Veni

[Veni]

Considering the documentary was free to watch, for me at least, I’m not complaining. However, I felt it was pretty bare bones in comparison with XI and XII, and obviously doesn’t hold a candle to X. I question the choice to have the first few words in it be Craig talking about getting a blowjob, but whatever.

The smeg ups were fun as always, felt like XI and XII with the quick, breakneck editing done in-between the bloopers, which I’m not a particular fan of. “Relative straight-fuck” and the exchange between Craig and Norman were absolute highlights.

The deleted scenes were all flab mostly, the worst one was definitely the Louvre one, which was painfully similar to the scripted and stilted lines from something like the “Archimedes” exchanges in Samsara where no actual person would talk like that. Luckily the final product was mostly avoid of such holdbacks. I think the best one would’ve been Rimmer coming across the cats holding the others at gunpoint, I and some others were wondering what was taking Rimmer so long to find them in the final cut, which was explained there. Plus, I thought it was funny too, so I could’ve done with it staying.

[Veni]

You bump this bullshit and gloss over this magnum opus?

What dream would you be mortified to have been recorded on the dream recorder

[Veni]

Plus we wouldn’t have been able to use material built for the previous series like the bunkroom, Kryten’s new makeup, the cast’s costumes, the science room. We’d had to build them all new and that would’ve limited the budget.

[Veni]

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

Without them we wouldn’t have this culture of new Red Dwarf being the norm, if we just had this special everybody would be bitching about the VIII cliffhanger getting resolved whereas now that Red Dwarf is just a normal thing again, we can have a fresh start.

[Veni]

Technically I’m not even paying to see this one

[Veni]

Yes, he has been used as one-dimensional comic relief, but there really isn’t any reason that a Cat focused story shouldn’t work if that’s what Doug decided to do. There’s actually a lot about the Cat we don’t know, there’s a whole history to him prior to meeting Lister and Rimmer that we know nothing about. That could be good to explore in the right setting, and meeting his own people after all this time could just well do that.

The main point is I don’t care much for the character to begin with, so unless the movie is able to make him sympathize with him in the movie itself, I’m not going to be bothered.

[Veni]

the problem for me is when the show straight-up plays to the audience. abit like a pantomime. which is great for the audience whose there. but not that interesting for those watching from home.

Its for this reason I can’t really rewatch the Holly bit of Skipper anymore, its so wanky its like what everybody at the time thought Back to Earth was (but wasn’t) where its just cheer after cheer. Its really too much, and unless you’ve been binge-watching and understand Holly’s been gone or you’re already aware of that, it seems so out of left field as well.

The Hollister return is done way better, you get a real quick cheer at the beginning and everything afterward feels incredibly standard so I, as a viewer as home, can hear the jokes without any obnoxious applauding.

[Veni]

I’d rather be the audience at home watching it on TV than the one at the studio, specifically in this case, where you’d (for most people) know a chuck of the plot but be completely oblivious to everything else that happens. That’d drive me mad.

[Veni]

I was more so referring to Cat’s, “Bye, bye, baldy,” remark in Queeg.

I definitely agree, though, Kryten in series VI is what made me really love the character, so he blows everyone else out of the water in that series if you ask me.

[Veni]

Related to the special, I really don’t care if it focuses on Cat, despite seemingly everybody else’s thoughts.

Yes, the felis sapiens are returning, and I think it’d be great for a Cat subplot to emerge with a possible love interest, but beyond that it should be a Lister story ala Waiting for God which focused on Lister (despite my prior claims it was a Cat-centric story when I ranked all the episodes, and even then I admitted I was bullshitting).

Cat is largely one-dimensional and a comic relief, yes, he has details related to him like his clothing, or certain traits and dislikes he may possess, but 90 minutes dedicated to him? God no.

People always moan about him being an asshole in XI and XII, he was literally, always an asshole. He’s a dick during Rimmer’s sendoff in Me2, he mocks Rimmer in Thanks for the Memory behind his back about how many times he’s had sex, he mocks Holly during his battle with Queeg (and don’t give me the entire crew weren’t behind him, this was after Holly had confronted them about not supporting him and Cat does it again anyway), he openly tells Lister he doesn’t give a shit about him in Backwards. Cat is a douchebag, that’s his character. If anything he’s way more sympathetic in Dave Dwarf cause he actually has flaws.

I don’t know, I never liked the character much to begin with anyway, so feel how you want to.

[Veni]

Resurrecting this thread was such a mistake, just depresses me looking at it now. I should really keep off the normal forums, just takes up my time and usually results in me making an ass of myself.

[Veni]

Ok me bringing up referencing American films, which clearly was a bad idea, aside. Red Dwarf really did make an appeal to international audiences during VII and VIII, it’s cut-and-dry. The whole reason for Remastered was due to Japanese markets, similar to the Blu-ray restoration.

Sorry if I seemed to take this personal, I just had a bad day and let things effect me easily.

[Veni]

Honestly I didn’t want a debate, was just throwing American centric references out there. Sorry to whoever took offense I guess.

[Veni]

I never called it an “American thing”, I even say it’s cheating cause it’s more spoken than the UK cause of a larger population. This is why I have to really watch what I say on forums or I get fifty messages misconstruing it.

I can see you’re of an older demographic, so you should understand as to how some aren’t going to recognize an entertainer who hasn’t been around since the 50s, like how Dean Martin isn’t well known and he’s a native to the US.

[Veni]

So I actually watched the finale and I was pretty insulted by it not gonna lie. Can’t see me every enjoying Doctor Who under this canon.

[Veni]

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lists_of_British_films

[Veni]

The point is they reference American films over British ones nearly everytime.

[Veni]

Yes you’re right, I believe it was The Last Day when dollarpounds was first said. In Marooned Lister finds Rimmer’s stack of money but he doesn’t refer to it as anything other than “20 grand.”

[Veni]

So the new tally is:

Series 11 – Trash
Series 12 – Just fucking bad

[Veni]

I’d be willing to bet most wouldn’t know that is was Laurel. They can have a thin guy and a big dude and they’d be able to put two and two together, but just him and most of them are going to be left clueless.

[Veni]

Excuse me, I’m having a stroke.

[Veni]

I assume it like a black and white 1940s noir, complete with wobbly backdrop and shaky steering wheel acting.

[Veni]

So the tally is:

Series 11 – Trash
Series 12 – Okay

[Veni]

How was series 12 overall

[Veni]

VII and VIII are mostly veiled in the attempt to sway international viewers (mainly American audiences) toward Red Dwarf. Tikka to Ride is definitely the most blatant in that, with its American-centric scenario, Kryten’s slang, alternate history presented which would fly over the heads of most Britons who would be mostly clueless as to who J. Edgar Hoover is, I’m sure.

Though its always had the eye for American pop culture, such as many of its film references pertaining to those from the States (namedropping Norman Bates from Psycho, “I’m off to see the wizard,” from The Wizard of Oz, Camille parodying Casablanca, showing Gone with the Wind on the lifts, Ace Rimmer’s entrance music referencing Top Gun, etc.), most captains in the show being Americans (Captain Hollister, Captain Platini, Ziggy Briceman), the waxdroids from Meltdown being ones most Americans would be familiar with (Elvis Presley, Marilyn Monroe, Abraham Lincoln, Al Capone, a Ku Klux Klan and a Hells Angels member). I’ll relent most wouldn’t recognize Laurel, but most are very aware who Laurel & Hardy are, it’s only having just him throws people off; Noël Coward is the only one they’d definitely wouldn’t know but Britons would.

The election in Mechocracy is absolutely modeled after an American one, with there being a President and Vice President. The language of Esperanto is more widespread in America than the UK, though that may be cheating as we’re a larger country and would be more likely to. Lister’s spacebike from series I flies both an American and British flag, not to mention his jacket bearing that of Wilma Flintstone in later series. Least we forget the mention of the NFL’s Cincinnati Bengals in Justice. The Skutters are members of the John Wayne fan club, the most famous American western actor of all time.

The Cat speaks in an American accent, specifically a James Brown-esque variant. Kryten, though Robert Llewellyn will often switch between calling it a Canadian one (even then, describing Canadian a mix between Scottish and American) and a Bostonian one, has been described as possessing an upper-crust transatlantic accent, even once joking maybe he was the only one invited to Red Dwarf USA cause they didn’t know he wasn’t an American.

We also get miscellaneous side-characters who speak in American dialects, Confidence is modeled after a New Yorker and a game show host; Epideme is played very similarly to Confidence in this regard but without the New York-flair; Blaize Falconburger is an American; etc.

In terms of VIII a massive push for global recognition was done, with several idents made for international audiences, with the most done for American audiences. Still do occasionally:

[Veni]

I tried taking a look at the home media releases on the Red Dwarf main page, however it seems really messed-up and beyond my frame of reference to really manage. I think it mainly stems from them all having categories in regions A, B, or C which complicates matters when you get to the Blu-ray releases and how you have situations like the I-VIII Blu-ray only being released in Japan and nowhere else in region A, but there being no convenient way to relay that information. Plus I’m unable to verify if the releases for region C concerning Back to Earth and XI are accurate, and assuming they are, I can’t find a release for X and XII since they’d surely have been included as well.

[Veni]

I’m not entirely familiar with how it was with the fanbase and the deleted scenes on the DVDs, but was it that those who regularly viewed Red Dwarf in the 90s were unable to view them until their home media releases in the 2000s?

Maybe they might be released on a big conclusive Red Dwarf I-[Insert Roman numeral here] collection somewhere at the end of the 2020s.

[Veni]

The main four being men adds to the theme of their total isolation from humanity, quite frankly. In quoting Ardal O’Hanlon, Dougal in Father Ted, “There’s something intrinsically sad about men without women.”

The separation Lister has from females plays into his longing to return home and have offspring, to settle down. Maybe he could manage being in deep space and manage to settle down with someone there with a Jim and Bexley, but he’s not able to for obvious reasons. As he says in Timeslides, “I want a life. This is worse than prison. In prison, you can look forward to getting out. I want to live. I want to meet people. I want to meet girls. I want to make love.”

Course you have exceptions such as the female Holly in series III-V, however she doesn’t disrupt this status que as she is at the end of the day an artificial intelligence with only the digital representation of her being a female. Even then, she has a platonic relationship with the four, and is more a little sister to them than someone they show active romantic interest in.

Kochanski may or may not cockup the entire dynamic, depending on your outlook. I cannot say whether she did or did not in VII and VIII, as I have never been familiar with just VII and VIII being her only appearances as I wasn’t even alive to acknowledge it. I will add, though, that combining that with her role in the Dave Era mixes a very good balance of longing that earlier series had. Instead of longing for something completely unattainable in delusion, Lister now has a realistic opportunity of achieving happiness; in many ways “growing up” in his ambitions from wanderlust for a teenage crush to attempting to win back an ex-lover.

Having a female cast for Red Dwarf is a dodgy concept at best, but in the end would have to be an entirely different show to at all function on its own two legs.

[Veni]

That’s timely, I have to write an essay on the theme of the Oedipus myth tonight.

[Veni]

>hacktually

He’s a bloody shambles

[Veni]

To think in the time it took you to write whatever that was you could’ve instead used it on updating your damn Red Dwarf Letterboxd list you lazy cunt

[Veni]

The Last Jedi is better than two-thirds of the prequels.

[Veni]

BETTER THAN THE SEQUEL TRILOGY

A forum user attempts to defend the dodgy prequel trilogy by stating they’re better than the sequel trilogy, though whether that has any relevance on the matter is something he refuses to acknowledge.

[Veni]

Souper.

Yeah, I thought of addressing that, but I thought him not brining it up since in the following 67 episodes might’ve been satisfactory.

[Veni]

It couldn’t have been too long before Lister was released as he was unfamiliar with the Cat, I assume he was activated the moment Lister was awakened.

[Veni]

I don’t think its possible for any episode to be so bad it tanks the entire legacy of the show, I don’t think that has happened to any show. You can have an episode of The Simpsons where Homer gets raped by a panda, and I’ll still love everything before that and just pretend the show ended before it got to that point.

However, I will say that if the show keeps getting detrimental viewership ratings, that could prove to be a great threat to the show’s sustainability with how fickle audiences are, there’s no telling if you fool them once they’ll be willing to risk being fooled again.

[Veni]

Technically, Holly wouldn’t have been female Holly as without Lister there’d be no reason to try and create the Holly Hop Drive and ensuring Parallel Universe occured.

[Veni]

Simulants were created with the intention they’d be used in war.

Rogue droids would be like Asclepius who just went computer senile overtime.

[Veni]

Weren’t humans created in the image of Time Lords? Think I heard that from somewhere.

[Veni]

Think you’ll find [REDACTED] already made that joke

[Veni]

here in Canada

Can we get the foreigner out of here, please.

[Veni]

We actually get to see the Cat-Polymorph sex scene in that timeline, surprisingly more arousing than you’d think. Too bad that timeline’s fandom keeps posting gifs replacing the pipe with a dick

[Veni]

Are we watching the same stuff

[Veni]

Ben come back, this one’s apparently good again

[Veni]

I’m being realistic here.

[Veni]

Think you should be weary of discussing other people’s theories for the time being.

[Veni]

“Skipper is are done”

Just put me out of my misery

[Veni]

Skipper is, and with it the entirety of Series XI and XII, are done: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skipper_(Red_Dwarf)

[Veni]

I’m considering the bold move of removing the tags placed on Samsara, Krysis, and Mechocracy myself for three reasons:

1. I do believe I’ve adequately addressed the problem with my past edits
2. The user, Polyamorph, has OK’d my prior articles for Officer Rimmer, Cured, and Siliconia evidently by simply fixing the references for directing toward Ganymede & Titan and not adding the tag
3. Nothing has been followed-up on the subject so if I don’t it’ll just be left in limbo for who knows how long

I’m seeking some advice on how to proceed

[Veni]

Thank you so much.

Speaking of which, I finally did Can of Worms: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Can_of_Worms_(Red_Dwarf)

So now it’s just Skipper, and when the special finally comes out, I’ll do a page on that as well. I just hope I don’t get ass-blasted by the Wikipedia stormtroopers for not being relevant enough.

[Author]

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