JamesTC

[JamesTC]

The story here is that a victim of sexual assault took 20 years to get justice. And even then had to go public to help other victims and to highlight the systematic protection that perpetrators of sexual assault have had for far too long.

A Red Dwarf episode from three decades ago is an irrelevance.

[JamesTC]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thirteenth_floor

[JamesTC]

Series VIII has the best deleted scenes. Series V has by far the worst (aside from Back to Reality).

[JamesTC]

>Bras and periods are things you’d imagine he’d have some idea about, given the crew of the Nova 5.

LISTER: How come you don’t know what bras are? What about the women on the Nova 5?
KRYTEN: Well, when I cleaned up my cache files, sir, I erased my lingerie database. I didn’t see there’s be much call for it, unless we had a fancy dress party, and you wanted to go as Herman Goering.

[JamesTC]

You could throw loads of deaths and resurrections in. The whole crew of the Enterprise D and Voyager in Cause and Effect and Timeless respectively. Add Year of Hell and Yesterday’s Enterprise too. Plus the episode Twilight and E Squared for the NX-01 crew.

Most of the deaths and resurrections are part of particular plots rather than a character being killed off and then coming back much later so I would say they don’t really count. When it is set up by the plot in a purposeful way then it is fine by me. Tasha Yar and Daniels come to mind as the exceptions although Tasha Yar was only resurrected as part of a specific plot.

[JamesTC]

>Were the last few seasons needed to get there or could Doug have just gone with specials since 2009 do you think though?

Absolutely they were needed in order to get the tone and style of modern Dwarf right. And I don’t think you could jump from BTE to an audience based special. I feel like now we are in the happy medium of what Dave wanted after BTE, what Doug wanted and what the fans wanted.

[JamesTC]

I thought this thread was going to suggest that Back in the Red, Back to Earth and The Promised Land are the Red Dwarf cinematic trilogy.

I definitely think that specials are the way to go forward from now on. And it was a sentiment echoed by others when leaving the recording. Red Dwarf has had sixty-odd single episodes so now, as it is in its final few years, a few big stories are the best way to go.

[JamesTC]

>Why Generations and Insurrection?

I explained Insurrection. To add to that, it is the story when Riker/Troi get back together. Generations is an important chapter in Picard’s story in terms of his family.

[JamesTC]

If you want a crash course in the Star Trek episodes that are likely to be relevant in Picard then I’d recommend the following:
TNG:
Datalore
The Measure of a Man
Q Who
The Best of Both Worlds
Family
Brothers
I, Borg
Descent
All Good Things…
Star Trek VII: Generations
Star Trek VIII: First Contact
Star Trek IX: Insurrection
Star Trek X: Nemesis

Voyager:
Scorpion
The Gift
The Raven
Dark Frontier
Collective
Author, Author
Endgame

Essentially a crash course in Seven of Nine, Picard, Hugh, Data and the Borg. Thrown in Author, Author too as it is relevant for the “synthetic rights”. Insurrection I added as it has similarities to Picard (synthetic losing control and Picard rebelling against Starfleet).

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>Hard-light Rimmer with Hattie’s Holly? Definitely non-canon.

The flashback in Blue confirms that he wore the puffy blue outfit back on Red Dwarf.

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I’ve just remembered an odd one from when I was a kid from Series II.

RIMMER: They don’t do they? You say “keep an eye on that lamb” and they do. They sit there for three hours and watch it burn.

I didn’t make the connection to him cooking a lamb and just imagined Rimmer asking the Skutters to take care of a live lamb and then returning to find it on fire.

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Backwards Forwards Backwards

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I think it would be good to have a general topic solely dedicated towards debating Breakfast, considering how important it is and how likely it is that the first meal of the day will affect the vast majority of members here.

Anyway, today Muesli has refused breakfast an opportunity of holding a “yes” or “no” vote on its dried bananas deal. Muesli is clearly a “marmite” breakfast that is either loved or loathed, depending on which side of the debate you sit on. However people should, in any case not be bullied into deciding on Breakfast until full scrutiny of the dried bananas deal is complete. Who knows then what will happen in the next ten days before we are due to have breakfast on the 31 October (if we even do now). Anyone who claims to know where this will end is lying.

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Honeymooners in Hawaii would stand on the peak of Mauna Kea, gazing at sunsets stamped with the slogan. Commuters in London, stuck in traffic jams, would peer through the grey drizzle and gape at the Pepsi constellation. The few primitive tribes still untouched by civilisation in the jungles of South America would look up at the heavens, and certainly not think about drinking Coke.

This will sure as hell sell a lot of cans of a certain fizzy drink.

[JamesTC]

I think Future Echoes, Queeg, Polymorph, Dimension Jump, Back to Reality and Gunmen of the Apocalypse is a fair description as the best episode from each series even if I don’t personally agree with 4 of them.

I’d go for:
Series VII: Tikka to Ride
Series VIII: Cassandra*
Series IX: Back to Earth Director’s Cut
Series X: The Beginning*
Series XI: Give & Take
Series XII: Skipper

*not my favourite episode from these series but I think the one that would best fit such a release.

[JamesTC]

What I take exception to is the wording. They described it (and continue with later releases) as “Limited Edition Packaging”. This indicates that the release will later get a non-limited simple release later on but they have confirmed that they have no plans to rerelease Season 12. If they changed the wording for al future releases to “Limited Edition” then it’d be fine but they don’t seem arsed.

For what it is worth they did appear to be taken aback by the demand for Season 12. Russel Minton (head of Who on DVD/BR now) said he had to fight for this release and used the strong DVD sales as an indicator but the higher-ups still didn’t have high expectations.

I wouldn’t be surprised if the plan is to wait until they are all out and then rerelease them in complete Doctor box sets (perhaps splitting Tom Baker’s era into two sets).

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I was thinking about Force of Nature a few weeks ago.

It completely fails in terms of trying to make people pay attention to environmental issues and even in-universe the future episodes just pay it a little lip service or ignore it completely…

…just like when governments try to “go green” and it is ignored within a few months.

Force of Nature being a complete disaster makes it a perfect analogy for the fight against global warming.

“What? Warp drive is destroying the universe? Ahh we’ll be fine”

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They weren’t in a romantic relationship though. There were the occasional jealous moments in Season 3 (at which point she was the equivalent of a human in their twenties age wise) but a lot of that came across more as an overprotective parent than a jealous lover.

Things don’t seem to have gone well for Jennifer Lien since she left Voyager. It was very harsh how she was written out too. They needed to get rid of a cast member when bringing in Seven of Nine so they decided to get rid of Harry Kim but then he won a sexist man alive poll so the network wanted him to be kept.

[JamesTC]

>In 2 I’d always get stuck at the Wing Fortress boss.

Me too. I could only do that boss by getting Super Sonic which was a pain. That boss and the Metropolis Zone 3 boss can go to hell.

I’ve never found the Doomsday Zone to be too difficult but I only played that from Mega Collection Plus. On the Mega Drive I only ever had Sonic and Knuckles. As a kid I never even knew that Sonic had a different ending as I always preferred playing through as Knuckles so I only ever got the Mecha Sonic final boss.

I adore Blue Spheres so I always go for the 14 emeralds.

One thing I am amazed by is how glitchy Sonic 3 and Knuckles is. Never noticed despite playing Sonic and Knuckles so much as a kid. It is all due to being a rushed game. There is a great YouTube channel which goes through all the glitches in the game. You can find it if you search Sonic 3 and Knuckles Glitches and Oversights (turn subtitles on for explanations). I would highly recommend the video for Lava Reef Zone Act 1. The mega glitch needs to be seen to be believed.

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My two earliest memories are of in and around my fifth birthday. First it was receiving Series III Byte 1 on VHS and then a few days later coming downstairs in the morning to find a VHS player of my own along with a copy of The Best Bits of Mr Bean.

Back when I was a kid it was Red Dwarf and Mr Bean as my two loves. Watched them on VHS on an endless loop. Now I’ve not seen Mr Bean since it came out on DVD which probably would have been around 8 or 9 years ago. Not sure why.

I now have a deep regret that I got rid of my Mr Bean VHS collection. Sure I would never watch them again but I will never watch my Red Dwarf VHS collection again yet that has pride of place on the shelves. I feel like I’ve nonchalantly gotten rid of a big piece of my childhood just because now the DVD of the series and two films take up less space than two videos.

I really need to re-watch them all and see if I can relive that big bit of my childhood. I think I can. I’m sure Mr Bean played into why I loved Twin Peaks Season 3 so much.

Also fuck the Reliant Robin.

[JamesTC]

Hoverbeds are so common that in the future they refer to all hospital beds the same way whether they hover or not.

Like how you “tape” something on DVR even though you aren’t using a videotape.

[JamesTC]

>I think Taskmaster is ahead of Dwarf now, ratings-wise, isn’t it?

I’d seen this mentioned before and just accepted it but now I’ve had a look at the BARB.

All 7-day viewing:

Cured: 1.2m
Taskmaster S05E05: 0.635m

Siliconia: 1.179m
Taskmaster S05E06: 0.652m

Timewave: 1.189m
Taskmaster S05E07: 0.593m

Mechocracy: 0.973m
Taskmaster S05E08: 0.875m (the finale)

M-Corp: 0.901m
Skipper: 0.846m

Red Dwarf also does a little better in 28-day viewing and repeats (marginal but noticeable).

Taskmaster Series 6 and 7 have upped a little on that. A few of the episodes go above 1m in 7-day viewing:
Taskmaster S06E01: 1.238m
Taskmaster S06E10: 1.109m
Taskmaster S07E01: 1.131m

I’d say they are roughly at the same level of success now. Which is great as they are both two of the best shows on TV.

[JamesTC]

>I wonder if the Sliders made it home?

They did. Several times from memory. Prime Earth was eventually taken over by Kromaggs (some evil alien that were originally just in one episode but became the main thrust of the show for some reason). I think it was around the same time that Wade Wells is written out the show offscreen by being taken to a Kromagg breeding camp and being brutally raped repeatedly. This is genuinely what happens.

>Voyager right until the very end persisted in being an adventure of the week series.

The annoying thing about Voyager is that the first couple of seasons have a nice throughline that means it doesn’t just feel like adventure of the week. It culminates in Basics which both brings together all the ongoing storylines together nicely but also wipes the slate clean and leads to, for the most part, the beginning of the disconnected nature of the show.

The thing is the later seasons of Voyager have better individual episodes overall but the first two seasons feel more rewarding watching together.

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>Fun fact – I didn’t create “The X Files”.

You would say that, wouldn’t you? All a bit too convenient.

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>So when are tickets available?

I think the person to ask is Robert Llewellyn. Best thing to do is tweet him.

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The Orville gets better and tones down the comedy very quickly. It is just Star Trek with the odd joke to pull in the punters. At times I wonder if I should just rewatch DS9 instead but I am happy somebody is trying to keep the spirit of the show.

Stopped watching Discovery after three or four episodes. Most of the characters were unlikeable pricks which meant I didn’t care for anyone outside Saru (who was interesting). When a TNG character dies in Season 1 in a stupid scenario with a tar monster, I am sad because the character was likeable. When a Discovery character was mauled by an alien in Season 1, I was delighted because they were so hateful.

I do wonder if the Discovery writing team have ever seen Equinox. Somehow I think not. Maybe they read the Memory Alpha page.

Then again it seems nobody has seen any Star Trek before Discovery. Hollywood Report is currently claiming Discovery touching on faith and how it conflicts with technology is an “untouched topic” in Star Trek. Which is like saying Lister loving curry is an untouched topic in Red Dwarf.

[JamesTC]

The opening to Season 11 was wretched. Just like the mythology episodes of Season 10. That said the season as a whole was an incredible return to form. One of the best seasons of The X Files. Even the finale managed to be an entertaining mythology episode and possibly ended the show better than any previous finale. The Mandella Effect episode is the funniest episode of The X Files.

You might not want to take my opinion though. I really liked Season 9 and was disappointed they couldn’t continue with Reyes and Doggett. And not just because I fancied Annabeth Gish and think Robert Patrick is great even when he isn’t made of a mimetic poly-alloy.

I have recently come to the conclusion that the best season of The X Files is The Lone Gunmen Season 1.

[JamesTC]

>Upscaling only goes so far, colour grading only goes so far and enhancing certain VFX shots only goes so far.

My copy of Season 19 hasn’t arrived yet but the Season 12 release looked superb. Massive step up from the DVD. It is the definitive way of watching Season 12 and will never look better. At under £40, it is an absolute bargain IMO.

All of this (as well as the Dwarf release) means they have an HD version of these shows for broadcast and streaming and pay for it using physical releases (as with TNG).

>Whoa, where did you hear all this?! If that’s true, it’s good to know. Given how long that’ll take, I wonder where the Blu ray format will be by the end of it.

Season 26 has had features filmed for it and Season 10 has been mentioned by the Australian Distributor as coming up (I think it has also been mentioned as having features filmed). Season 26 was mooted for the end of the year. Season 14 has been mentioned on Zeta Minor by somebody who had previously provided information on Season 19 and 18 being next.

They can only make around 3 or 4 per year by the production team’s estimates. At 4 per year it will take 6 years for this range to complete.

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>I’d kind of prefer if BBC Video focused on making animated reconstructions of missing episodes for DVD (as with Power of the Daleks, Shada and The Macra Terror) instead of this. Plenty to cover there.

The animated releases are done by a different team to the Blu-Ray sets (with some crossover of personnel). One doesn’t have a bearing on the other aside from avoiding each other in the release window.

They have made a commitment to release the first 26 seasons. They are already filming extras for releases way into the future. Season 17 has had stuff filmed for it even though that won’t be out until likely 2020 at the earliest (2019 is Season 18, 10, 26 with 14 also rumoured).

The release order makes sense to me. The first season they wanted a popular set of stories with the most popular classic Doctor. It makes sense to go for the shortest and first. Then with the second release, they want to show off the format so it makes sense to go for the one with the most existing film which can be presented as true HD. From then on it is about varying it up with lesser seasons amongst more popular seasons (a less popular Tom Baker with a popular McCoy) and also about tackling the more troublesome seasons later (hence Season 10 being the first Pertwee).

They definitely need to stop referring to it as Limited Edition Packaging. I’d dare say they’ll wait until everything is out and release complete sets for each Doctor in none limited packaging.

[JamesTC]

Let’s ask the What-If machine.

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Was it at the last DJ when Doug went into more detail on this?

From memory, he said it was roundabout 2002 he went to the BBC and pitched a new series but there were two reasons it didn’t happen. One reason was that it needed to be tied into the funding of the film (as the original agreement for funding for the film from the BBC had run out) and the BBC no longer wanted to contribute to the film. The other reason was that Doug felt that any commissioner would not get credit if a new series of Red Dwarf was a success so they preferred to make new shows. I imagine the latter reason was a bit of bitterness from Doug.

[JamesTC]

It all goes out the window when Sam encounters an animal.

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They seem to be a little contradictory and confusing in how the leaping works in Quantum Leap.

Watching the episode What Price Gloria right now and Al explains that he sees the person Sam has lept into whenever he is speaking to Sam (Al is letching on the attractive woman he has lept into) and in the waiting room he sees Sam.

It seems the only person who sees himself as Sam is Sam (aside from when he looks in a mirror).

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I’m hoping it is Blue Midget.

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I remembered this thread and decided to order the book to go along with the Blu-Ray set I have on the way next week.

Pretty expensive at £34 but will hopefully be worth it.

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In the old Lee and Herring show This Morning With Richard Not Judy they had a brief flash on screen of things you should try.

I’ve just been looking at the old Lee and Herring website and they have the first four episodes of these listed. One such entry is “Why not try being in Red Dwarf but still being a nice person?”.

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I hope they try to do it like Series VII. Have the dead cast member appear in just half the episodes to ease the transition.

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I like it when the vampire needs a poo.

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>Budget is a major reason for this happening, as they will often produce one master for all markets. If they REALLY wanted to, they could make it all work. The same goes for 5.1 surround mixes as well, but that’s another story…….

It sounds like that won’t happen next time. Over on another forum when talking about the possible upcoming Classic Doctor Who Blu-Ray season sets a member of the Restoration Team has stated that there would be separate 50i and 60i releases, depending on territory.

I think with Doug Naylor ensuring the quality of the release before signing off on them, we hopefully won’t get a screw up like that.

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>Everything feels just a mild bit dreadful at the slowed pace.

If you are watching Dear Dave, it is supposed to be like that.

[JamesTC]

I was impressed with the studio sections of Shada look superb on the recent Blu-Ray release. Stand well alongside the HD location footage and animation.

It all depends if they do it right. Get the frame rate correct and do some colour correction and grading and then it will be the best Red Dwarf will ever look and a well worth purchase for us fans who watch these episodes so much. The frame rate is where I am anticipating the major fuck up. Doctor Who Series 1-4 came out 4% slower because of the frame rate issue. That was initially made for America though so hopefully this initially being for the UK market will mean it doesn’t happen here.

[JamesTC]

The Blu-Ray now looks like it is going full speed ahead but with a slight difference. Now rather than individual releases it is all 8 series. Currently listed as 16 discs and out October according to Amazon and Zoom.

Get your pre-order in with Zoom now as it is currently listed as £40 (and you can use SIGNUP10 to get 10% off) and that seems like a misprice. They might not honour it but I think they have honoured misprices in the past.

[JamesTC]

They’ve been down as that date for a while now so don’t put too much stock in it being that date.

That being said the Blu-Ray releases are back on. Doug tweeted in a reply on the 12th of November: “They’re increased the budget and are trying to convince me the uprezing will look much better this time. They’re also throwing in a colour grade something they wouldn’t agree to first time around.”

[JamesTC]

Bump to remind people that this is up now.

Listened to the first half. Always nice to hear from Chris Barrie. Considering the DVD never had a documentary it is nice to have this even if it isn’t as insightful as we might hope for (as I guess it needs to appeal to people who are only vaguely familiar with the show).

[JamesTC]

SNACK ME A KIPPER

Snacky becomes the next Ace Rimmer. Meanwhile Kryten takes up ballet lessons.

[JamesTC]

The spin-off range everybody should buy is Jago and Litefoot.

[JamesTC]

Them not doing adult stories has nothing to do with the quality.

I think it is a perception fuelled by the fact that the early days had their two best audio exclusive companions in the form of Evelyn and Charley. Everything kind of melds into one with so much.

It also had some of their stone cold classics like Spare Parts, Jubilee, The Chimes of Midnight, The One Doctor, The Holy Terror and Colditz.

I’d say that all through Big Finish, aside from an off year or two (a quick look and I’d say 2011 and 2012 are it), they tend to have 2 real classics, 8 or 9 great stories and 2 or 3 not so good stories per year. It is also difficult to split things since they moved to the trilogy format in 2009.

You can list some classics from after 2005 and they are as good but just don’t have the awareness of their existence and just get lost in the mass. Since 2005 we’ve had Night Thoughts, The Reaping, Circular Time, The Wrong Doctors and 1963: Fanfare for the Common Men which are all worthy of standing alongside the best.

Also as they’ve expanded they have has classics like Peri and the Piscon Paradox (one of my favourite Doctor Who stories ever made), Solitaire, The Rocket Men, Return of the Rocket Men, The Scorchies, The Foe From the Future, The First Sontarans, An Ordinary Life, The Yes Men and The Black Hole to rattle off a few.

In terms of how I afford it: Well I wait for sales for most stuff. £6 a CD is the current norm plus postage. I justify by the fact that since 2012 it is the only way for me to get new Doctor Who which I think I will enjoy after losing interest in the TV show. After collecting for a few years I’m now only missing 15 main range stories aside from very new ones (I have up to story 223). I also steer well clear of any new series spin-offs aside from the odd one (Tenth Doc Vol 1 and Classic Doctor, New Monsters is it) as I’m not a fan of new stuff. Once I’m all caught up it will still be an expensive hobby but not eye watering all things considered, probably around £250 across a whole year.

[JamesTC]

The BBC is one person.

[JamesTC]

What if Doug Naylor invented the Fing-Longer?

[JamesTC]

Heil Hogey I’m Home:

Hogey the Roguey and Hitler-Bot move in next door to Rimmer and Lister. Hogey invites his boss for dinner but Hitler can’t make it so Lister has to pretend to be Hitler. Meanwhile Cat gets a tattoo.

Directed by Juliet May.

[Author]

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