may have passed – it’s only been a few years.
I appreciate that unpicking any joke pretty much kills it, but I definitely think it’s the delivery of the line, and I guess the absurdity of what is said, that makes it funny regardless – albeit not as screamingly hilarious as the audience make it out to be on that occasion!

While we’re here – I have always assumed that “Psirens” as an episode title is a play on “Psi-” and (obviously) “sirens”, but why would they be spelt that way, even with intestines, in-universe?

[Moonlight]

While we’re here – I have always assumed that “Psirens” as an episode title is a play on “Psi-” and (obviously) “sirens”, but why would they be spelt that way, even with intestines, in-universe?

I would assume because it’s cool.

[Frank Smeghammer]

While we’re here – I have always assumed that “Psirens” as an episode title is a play on “Psi-” and (obviously) “sirens”, but why would they be spelt that way, even with intestines, in-universe?

It makes sense for telepathic GELFs based on the old Siren legend. Given they were genetically engineered, some scientist probably thought he was dead clever when he gave them that name. The guy who spelled it out with his guts didn’t name them.

Unless I’m not getting what you mean and I’m being daft?

On the subject of jokes you didn’t get also, it actually took me many many watches of RD to get the Psi reference in Psirens. Same with Camille/Chameleon

[International Debris]

Yeah, for the longest time I remember thinking sirens felt wrong without the P, and that post has only just cleared it up.

[Future Producer of Series IX – aaaaany day now]

As the late great Barry Cryer once observed, analysing comedy is like dissecting a frog. No-one laughs, and the frog dies.

[Rudolph]

The footballer joke I interpreted as, because footballers aren’t considered the most articulate or eloquent people at the best of times, it sounded like a particularly unintelligible noise coming from someone who wasn’t the most comprehensible person in the first place.

[Warbodog]

Given they were genetically engineered, some scientist probably thought he was dead clever when he gave them that name.

I don’t think they would have been engineered with the intention of being deep space scavengers, more that’s how they ended up and the name was applied by some literary smart arse.

Out of universe, literally spelling it out always felt a bit awkwardly like Grant Naylor showing what they’d done there.

[Formica]

but why would they be spelt that way, even with intestines, in-universe?

[RunawayTrain]

On the subject of jokes you didn’t get also, it actually took me many many watches of RD to get the Psi reference in Psirens. Same with Camille/Chameleon

If it helps, I’ve only just understood that from this thread.

The Camille/Chameleon link doesn’t feel as startingly new to me but if I did understand it already I think it was from here too.  Certainly not something I picked up on myself.

[Moonlight]

Kid me misheard this as “death function” and somehow concocted a meaning in which Lister and Kryten were attempting to kill themselves with the teleporter but Kryten hesitated.

[Warbodog]

Kid me misheard this as “death function” and somehow concocted a meaning in which Lister and Kryten were attempting to kill themselves with the teleporter but Kryten hesitated.

This was my big one, back when I only really had VII & VIII to stupidly misunderstand.

I was a bit confused, but I imagined it meant that the air spraying around the sealed airlock on their side was ediatic gas (famously poisonous, as adult viewers would know) and that Kryten was saying he and Rimmer would have been dead within five seconds of inhalation if they were organic.

The gas coming through on Lister’s (habitable) side was obviously unconnected, probably just pressurised air or something.

This is despite Kryten’s line being a callback to dialogue from mere moments earlier, where I never had any trouble understanding those exact same words. Nice going on the idiotic gaffes front, me.

[Dave]

In Series 2 – Better Than Life… Holly’s opening monologue he says, the only comfort he has is that we are over 6 million light years away for the nearest Burniean – What the hell is a Berniean?

[Dave]

Berniean

They’re inhabitants of this ancient place.

[Dave]

Berniean
They’re inhabitants of this ancient place.

Oh my word. That has bugged me for years!

I finally understand the reference, and I can hear the gap between Bernie and Inn now, when he says it.

Cant say I remember Bernie Inns though. 

Cheers

[Dave]

Cant say I remember Bernie Inns though. 

You didn’t miss much.

[cwickham]

[please imagine a meme consisting of an image of Peter Kay doing stand-up with caption reading “Who remembers Berni Inns?” here]

[Podey]

“Of course, lager, the only thing that can kill a vindaloo!”

As a fan of neither curry nor alcohol, I never quite understood this (though, tbf, I was also only about 9 at the time). Is the joke literally just that the tastes clash? 

[Warbodog]

“Of course, lager, the only thing that can kill a vindaloo!”

My dad explained it as lager neutralising spiciness, so I’ve never reconsidered it if there’s another explanation. Though it’s the only time I’ve seen lager suggested for this purpose, normally it’s lassi-type yoghurt/milk-based drinks.

[Ian Symes]

Yeah, pretty sure that’s all there is to it, lager being the traditional drink for drunken Brits to pair with curry to cool down their palates, even though it doesn’t actually work like that.

[Dave]

Yeah that’s it, especially given that traditionally it’s usually lighter/sweeter/more refreshing types of lager that are the typical accompaniment to a curry.

It’s true though that it doesn’t really work. What works better to kill spicy heat more immediately is sugary sweet stuff. Although maybe DNA wouldn’t have been as good if it had ended with RoboLister throwing Mars bars at the mutton vindaloo beast instead.

[Podey]

Aha! Suddenly it all makes sense, thanks gang.

[Jonathan Capps]

There is also the fact (for me at least) that the more drunk you are the higher your spice tolerance is. The last time I had a vindaloo I had no problems eating it because I’d been to see Villa beat Middlesbrough 2-1 (Peter Crouch winner late on) and so I was off my face.

[Dave]

[Ben Saunders]

Dunno if anybody has mentioned it thus far, but in Scotland we say “pished” to mean drunk by standard. So when Lister says he’s “not pished” in the planet pool scene, it didn’t even occur to me that was any sort of joke, because we just say that here.

[Podey]

When I was a kid I never knew that “bum” meant someone who was a layabout and so my interpretation of that joke for many years was that Lister had simply responded to the question “Occupation?” with a silly word. And oh how I laughed.

(tbf to my young self I think I actually interpreted Lister’s confused look before answering as him not knowing what “occupation” means and then just saying any old bollocks in response)

[Formica]

Perhaps he meant that his bum was occupied.

[Unrumble]

[Dave]

[International Debris]

Why does Cat ask this? Does he think it would be better if they were killed? 

[Unrumble]

Why does Cat ask this? Does he think it would be better if they were killed? 

One way it could make sense, was if Cat was assuming horrible torture was on the cards. Which I don’t believe is hinted at beforehand, so…

[Podey]

Why does Cat ask this? Does he think it would be better if they were killed? 

I think Cat is highlighting how underplayed the inverse implication is (ie that being killed would be a “bad sign”, which is of little use if you’re dead). 

Or that’s how I always understood it, anyway but, y’know…. bum. 

[Flap Jack]

Cat’s line is just an extension of the general joke, which is that the Kinatowawi are so violent, that them not electing to immediately murder them is a sign of high hospitality. So Cat’s confusion is about “well we’re still alive” being a very low bar for a “good” outcome.

[Ian Symes]

Or, the Cat secretly longs for the sweet release of death. See also:

[Warbodog]

Why’s everyone having a Mandela effect about Cat saying Rimmer’s line?

[Unrumble]

[Jenuall]

[Podey]

[Warbodog]

Actual Rimmer dialogue from Last Human because Doug missed a line break.

[cwickham]

[Author]

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