It'd be great if they got some of the Doctor Who effects team from the Mill to work on this. They'd make the ship look fantastic.
No it wouldn't be great.
The whole point about RD was that the sets were crap, but just real enough to not be completely awful. It was a budget thing from Manchester and that made it all the more funny. Adding whizzbang special effects would be pointless - just keep it simple.
I'd agree that giving a new episode cutting-edge special FX throughout would detract from its charm. They can add to the show when used right, but as with many elements of the show, RD doesn't need to take itself too seriously there - to have a big budget feel is not its style; keeping it simple is IMO a good idea. Obviously, I'd be more eager to see quality of script come before quality of FX.
On a side note, while I reckon VII was the weakest series (considering the high standard, still very good), I would disagree with the earlier comment that
Stoke Me A Clipper
was the only really good episode - I personally think
Tikka To Ride
was a very good opener with a brilliant plot idea. Trailing behind those two with honourable mention would be
Blue
- it had its moments, if only thanks to the appearance from Mr Barrie!
:-(
A former member
I have to ask, can any one clear up the wee matter?
on the DVD release did there use the original master tapes or the crap remasterd ones form 1998?
I'd agree that giving a new episode cutting-edge special FX throughout would detract from its charm. They can add to the show when used right, but as with many elements of the show, RD doesn't need to take itself too seriously there - to have a big budget feel is not its style; keeping it simple is IMO a good idea. Obviously, I'd be more eager to see quality of script come before quality of FX.
On a side note, while I reckon VII was the weakest series (considering the high standard, still very good), I would disagree with the earlier comment that
Stoke Me A Clipper
was the only really good episode - I personally think
Tikka To Ride
was a very good opener with a brilliant plot idea. Trailing behind those two with honourable mention would be
Blue
- it had its moments, if only thanks to the appearance from Mr Barrie!
I thought Tikka To Ride was great as well, the extend version has a very interesting ending, funny but I can see why they didn't put it in (would have had to have had an explination in Stoke Me A Clipper)
I'd agree that giving a new episode cutting-edge special FX throughout would detract from its charm. They can add to the show when used right, but as with many elements of the show, RD doesn't need to take itself too seriously there - to have a big budget feel is not its style; keeping it simple is IMO a good idea. Obviously, I'd be more eager to see quality of script come before quality of FX.
On a side note, while I reckon VII was the weakest series (considering the high standard, still very good), I would disagree with the earlier comment that
Stoke Me A Clipper
was the only really good episode - I personally think
Tikka To Ride
was a very good opener with a brilliant plot idea. Trailing behind those two with honourable mention would be
Blue
- it had its moments, if only thanks to the appearance from Mr Barrie!
Okay perhaps my comments on VII were a little over the top, as the two above mentioned shows were also good... and Blue of course has to be in the top 10 thanks to a certain Munchkin Song!
Speaking about previous DVD's, looking at their sales and apparently the best selling series of DVD's in British TV history [as a whole 8 series set] the BBC have been stupid leaving it this long to realise the shows potential as a new success. Doctor Who should have shown them this to be honest...
Having re-watched series 1-7 quite recently, I just hope they learn from the mistakes that were made. Which, of course, were non-existent until series 7! Series 6 really is amazing, you can see why people rant about it so much.
Series 7 proved that you can't mess about with the character lineup when you are that far into a series. The substitution of Rimmer with Kochanski is disasterous (despite Chloe Annet!). Although I agree "Tikka To Ride" is excellent, and a couple of the others are ok.
I refused to buy Series 8, so admittedly it's been a while since I saw it. But I seem to recall it degenerated into farce. Not only had the chatacter lineup changed beyond recognition, but the whole premise of the show (ie the 4 of them being isolated in space) had been changed. This created a totally different show in my opinion - and one that just isn't as funny. I've got a vague memory of an episode where Kryten runs a TV channel ... it was so bad that I can honestly say I've seen funnier episodes of "Friends".
So this is what we need:
- Ditch Kochanski (sorry Chloe)
- Ditch the rest of the crew
- No film effect (yeah, right)
- Live audience
- Grant AND Naylor writing (has this been confirmed yet?)
As for the effects - get over it. The effects will be good as nobody is going to make deliberately crap effects nowadays. The effects being bad was not the point of the show at all - Red Dwarf's excellence is, and has always been down to the writing. Flashy effects won't detract from that.
After again watching Series 7 recently, i realised why exactly it was so crap. They were clearly wanting to turn the show into a British Star Trek with comedy, so massive production values and good stories mixed with comedy. All that happened though is that they had the ambition and the talent to do it but not the money. 'Tikka to Ride' is an example of just how good the concept worked. You can tell that a lot of money was spent on 'Tikka to Ride' and because of that their ambition was met, and the comedy and drama mixed very well. It was a great episode. What then happened is that they ran out of money. They then ended up having to do crappy filler episodes like 'Duct Soup'. While there was some good comedy in those eps, it was long, drawn out and very boring. Though moments in 'Stoke me a Clipper' and even 'Beyond a Joke' with the tank and the Pride and Prejudice stuff were very good BECAUSE they had spent money on them. I reckon if they had the budget, Series 7 would have been spectacular. Imagine the Rimmer coffin sequence done with decent CGI, it would have been brilliant. The music was already brilliant.
- Ditch Kochanski (sorry Chloe)
- Ditch the rest of the crew
- No film effect (yeah, right)
- Live audience
- Grant AND Naylor writing (has this been confirmed yet?)
- I agree (sorry again Chloe)
- They'll be in the mirror universe anyway
- 50/50 on that one, cause in some ways the filmic effect did work once the audience was brought back in VIII
- That's as standard
- Very little chance of this I'm afraid... it took the BBC all 8 DVD releases and a remastered boxset just to finally get him in for a single interview! At the end of the day, the two men don't see eye to eye in the TV world anymore, and would probably make the product suffer in the end.
I can see why people slate VII, allbeit there being some very Dwarf-like scripts within it... but I feel VIII was like a "best of" from the rest of the programme, just with seven's production values. So personally I'd rank Series VIII as some of their best work!
