Red Dwarf: Titan being developed into a Novel

[Dax101]

At Kocour Na Comic Con, Rob Grant has revealed that Red Dwarf: Titan will be developed into a novel. He doesn’t have a publication date yet but it is happening. 

He also revealed that the prequel will not solely be a Rimmer and Lister Story as The Cat and Kryten are also involved. A much ealier version of Kryten and the Cat being created through some DNA manipulation.

He talks about it at 7:44

https://youtu.be/vJ5zYyAXxY4?si=XDcyNJNXA3v-j1lW&t=457

Topic

[Moonlight]

It’s about time one of them wrote another Red Dwarf book. If it comes out next year, it’ll be three decades since the last one and the universe hasn’t been at peace without more.

[evilmorwen]

he doesn’t leave a lot of room for doubt does he 

[Moonlight]

Also, I am trying to get better about reading books again and it would really help me to have another Red Dwarf book for the pile.

[Technopeasant]

[Technopeasant]

If we get two different Red Dwarf novels based on cancelled television pitches it certainly won’t dampen the Rob versus Doug debates.

[Dave]

 A much ealier version of Kryten and the Cat being created through some DNA manipulation.

[Warbodog]

This feels like the most positive confirmation we’ve had of something actually coming out in reality, which is cool. The world-building prequel chapters of the original novels (pre-ship and filling in history) are great, so it’s not like it needs to be deep space in the far future to be Red Dwarf. It doesn’t need to have Cat and Kryten squeezed in to be Red Dwarf either, but we’ll see how well or awkwardly that’s done, hopefully without the whole plot being spoiled in the meantime.

It’s also funny how the topic of the prequel was introduced as “I’m not sure, up til now, if that was a joke?”

[Ian Symes]

Note that the video is six months old.

[L. T.]

Got to be a big cynic once again – I just don’t think it’s going to happen. It honestly feels more and more as 2025 continues that we’ve had all the Dwarf we’re getting and Rob – and, perhaps less surprisingly, Doug – are railing against the inevitable.

I know everyone will think I’m being a negative bastard but how many times can we hear “this Red Dwarf project is definitely going to happen” since 1998 before we admit that no in fact it’s not? I’m absolutely certain they both currently think their projects will see completion but we fans will almost certainly never see word one of them.

[Dave]

I know everyone will think I’m being a negative bastard but how many times can we hear “this Red Dwarf project is definitely going to happen” since 1998 before we admit that no in fact it’s not?

I don’t know, I mean there have been a few minor Red Dwarf things that have happened since 1998.

[Flap Jack]

I’ll take it, but if Rob really wants Lister, Rimmer, The Cat and Kryten to all be in his new Red Dwarf story… I can think of some less convoluted ways to do that?

[L. T.]

I don’t know, I mean there have been a few minor Red Dwarf things that have happened since 1998.

Obviously we were super lucky to have those and I’m grateful we did. But between the movie, a Doug novel, a Rob novel, a prequel series, Unplugged, a stage show, another special, another series, Out of the Red and the general state of the entertainment landscape in 2025, I await being proven wrong this time. Truly, I’d love to be sat here holding a new Dwarf book or watching a new episode and thinking how happy I am to be wrong.

[Dave]

I’ll take it, but if Rob really wants Lister, Rimmer, The Cat and Kryten to all be in his new Red Dwarf story… I can think of some less convoluted ways to do that?

I can’t help but feel there may be some aspect of Rob and Doug having agreed to clearly mark out the territory that they can each occupy with their Red Dwarf work, so the two don’t clash. The setting of Titan might be a result of that.

[Dave]

Obviously we were super lucky to have those and I’m grateful we did. But between the movie, a Doug novel, a Rob novel, a prequel series, Unplugged, a stage show, another special, another series, Out of the Red and the general state of the entertainment landscape in 2025, I await being proven wrong this time. Truly, I’d love to be sat here holding a new Dwarf book or watching a new episode and thinking how happy I am to be wrong.

Yeah, I don’t disagree that a lot of these things may never see the light of day. But in terms of novels, surely if it came to it then you could crowdfund those if no major publishers were interested.

[Warbodog]

I can’t help but feel there may be some aspect of Rob and Doug having agreed to clearly mark out the territory that they can each occupy with their Red Dwarf work, so the two don’t clash. The setting of Titan might be a result of that.

In the video, Rob explains, “We reached an agreement about the Red Dwarf rights a couple of years ago and I got the rights to the prequel.”

[Dave]

Ah, thanks. I hadn’t watched the video yet but I vaguely remember some talk along those lines.

[sleepey]

Sounds a bit silly but I’ll happily take a book if there’s one going

[Renegade Rob]

[Dax101]

Got to be a big cynic once again – I just don’t think it’s going to happen. It honestly feels more and more as 2025 continues that we’ve had all the Dwarf we’re getting and Rob – and, perhaps less surprisingly, Doug – are railing against the inevitable.
I know everyone will think I’m being a negative bastard but how many times can we hear “this Red Dwarf project is definitely going to happen” since 1998 before we admit that no in fact it’s not? I’m absolutely certain they both currently think their projects will see completion but we fans will almost certainly never see word one of them.

If Red Dwarf can’t even get plain text on paper produced. This brand really is in trouble.

[Ben Saunders]

I’d say, given that Doug has just published a book, Doug getting a book published isn’t the most unrealistic scenario one could imagine.

[Warbodog]

I’d say, given that Doug has just published a book, Doug getting a book published isn’t the most unrealistic scenario one could imagine.

He said Penguin (who published the old Red Dwarf books, so probably the most likely publisher) didn’t reply when he asked about it twice. Maybe Rob had also asked and they didn’t want to be in the middle of a domestic again.

[Rushy]

Doug writing a story about Lister and Rimmer going back in time to pre-accident Red Dwarf after Rob got prequel rights is honestly funnier than anything he might have put on paper. 

[Dax101]

I imagine prequel is pre-tv show and not set anytime within the shows timeline. Which is what Doug was going to do. And that was probably brought on by someone showing him they could do de-aging.

[Technopeasant]

Note that the video is six months old.

I’ll take it, but if Rob really wants Lister, Rimmer, The Cat and
Kryten to all be in his new Red Dwarf story… I can think of some less
convoluted ways to do that?

Especially since as a novel getting a new cast would not be something to consider.

[Asclepius]

Jeez. Rob takes a look at the three Red Dwarf novels he was involved in and thinks “the only good world-building I can do involves Lister, Rimmer, Cat and Kryten. I was never capable of just writing for Lister and Rimmer…”

He managed page 1-11 of ‘Infinity Welcomes’ without *any* of them. Then pages 11-ONE HUNDRED AND FIFTEEN without the Cat or Kryten. And then a further 46 pages without Kryten either.

Also, weirdly, I’ve just opened what I always thought was ‘my’ copy of ‘Infinity Welcomes…’ but I know it isn’t mine. Mine was bought from a jumble sale at a stall run by a Physics Teacher at my school. The barcode had been removed. (Barcode battlers?) ANYWAY, this copy on my shelf has a barcode. It also, *madly* has a feel of being barely read (the spine isn’t broken in multiple places like mine is). And, just now, searching for the bit where Kryten appears, I’ve found a receipt being used as a bookmark!!

My copy was bought for £3.99 at WH Smith No. 6616 (anyone wanna research that?) A fiver was handed over. £1.01 given back. The date was 23rd September 1991.

I wonder where I got this from? I wonder where mine is? I love the receipt, though! Especially as the book was meant to be £4.50! Obviously it might be a receipt from a different thing…

[Dave]

[Dave]

Joking aside I love finding old receipts like this and having a record of a little moment in time, especially when it recalls a bygone era like Woolworths or Our Price or (now) WH Smith.

I always used to keep receipts, tickets etc. in my CDs, books, VHSs, DVDs, partly for that reason. Another reason to love physical media. Having an email receipt isn’t the same.

[Warbodog]

It’s like that Douglas Adams story about sharing a packet of biscuits on a train (reused in Hitchhiker’s #4). Someone was astounded at your cheek in walking off with their Red Dwarf novel (though doesn’t sound like it was a prized possession).

I got a nice Silver Jubilee bookmark in a Dirk Gently hardback.

[Asclepius]

I  Haha! Yes. Very! Btw I have now researched it. It’s very close to where I currently live, but was a long way from where I actually bought my copy. Weird! I have no memory of ever thinking “Well, I need another copy of this book…”
Not quite a receipt, but I was looking at a 1920s edition of a late 1800s book in a charity shop a few weeks back, and the owner had cut out and kept a late 1930s centennial newspaper article on it being 100 years since the author’s birth and what they had been about. Me and my £5 were soon parted…

[Jimboid]

My copy was bought for £3.99 at WH Smith No. 6616 (anyone wanna research that?) 

Stockport, seemingly!

[Unrumble]

My copy was bought for £3.99 at WH Smith No. 6616 (anyone wanna research that?) 
Stockport, seemingly!

 Btw I have now researched it. It’s very close to where I currently live, but was a long way from where I actually bought my copy.

[Quinn: Clochebusters World Champion]

Joking aside I love finding old receipts like this and having a record of a little moment in time, especially when it recalls a bygone era like Woolworths or Our Price or (now) WH Smith.
I always used to keep receipts, tickets etc. in my CDs, books, VHSs, DVDs, partly for that reason. Another reason to love physical media. Having an email receipt isn’t the same.

I can’t be bothered to check but I’d wager at least half my Red Dwarf DVDs have the original Woolworths of HMV (or maybe even Virgin) receipt inside the case.

[MANI506]

Yes, mine have MVC receipts from 1995 tucked in the sleeves. It was the second time I bought series 1-V as I’d traded them in for Smegazines the year before.

[Rushy]

Jeez. Rob takes a look at the three Red Dwarf novels he was involved in and thinks “the only good world-building I can do involves Lister, Rimmer, Cat and Kryten.

I think it’s more to do with the fact that he wants to write about the posse having adventures, together. But because of the contract, he has to contrive a way for them to be together before they’re actually meant to meet. 

This contract (and Rob and Doug’s entire relationship since 1993) is extremely bizarre to me. You’d think two reasonable adults could agree to write separate stories in the same world/continuity, with an editor to make sure they don’t contradict each other. 

[Dax101]

Having it be about Rimmer and Lister alone you probably could head canon it into the show. But i guess Rob wanted to have his own playground with the 4 characters  to play with and it sounds like its a little like what Doug was going to do with the movie. Which is its own alternative timeline where things play out very differently. As it sounds like the movie was also going to do some things very differently.

[Jenuall]

Joking aside I love finding old receipts like this and having a record of a little moment in time, especially when it recalls a bygone era like Woolworths or Our Price or (now) WH Smith.
I always used to keep receipts, tickets etc. in my CDs, books, VHSs, DVDs, partly for that reason. Another reason to love physical media. Having an email receipt isn’t the same.

I love using receipts as bookmarks that I leave in a book when I’m done with it – then when some time I come back and read it again I get a little memory bite or whatever I was doing last time I read it! 

[barbucha]

If you’re interested, this blog contains “newish” information about the Red Dwarf: Titan project, which we learned about at Comic Con Prague, from which the video comes. This is information we had available in April 2025.

[Rushy]

“In this alternate timeline, Lister and Rimmer are already flatmates, and the story finds them on holiday on Titan“

Ah, so it’s series 8 Lister and Rimmer where they actually like each other. 

[Warbodog]

There’s the story in Marooned about them visiting a bar together on planet leave, which seems very unlikely based on their relationship in The End.

[Quinn: Clochebusters World Champion]

There’s the story in Marooned about them visiting a bar together on planet leave, which seems very unlikely based on their relationship in The End.

Maybe it was a work do, and they were all there with the technicians department or something.

[Unrumble]

There’s the story in Marooned about them visiting a bar together on planet leave, which seems very unlikely based on their relationship in The End.

Maybe it was a work do, and they were all there with the technicians department or something.

[Technopeasant]

Ah, so it’s series 8 Lister and Rimmer where they actually like each other. 

Which, honestly, is actually large chunks of Series VIII.

[tombow]

I bought the IWCD/BTL omnibus from the bookshop that used to be on the upper floor of the Leamington Spa shopping centre (now a JD sports) and Last Human from a small bookshop in the Cotswolds (my parents think it might have been Stow on the Wold). Bought most of the Discworld and Stephen King books from that Leamington shop too, it wasn’t a Waterstones, but I remember it being big.

[Quinn: Clochebusters World Champion]

[Warbodog]

I borrowed the first two novels from the library. Seeing the IWCD book cover at 11 was something of a momentous experience. I didn’t get around to buying them for years, instead buying the abridged tape pack from WH Smith which I listened to all the time and was satisfied with. It was the 90s and I was completely used to having incomplete things, so it didn’t seem as strange as it does now.

Eventually bought things from eBay anyway.

[MANI506]

I got the first two novels for my 12th birthday in 1992, Last Human for my 15th birthday in 1995 but was so unenthused by the concept of a novel called Backwards that I didn’t pick that up until later in the 90s. I only got the unabridged audiotapes last year from eBay.

[Dave]

[Rushy]

Being a young’un, I just bought them all off Amazon last year. 

[tombow]

So seems that temu are already selling merch of the de-aged cast from the new special, little spoiler here for how their classic era selves will look

[Ben Saunders]

Cat looks like he’s just seen the cover he’s on

[Author]

Replies