TBone
Tuesday 7th August 2012 7:23am
90 posts
Quote: Samantha Feinglass @ August 6 2012, 5:57 PM BST
I have the same mixed feelings as the original poster. I just loved Red Dwarf but when the collaboration between Rob Grant and Doug Naylor ended, the well-developed characters ended. Looking at Kryten doing the cam thing in the showers. Was just watching Series V the other night when Rimmer proposed to work on board the Holoship and Kryten says, "where you would be obliged to have sex with beautiful, brilliant women twice daily. Am I the only one who thinks that's just a little bit tacky?" - Someone who utters these sentiments would be the last guy to take a cam into a ladies' shower.
No, I didn't like Kochanski, either... but she was a symptom of the problem (one writer on his own) rather than the problem itself. If the series is to be written by only one of the writing team (I'm not one of those folks who says that one of the writers is better than the other; it was the synergy between the two that made such a fearsome twosome), it's doomed to be mediocre at best and just plain bad at best. All the development the characters had made over time (Lister using his brain, Rimmer actually semi-human and caring about someone other than himself, etc.) had gone out the window. It wasn't fun anymore.
I'd rather re-watch the first episodes written by both Rob Grant and Doug Naylor again and again and again than watch any of the solo episodes.
I agree totally with the character development let-down. At the end of 6, when Rimmer saves the day I thought that when they continued Red Dwarf, there would be an acknowledgment of his heroism and the story would take a different turn, leading to a conclusion where the crew mates have a new found respect for each other, culminating in them getting back to Earth or something. I think this would be a fitting end to the story with Rimmer overcoming his demons and becoming more like Ace, Lister returning home and pursuing his dream of a farm on Fiji with Kochanski, Kryten removing his mechanoid shackles completely and enjoying a human like existence and the Cat, well, finally "getting his end away". Series 7 seemed to disregard the emotive nature of series 6's conclusion and explained it away quickly at the start of the first episode. The episodes got gradually worse and became sillier and sillier. I also thought that considering that Lister had been pining for Kochanski for so long, he would be more affected by her return. Also, in the first episode of series 1, Kochanski seemed to like Lister a lot, there was a geniune mutual affection there, Lister having already had a relationship with her. This didn't seem to be the case in series 7, where Kochanski regarded Lister as an uncooth slob. The whole thing seemed to lack credibility and continuity considering what had gone before.