It’s cold outside, there’s no kind of atmosphere…..

So the question is am I talking about another chilly day here in Cellblock H or is this going to be a post about a cracking Sci-Fi comedy??? Well originally I was going to go for the former, however now that it comes down to it, I think that the latter might be a more fun approach, so lets talk Hyperdrive….. No I’m just kidding, come back, I really mean Red Dwarf. Fuck me that was close, my one reader nearly left there….
Ok so a Comedy show set in space, One Human, One Hologram, One Cat, One Computer and eventually one Andriod and if you waited long enough One bit of Crumpet.
Not exactly the best sounding premise, but this one just mixed up all the parts and created something special. From the opening scene with Lister and Rimmer cleaning the drinks dispenser, the jokes just keep coming.  The interaction between the initial four charcters quickly hits the mark and whilst Season 1 has, IMO, a number of weaker episodes “Confidence and Paranoia” and “Waiting for God”,  the other four episodes more than make up for it and establish a number of future plotlines, for example Lister having twins.

Season 2 – 4  are the seasons that cememted Red Dwarf as a classic and contained some of my favourite episodes,  “Queeg”, “The Last Day” and “White Hole” which includes my all time favourite scene which begins with the Cat uttering the words “So what is it”.  During this time Holly had a sex change as Norman Lovett was replaced by Hattie Hayridge and also Kryten went from a one episode appearance in Season 2 to a fully fledged member of the cast.

Season 5 suffers from Director Juliet May being brought in and then leaving before the season finished, standout episode for the season is a tossup between “Holoship” and “Back to Reality” however I think “Back to Reality”has to take it if simply for the creation of the Cat’s alter ego Dwayne Dibbley.

Season 6, what can I say 5 episodes that ranged from completely sucking to sort of ok and then the excellent “Gunmen of the Apocalypes”. Removing Red Dwarf and Holly didn’t help.

Season 7, I really try to like this season but my real problem is that it looks too polished and lacks the “sense of naffness” that the earlier seasons had.  “Tikka to Ride” suggests a unique idea for the identity of the “Man on the Grassy knowl” back in Dallas  in 1963.  With Chris Barrie wanting to reduce his workload he gets written out for a few episodes and Chloe Annett takes over the role of Kochanski and becomes a regular character.  The interactions between the cast seem to lose their way without the antagonism that Rimmer brought in.

Season 8. Oh dear, the idea of bringing back Red Dward was a good idea, recreating the crew not so much.  The close knit group of Lister, Kryten, Cat and Kochanski along with a non-hologram Rimmer, appear to get lost among the prison population and whilst some of the ideas within the series work overall it’s a poor finish for a great show.  The final cliff hanger at the end of the series is a high point, but it has left us hanging for 10 years.

2009 and beyond.

Rumours of a film continue to be banded around and even some pre-production work has taken place, however with most of the cast now involved in other things, from tabloid headlines quite a few of them illegal, I don’t see it happening soon.

Channel Dave from UKTV have apparently commisioned 4 special shows to be filmed in early 2009, with a behind the scenes featurette and a clip show taking up half the runtime, the other two will apparently be new material with the original cast.  My breath is well and truly bated.

Heroes snippet

Well just heard the news that the awesome Heroes has not only been given a full season run, we have some of the characters back story being fleshed out. Hiro, the Jap who can bend the space time continuim has George Takei joining as his father, can’t wait for that. The show seems to be going from strength to strength and unlike many of the other shows I have loved has been given that all important full season run. To celebrate this I will write a full character review in the next few days.