What do you expect from Titan?

[Rushy]

As we are so close to release, I’m curious to know what other fans are hoping/thinking they’ll get out of this new book. Any predictions about the tone, the story?

Topic

[tombow]

[Moonlight]

It is a tragedy that Rob can’t be here to read our arguing and genital torture memes.

[Dax101]

We got our first review of Red Dwarf: Titan
https://www.express.co.uk/showbiz/tv-radio/2224698/i-read-new-red-dwarf-book

[Moonlight]

Welp, time for me to tune the fuck out for the next 12 days. I already know the gist and that I’ll like it, and outside that I want to know, as the wise Seargeant Schutlz said many a year ago, nothing.

Do you have that reference in England? I’m not translating it.

[clem]

We got our first review of Red Dwarf: Titan
https://www.express.co.uk/showbiz/tv-radio/2224698/i-read-new-red-dwarf-book

All very positive. 

I don’t suppose Holly will be in the book much if it’s mainly set off the ship, and he’ll be the non-senile pre-radiation leak version anyway. But if they’ve managed to include Cat and Kryten somehow I guess anything is possible. 

[Rushy]

Welp, time for me to tune the fuck out for the next 12 days. 

Try 12 weeks… or however long it takes for Amazon to bring me my actual physical copy. I’m not reading this from the screen!

[Technopeasant]

I just don’t like to spend half the bloody book in some weird surrealist landscape where all the jokes have about forty layers to them, and each chapter requires half a minute of figuring out where they are, what they’re doing, who they’re with and why. 
I don’t mind doing that in moderation, but for every few chapters like that, I would enjoy some larking about on the ship. And then do something else. That’s what worked so well about the show format. You’d have a Better than Life, and then you’d have a Thanks for the Memory. 

Exactly this. There’s no cosyness to the novels once they leave the game.

[Doomitron]

Might be up to personal preference but one thing I like about the novels is they take the setting and situation pretty seriously, in the show it seems like a fun adventure most of the time but I don’t think I’d describe anything in the books as cozy at any point.

[Rushy]

It’s also about variety. A third of the book takes place in the video game.

(After Infinity already spent a fair few chapters there)

Then you have Marooned/Garbage World. Then White Hole and half of Polymorph take place during the Garbage World segment. 

Maybe it’s some form of neurodiversity in me, but I’d like them to just have a (shorter) adventure and then a time skip. It can be a dark, brutal adventure and it can tie into the next adventure, but there should be a sense of “okay, we did this, now we’re moving on”.

That’s one thing I liked about Last Human. They go somewhere, they get back into Starbug, they fly off. And you don’t know how long it takes until the next adventure happens. Could be next week, could be next month. I like that sense of journey. 

Everything in BTL and Backwards feels unnecessarily crammed together. Kryten in particular suffers from this, because he has no time to develop whatsoever. He is in David Ross mode for the entire first two books. Then in Last Human and Backwards, he jumps to series 6 Kryten. 

[Moonlight]

Kryten in particular suffers from this, because he has no time to develop whatsoever. He is in David Ross mode for the entire first two books. Then in Last Human and Backwards, he jumps to series 6 Kryten. 

I mean, in fairness, the first two novels are both pre-Series IV, whereas both third novels are post-VI. I can understand the desire to have the character immediately conform to how the audience would expect at that point in a way that wouldn’t happen if they’d more gradually written novels alongside the show’s run.

[Doomitron]

It’s also about variety. A third of the book takes place in the video game.

Be false advertising if it weren’t, that is its title. Kind of like how I do expect Titan to take place predominately on Titan.

[Technopeasant]

Might be up to personal preference but one thing I like about the novels is they take the setting and situation pretty seriously, in the show it seems like a fun adventure most of the time but I don’t think I’d describe anything in the books as cozy at any point.

I mean, it’s definitely lonely but there are worse fates than being trapped in a comfortable existence with essentially limitless resources and never having to work again. Until the genetic mutants and killer robots showed up.

[Doomitron]

But everyone you loved is dead and your only companions are an advanced ChatGPT, the necromanced AI of the worst person you know and a stupid one-dimensional narcissist. Realistically I think most people who top themselves pretty quick, but its dependent on the person as evidenced here.

[loadoftottnumb]

Taking into account the info we have already (hopefully it’s ok to mention what’s in the teaser vids) I expect

A self contained story set mostly on Titan in the Red Dwarf universe, one to the side, pre-accident. 

There will be characters called Dave Lister and Arnold Rimmer, based on the two we know from Grant/Doug Naylor. 

Kryten will be there, easy enough to do with the different universe thing, they meet him early on. There will be a Holly character, possibly female, based on the one/two we know. 

There will be a ‘Cat’ but this is the one I’m most intrigued by. When first discussing Titan and not knowing what format it would be I thought it might be a human character with cat like qualities, maybe called Cat as it’s short for ‘Cathisius’ or something. 

Kochanski will be prominent. 

I expect we’ll see different versions of old friends, hopefully not all of them called Frank this time (a teaser vid is hopeful there)

I suspect there will be a lot of humour, some horror and some new villains to overcome.

[Dax101]

The audiobook is also available to buy on 
https://xigxag.co.uk/audiobook/red-dwarf-titan-9781399636124/

Infact there is a 3 min sample of the audiobook up on there now. Nothing particularly spoilery. 

[Spare Hand One]

The audiobook is also available to buy on 
https://xigxag.co.uk/audiobook/red-dwarf-titan-9781399636124/

Infact there is a 3 min sample of the audiobook up on there now. nothing particulaly spoilery. It has an infinity style opening to it

This is great. Feels classic.

[Technopeasant]

But everyone you loved is dead and your only companions are an advanced ChatGPT, the necromanced AI of the worst person you know and a stupid one-dimensional narcissist. Realistically I think most people who top themselves pretty quick, but its dependent on the person as evidenced here.

Lister was already estranged from everything/everyone he knew and loved after the pub crawl left him stranded. It’s possible the trauma would compound, but equally possible Lister was better positioned than most to handle the transition. As for the AI dig, Lister has never seemed inclined to see Holly or Rimmer as less than 100% sentient, so I don’t think that applies.

There will be a ‘Cat’ but this is the one I’m most intrigued by. When first discussing Titan and not knowing what format it would be I thought it might be a human character with cat like qualities, maybe called Cat as it’s short for ‘Cathisius’ or something. 

I vaguely recall Rob mentioning something about accelerated evolution or something.

[tombow]

[clem]

I vaguely recall Rob mentioning something about accelerated evolution or something.

Yeah he did say something like that, and that Express review mentions the Cat in the sewers. Hmm. 

Red Dwarf Titan 2: The Secret of the Ooze

[JimReaper]

My guess at the plot?

3 million years in the far future a sinister antagonist has erased “our” Rimmer and Lister from existence. Needing to restore / repair the timeline (to preserve the remnant of the human race) Kryten and Cat travel back before the accident to ensure events more or less line up with before… only to find that the same forces that caused the trouble in the far future are at play on Titan too.

Told mostly from the perspective of young Lister and young Rimmer, it serves as a prequel / alt origin story, while older Kryten and Cat’s presence allows it to also be a sequel.

[Technopeasant]

Personally I don’t think so, given the explicit universe one to the side framing. It doesn’t sound like the idea was a time travel event creating the partition, outside of the message from the future tidbit.

[Dave]

the explicit universe

This is a great denomination for the new Rob Grant timeline. 

[Technopeasant]

Rated NC-17 for intense genital torture.

[tombow]

Ok what is this thing of spelling skidaddle “skedaddle”

[tombow]

Actually maybe it was always skedaddle 

[Technopeasant]

[Moonlight]

[tombow]

I was planning to read it all tonight but it’s such a fast paced, frantic story, with so much going on, I’m finding I need breaks to take it all in. 

[tombow]

I’ve said this before, but I wish Dwarf had a novel franchise where other authors had written novels/radio plays etc. There’s been loads of comedy sci fi/fantasy authors over the past 30 years trying to match stuff like Dwarf and Discworld, it would be cool to see other author’s take on the boys.

[Rushy]

While Doug’s quality control has always been spotty, I can’t blame him for not wanting the franchise to be watered down like so many others. I like that a new Dwarf release is a special thing. There shouldn’t be a new book or an audio drama every few months. 

[Moonlight]

I think we should have a Salmon of Doubt type book for the movie.

[International Debris]

Yeah, I think a lot of the appeal of Red Dwarf is the authorial voice(s) of Rob and Doug. It’s not easy to judge the impact of the guest writers on VII and VIII, given how wildly those series veer from usual Dwarf at times, and how bad they frequently are anyway, but I do think it’s telling that the episodes with guest writers are almost all among the very lowest rated episodes. When we do get spinoff stories – some of the tie-in books, the Smegazine comics – they usually miss the tone by some margin.

It’s not like Doctor Who or Star Trek, which always had a constant rotation of writers.

[paintings]

I think we should have a Salmon of Doubt type book for the movie.

Heck, no. “A Salmon of Doubt” was a huge disappointment: a handful of reasonable items that had not been published widely (e.g. only appearing in a local newspaper), bulked out with unfinished drafts retrieved from his hard disc that varied from below-par to embarrassing.

I don’t want to read a book like that ever again.

[Frank Smeghammer]

I disagree to be fair. As a great man once said, we want Red Dwarf flying out of our buttskis.

New Dwarf from Rob and/or Doug is special but to be honest, Titan might seriously be the end of the road this time. I don’t think Doug has any more to make and Rob isn’t with us anymore.

Expand the IP. Go full pre-Disney Star Wars and have thousands upon thousands of confusing layers of canon, each more contradicting than the last.

We have no choice but to water it down because there’s very little left to share out. I don’t think anything will overshadow true Rob Dwarf, Doug Dwarf, and Rob & Doug Dwarf. They are sacred. Now give me some pale imitations. I need it.

[Dave]

I don’t think Doug has any more to make

I hope that the novel adaptation of the abandoned special (involving young Lister and Rimmer) happens at some point. 

[Moonlight]

Let’s just all write our own space comedies. I already did so I win. As you were.

I hope that the novel adaptation of the abandoned special (involving young Lister and Rimmer) happens at some point. 

Still waiting for Doug to realize radio exists. You could do Series XV.

[Warbodog]

I’m also on team quality over quantity, but that said, I wouldn’t have minded Doug cranking out some audios with co-writers for the chance of just one classic per batch of six, any shit ones would be easy to ignore and decanonise. There’s been plenty of time though, so it probably won’t happen now.

[Ian Symes]

any shit ones would be easy to ignore and decanonise

Have you met this fanbase?

[Flap Jack]

I don’t think Doug has any more to make and Rob isn’t with us anymore.

What makes you say that? Doug was quite famously writing a new special quite recently until it was cancelled, and I believe he’s said he’d be open to doing a novel.

If companies are willing to commission new Red Dwarf in other media and Doug is still interested in writing new Red Dwarf, then it should just be Doug (and maybe Andrew Marshall, if Titan is regarded as sufficient proof-of-chops) for as long as he’s willing. An expanded universe of spin-offs would need the approval of Doug/GNP to happen anyway.

[tombow]

I disagree to be fair. As a great man once said, we want Red Dwarf flying out of our buttskis.
New Dwarf from Rob and/or Doug is special but to be honest, Titan might seriously be the end of the road this time. I don’t think Doug has any more to make and Rob isn’t with us anymore.
Expand the IP. Go full pre-Disney Star Wars and have thousands upon thousands of confusing layers of canon, each more contradicting than the last.
We have no choice but to water it down because there’s very little left to share out. I don’t think anything will overshadow true Rob Dwarf, Doug Dwarf, and Rob & Doug Dwarf. They are sacred. Now give me some pale imitations. I need it.

The indie sci fi series Fermi’s Progress is written by a Dwarf fan who’s written about the show on Den of Geek and stated as Dwarf inspired. They’re all cheap on kindle. I might try them at some point. 

[Podey]

I would never want anyone to ask because it would be insensitive but I’d LOVE to know if Doug ever reads Titan. Must be bizarre seeing a version of your baby out in the world that you had no say in, for presumably the first time in his career with Red Dwarf.

[Dave]

I would never want anyone to ask because it would be insensitive but I’d LOVE to know if Doug ever reads Titan. Must be bizarre seeing a version of your baby out in the world that you had no say in, for presumably the first time in his career with Red Dwarf.

By Rob’s Series VII logic, it would be like the woman you married went back and had an affair with her ex-husband.

[Warbodog]

By Rob’s Series VII logic, it would be like the woman you married went back and had an affair with her ex-husband.

Hmm… but would she let him sit in the corner and watch their writing process?

What the hell is happening to this place

[Podey]

Are you suggesting they “bookolded” him?

[Starbugger]

My guess at the plot?
3 million years in the far future a sinister antagonist has erased “our” Rimmer and Lister from existence. Needing to restore / repair the timeline (to preserve the remnant of the human race) Kryten and Cat travel back before the accident to ensure events more or less line up with before… only to find that the same forces that caused the trouble in the far future are at play on Titan too.
Told mostly from the perspective of young Lister and young Rimmer, it serves as a prequel / alt origin story, while older Kryten and Cat’s presence allows it to also be a sequel.

Red Dwarf: The Kelvin Timeline?

[Technopeasant]

The indie sci fi series Fermi’s Progress is written by a Dwarf fan who’s written about the show on Den of Geek and stated as Dwarf inspired. They’re all cheap on kindle. I might try them at some point. 

Also Ben Paddon’s Jump Leads.

Might need to check out Fermi’s Progress.

[sleepey]

Are you suggesting they “bookolded” him?

Gold star

[tombow]

Space Captain Smith is basically an Ace Rimmer series

[Rushy]

I would never want anyone to ask because it would be insensitive but I’d LOVE to know if Doug ever reads Titan. Must be bizarre seeing a version of your baby out in the world that you had no say in, for presumably the first time in his career with Red Dwarf.

By Rob’s Series VII logic, it would be like the woman you married went back and had an affair with her ex-husband.

Doug said in his foreword to Last Human that he looked forward to reading Backwards, so I’m not sure he has the same hang-ups as Rob.

[Podey]

True, but he hadn’t written the bulk of the entire show without Rob at that point so it probably still felt more like their baby than his.

[Author]

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