Am I the only one who likes season 7?

I started a similar thread a few months ago on the forums regarding how much I love series 8 - and I recently re-watched series 7 for the first time in a few years. I was amazed at how much I enjoyed it - every single episode, perhaps Duct Soup the least - was engaging, interesting, different that what had gone before.
Unlike some other RD fans, I actually really liked the fact that the writing had become more 'drama / narrative' first, gags second. I thought this was brave of Doug at the time, and it's a series that hasn't dated aesthetically, the CGI does a fine job, whilst I prefer the model shots - things like that are not particularly high on my list of what makes or breaks an episode.

I thought that from a deeper, character development and story arc perspective, episodes like Stoke/Ouroboros were fabulous, and think the Lister being his own father is an interesting and clever take on the whole Lister birth event. It showcases the actors range more than in previous series and I also like Chloe Annette in the role of Kochanski.

I think it's a great addition to the RD canon, and ANY series that can change up production values / laughter removed / writing / cast changes like RD has over the years - is not only brave, but expansive and brilliant.

 

I don't think series 7 is anywhere near as good as 1-6 but I prefer it to 8 and 9/BTE. Tikka to Ride is a classic episode. Blue is also very funny and there's some great story moments in Stoke and Ouroboros

 

When it aired I absolutely hated Season 7. Like I was impressed at how it looked so much more expensive, but i also resented that it was not the even, bright unassuming studio-lighting I was used to. Scenes in the cockpit were just far too dark. I really, REALLY missed the live crowd, I thought it gave the show energy and making sure the cast were on top form. The music however was one of the best seasons (even though later i found out it was mostly library music).

There were two massive problems that I couldn't get over - losing Rimmer (my favourite character) and that the show was now comedy-drama, focusing on more emotional BS instead of delivering excellent jokes in a great sci-fi package. I don't care to see Lister moping over Rimmer, losing an arm etc - I don't care about your new acting range! No thanks to Kochanski the prissy new character who's had their backstory changed; whining sonar Kryten is at his most insufferable...at least the Cat stayed the same.

Over the years I've grown softer towards the comedy-drama and appreciate the story more, hone in on the positives. Like after several re-watches I find the jokes funnier and the sad situations less sad. Drama just isn't what I want out of Red Dwarf. There are some impressive revelations and good plots but in general I want a more uplifting and fun, enjoyable experience. Compared to other seasons it's overall just not that enjoyable. Like going from a couple of 10/10 seasons to a 6.5/10 is a bit of a pill to swallow. There was a big sigh of relief to see Holly back at the end of S7. The quality of the show jumped up right then and there!

At least RD took what they learned about producing S7 movie-look and applying it to the sitcom sets of S8, making their sitcom look the prettiest it's ever been.

 

Can't believe anyone likes SERIES 7. It is terrible so full of half-baked ideas that wouldn't get past first draft in the good old days of 1 -6. :x

 

Sorry to ressurect an old thread, but I couldn't let it end with that last one!

I absolutely love Series VII. And as someone who pretty-much hates series VIII and BTE, I've always found it strange that 7 is so often lumped-in with those two.

I thought it was wonderful. One of the very best seasons, in every regard. Seriously. It has great adventure-episodes (Beyond a Joke, Epideme) great drama or 'bunkroom' episodes (Blue, Duct Soup), and just SO many wonderfully funny moments. The Cat was at his absolute best, until his scene-stealing machine kicked in for series X anyway. Just the way he sidles up to a claustrophobic, near-catatonic Lister, pauses half a second, and says "WOOO boy it it cramped!" I was won over right there. I have never stopped being in love with Danny after that delivery.

I suppose there are three big things that cause controversy in VII -- Kochanski, the lack of Rimmer and the changes to Kryten. I guess I was just the one guy in the world who liked two of those things very much, and didn't mind Rimmer's not being there terribly. The other cast kind of picked up Rimmer's roles, subtly and effectively. Cat takes his foolishness, Lister his stubbornness, Kryten his fussniess and Kochanski his imperiousness. I would have been very unhappy if the show had gone on without Chris Barrie, but for only a few episodes, VII succeeds without him spectacularly.

Kryten's changes... I dunno, I just loved him as a mother-hen-clucking, jealous guy who lets his emotion get the better of him. It seemed to make sense to me - the foundations were definitely laid for this in V and VI (notice on the commentaries how the cast notice Kryten being 'a git' in those seasons) and when Kochanski comes in and steals his role as 'the smart one' it just seems a perfect fit.

And as for Kochanski, well I loved her. I'm NEVER a fan of retconning backstories or switching actresses, but I guess I just loved what Doug and Chloe Annet did with the character too much to care. I hated what they did to her in VIII, by the way. She's a woman. She...... is there and..... she... is attractive and has a period. Yeah, you really nailed her character down there, guys.
But in VII Kochanski was a developed, sympathetic, flawed and fascinating character. And she even fitted nicely into the colour scheme of the show with her bright red contrasting Rimmer's current blue. I wish she'd kept that outfit. What can I say, Kochanski was funny at times, and at other times she was a damn fine straight woman. One might argue that there is some sexism in having a woman join only for her to be smarter, more skilled and generally more perfect than all the guys. But she had her depth to her in that season. And in the novel Last Human, a similar interpretation of the character interacts perfectly with Rimmer as well. Wonderfully.

I think what made VII special for me in particular, though, was the seriousness. The dramatic and tense moments, which had been extremely rare in other series. I just loved the mournful shot of JFK striding into Oblivion, the moment when Rimmer sees those coffins and sees what he's capable of, Able releasing the nega-drive as the crew watch helplessly... and even Lister desperately heading to his death and the ruin of the yo-yo tournament in Epideme. Like Last Human, VII made Red Dwarf into a real adventure and a real drama, just sometimes. I can certainly see why people would dislike that (people have quite rightly compared it to the American style of sitcom, where a sad bit appears at the end of each show), but for me it just made me care more for the characters and find their jokes even funnier. All of those moments were based in something great: Naylor and the cast's compelte and true understanding of the characters. That which was absent in VIII and most of BTE. Of course BTE part 3 had its moments... great moments, such as Lister's speech to the hallucinated Kochanski, while the other three stared at his convulsing body. That's what I loved about VII.

I don't know what the point of this massive diatribe was, but thanks for reading. Series VII rocks, and stuff. Also the kiss was funny.

 

I didn't like 7 because of one simple reason: Rimmer left.

Yes he popped up again in Blue, but to me he was Red Dwarf. He was written out in a story that should have grew more naturally over several episodes or an entire season.

As a result characters like Kochanski were written in and Rimmer is too good an act to follow. Having two humans also made the show lose the central premise of Lister being the last human. Personally, I found the lack of a dead bunkmate to be a deal breaker.

That's why I don't like 8 either. It's Chris Barrie but Rimmer isn't there. He was the anti-Rimmer. There was so much potential in that character and 7 and 8 nuked it.

 

Well whoever the HELL he is, I'm not gonna see him! By the time you've fixed this mess I'll have missed the linkway!!!

...

Joking. I hear you - I guess one of the reasons I like VII so much is because it took such a difficult situation (a new character, losing Rimmer) and did so much with it. The concept for VII was not great, but the results? Incredible.

VIII, however, abandons any attempt to characterise anybody at all. Every character is squandered in favour of childish visual gags and a ton of horribly over-acted pantomime performances in new regular roles.

 

Argh! Thanks for the heads up - fixed. Sorry I'm typing on one of those stupid devices that likes to auto-shambles everything I write. What sort of word is Barroe anyway, Apple?

I can honestly see the Jupiter Mining Corporation being a descendant of Apple.

 

I agree with much of your assessment of Series 7 Mr Bruch.

I did find Kryten's whining a bit irritating at the time. And Kochanski's too at the start of Duct Soup, although not as many as some. Besides, it does make sense that the character would react that way considering the situation she is in. Incidentally, she doesn't whine half as much as people make out. And I thought the nanobot explanation to missing Red Dwarf a bit much. But apart from those things (and I'm not being sarcastic, I mean this. Besides those very things weren't as bad on rewatches) I think Series VII is up there with the previous series. I probably actually prefer it to the first two overall. (I know. Blasphemy.)

 

Yeah, the nanobot explanation is a bit ahrd to swallow. That whole episode is a bit crap, actually.

Apart from the bit with 'Famous one-armed people from history'. I love that one.

 

And why did Ace who was a hologram not have an 'H' on his forehead?
I hated Stoke me Clipper - successfully killed Ace off and took Rimmer away. Rubbish bond-esque start and generally feel its depressing (cos I know Rimmer left.)

 

To hide the fact that he was not the original. If the hologram projection unit can be used to change clothes and hair-cuts/styles, removing the 'H' would be easy. Most holograms don't do this as they're not trying to hide what they are. Ace Rimmer is trying to live up the legend of Ace Rimmer. One character... albeit lots of individuals. (In a sense.)

 

Nice answer

 

M'Aiden Ty-One gave a good explanation for why Ace didn't have the 'H' on his forehead. Also, if you notice, the Red Dwarf Rimmer loses his 'H' the moment that Ace changes his appearance with the lightbee remote.

I never hated Stoke Me A Clipper, though I do sort of agree with what you're saying. It is clear though that this episode was written specifically the way it was to explain Rimmer's absence in the other series VII episodes. That episode was only written after it became known that Chris Barrie was leaving the show, and would be leaving during the 7th series. In that respect, anyone who dislikes the episode because of losing Rimmer would have disliked it no matter what the storyline was, amd even if Ace had nothing to do with it, that wouldn't really have made any difference. It is a sad episode, and I don't love everything about it, but overall, it is a good episode, and it is one of my faves from series VII. The scene where Starbug follows Rimmer's coffin, where it joins the coffins of all the other Rimmers to make up the rings surrounding a planet, is one of my all time fave Dwarf scenes. Which is kinda strange when Rimmer's exit is one of the main reasons why I think series VII suffers compared to the first 6. But the scene itself is just very well done, especially with the music that accompanies it... I still sometimes tear up during that scene. lol

 

Rimmer is the best character in Red Dwarf by a mile.
Kochanski is the most annoying and poorest character who every appeared in the series.
I guess it's pretty obvious why Series 7 is so unpopular
That said, there are some wonderful moments that put the series streets ahead of any comedy on TV at the moment!

 

I never had much of a problem with Series VII. I think, deep down, many people hate it because they just can't accept the loss of Rimmer. But when you look back at it now, he's only absent for four episodes of the entire show. I think people are unnaturally hard on this series.

"Stoke Me A Clipper" is one of my favorite Red Dwarf episodes of all time; it just hits all the right notes. "Epideme" and "Nanarchy" are pretty flawless, and "Blue" is a lot of fun. The other episodes all have a lot of brilliance and humor, even if they're a little uneven. "Tikka To Ride" can be really funny, but gets a little too dark in places, I feel. The Lister beatdown at the end is uncomfortable. "Duct Soup" had good character moments despite being a bottle show and "Ouroboros" is important to the overall storyline of the series if perhaps a little over-ambitious. Even "Beyond A Joke" has positives. The stuff with Kryten infiltrating Jane Austen World and the lobster dinner is classic Dwarf, IMHO. The episode lags after they go to the Centauri and meet the Simulant and Abel, but there's still some great stuff in the episode. RD VII is like this in general. I also really like Series VIII but it does shake up the Red Dwarf formula quite a bit and a lot of folks seemingly just can't deal with change of that magnitude.

 

I think the only weak series is 8 but I still like it anyway. 7 is decent IMO

 

Exactly. Even when an episode of Red Dwarf is bad, I still enjoy spending time with those characters.

 

In general, it's considered a huge step down from Series 6, and that's really the problem. It's not an affront to Red Dwarf or anything, but Series 6 was the most popular series of Red Dwarf mainly because of the expertly honed puns and gags which accompanied the sci-fi plots. Try as you might, there's not a "red alert bulb" moment in the whole of Series 7. It had the plots, but it's pretty clear that Grant was the punmeister in that writing partnership. No studio audiences was a negative too.

On a personal level, it's also when Kryten became jealous-possessive Kryten. Which was just a really terrible move.

 

I'm really not sure about these two points. Series 6 actually received plenty of negative reviews when it was first broadcast and I still rarely hear people saying that they think it was the best series.

And I would seriously disagree with Rob Grant being, 'the punmeister'. Have you seen Dark Ages? Series VIII had terrible plots after all (the best one being a copy of a Series I episode) but had a few laughs.