Part II, Chapter VI: "It's Cold Outside"
“He’s dead, Dave. Everybody is dead. Everybody is dead, Dave.
- Holly, informing Dave Lister that the entire crew of Red Dwarf has perished, taken from “The End”. [1]
With
Doctor Who and
Star Trek both back on the air, it was becoming clear that science fiction was a genre with a large audience. And where there was a large amount of media, there was room for parody. Doug Naylor and Rob Grant recognised this. They had already produced a series of sketches set in space in their BBC Radio 4 series
Son of Cliché.
The show, to be named
Red Dwarf was to be a sitcom set on a space ship, three million years in the future, after the entire crew is killed by a radiation leak. The main character, Dave Lister, was the only survivor, and previously the lowest ranked member of the crew.
He would be joined by Arnold Rimmer, a holographic recreation of Lister’s old room-mate, and the second lowest ranked crewman. The ship’s computer, Holly, would have “gone a bit peculiar” in the three million years that Lister was in stasis, and would often play practical jokes on Lister and Rimmer. The final main cast member would be the Cat, a descendent of Lister’s cat, which was spared from the radiation leak by being sealed in the cargo hold.
For Lister, the producers cast Craig Charles, a Liverpudlian “punk poet”. Alfred Molina was originally cast in the role of Rimmer, though he left the show when he had difficulties with the script. In his place was Chris Barrie, with whom Grant and Naylor had worked with on
Son of Cliché. For Holly, they chose Norman Lovett, a comedian known for his dry wit. Danny John-Jules was cast as the Cat, given his experience in dance and singing. [2]
Originally, only two seasons would be planned, both to be released in 1988, though its popularity would result in the commissioning of a third, to be released the following year.
Episodes of Season 1 of Red Dwarf:
- The End
- Future Echoes
- Balance of Power
- Waiting for God
- Confidence and Paranoia
- Me^2
Episodes of Season 2 of Red Dwarf:
- Kryten
- Better than Life
- Thanks for the Memory
- Stasis Leak
- Queeg
- Parallel Universe
[1] Almost nothing is changed here, but there will, as always, be changes in the future. As a result, I thought I'd just use a quote from the show here.
[2] Was tempted to change the casting, but I think that it was pretty much perfectly cast. This entire update is OTL.
Sorry that this is such a short update, it's just that there isn't so much to cover with this. I needed to bring Red Dwarf into the timeline for stuff that comes later, and there will be changes later on. My writers block seems to be gone now, so I'll try to keep updating regularly, though updates will come out when they're ready, I'm going to stop giving release dates in advance. 1988 is pretty much done now, next update will be more Doctor Who.
Also, there's a casting change about 5 years from this update that will be affected by Red Dwarf. I'd be interested to see if any of you can work it out, though given past experience, you'll probably get it instantly.