Canon-Strike XIV: Red Dwarf

[Asura]

With Rimmerworld, it's probably the least inspired one. They seem to have an attraction to multi-Rimmer concepts and this isn't even the last time we get this concept from them either. I think I'd have enjoyed it more if they'd have done a Rimmerworld that wasn't clone dependent.

Yeah, I too confuse this in my memory with TerrorForm.

[Neon Ignition]

Keeping track of news on a new series, this turned up on one site today as a thing:




I'd say what the synopsis is but it's essentially a NSFW gender inversed version of the pilot ep. It's already up to five installments and you can buy it on Amazon.

[Neon Ignition]

Episode 36 - Out of Time
Aka the most frustrating episode fans had ever experienced at one point. The crew stumble across a derelict space lab containing a time drive. Once the drive is installed in Starbug they discover that it in fact works and are soon after visited by their future selves. The trouble though is that the future version of the crew are gluttonous and bereft of their morals having been spoiled by the opportunities time travel has afforded them. A stand off ensues, one that could mean the end of the road for them all... This episode would be notable for ending on a cliffhanger, one that was not only notably dramatic but also left viewers waiting four years for a conclusion. Filming was so on a wire for this episode that the script wasn't fully written and auto-que's were fitted on the set to feed the cast lines as filming occurred and the BBC had already indicated it wanted a seventh run of the show so the plan to find Red Dwarf was abandoned and the cliffhanger used instead. This would be Rob Grant's final episode before leaving the show.




Did the shows attempt at a dramatic ending pay off?

[Asura]

Keeping track of news on a new series, this turned up on one site today as a thing:

I'd say what the synopsis is but it's essentially a NSFW gender inversed version of the pilot ep. It's already up to five installments and you can buy it on Amazon.

Oh my god really? That's hilarious? But, like, where is it though? Precisely?

->Open Spoiler<-

Jokes aside I can see that being a great laugh after a couple of pints.

[Neon Ignition]

Episode 37 - Tikka to Ride
Four years passed and Naylor had been left to steer the direction of the franchise without Grant. In doing so he had to force the BBC to wait for the new run longer than had been intended, work around the temporary imprisonment of Craig Charles following an allegation of rape, bring in a writing team and convince the BBC to increase the episode count to eight so that the show would pass the bar for US syndication once it completed the eighth run and as part of his grand plan to now move toward making a movie. The live audience was removed along with the practical effects to attempt to increase the visuals of the show and adjust the audience to the planned approach. Naylor also wanted to embrace sci-fi concepts more and move away from villains of the week but the biggest hurdle was that Chris Barrie was finally done with the show having disliked how chaotic making the sixth series was and not being keen on returning, in the end agreeing to make a short run of episodes in order to give Rimmer an ending. Kochanski was written in to mix up the male led dynamic and replace Rimmer with the opportunity being taken to rewrite the characters personality around a new actress, Chloe Annett. Tikka opens with a brief explain away of the prior series cliffhanger before reintroducing the time drive in a canon-breaking manner that see's the crew return to Earth during the JFK assassination. Though audiences were unsure of the new style, the episode was well recieved.



A step in the right direction?

[Neon Ignition]

Episode 38 - Stoke Me a Clipper
The first ever episode to feature work by a writer other than Grant or Naylor, this second episode served as Rimmer's exit from the show. It wasn't his last appearance in the series or even the show but for all intent purposes at the time this was his canonical exit. Acting as a direct sequel to the original Ace Rimmer episode, he returns to reveal a secret about his adventures and to convince the Dwarf's Rimmer to take up the mantle. The episode was broadly liked, losing some as the comedy subsides later on but given that was the intention at the time it's a rare moment of Lister and Rimmer showing signs of appreciation of each other.




If things had worked out as they originally seemed to be, would this have been a fitting farewell for Rimmer?

[Asura]

What a guy.

[Neon Ignition]

At the time the new style of the show was already a weird pill to swallow but I recall how much knowing Rimmer was leaving winded the series from the outset. The opening to this ep is probably the peak of series seven as well.

[Neon Ignition]

Episode 39 - Ouroboros
A brief crossover with a parallel universe traps Kochanski with the remaining crew with Rimmer only appearing in a small flashback. This pleases Lister immensely though Kryten is much less keen on having such a distraction on board for his favourite human. The episode also reveals who Lister's parents are and was overall one of the weakest received episodes with the new Lister-Kochanski-Kryten dynamic wearing thin quickly on some viewers.




Clever or the beginning of a decline?

[QualityChimp]

Sorry, I'm a few episodes behind, but I liked Rimmer's arc in these last few episodes - he saves the day in Out Of Time, but I didn't like the idea that the Boys From The Dwarf could become evil. They're lazy/vain/neurotic, but never evil.

Tikka To Ride was excellent and it felt like a real shift in quality, like a mini movie.
Thought the payoff of who shot JFK was sublime and something I think about every so often.
It's that silly idea that other make entire films out of.
I recently read Stephen Kings's "11.22.63" where a man goes back in time to stop the assassination of JFK and I couldn't not think about Red Dwarf! It is a different (and brrrrrilliant) story, but there are parallels, although James Franco was in the TV adaptation.


Stoke Me a Clipper - love it. Great episode, gets on with Ace's jokes as he's already established and takes it to the extreme "That was Ace Rimmer! You're lucky to be alive!"
I also love that this is the end/start of our Rimmer. I love the idea that somewhere out there is the gazpacho-warming doofus saving entire universes despite it not being his natural disposition.
Any future Rimmers are fine, knowing that our Rimmer is a hero. What a guy.

Our Rob or Ross is okay, but I'm firmly in the Grogan camp.
It works in that this isn't our Kochanski, but there's no chemistry.
Grogan's version would at least go for a drink and a dance with you, even if she was out of your league.
Annett's version just seems this snooty and aloof snob. Not her fault, though, it's how she's written.
I think her Kochanski is best when she's showing frailty, IMHO.

[Asura]

"Yeah! It'll drive the conspiracy weirdos nuts, but they'll never figure it out!"

[QualityChimp]

I suspect you think about that episode occasionally too, [MENTION=5941]Asura[/MENTION].

There's some sci-fi film or show and you think that Red Dwarf got there first!

[Asura]

Annett's version just seems this snooty and aloof snob. Not her fault, though, it's how she's written.

Yeah, I've always felt Chloe Annett does great with the material, just it's not good material on the whole.

I just think the idea was a bit stale, to start with. They'd already done "a parallel Red Dwarf with opposites" and "parallel Red Dwarfs where everything's good and everything's bad", so the idea that they encounter a parallel Red Dwarf where Kochanski is stranded with a super-competent non-slobby Lister wasn't really all that inspired.

I get why they did it, because they needed Kochanski to be up tight, to be a "straight man" to Lister's foil, but it just didn't work.

[QualityChimp]

Yeah, I totally get why they did it and it's a clever idea, but they'd already established what Kochanski was like and what Lister liked about her. This version just wouldn't be his type. You just know she'd be drinking wiiiine. Always wiiiiine.

[Neon Ignition]

I've got bad news about Stoke being a heroic ending for Rimmer...