Unanswered Questions

[Dave]

Who took the picture of young-Rimmer’s dorm room that he uses to go back in time, in Timeslides? And how is adult-Rmmer in possession of it in the future?

The more I think about this the more it bothers me.

Topic

[tombow]

I just assumed Rimmer got angry with Lister using so much paper once and lectured him on the correct way to wipe with 3 pieces.

[Dave]

“Polish your arse, m’boy, lickety-split.”

[Ridley]

“Even it out. Take out the flakey bits.”

[Flap Jack]

In Backwards, how much are the denizens of the backwards world aware of the nature of their universe? Are they actually perceiving the Dwarfers as being the backwards ones? Is free will even possible if time runs backwards? Is free will in general just an illusion?

[Quinn: Clochebusters World Champion]

It is very much presented like this is just a tape re-winding, so these people have no fucking idea that they’re running backwards or anything. To them it’s normal. And no, they’d have no free will, especially as you could look at a photo/video/newspaper etc and see exactly what you were going to be doing tomorrow/yesterday.

What is interesting is how the crew are able to perceive things as going backwards. If time, is indeed running in reverse, why is it it doesn’t immediately affect their perspective on things. In the show and the book they are able to grasp that they ought to be going the other way, even though everything else about how their body functions, food, toilet, sex etc runs in the opposite direction. Why is it their minds continue to run “forwards” whilst everything else is “backwards”

[International Debris]

It depends on how literal Kryten’s newspaper translation is. Things like being demoted straight to the bottom, roll-off deodorant, etc. all suggest they actually perceive things in kind of the way the Dwarfers do, ie they’re aware of the direction they’re going in. As opposed to the novel version, where they are literally un-learning / un-experiencing everything.

[Quinn: Clochebusters World Champion]

That’s a good point. In that case seeing someone eat an egg is no different to watching someone throw up, which doesn’t sound like entertainment, or even astonishing. Just weird.

One thing that always slightly annoys me about Backwards, is the fact all the writing is mirrored too. Which also suggests it’s more than a just rewinding of a tape and is actually a very distinct “reverse” universe. A combination of backwards and mirrored.

[International Debris]

Some of the letters are the same way round as ours, and others aren’t.

It’s almost like they didn’t think this through.

[si]

It’s almost as if a half hour sitcom wanted to throw its audience some amusing things that look silly in reverse without the audience needing to seriously analyse what they’re laughing at.

[RunawayTrain]

That’s a good point. In that case seeing someone eat an egg is no different to watching someone throw up, which doesn’t sound like entertainment, or even astonishing. Just weird.

Well, watching someone regurgitate something *whole* would be unusual for us. Considering the reaction the backwards eating got from the real-life audience, as a novelty it evidently does fall into the category of entertainment (not high-brow, certainly, but it did its job) ;)

[si]

Considering the reaction the backwards eating got from the real-life audience

If we’re continuing with pedantry hour, it shouldn’t really get a reaction at all – the reaction would be before he’d (‘un’)eaten it.

[Dave]

The fact they get fired and then go out and do their show (presumably for many nights afterwards) has always bothered me.

Rimmer and Kryten should be the ones who turn up and see their face on posters and wonder what’s going on, go to the pub and get fired, and then do their first/last show.

[Quinn: Clochebusters World Champion]

Yeah that’s extremely annoying.

Also, if you think about it (which we are) what actually happens is the crew all arrive together on one Starbug, get separated, Lister and Cat leave without Rimmer and Kryten and then they find another Starbug crashed in the lake and leave in that.

Or something.

[Renegade Rob]

I thought the bar manager hired them for real in the dressing room, and “before” that was negotiating a contract with Kryten. “Something about a fight” and “they’ll never work the pub circuit again,” could be interpreted as “Wow that fight we just had was crazy. Anyways, welcome, and good luck, since you don’t seem to have worked the pub circuit before.”

Also, “after” the bar room brawl, Lister ate the guy’s pie, presumably as a taunt, and the guy punching him was the “last” punch in the rumble.

Always thought the implication was that it’s fine if there are logical plot holes in terms of backwardness vs. forwardness, since all that can be explained by the fact that there’s an orange swirly rip in spacetime that exposes forward and backward universe to each other and is just there in the sky. Time anomalies are afoot even from the backwards “POV” of the denizens of Backwards Earth, as if the backwards natives were experiencing White Hole shenanigans.

It would be interesting to see an episode where the reverse happens, where a time hole brings “backwards” space travelers into the forwards world.

[Dave]

So why does Cat have a shit in the bushes when Starbug is right there?

[Ian Symes]

There were a fair few stairs to climb. Sometimes it’s just that time-sensitive.

[By Jove its holmes]

Sometimes you need to pee or poo and you need to do it NOW!

[clem]

Do we know whether Cat usually uses toilets or a giant litter tray, or what? He has a shit in Rimmer’s wardrobe in Me².

[Dave]

I suppose Dear Dave suggests he’s graduated to toilets and loo roll by that point.

[Pete Part Three]

Why does Cat choose to go and hunch over a freshly laid turd?

[Ridley]

Maybe it sort of… bounced up there from a freshly buried spot. Presumably the area has the hint of his scent.

Plus Cat’s poop is probably a layered mousse in a glass with dessert fork and wafer shape or something.

[RunawayTrain]

From series X:
Why does Kryten moan that he always knew the human race would let Lister down, that they were never good enough for him? He didn’t know Lister until all others were extinct already.

Given that humans are extinct apart from Lister, are artificial life forms running JMC? For whom – ALF society?

How are they able to receive an electronic communication from JMC via the computer about Rimmer’s record?

Who or what is in charge of budgets and different departments on Red Dwarf? Where would they return the toilet rolls for a refund, and who would give it to them, and what use does the medicomp have for money in the first place? On the ship there are only two humanoids to use the toilet roll, and we know they’re running low on supplies like anaesthetic. I can run with the idea of external trade but I’m not sure how a crew of 4 would justify having different internal departments beyond food, energy, other supplies directly used by organic humanoids, and maintenance. Surely all in the third category would be amalgamated and decided based on need, not budget size.

I also haven’t quite understood why or how they encounter the M-Corp upgrades in XII – basically the same question as number 3. I have paid attention in that ep, wondering about this, but not for quite a while.

[Ian Symes]

Given that humans are extinct apart from Lister, are artificial life forms running JMC? For whom – ALF society?

[Ian Symes]

Although funnily enough, I stumbled across an old article of mine the other day in which I put forward the theory that all that JMC computer stuff is completely automated, and that it’s always been running in the background, it’s just that previously Holly had been around to countermand it.

[Quinn: Clochebusters World Champion]

Although funnily enough, I stumbled across an old article of mine the other day in which I put forward the theory that all that JMC computer stuff is completely automated, and that it’s always been running in the background, it’s just that previously Holly had been around to countermand it.

This makes the most sense. Kryten does say “as far as the computer is concerned, we’re just moving things around” or something. The computer is just a basic AI running inventory and accounts on all the stock, so you remove an item it updates the ledgers, you return an item it does the same.

It has no ill will towards the crew, just that its books need balancing, which gets in the way of the crew just using the supplies.

It does make sense that Holly would have overwritten all this before, but equally you’d expect him to have just turned all those background processes off.

It’s one of those things that in reality you could just ignore, but it made for some interesting tv.

[By Jove its holmes]

If Rimmer can give himself Kochanksi’s form and any other crew would he also be able to give himself the form of the characters from the entertainment films stored on holo discs – perhaps Henry VIII or Casablanca’s Rick Blaine?

[International Debris]

Yeah, it’s basically the automated personification of JMC bureaucracy. Now that Holly’s gone, everything has to be done ‘by the book’.

One thing that does bother me about it is that, up until IX, Holly was the JMC computer. The idea that there were two separate systems running seems a bit odd. But obviously there’s a very practical reason for it, re: Norm.

In terms of them getting the update, I assume it’s much like the post pod, in that it’s been on its way to meet them for millions of years and finally caught up.

[RunawayTrain]

Although funnily enough, I stumbled across an old article of mine the other day in which I put forward the theory that all that JMC computer stuff is completely automated, and that it’s always been running in the background, it’s just that previously Holly had been around to countermand it.

Ah, excellent article! Yes that makes sense that what they now call JMC is the computer.

(Also, I did not know there was a sitcom called ALF! I do now.)

Yeah, it’s basically the automated personification of JMC bureaucracy. Now that Holly’s gone, everything has to be done ‘by the book’.

One thing that does bother me about it is that, up until IX, Holly was the JMC computer. The idea that there were two separate systems running seems a bit odd. But obviously there’s a very practical reason for it, re: Norm.
In terms of them getting the update, I assume it’s much like the post pod, in that it’s been on its way to meet them for millions of years and finally caught up.

I sort of see it as Holly (and Gordon, and their equivalents on other ships) being AI overlaid on top of the pure programming of the core computer, if that makes any sense at all. So the computer can run without intervention but for all intents and purposes the personified AI pretty much *is* the computer ordinarily. Sort of like how our brains control all of our automatic functions as well as being our consciousness, and can still keep the automatic processes functioning even if parts that affect our personality and ability to make conscious decisions become damaged or are missing.

For the updates, do you mean similar to how Star Trek sends messages through subspace – so the signal’s been travelling for all that time and has met up with them? That would make sense.

[Dave]

Also, I did not know there was a sitcom called ALF! I do now.

Remember ALF? He’s back, in JMC form.

[si]

Also, I did not know there was a sitcom called ALF!

Youngsters today. Do they teach them nothing?

[RunawayTrain]

Youngsters today. Do they teach them nothing?

Apparently not! Most of it was literally before my time … but then so was the beginning of Red Dwarf so I guess that’s no excuse ;) I’m going to blame it on growing up without a TV and then no Freeview channel showing it 20+ years later (which is how I got into Star Trek).

It actually looks quite interesting, hmm.

[Ridley]

Looking interesting is the best ALF’s got.

[Unrumble]

Holly (and Gordon, and their equivalents on other ships)

Awesome his intellect, I tell ya. How come he’s such a genius? Don’t ask me.

[By Jove its holmes]

OT: it’s only been weeks but I already miss the days when people he’d banned would run to here and say “Who’s a Dictator? Don’t Ask Sebby P., Ask Me!”

[tombow]

I’ve just been wondering whether Norm’s Holly ever interacted with Bob’s Kryten. I guess it would have had to have been in S8 if they did.

My auntie had a teddy of Alf but I never really knew what he was. I’m guessing the show was E.T. influenced.

[clem]

I’ve just been wondering whether Norm’s Holly ever interacted with Bob’s Kryten. I guess it would have had to have been in S8 if they did.

The only instance I can think of is in Nanarchy, when Kryten welcomes Holly back online. Holly doesn’t recognise him and asks if his face is like that because of a cheap razor.

[Ian Symes]

Nanarchy was the first time. It was a joke about Holly not recognising Kryten because of his senility, which always struck me as odd because these two incarnations of the characters wouldn’t necessarily have recognised each other, even though they are in fact the same characters that knew each other in the episode Kryten and throughout III-V.

[RunawayTrain]

I’ve just been wondering whether Norm’s Holly ever interacted with Bob’s Kryten. I guess it would have had to have been in S8 if they did.

The only instance I can think of is in Nanarchy, when Kryten welcomes Holly back online. Holly doesn’t recognise him and asks if his face is like that because of a cheap razor.

Oh, that made me snorfle – maybe Nanarchy is worth watching again just for that joke.

[Dave]

Nanarchy was the first time. It was a joke about Holly not recognising Kryten because of his senility, which always struck me as odd because these two incarnations of the characters wouldn’t necessarily have recognised each other, even though they are in fact the same characters that knew each other in the episode Kryten and throughout III-V.

I always felt the same, the casting issues confuse the joke.

[Dave]

I’ve just been wondering whether Norm’s Holly ever interacted with Bob’s Kryten. I guess it would have had to have been in S8 if they did.

On top of Nanarchy there’s also Promised Land.

[tombow]

actually when I heard that joke it never occurred to me till now that the two Hollys are actually the same.

[evilmorwen]

I just wondered whether Norm and David Ross’s Kryten even had a scene together and checked. Holly drops out of the narrative – and doesn’t have any more lines – in “Kryten” after they arrive on the Nova 5. But of course there’s that beautiful moment in the cleaning montage.

[RunawayTrain]

Not an in-universe question, but was there ever a fan edit of Holoship with the cut scenes added back in?

[Pete Part Three]

I gave it a go a while back. https://www.ganymede.tv/forums/topic/holoship-xtended/

[RunawayTrain]

I gave it a go a while back. https://www.ganymede.tv/forums/topic/holoship-xtended/

Thanks, and the videos are still up! I’ll have a watch later :D

[By Jove its holmes]

Why doesn’t someone follow Rimmer’s prescription and give Trump two hours of W.O.O.?

[Quinn: Clochebusters World Champion]

If his covid gets any worse that’s basically what his body will do to him anyway

[Dave]

Where did they get the three gingham dresses from?

[By Jove its holmes]

it makes sense that there would be a machine that makes clothes on board in case uniforms etc. are damaged.

[Dave]

Presumably it’s where Rimmer-Lister gets his Captain Emerald costume from too.

[Author]

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