Red Dwarf - Series 8 (Skutter Limited Edition) (+Toy) (DVD)

Author's product rating:   

Did you enjoy it?	Liked it
Story	Good
Characters / Performances	Good
Special Effects	Standard
How does it compare to similar films?	Not applicable

Advantages:	Very funny, fantastic extras, very good final series
Disadvantages:	too many special effects, the first episode is longer than it needs to be

Recommend to potential buyers:

yes

Full review

The final series of the brilliant Red dwarf series ends with the words The end..... The smeg it is. But as time passes it becomes increasingly unlikely that the long promised film will ever be made. So how good is the final series? Compared to some of the earlier series it doesn't compare favourably, but i do believe its an improvement on the 6th and 7th series. And just because its not as good as series 2-5 that doesn't mean this isn't a good series, much improved by the bringing back of Rimmer, it has its truly hilarious moments and some great story lines.

Series 8 kicks off where series 7 left us, with the cat flying starbug into a slightly large, but rapidly shrinking Red dwarf leading to them destroying starbug and giving one rat a rather big surprise. Episodes 1, 2 and 3 are actually one very long episode, which you can watch in one go along with previously deleted scenes, making it longer than any movie would have been. This episode is brilliantly written with some fantastic conversations between Lister and Rimmer, part of what made red dwarf great. The basic synopsis of these episodes is that lister, cat, Kryten and Kochanski have crashed back into red dwarf, where the dead crew have been resurrected and the four of them end up in trouble for stealing starbug. The four of them attempt in vain to escape, unaware that they are actually in a computer simulation which is recording everything they do, meanwhile they manage to drag Rimmer down with them after he is caught using the ships personnel files and the long forgotten sexual magnetism virus for his own means.

Episode 4: casandra starts with Lister joining everyone up for the canaries, a prison singing group (or is that a suicide squad?) Sent into a deserted ship they run into the computer cassandra which has the ability to predict the future with a 100% accuracy. Where she has some bad news for Rimmer (how many times can that poor guy die? its bad enough for most of us having to die once but this would be his 3rd time) However can he use his increadible god given stupidity to weasel out of death?

Episode 5: Krytie TV sees Kryten reprogrammed to film womens shower night, all three hours of it (they obviously like their showers in prison) meanwhile Lister and Rimmer are on best behaviour because of listers looming appeal, but is all this effort really going to be worth it when rimmer finds out the truth. This is a funny episode and i quite like it because there's none of the annoying special effects which i think were a little overused in this series.

Episode 6 and 7: Pete. The basic story line of these two back to back episodes (which you can also watch in one hour long special) is watching Rimmer and Lister being repeatedly marched back and forth to the captains office for increasingly unlikely stunts, including the famous basketball game and the half time drink, followed by a competition to see how many erection related jokes could be squeezed into one scene. This is followed by the pair attempting to get out of pealing spuds by using a programmeable virus which ends up in eating their clothes and their hair. At this point the special FX start to kick in. Kryten, the cat and Kochanski find a time wand which can "digitize time" allowing them to effectively slow down or speed up time. This in a roundabout way leads to the creation of Pete, a T-rex, lety chaos insue and enjoy. I personally don't likke this episode that much, theres simply too many special effects, which retract from the main purpose of the show, which is to be funny.

Episode 8: Only the good.... The final episode ever? very possibly, but its a good one. with all the usual complicated sci-fi mumbo jumbo about mirror universes, space viruses and vending machines out for revenge. The story ends with death arriving to take Rimmer away, but as i mentioned earlier i think he's fed up of dying (i know i would) so he knees him in the balls instead.

Finally the Extras: This is something that the red dwarf makers have always doen well, theres loads of extras including cast commentary, documentaries, smeg ups, 30 minutes comedy connections episode and a whole lot more

Overall this is an entertaining final series with some very funny moments, but just a little too much emphasis on the special effects.