TV Series Review: Red Dwarf

For the last couple of weeks we've been rewatching Red Dwarf before bed. It's become a tradition for us to watch something funny before bed, you don't want to be going to bed right after watching something scary and disturbing (like Criminal Minds).

Red Dwarf was perfect for this.

It's one of those programmes that I've seen often enough to be able to switch in and out of as I want to, with the exception of the later episodes which I watched a little closer because I've not seen them as often. It is brilliantly funny and very clever. And we've got the Smeg Ups DVD now as well, so we got to watch lots of outtakes.

I've been watching Red Dwarf for pretty much as long as I can remember. It originally started back in 1988 (when I was two!) so I've grown up watching it. I can remember sitting in bed watching it on TV feeling really mature, that must've been about series seven or eight.

The early series are definitely my absolute favourites, with Backwards probably being my top, because it's just so clever (though it kind of makes my head hurt to think about it too much). Though the episode with the Tongue-Tied song is pretty cool too (for obvious reasons).

Sorry, you'll probably have that going round in your head for the next couple of days.

Series eight is probably my least favourite of the original run and while I enjoy Back to Earth, now that they've made the tenth series it's kind of dropped slightly in my ranking. I feel as though Back to Earth was very much made by the fans for the fans, whereas the tenth series returned to how it felt at the beginning.

Of the new series Lemons is my absolute favourite. The gang travel back in time and end up meeting Jesus. With the Dwarfers things aren't going to go smoothly and they end up taking him back with them, into the future, where he learns all the bad things that people have done in the name of Jesus and vows to change. Oh, and he discovers a brilliant new invention called a 'bag'.

Series ten seems to combine the original set up of the early series with a more modern sense of humour and style of filming. I think that's why I've enjoyed it so much. Things that people find funny have changed quite a bit in the last thirty years so it's cool to see that Red Dwarf has grown up as its viewers have aged as well.

And it appears that we've got some new episodes coming up in the near future as well. According to Wikipedia the new episodes will air in the next month. I hope that means they'll be out on DVD in time for Christmas!

Last night we started watching our new bedtime viewing, inspired by the fact that it first aired fifteen years ago; Scrubs. Expect another review of that sometime in the future.