Red Dwarf at Blackpool Tower (or Red Dwarf not at Blackpool Tower)

[Podey]

At some point in the 90s I persuaded my family to take us to Blackpool for a trip because I read somewhere – probably in Better Than Life, though possibly the Smegazine – that the Red Dwarf model used in the show was on display at Blackpool Tower.

We never found it, either because the exhibition had already ended (I have no idea how long a gap there was between me hearing that it was there and us going but I doubt it would have been right away), we missed whatever room it was in or maybe I misunderstood something and it was never there in the first place.


Obviously it is impossible to verify on Google so I was wondering a) if anyone remembers this and b) if it anyone went to see it? 

[bountyhunter]

It’s possible. Fanderson had an exhibition in the Winter Gardens cica 1993. It featured loads of models and puppets from across the various Gerry Anderson productions. It was great to see them all up close. I have vague memories of a few other sci-fi shows being there can’t say for sure whether Dwarf was there. (Though I’m sure I’d remember that!)

[Rudolph]

What’s the timeline for the original Red Dwarf models? I’ve read a comment from Pete Tyler implying that the original ten-foot model was destroyed by accident in 1988, and we know the smaller, six-foot model was blown up when filming Demons & Angels in 1991.

[GlenTokyo]

The most recent model shot of Red Dwarf of those included on the DVDs is 11/2/87 from a cursory skip through.

Could’ve been in a skip before the show went out.

[Future Producer of Series IX – aaaaany day now]

I did notice that the vast majority of the “new” shots featured in Series 2 (that is, the ones that don’t appear to be recycled from the Series 1 sessions) are pretty much static with regard to the ship itself, with the most obvious exception of that one slow moving shot that tracks into the ship as it’s moving past. Even the shot of the two Dwarfs side-by-side from Parallel Universe doesn’t seem to have a lot of motion in it. Purely on that basis I suspect that the accident occurred quite early on in 2’s production.

[GlenTokyo]

Second series DVD has no new shots of Red Dwarf, only ones with a static image of it in the background. 

The third series has one model shot of Red Dwarf at the very end, but it’s from January 87 so it’s from the first series shoot.

Even the shot in Polymorph seems to be just a zoom of a photo, there’s barely any parallax that couldn’t be accounted for by lens distortion. 

I think there were two shoots of the OG model, because there are some differences around the exhaust (goes from bulb with a square on it, to 4 lights) that would have taken some time to do perhaps but both could have been in 1987

[Podey]

I did consider that before posting this and, aside from the very likely scenario that I simply got it wrong, I think there are (at least) two candidates for a model of Red Dwarf that may have appeared at Blackpool Tower in the nineties:

A second, smaller model of Red Dwarf that was used after the original fell off a shelf and was then blown up in “Demons and Angels” according to a comment on this photo by Peter Tyler 
https://www.facebook.com/Thepropgallery/photos/a.574423632599933/735840406458254/?type=3#:~:text=To%20answer%20Darrell’s%20question%3A%20This,for%20filming%20on%20later%20series. 

Or this remastered Red Dwarf model: 

https://www.ganymede.tv/2019/06/former-models-visiting-bbc-visual-effects-1997/

[GlenTokyo]

Or possibly just “the Red Dwarf models used in the show” – I can see Starbug, Blue Midget, various pods and guest ships, Kryten heads being shown. 

[Future Producer of Series IX – aaaaany day now]

[Podey]

The thing is I still have all my BTL and Smegazine issues so I absolutely 100% still own whatever I think I read it in. I’m going to have to go through them all sometime and get to the bottom of it. 

(although I suddenly have a creeping doubt that it may have been in the Radio Times….) 

[Dave]

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