Mundane observation dome

[Warbodog]

Do you have any miscellaneous insights on the series that may be worth contemplating for a few seconds before moving on with our lives? Here are some of mine.

1. The four regulars have names that can work any way around, though this would have been more obvious if David Ross had stayed and wouldn’t work if Chris Barrie used his real name.

2. The series’ lax attitude to continuity extends to the setting. Outside of Holly’s distress calls, I don’t think three million years is mentioned all that much after series I and before VI (not sure about later years). Instead, we get the extremely fudged “dead for centuries” and “travelling for thousands of years” – not actual retcons, but suggesting a more conventional setting for casual viewers tuning in and the sort of stories they’re telling. It’s only millions when they need it to be.

3. 200 years of stasis between series V and VI means that the earlier series took place in their equivalent of the early 19th century by comparison (e.g. Blackadder the Third). Since they didn’t run into a long-lived Camille or one of her great-great-etc grandchildren, it didn’t come up.

4. Although Lister is routinely slagged off in the series, he’s spared the level of seemingly authoritative character assassination that Rimmer gets, because the audience is aligned with Lister’s viewpoint most of the time. For example, we see Kochanski Camille belittling Rimmer’s interests, but we don’t get the equivalent of Hologram Camille reacting to Lister’s pickup lines, we’re left to form our own opinions on those. This flimsy point has not been considered much beyond this single example.

5. Cat’s costumes are overwhelmingly referenced more than anyone else’s in the series, but the least discussed by fans.

6. Ace Rimmer and Duane Dibbley were so seemingly ubiquitous in canon and tie-in merchandise through the 90s (Smegazine strips, T-shirts) that they still feel overused today, even though it’s been over 20 years since they appeared. Maybe they’re allowed back after all.

7. Only series III & V and maybe XI & XII (not as familiar with those) don’t have any sense of an arc whatsoever (though IV’s minor Kryten disobedience arc was already fucked up by episode shuffling). Series III is just about the only series where no episode directly references any previous episode, but it still has the Backwards scrolling text and general references to Rimmer having died and stuff.

8. One of the series’ most famous and quoted scenes – everybody’s dead, Dave – is a straight-up 2001: A Space Odyssey homage and would have been received that way at the time, but doesn’t work like that for most people coming to the episode later on or new viewers who are young or don’t watch old films.

9. Sometimes dismissed as lightweight and gimmicky today, Backwards was designed as an innovative interactive experience to reward extracurricular effort. As well as inviting fans to work out the backwards events and filming logistics, Arthur Smith’s eugolonom is teasingly long and “you scoundrels” is clearly a cleaned-up translation gag even before you’ve heard it. Unfortunately, by the time technology caught up with the intent and the ability to reverse media files properly on home computers became commonplace, Backwards Forwards came out and everyone just cheated with the walkthrough.

Imagine the quality of the musings I left out!

Topic

[gerrydelasel]

How many layers are there to the Backwards onion…

[Flap Jack]

Better Than Life starts with Rimmer being a terrible chef, foreshadowing him unintentionally ruining another group recreational experience.

[Dave]

Parallel Universe starts with Tongue Tied, foreshadowing Lister being lost for words at the news of his pregnancy. 

[Technopeasant]

Gunmen starts with Lister having sex, foreshadowing Starbug slamming into somewhere warm and wet.

[Dave]

Ouroboros starts with baby Lister being placed under a pool table at the Aigburth Arms, foreshadowing the ending where baby Lister is placed under a pool table at the Aigburth Arms.

This also makes it the longest Red Dwarf Looping GIF.

[Ben Saunders]

Timewave oddly starts with what should be a mid-episode music sting, highlighting that the episode is going to be an awkward, confusing mess.

[Ian Symes]

Marooned starts with a shot that’s mostly a shade of red, directed by a man called Ed.

[Dave]

The opening of The Promised Land foreshadows the rest of The Promised Land by showing you a montage of clips that all come from The Promised Land.

[loadoftottnumb]

The first scene of Back in the Red Part III has Rimmer about to take a crap. 

[sleepey]

In the first scene of Only The Good, Captain Hollister is in bed with smegitis

[Moonlight]

Blue opens with Lister polishing his shoes, sutbly foreshadowing the shoes the cast will be wearing throughout the episode.

[Nick R]

Future Echoes starts with the title “Future Echoes”, foreshadowing the fact that the phrase “future echoes” will be spoken in the episode’s dialogue.

You might say that the title “Future Echoes” is, itself, a future echo.

[Dave]

Tikka to Ride begins with Lister telling a paradoxical story about time travel that makes no sense.

[Flap Jack]

Camille begins with Kryten mostly failing to lie. This foreshadows him not lying to Camille at the end.

[Moonlight]

Holoship opens with some ducks getting into trouble. Then it turned into a romance and I fell asleep.

[Warbodog]

Dimension Jump starts with Rimmer hanging from a tree, which mirrors the fish hanging from the ceiling at the end as a callback to Rimmer being a fish.

[Quinn: Clochebusters World Champion]

Kryten opens with a scene that ends on the line “he isn’t your android”, foreshadowing that Kryten isn’t Rimmer’s android but instead his own person. 

[Warbodog]

The Inquisitor opens with the Thomas Allman scene, so we’re all doing these wrong.

[Dave]

The Inquisitor opens with the Thomas Allman scene, so we’re all doing these wrong.

Although you can’t deny, that does somewhat foreshadow that the episode will be about the Inquisitor. 

[Flap Jack]

Timeslides opens with Cat and Lister playing some holes of tabletop golf, foreshadowing all of the holes Rimmer gets blown into him at the end of the episode.

[Dave]

Krytie TV begins with the opening titles of Red Dwarf VIII, thus foreshadowing that it’s going to be shit.

[Author]

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