Context for those unfamiliar with Red Dwarf (Spoilers for Episode 1 of the show)
Dave Lister is the last man alive. He’s living in the mining ship “Red Dwarf” with a Hologram of his dead roommate, Rimmer; a member of a species of evolved cats, “The Cat”; and a computer on the ship, Holly. Lister crushes on a deceased member of the crew, Kristine Kochanski.
I was glad to see this episode would be covering the religious aspect of the show. Sadly, it’s not too in depth, but even what we get is nice. The episode starts with Holly revealing to the audience that Lister faked the exam that he took last episode. He follows this up with “That gives you some idea of how truly exciting some days can be around here.” I like the cheeky way of advertising the show with that line. The exam or Lister’s status aren’t brought up again in this episode or the rest of series 1. Why not try to fit the reveal on the end of last episode instead of having it in this one? It would be better to just not bring it up at all.
Rimmer’s obsessive and retentive ways continue to be shown. He so much wants to look good for who knows? We learn he hangs his underwear on coat hangers. Rimmer sees a space pod of unknown origins come by the ship. He’s more or less confident it’s aliens who can give him a body, something he’s wanted recurringly throughout the show. Rimmer wants to talk to someone about the pod so badly, he wakes up Lister. When Lister wears one of Rimmer’s shirts, Rimmer makes a fuss, but Lister is nice enough to offer it back. Holly tells Lister it’s a garbage pod, but they both think it’d be funny to not tell Rimmer. This is interesting to me as Holly’s a computer. We’ve seen a few times where he made jokes.
Speaking of Lister, he learns from a cat book about some of the complexities of the religion around him. The cats even fought in a war over it. There’s a joke about death when we learn the war was fought over the color of a hat Lister would wear in the business he dreams of having. Holly says most of the cats left Red Dwarf with Lister’s laundry list, thinking it was directions to the “promised land”. The God plot stops for a bit, then resumes with Lister telling Rimmer he doesn’t want to be God. Rimmer says he would like to be God. That’s a nice, quick way of showing more of Rimmer’s complex. Lister feels bad for indirectly hurting the cats, but Rimmer is more focused on the pod. Rimmer has poorly placed faith, just like the cats. Rimmer’s trying to decipher useless info on the pod, like how the cats tried to decipher Lister’s things and learn what they mean. We get good acting from Lister when he speaks of wishing he could change what happened.
SPOILERS
Finally, a story for the Cat. For some reason, he goes to visit an old cat priest that’s dying. The Cat just wants to talk about himself. He respects the priest as much as anyone else, not much. The priest gives a frustrating exposition dump. He describes himself, he’s a priest who just stopped believing in God. Lister finds the Cat and the priest and comforts the priest the best he can. He acts like how he was described, as God. The priest said that when the cats left for the promised land, the sick and the lame were left behind. The priest was one of them. It’s a bit annoying that the priest is literally just explaining everything, but what he’s saying is interesting, so it’s forgivable. The priest, having met God, says this is the happiest day of his life and he dies right there. We get more good acting with Lister when he has a disturbed look on his face.
I find it interesting the Cat was quiet during the priest and Lister’s conversation. This was probably an oversight by the writers. Perhaps the character wanted to be respectful? Note that in Episode 1, the Cat said “no one” believed in the religion being true. The Cat was born after the cats left. It makes sense that when the cats left behind the ill, the ill would not believe in the religion as the religious were not respectful to them. Thus, they wouldn’t teach it as true to future generations. Even the priest lost his faith. There’s a nice parallel between the religion plot and Rimmer’s plot. The priest regains his faith while Rimmer loses it upon discovering the truth behind the pod.
OVERVIEW
It was good that we finally got a story for the Cat, even though it mostly followed Lister. The Cat infamously doesn’t get storylines, so you got to take what you can get. This episode stayed focused on its core idea, which had foreshadowing earlier in the series, but Lister and Rimmer still got time to interact. This one gets you thinking about religion, at least a little. It’s intelligently thought out and creative. The priest’s guest actor, Noel Coleman, was good in the role. This is probably the first great episode, though “Balance of Power” was pretty good, and the second best of series 1…