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

[Stabbim]

have always been amused that the one bit of fleshing out Yvonne McGruder gets is that she’s the ship’s boxing champion.

such a fun throwaway gag.

[tombow]

I wonder if Starbuck in 2000s Battlestar was inspired by MacGruder? She boxed

[tombow]

Average Rimmer would still be quite lowly in the ranks, but probably a semi competent middle manager. 
Recognises he faults, doesn’t blame others but is still never going to be an officer.
Not quite a navigation office but above technician. Probably leading a small team. 
Could fix a drive plate without killing everyone. 
Ultimately everyone under his charge ends up promoting away from him.
Not completely unlucky in love, a string of fairly boring relationships in his teenage years and then a bit like BTL, ends up setting down with a wife and couple of kids.

Flight Officer…Gordon Brittas

[Future Producer of Series IX – aaaaany day now]

I was always under the impression that referring to her as the female boxing champion was Rob and Doug’s very 20th century way of inferring that she’s not particularly conventionally attractive, which of course flies in the face of how she appears when we see her in Better Than Life.

[Stabbim]

Well, yes, but I always interpreted that in more of a “she’s weird/crazy” way rather than a “she’s ugly” way.  The punchline being that she’d have to be weird/crazy to actually be attracted to Rimmer (with “punch drunk” as the ultimate explanation) because a “normal” woman would never give him the time of day.

Though her BTL manifestation can be explained away as “how pretty she is in Rimmer’s eyes vs how she looks to everyone else” if necessary.  The real McGruder never actually appeared on-screen, did she? (Yet another of S8’s many missed opportunities).

[Future Producer of Series IX – aaaaany day now]

Given how Series 8 treats the women who did appear, I’d say McGruder got off lightly.

[International Debris]

[Moonlight]

And with their difference in hair, Ace does mention getting his highlights done in Stoke Me a Clipper and refers Cat to his stylist Alphonse at Astro Cuts in Dimension 24.

[Moonlight]

So are the bulky Kryten gloves the reason Samsara has the world’s most unconvincing strangling?

[Stabbim]

Given how Series 8 treats the women who did appear, I’d say McGruder got off lightly.

[tombow]

tbh I’m surprised now she wasn’t recast as a serious love interest for Rimmer in 8. Then it could have been a Men Behaving Badly set up.

[Stabbim]

tbh I’m surprised now she wasn’t recast as a serious love interest for Rimmer in 8. Then it could have been a Men Behaving Badly set up.

And best of all, with McGruder as a gal-pal for Kochanski, there’s no narrative need for Kryten to be classified as a woman, and thus we get something, anything, other than Krytie TV.

[Quinn: Clochebusters World Champion]

McGruder TV. Yvonne McGruder becomes a cam girl. 

[RainbowGazelle]

So how can he live to be the future echo at 171 and die on Red Dwarf in his early 30s?

Easy, they take his remains to Backwards world and bring him and Kochanski back to life.

See I knew it all made sense. Child me was clearly ahead of their time.

[Dave]

McGruder TV. Yvonne McGruder becomes a cam girl. 

Sequel to Cam-mile

[Nick R]

McGruder TV. Yvonne McGruder becomes a cam girl. 

Leading to the final episode “OnlyFans the Good…”

[Ian Symes]

If only Stoke Me A Clipper had kept its original title of Natural Porn Rimmers.

[Ridley]

OnlyFans and Horses Named Trumper

They’re like the original Porridge in space. One is in gaol and the other– SHUT UP

[Future Producer of Series IX – aaaaany day now]

And that, kids, is the story of how I met your mother.

[Formica]

Star Knotting

[RunawayTrain]

Star Knotting

across the universe,

On the Starship Enterprise under Captain Kirk.

Star Knotting across the universe

Boldly going forward, cos we can’t find reverse.

[Dave]

[Moonlight]

[tombow]

I thinking last night that one thing that bothers me in series 8 is, I always thought the Dwarfers would have some measure of respect if they ever got back to their own time or old crew, for how they rose above their humble roots to keep the ship going through tough times.

[clem]

We’ve discussed on here before the idea of a Series VIII where the resurrected crew run into monster of the week situations and weird space phenomena and are completely out of their depth, suddenly having found themselves in deep space in the future, and so keep having to rely on Lister and co. to save the day, but Hollister and the officers take all the credit. Sort of similar to The Admirable Crichton, funnily enough. 

[Future Producer of Series IX – aaaaany day now]

There’s so many ways that the series could’ve been good if it’d done one thing or another, but at the end of the day, Doug chose just the wrong combination of ideas to use.

Obviously that’s a bit of an oversimplification, but you get the point I’m trying to make.

[Stabbim]

There’s so many ways that the series could’ve been good if it’d done one thing or another, but at the end of the day, Doug chose just the wrong combination of ideas to use.
Obviously that’s a bit of an oversimplification, but you get the point I’m trying to make.

I think that’s my biggest frustration with S8.  So many relatively small adjustments that could’ve made it really really good, and yet what we got was so bad and “un-Dwarfy”.  So many bits that felt like something you’d see in Every Other Sitcom, Ever.

Plus, S1 did a great job of giving just enough glimpses of the living crew for me to miss them along with Lister.  So on paper I was really looking forward to the crew being back.  Such potential!  And then…

[Moonlight]

I still want to see the version of Series 8 where they try to marry the regular formula to daily life on pre-accident Dwarf. Have a whole episode where the A-plot is just following Rimmer and Lister going about a day on the job as things get increasingly ridiculous though some farcical shenanigans.

[Quinn: Clochebusters World Champion]

That’s just a work place comedy that happens to be on a mining ship.  Not saying it wouldn’t be fun but it would basically be doing what’s been done before. 

[Moonlight]

I want to see a workplace comedy on a mining ship episode. I feel like there’s character and lore mileage from showing an average pre-accident day. I always wanted to see more flashback stuff when the cast were still young enough to get away with it.

[Quinn: Clochebusters World Champion]

A single flashback episode could work. I’d misread what you’d said and thought you wanted an entire series of it. 

[Moonlight]

I did say “have a whole episode where the A-plot is” but I supposed reading can be difficult when you’re so quinnly.

[Quinn: Clochebusters World Champion]

[Future Producer of Series IX – aaaaany day now]

[Frank Smeghammer]

In Queeg when Rimmer’s corrupted hologram starts going through the crew (Brannigan, Lister, Holly etc) he briefly has Cat’s personality. This implies at some point they uploaded Cat onto the Hologram system in case he ever needs to be brought back.

Furthermore, why is Holly’s personality on file? Does this mean they could have a full bodied Holly hologram walking around the ship if they wanted? With 6,000 IQ could a hard light Holly be able to put his abilities to use in a practical way, perhaps using the time drive to go back in time and physically repair the drive plate personally with his own hologrammatic hands?

[Flap Jack]

I wouldn’t say Holly’s personality is counted among those that can be used to make holograms, it’s just in the ship’s computer system generally.

Although considering Rimmer doesn’t really “become” Holly or Lister in that scene, he just repeats what they say (while doing impressions of them but still speaking in his own voice), it seems more like his own short term memory system is just bugging out, rather than him temporarily switching to the mind of a Lister or Holly hologram.

[clem]

He doesn’t really become Brannigan either in that sense, not like in Bodyswap when they replace Lister’s mind with Brown’s using her personality disc. Presumably the Brannigan dialogue about the shuttle is also just a memory. Rimmer goes through a few other crewmembers in the longer version of the scene on the Series 2 DVD, including a histrionic Italian iirc but I don’t remember what they say. 

Rimmer doesn’t really “become” Holly or Lister in that scene, he just repeats what they say (while doing impressions of them but still speaking in his own voice)

I can’t tell whether this is deliberately throwing shade on Chris Barrie’s skills as an impressionist. 

[Flap Jack]

That’s right, I’m coming for you, Chris Barrie. Your Rimmer-as-Holly does not sound 100% identical to Norman Lovett as Holly. YEAH, I SAID IT.

[Quinn: Clochebusters World Champion]

Holly probably could manifest himself as a hologram though if he wanted to, ala Andromeda. It would just be another interface for his system. 

[clem]

With 6,000 IQ could a hard light Holly be able to put his abilities to use in a practical way, perhaps using the time drive to go back in time and physically repair the drive plate personally with his own hologrammatic hands?

[clem]

Holly probably could manifest himself as a hologram though if he wanted to, ala Andromeda. It would just be another interface for his system. 

That’s vaguely reminded me of a fanfic where Mellie in Ace’s dimension is said to be an avatar of some sort, as an explanation for why she looks just like Holly. Turns out I was thinking of the Talkie Toaster interview on T̶O̶S̶ TUA where he says she’s an android. 

[International Debris]

I mean, the drive plate blew, there was a nuclear explosion… and then the ship carried on flying for three million years. A little nibble here and a little nibble there from a cat could send the ship backwards, but an exploding drive plate that wipes out the crew and all systems functioning a-ok?

[cwickham]

The drive plate only powers one of several engines, Holly switches it off and the ship carries on using its remaining engines.

[Stabbim]

speaking of Queeg, has anyone ever tried to actually play out the chess match, and did it work?  Just thought there might be an easter egg joke where that tense, dramatic music implies a tight back-and-forth contest but if you follow the moves closely you realize Holly’s completely getting his ass kicked or something.

Or is it just a bunch of illegal move nonsense that lets Holly say “horsie” and “prawn” a lot.

[Flap Jack]

That’s vaguely reminded me of a fanfic where Mellie in Ace’s dimension
is said to be an avatar of some sort, as an explanation for why she
looks just like Holly. Turns out I was thinking of the Talkie Toaster
interview on T̶O̶S̶ TUA where he says she’s an android.

🎵 Androids 🎵

🎵 Everybody needs good androids 🎵

🎵 They want to fuck Ace too 🎵

[Unrumble]

speaking of Queeg, has anyone ever tried to actually play out the chess match, and did it work?  Just thought there might be an easter egg joke where that tense, dramatic music implies a tight back-and-forth contest but if you follow the moves closely you realize Holly’s completely getting his ass kicked or something.

Or is it just a bunch of illegal move nonsense that lets Holly say “horsie” and “prawn” a lot.

The back and forth stuff suggests that Holly’s playing proper, legal moves, up until at least “queens don’t move like that” and “check and mate, sucker”, with the ‘horsie’ stuff being silly, but inconsequential to the actual gameplay. 

To counter that, seems odd that Holly would be competent at it, given he tries his best to get out of chess being the game, and “I was thinking of poker” etc… 

[Rudolph]

I always imagined that the drive plate was part of the protective shielding on the engine, like lead shielding in nuclear reactors.

Presumably Holly had the skutters correctly repair the plate after the crew were dead.

[Quinn: Clochebusters World Champion]

> The drive plate, or damper as it is often called, bolts to the engine flywheel and connects the engine to the transmission / gearbox splined shaft. The damping is achieved by two methods: R & D drive plates feature a special polyurethane moulding, designed to be stiff enough to transmit the engine power yet flexible enough to isolate vibration and shock. They are also designed to fail safe in the event of an emergency

https://www.asap-supplies.com/engine-gearbox-components/adaptor-drive-plates/drive-plates

Presumably they took this concept and built it up to be a part of a nuclear powered space ship. 

[tombow]

just been thinking with everyone they’ve met like GELFs, holograms, simulants etc, have they never asked anyone if they’re aware of the current status of Earth or humanity.

[paintings]

speaking of Queeg, has anyone ever tried to actually play out the chess match, and did it work?

Many of the moves are missing or incomplete (e.g. at one point Holly says “to Queen 3” and Queeg says “takes pawn”, both of which don’t state the piece being moved).

The one clear view we get of the chess board shows the bishop on its way to Knight 5, with Queeg’s voice announcing the move. However only 4 other pieces have moved from their starting positions, so it should have been Holly’s move.

Allowing for the fact that all of the moves aren’t detailed, the moves we do hear are (or could be) legal chess moves, although it is odd that Holly says “Prawn to King 4” near the end when he had started with that exact move. It’s not necessarily an illegal move (another of his pawns could – by taking one of Queeg’s pieces – have ended up on King 3) but it’s a bit odd.

To summarise: Close, but no cigar.

[Author]

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