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

[Rushy]

In Entangled, why does Lister wait an entire 12 hours before asking Kryten to remove the bomb attached to his groin?

He goes to sleep with it! 

[Rushy]

Also, this is really wholesome before Lister spoils the moment. I love the idea that Rimmer on some level genuinely wants Lister to become a better version of himself

[Rushy]

Do we ever see Lister’s Stalin sweater again? It looks really… interesting 

[Moonlight]

Trying to decide if the deleted scene of Captain Platini referring to the holoship crew as “ubermensch” is too weird because of the obvious Nazi connotations or excellently plays into it being a fucked up elitist society built around IQ (which does feel like some Nazi shit anyway).

[Warbodog]

a fucked up elitist society built around IQ

and fucking.

[Unrumble]

In Entangled, why does Lister wait an entire 12 hours before asking Kryten to remove the bomb attached to his groin?
He goes to sleep with it! 

Drunk? 

[Nick R]

Trying to decide if the deleted scene of Captain Platini referring to the holoship crew as “ubermensch” is too weird because of the obvious Nazi connotations or excellently plays into it being a fucked up elitist society built around IQ (which does feel like some Nazi shit anyway).

[Cardinal_Hordriss]

I believe it was Stephen Hawking who said – People who boast about their IQ are losers. 

[tombow]

so with the passing of Ozzy I’m reminded of the part of the Last Human novel where evil Lister has posters of metal bands “eating small furry animals”. I think a lot of people in those days heard snippets of the Ozzy bat/bird incidents, the Alice Cooper chicken accident, and the various Scandinavian extreme metal antics –  and got an idea that every heavy metal concert featured band members killing and eating animals on stage, throwing real blood everywhere, etc. 

[Warbodog]

[Rushy]

I’m reminded of the part of the Last Human novel 

How? I’m still working on my review of it, and I’m pretty sure I’ve forgotten over half of the book by now. 

[clem]

so with the passing of Ozzy I’m reminded of the part of the Last Human novel where evil Lister has posters of metal bands “eating small furry animals”. I think a lot of people in those days heard snippets of the Ozzy bat/bird incidents, the Alice Cooper chicken accident, and the various Scandinavian extreme metal antics –  and got an idea that every heavy metal concert featured band members killing and eating animals on stage, throwing real blood everywhere, etc. 

The morphlings’ defence tactic in Can of Worms would have seriously backfired if the crew had been a metal band. Ozzy would’ve wolfed down this lot, shopping trolley, skateboard and all.

[Warbodog]

[clem]

[Podey]

“What about sex?”

”Not here, it’s too sandy.”

I get this is just a throwaway joke with zero relevance to her actual character but, given she says in series 8 that all Lister had to do was *ask* to see her naked when they were still friends, does this imply Kochanski would have also been up for a platonic bonk at a different time and location…?

[Dave]

platonic bonk

[Nick R]

[Hamish]

I mean, given she decked him over propositioning her in the previous episode, one would assume not.

[Technopeasant]

I mean, randomly unbuttoning your shirt is not the same as asking nicely.

[Cardinal_Hordriss]

I think after coming to terms with the fact that she wasn’t going to get back to her Lister that she was slowly softening towards our Lister but at the end of the day our Lister is still a bit of a jerk. He was a bit of a jerk before the accident but after 7 years with only a hostile hologram, totally self-centred cat and sycophantic droid for company he hadn’t exactly improved so there were always bound to be problems. 

[Technopeasant]

[Podey]

Just did a quick Smega-Drive search on the word “sand” in search of dialogue to make a joke from and, I must say, it’s surprising how often sandwiches come up in Red Dwarf.

[Unrumble]

[Flap Jack]

[Rushy]

This is one of the coldest insults in the entire show

[Nick R]

Sandy details

[Warbodog]

Supposedly, one of the original Countdown presenters, Beverley Isherwood, played one of the extras in Balance of Power. Is she the one on the left? I dunno.

She was also Miss England 1978, but I led with the TV history nerds angle rather than the sleazy old dads one.

[Ben Saunders]

The crew mates on Red Dwarf all had horrendous fashion sense

[Ian Symes]

It was a 1990s retro night, they were essentially in fancy dress.

Also, 6 x 3 = 18; x 10 = 180; + 7 + 1

[Warbodog]

Also, 6 x 3 = 18; x 10 = 180; + 7 + 1

I guess the Countdown computer worked through different combinations rather than flashing up random numbers for show, since it was still processing during that screencap when I was trying to match the angle. They were actually tasked with this:

[Warbodog]

SPOILERS

(Yes, the original format was that a former Miss England would select the numbers and then a cleverer lady would be brought on to do the maths).

[Flap Jack]

Wow, 4 whole minutes to solve it.

I did get it without looking, but you’ll just have to take my word for it.

[Android 72264Y]

Re-watching Series VIII I notice Chris carried a bit of dad weight/bloating that wasn’t present in previous and subsequent seasons. Maybe Brittas got him into shape?

[Podey]

Funny you say that, I’ve always thought he looked a healthier weight in 8.

[Warbodog]

No, he looked identical to pre-accident Rimmer as intended and not clearly a decade older.

[Flap Jack]

The thing is that Chris takes his roles very seriously. From Series 1-VII he strived to make his own weight as close as possible to Rimmer’s canonical weight (0kg), so when he switched to playing nano-Rimmer he intentionally put on a few pounds.

[Rushy]

I thought he was a bit overweight in VI-IX, but from X onwards, he’s back to the ramrod sharp Second Tech I know and love. 

[Quinn: Clochebusters World Champion]

Dave era Chris is pretty chubby around the middle but his uniform is cut to hide it. 

[tombow]

I’m reminded of the part of the Last Human novel 
How? I’m still working on my review of it, and I’m pretty sure I’ve forgotten over half of the book by now. 

I re-read it a lot of times as a kid trying to make sense of it, so I strangely have almost full recall of some scenes…

actually I was trying to remember how Lister’s back story with the choice of foster parents fits in with his TV backstory

[Rushy]

I assume Lister was placed in the foster system after being found under a pool table. He eventually picked the family with his famous grandma

[Warbodog]

I assume Lister was placed in the foster system after being found under a pool table. He eventually picked the family with his famous grandma

Ouroboros seems to suggest that Frank took him in (finders keepers), since he dresses similarly and goes to the same pub Lister will be going to have. Unless that was just the overly simplistic conclusion of my child brain.

[Rushy]

Ouroboros seems to suggest that Frank took him in (finders keepers)

Rimmer: “Why did you say that name?!”

[Flap Jack]

I definitely never thought the episode was trying to suggest that Frank fostered or adopted baby Lister. Leather jackets aren’t that unique a fashion choice, and Lister being an adult regular of the pub where he was found just shows that he stuck around that area (or that he checked it out after being told that’s where he was found).

[Warbodog]

I didn’t know that was an accidental headcanon all these years and expected to be supported (even wrongly) by the Tongue Tied wiki or something. My defense is that about 95% of my viewings of that episode were when I was under 13.

[Quinn: Clochebusters World Champion]

Maybe being found (and or adopted) by a man called Frank is what Lister led him to name his cat Frankenstein 

[Dave]

Maybe being found (and or adopted) by a man called Frank is what Lister led him to name his cat Frankenstein 

[clem]

That character was named Eric in an early draft of the script, changed perhaps because of the other Eric in Series VII – the dead guy in Tikka (although I think it might only be in the Xtended version that we learn his name). Clearly two is one too many Erics, but you can never have too many Franks in Red Dwarf.

[Rushy]

True. There’s also Frank Todhunter and Frank Hollister, and I literally only just realised they have the same name. 

Kryten says “screw down my diodes and call me Frank!” in Justice. There’s also a Frank in his western dream, and he named the washing machine Frank because it works better with a personality. 

[clem]

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=mgsMiHHx_mc

[Hamish]

I thought he was a bit overweight in VI-IX

In fairness, the quilted VI-VII jacket never really did his waistline any favours.

[Author]

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