Red Dwarf - Back To Earth

5:02p.m., Wed 15 Apr 2009

I just got around to the three episodes of Red Dwarf's "Back To Earth" comeback.

I was underwhelmed. That's not to say it was rubbish, but the amount of hype surrounding it led me to believe it was going to be a triumphant comeback.

I'm a huge fan of the first three series, so maybe I've conveniently forgotten the diminishing returns of subsequent series.

I guess it was as good as we could have expected, but that just didn't feel good enough.

Like series 7, 'Back To Earth' was filmed on proper film as opposed to video tape and largely on a film-type set or on location rather than in front of a studio audience. Unlike series 7, Back To Earth had no laugh track. The lack of laughter, for me, meant it lacked a certain atmosphere. Red Dwarf always will be, to my mind, a traditional sitcom, but without that sitcom atmosphere the gags felt a lot flatter. Whatever pretensions the creators have about RD, they should understand that it's a sitcom and it's best suited to many of the trappings and techniques of the British sitcom tradition.

The script felt heavy on the exposition too, meaning that the gags struggled to give each episode any comedic momentum. It also felt like a feature film plot hacked into three half-hour episodes, meaning that each half-hour lacked any kind of rhythm. I would have definitely benefited from being screened as a one-off.

The Bladerunner echoes worked fabulously, but the whole premise of fictional characters escaping their fictional universe to confront their creators (yes, yes, I know that didn't happen in 'reality' as it turned out) felt horribly forced and derivative - this is, after all, the plot of The League Of Gentlemen movie which failed to impress critics and was a commercial flop to boot.

On the plus side, the four central characters all seemed to fit into their old roles comfortably and looked remarkably well preserved. The lack of either Hattie Hayridge of Norman Lovett as Holly unbalanced the cast though. Holly's dry wit is a useful counterpoint to the zanier aspects that creep in.

It was nice to see the gang again although I can't shake the feeling that somethings had their time and should stay there. Back To Earth is still at least a thousand times superior to the godawful "Hyperdrive" though.