Red Dwarf: Series I and II

Red Dwarf: Series I and II
by Ed Bye

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DVD Reviews of Red Dwarf: Series I and II

DVD Review: Attack of the killer computers
Summary: 2 Stars

Most of the series revolves around two principal characters: Rimmer (a reconstituted hologram of the now-dead original) is portrayed by Chris Barrie (quite well, actually) as a perfectionist constantly obsessed with personal order and cleanliness of his "body", his wardrobe, and his surroundings. His nominal roommate aboard the ship, Lister (a surviving member of the original crew) is portrayed by Craig Charles as the (naturally) slovenly polar opposite. Much of the intended but never realized humor proceeds from this conflict using an old and worn device right out of Elementary Writing Class: Kindergarten Level. From a quite different direction having to do with the series' clever basic premise comes a third principal character, "Cat", in a no-holds-barred portrayal by Danny John-Jules which, along with related events, provide most of the more inspired humor and mad-cap sub-plot elements.

Comparisons to Dark Star come to mind, and its effect on this series is pronounced. But Dark Star was thoughtfully and imaginatively crafted by budding experts using dead-pan humor and satire. The professional quality actors never broke character. Special effects, while primitive, were inventively supplied within a highly limited college-student budget. Yet these limitations actually enhanced and endeared the overall effect. Humor was always completely natural and needed no adornment.

But there is a chasm between Dark Star and Red Dwarf: Class. There is too much annoying and amateurish breaking of character. Some reasonable, but primitive special effects end up like fragile rice paper stretched tautly over the sharp and protruding bones of an underlying carcass. Humor density is sparse. And therein probably lies the explanation for the single most degrading feature of this series: CANNED LAUGHTER. In the first ten minutes of Series I episode 1 (this reviewer stopped notating in disgust after that), canned laughter erupted at an average rate of every 12 seconds, with frequent inane giggles in between. Such disembodied spectral laughter occurs when two characters are interacting (in what is supposed to be a humorous situation but rarely is) deep in interstellar space and time, isolated by millions of light years and millions of years from the nearest earthlings (if such still exists) on a gigantic space ship. Nor does this annoyance seem to diminish and is "enhanced" by additional spectral CLAPPING in at least two Red Dwarf II episodes! (Series II by the way is a definite step downhill, if that's possible, from Series I.) The resultant intrusions were so annoying to this viewer that the episodes became increasingly difficult to watch, even for review purposes. And therein is perhaps the downfall of this series.

Do those who produce this stuff use canned laughter to hide their minimalist efforts and/or to signal intellectually challenged viewers when to react to something as funny (when it isn't)? Perhaps they are slapping together a product for what they contemptuously perceive as (or worse yet, correctly realize is) their target audience's lack of intellectual vigor?

Each series has two DVDs contained in a single normal sized quality storage case, wherein DVD 1 contains six 28-minute episodes and DVD 2 has 90 minutes of bonus features including the usual narcissistic, self-congratulatory, blather.. DVD 1 is held in a book-leaf like interior holder that hinges off the case's inner spine, a very nice arrangement. Picture quality is sporadically grainy at times, though generally adequate. Sound seems OK. Navigation to the various episodes and bonus features is clever.

Description of Red Dwarf: Series I and II