As I've stated before I love science fiction and the numerous possibilities it offers for adventure. That being said I've never really been an avid follower of any science fiction franchise, I'm definitely not a Trekkie and although I do watch Doctor Who and am a fan of Star Wars I've never been too attached to them.
Red Dwarf however is the exception, I LOVE this show.
The setup of Red Dwarf is a basic Sci Fi story: the lowest ranking crew member of the mining ship 'Red Dwarf' named 'Dave Lister' is put into suspended animation as punishment for smuggling his pet cat on board. During this time there is a radiation leak and the entire crew of the ship is wiped out, the on board computer 'Holly' has had to keep Lister frozen until the radiation dies down to a safe level. Three million years later Lister emerges to find himself alone in deep space with only Holly, a life form who evolved from his cat and a hologram of his dead roommate (Rimmer) for company, their mission: Get back to Earth.
What makes this show work so well is the characters and the cast who play them. Dave Lister played by Craig Charles is NOT a typical handsome space hero like what you see in Star Trek and Star Wars, he's a low life, slobby, curry eating, beer drinking grease monkey. This is a nice change of pace and it's a very amusing possibility to think that potentially the last human being in existence is a lazy and uninspiring slob who lives off vindaloo and not a remarkable scientist or space adventurer.
But Lister wouldn't be as funny as he is without his opposite, the second part of the main Red Dwarf duo: Arnold Rimmer played by Chris Barrie is what makes this show what it is, he's the complete opposite of Lister, high class and brought up by a military family, aspiring to be something more than a chicken soup machine repairman, he wants to be an officer. The only problem is he's a completely idiotic, self obsessed, dis likable, stupid , slimy, deceiving coward. These characteristics are perfect as he and Lister constantly play off each other to great comedic affect.
There is also a great supporting cast who provide comic relief aside from the odd couple relationship of Lister and Rimmer. There's Cat played by Danny John Jules, who evolved over millions of years from Lister's pet cat, he's completely self obsessed and only concerned about his image, dressing in outrageous coats and suits he's the coolest character on ship. In the earlier series he displayed many cat like qualities and even look to Lister as his God (this was downplayed in later series).
Kryten played by Robert Llewellyn is an android who obeys every command no matter how stupid, over the course of the series Lister teaches him how to break his programming and become more human like, this gave him some amusing character quirks.
And finally Holly played by Norman Lovett and Hattie Hayridge, Red Dwarf's once intelligent computer who's now gone slightly senile.
What's brilliant about this series is that every character has a purpose and deliver some very witty and funny lines en keeping with the situation they're in, and boy do they find themselves in some bizarre situations! Backwards realities, alternate dimensions, shape shifting creatures, psychotic killer viruses and a visit to the wild west just to name a few. Yet despite the weirdness of the group's adventures they all seem scientifically possible and despite the show being a comedy the science fiction is often believable and you care about how the characters are going to solve the crisis of the week and escape with their lives (if not their dignity). The believable science fiction is backed up special effects that are very good to say they're for a BBC sitcom with no budget made in the late eighties and early nineties. Another remarkable thing about Red Dwarf is how much of a fan base it's attracted, whilst it was consistently popular in the ratings on BBC Two with the general public it attracted a cult of Sci Fi fans who were entranced by the concepts and the high production values, the show has a worldwide fandom similar to that of Star Trek and even has it's own popular vocabulary with words like 'Goit', 'Gimboid',
'Gelf' and 'Smeghead' recognisable by people all over the world.
*SPOILERS ALERT*
However despite how much I've praised Red Dwarf it does have it's weak points: There are times when continuity is thrown out of the window and some episodes feel lacking overall. The writing out of Rimmer in Series 7 to be replaced by Lister's old girlfriend Kochanski was a big mistake considering how Rimmer and Lister's relationship is what made the show so enjoyable, the reconstruction of the Red Dwarf crew in Series 8 and the crew being prisoners on the ship seemed to come out of left field and not make much sense from a plot perspective, speaking of Series 7 & 8 the very well done model effects were replaced with less than convincing CGI. There was also three special episodes produced in 2009 'Back to Earth' which received a mixed reception from fans and critics, I personally thought they weren't on par with the older series but weren't terrible either.
Red Dwarf will always be one of my favorite science fiction series and with the promise of a new series with the original cast set to air in 2012 I hope this series will continue the exciting, enthralling and hillarious tradition of Red Dwarf.
In the meantime...
"Smoke me a Kipper, I'll be back for breakfast."
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