Season 1: "Three million years from Earth..."
Episode 4: "Waiting for God"
Holly's joke:
The most interesting event that happened recently was that Lister pretended he passed the chef's exam, although really he failed. That gives you some idea of how truly exciting some days can be around here.
Rimmer orders Holly to give him access to the crew's confidential reports, and is happy when he hears Captain Hollister's remarks about Lister, less than complimentary. However, he is less than pleased to hear his own report, which is little better. Holly tells Rimmer that he has detected a UO (Unidentified Object), but Rimmer stalks off in a huff. Meanwhile, Lister is reading a book the Cat has given him; Cats read differently than humans, by sniffing scents impregnated into the paper on their books. As he is reading, Talkie the Toaster bemoans the fact that no-one wants to eat toast.
Rimmer comes in, and is more than annoyed that Lister is using his clothes. Even though he's dead, he doesn't like Lister taking his things. The two discuss the possibility that they are alone in the cosmos. The Cat returns with the Holy Book, which tells the Cat people's history, and Lister sees that there are pictures in this one, which depict him as Cloister, the Cats' god. All the facts fit, and in truth this is the case --- Lister
is their god, but the Cat scoffs at the idea. Lister asks Holly to translate the Holy Book for him, and Holly says he'll give it a go.
Rimmer runs in, excited and tells Lister that the UO is in fact a pod. Lister goes into the quarantine, and when Rimmer tells him he's to stay there for a month, he walks right out again. When Rimmer goes off to get the scutters, Lister discovers that the pod is in fact one of Red Dwarf's old garbage pods! He asks Holly why he didn't tell Rimmer, and Holly replies that "Well, it's a laugh, innit?" Later, Lister and Rimmer discuss their beliefs, and Lister puts forward the theory that humans may be regarded as a galactic disease, with the result that aliens stay away from Earth. Rimmer, however, dreams of aliens giving him a new body...
The next morning, Holly has deciphered the Holy Book, and reveals that indeed Lister and Cloister are the one person. He tells Lister of a great war that broke out on Red Dwarf between the Cats, as they took Lister's plan to open a hotdog stand on Fiji as their holy doctrine. The Cats fought over the colour the hats were supposed to be that they would wear in the diner, and after the war the two factions piled into space arks, one of them smashing into an asteroid, having used Lister's old laundry list as their starchart! Rimmer has no sympathy or time for Lister, who is somewhat shaken by the amount of destruction and carnage his plan has caused.
Finding no joy with Rimmer, Lister heads off in search of the Cat, and comes across him in the cargo bay, in company with an old priest, who regrets wasting his life living the way Cloister preached, and now no longer believes that his god exists. Lister appears to him, dressed as Cloister, and tells the old man that he has in fact performed well, and will be received into Fiji as a loyal worshipper.
Back at the quarantine room, Rimmer waits with bated breath to see the emergence of the Quagaars (a name for the aliens he has made up!), and is a little miffed when Lister draws from the garbage pod.... a rancid chicken carcass!
Notes:
This is where you really start to appreciate that Red Dwarf is more than just a comedy series, indeed, more than just a sci-fi series. Rob Grant and Doug Naylor, the creators and writers of the series, have set up a whole mythology and religion for the race known as
Felis sapiens or Cats. But they've put it together in a way that is weirdly logical, if you look at it, and if you don't have all the facts. In fairness, we can't really scoff can we, when some of us revere the memory of, as Douglas Adams once put it, "a guy who was nailed to a tree for saying for great it would be to be nice to each other for a change", and others who believe their god wants them to kill in his name? In fact, in my view, all religion sucks, as Lister points out in this episode when he says of the Cats: "They're just using religion as an excuse to be crappy to each other!" to which Talkie the Toaster replies, "So what else is new?"
But the Cat mythos is all built around a real event, if somewhat distorted through the lens of three millennia of their history. Lister --- whose name has become corrupted to Cloister (perhaps because he was cloistered away in stasis, perhaps not) --- did indeed save his cat Frankenstein's life. She was pregnant, and due to his sacrifice was able to give birth and basically begin a bloodline that would one day lead to the emergence of a sapient species, of whom we believe the creature currently known as Cat is the last survivor. Yea, as it is written in the Holy Book:
Cloister, the Holy One, who gave of his life that we might be saved. In a twisted, very funny way, it all fits.
But because Lister was and is such a slob, Frankenstein (or her later sentient descendants) taught their offspring to emulate his ways: be lazy, eat food that's bad for you, never wash, and so on --- none of which of course Dave had ever envisioned happening or he might have explained to them that his life choices weren't for everyone. The Cats then inevitably as they became more humanoid had a war, splitting into two factions and after the war leaving Red Dwarf in search of "Fyushal" (Fiji), their Promised Land. Sadly, one faction used Lister's old laundry list, believing it to be a star chart, and flew straight into an asteroid!
When Lister and the Cat meet the old Cat priest belowdecks he has been left behind, in a typical cat move, because he is old and infirm, and the other cats did not want to have to look after him: cats are of course notoriously selfish. Quite how he's survived down there is not clear --- though it appears the Cat (our Cat) has been bringing him food, and anyway how did
he survive on his own for as long as he did before Lister was revived, having no access to Red Dwarf's computers and thus no way of getting food? That's never explained, but cats are hunters and we assume he was able to catch enough food to remain healthy. Of course, there's then the question too of how he manages to keep looking so cool and unruffled if he's foraging for food, but I guess that's one of the never-to-be-solved mysteries of the universe!
There is a change in the script here, and it's pretty obvious, but maybe it can be explained, like much of the Cats' teachings, by the details changing with the passage of time and the story being handed down from generation to generation. Lister's original plan, which he confided to Rimmer in the first episode, is to have a farm on Fiji, however here the Cats have decided it was to open a hotdog stand. It's a small point, but without the change the war would not have made sense, as the main point of contention was over the colour of the hats to be worn. Wouldn't really have worked with a farm, and can you really see Cats labouring on the land?
Best lines/quotes/scenes
Rimmer asks Holly for his confidential report:
RIMMER: "Holly, give me access to the crew's confidential reports."
HOLLY: "Those are for the Captain's eyes only, Arnold."
RIMMER: "Fine. Well, we'll give him ten seconds to come back from the dead, and if he hasn't managed it, we'll presume I'm in charge." (Waits) "No, he hasn't managed it."
HOLLY: (With resignation) "Whose do you want?"
RIMMER: "Give me ... give me Lister's. Just the remarks."
HOLLY: "David Lister, Technician, 3rd class. Captain's remarks:
Has requested sick leave due to diarrhea on no less than 500 occasions. Left his previous job as a supermarket trolley attendant after ten years because he didn't want to get tied down to a career. Promotion prospects: zero."
RIMMER: "I always liked Captain Hollister. Such a great reader of men, was Captain Hollister. A marvellous, marvellous man and a tragic loss to us all. All right, Holly, give me ... give me mine."
HOLLY: "Arnold Rimmer, Technician, 2nd Class. Captain's remarks:
There's a saying amongst the officers: If a job's worth doing, it's worth doing well. If it's not worth doing, give it to Rimmer. He aches for responsibility but constantly fails the engineering exam."
RIMMER: "Whoa, whoa, whoa, Holly, Holly. I want
my report. Rimmer. Two M's, E, R."
HOLLY: "
Astoundingly zealous. Possibly mad. Probably has more teeth than brain cells. Promotion prospects: comical."
RIMMER: "No no no no no, Holly. I want
Rimmer. That's two R's, one at the front, one at the back."
HOLLY: "Arnold, this
is your report."
RIMMER: "I always hated that pus-head Hollister. He always resented my popularity. That's why he never put forward my proposal to reduce the minimum haircut length by an eighth of an inch. Small-minded, petty-thinking modo."
HOLLY: "Arnold, I'm picking up an unidentified object."
RIMMER: "
Constantly fails the exam? I'd hardly call eleven times
constantly. I mean, if you eat roast beef eleven times in your life, one would hardly say that person
constantly eats roast beef. No, it would be a rare, nay, freak occurrence. Possibly mad? What is he dribbling about?"
Rimmer is angry that Lister has borrowed one of his shirts:
RIMMER: "What's that down the front?"
LISTER: (Checking the various stains) "That's
definitely biscuit, um, that's custard, that's definitely ink, and just general sort of dirty marks."
RIMMER: "You can't just go through my possessions!"
LISTER: "Come on, you don't need them any more."
RIMMER: "Because I'm dead?"
LISTER: "Yeah. You're a hologram, and holograms don't need clothes."
RIMMER: "They're my things, Lister! Would you steal verruca cream from a man with no feet? I mean, how would you like it if I stole your T-shirt? Your favourite one, with the custard stains down the front?"
LISTER: "I wouldn't care".
RIMMER: "You've got no right to go through my wardrobe."
LISTER: "OK, OK. (Grins) "You keep your underpants on coathangers, don't ya?"
RIMMER: "That's private!"
LISTER: "OK, Rimmer, OK. Take the shirt back."
RIMMER: "I don't want it. It's ruined. You've (shudders)
sweated in it!"
LISTER: "Well, if you don't want the shirt, what do you want, Rimmer?"
RIMMER: "Just keep out of my things, all right?"
Lister waxes philosophical about the possibility of life in the universe:
LISTER: "Rimmer, there's nothing out there, you know. There's nobody out there. No alien monsters, no Zargon warships, no beautiful blondes with beehive hairdos who say, "Show me some more of this Earth thing called kissing." There's just you, me, the Cat, and a lot of floating smegging rocks. That's it. Finito."
Tha Cat shows Rimmer his "shiny thing"...
CAT: "Hey! You can't have my shiny thing! I found it, it's my shiny thing."
RIMMER: "What are you dribbling about?"
CAT: (Pulls out a silver yo-yo) "This is my shiny thing, and if you try and take it off me, I may have to eat you."
RIMMER: "It's a yo-yo, you modo."
CAT: "It does two amazing things. One, you have the shiny thing at the top, and the string down below, or, and this is the clever part, you have the string at the top, and the shiny thing down here where the string used to be."
RIMMER: "Yeah ... woweeee! You haven't the slightest clue what it's for, do you?"
CAT: "Why sure I do, grease stain. You hold the shiny thing in one hand, and you go ... aaaooowww! The string's moving! Hey! Stop that thing! Catch that string! Aaaooowww!"
Lister reads the Cats' Holy Book and finds out he is their god...
LISTER: "This is
me!"
The picture depicts a noble-looking individual, vaguely resembling
Lister, wearing biblical-style robes and carrying a black cat (an
ordinary cat, not a humanoid cat) on his shoulder. Above his head is a
doughnut-shaped halo.
CAT: "No, that's not you, that's Cloister. He was the father of the Cat people. He lived years ago, at the Beginning."
LISTER: (Turns the page) "Who's that?"
The next picture shows the same guy (without the cat) sitting lotus-style
inside what seems to be a giant ice cube.
CAT: "That's him frozen in time."
LISTER: "No, that's
me! I was sent into stasis. That's what "frozen in time" is."
CAT: "He did that to save Frankenstein."
LISTER: "Look, Frankenstein was my pet cat! (Points back and forth between himself and the picture) "Look: Lister, Cloister. Cloister, Lister! See?"
CAT: "Listen, you stupid monkey, Cloister's another name for ... for
God!"
LISTER: "That's what I'm saying! I am your God!"
CAT looks LISTER up and down. He's not impressed. (Well, who would be?)
CAT: "OK." (Points to his bowl of crispies) "Turn this into a woman."
LISTER: "I'm serious."
CAT: "So am I!"
LISTER: "Look, Frankenstein was my pet cat, right? And she was pregnant. Now, I got put into suspended animation. I was supposed to be there for 18 months, but I didn't get out for three million years."
CAT: "You oversleep? So do I."
LISTER: "No! What I'm saying is that over those three million years, your entire race of people evolved from my pet cat."
CAT: "Ah, I gotta go now, man. But let's do lunch sometime. I'll put it in my diary: 12:30, lunch with God. And, ah, formal dress, you know what I'm saying?"
LISTER: "It is true, you know."
CAT: "Yeah? Then I gotta ask you the ultimate question. If you're God, why that face?"
Lister works out what the "UO" --- the pod --- really is:
LISTER: "Give me an R, give me an E, give me a D ... give me a Red Dwarf Garbage Pod! Holly? Did Rimmer never work in waste disposal?"
HOLLY: "No, Dave."
LISTER: "It's one of our Red Dwarf garbage pods with, like, the writing burnt off in places. Why didn't you tell him?"
HOLLY: "Well, it's a laugh, innit?"
Rimmer, blissfully unaware of what it is, ruminates on what might be inside the pod, and on the nature of, again, intelligent life in the cosmos:
RIMMER: "You can scoff, Lister. That's nothing new. They laughed at Galileo. They laughed at Edison. They laughed at Columbo."
LISTER: "Who's Columbo?"
RIMMER: "The man with the dirty mac who discovered America."
LISTER: "What makes you think these aliens exist?"
RIMMER: "They must do, Lister! There's so many things that are strange and odd. So many things we don't have any explanation for."
LISTER: "Like, um, why do intelligent people buy cinema hot dogs? Do you mean that sort of weird and mysterious thing?"
RIMMER: "No, Lister, I mean like the pyramids. How did they move such massive pieces of stone without the aid of modern technology?"
LISTER: "They had massive whips, Rimmer. Massive, massive whips."
RIMMER: "All right, then, the Bermuda Triangle. Go on, explain that one. You know all the answers."
LISTER: "No, I agree there. That is a genuine mystery. How did a song like that ever become a hit? It defies all reason."
RIMMER: "I just don't know why I bother. I'd get more sense out of a squashed hedgehog. Lister, don't you ever stop and wonder: why are we here? What's the grand purpose?"
LISTER: "Why does it have to be such a big deal? Why can't it be like, like, human beings are a planetary disease? Like the Earth's got German measles or facial herpes, right? And that's why all of the other planets give us such a wide berth. It's like, "Oh, don't go near Earth! It's got human beings on it, they're contagious!"
RIMMER: "So you're saying, Lister, you're an intergalactic, pus-filled cold sore! At last, Lister, we agree on something."
LISTER: "What do you believe in, then? Do you believe in God?"
RIMMER: "God? Certainly not! What a preposterous thought! I believe in
aliens, Lister."
LISTER: "Oh, right, fine. Something sensible at last."
RIMMER: "Aliens, Lister, with technology so far in advance of our own we can't even begin to imagine."
LISTER: "Well, that's not difficult. Mankind hasn't even got the technology to create a toupee that doesn't get big laughs."
RIMMER: "Aliens, Lister, who can give me a real body."
LISTER: "Ooohhh, I can't wait to see your face in the morning, I really can't."
RIMMER: "And nor I yours, Lister. When that pod opens and from it emerges a beautiful alien woman with long green hair and six breasts."
LISTER: "Six breasts?! Imagine making love to a woman with six breasts!"
RIMMER: "Imagine making love to a woman!"
Having asked Holly to translate the Cats' Holy Book for him, Lister learns the full truth of what their beliefs are, or were:
LISTER: "Who's Cloister? Is it me?"
HOLLY: "Yes, Dave. The Cats have made you their God."
LISTER: "Hey! Working class kid makes good!"
HOLLY: "Your plan to buy a farm on Fiji and open up a hot dog and doughnut diner has become their image of heaven."
(Trollheart's note: this is perhaps a hollow attempt by the writers to claim that Lister's plan all along was to run a farm AND open up a diner. Well if it was he certainly didn't mention it to Rimmer...)
LISTER: "What?"
HOLLY: "And Cloister spake, `Lo, I shall lead you to Fyushal, and there we shall open a temple of food, wherein shall be sausages and doughnuts and all manner of bountiful things.Yea, even individual sachets of mustard. And those who serve shall have hats of great majesty, yea, though they be made of coloured cardboard and have humorous arrows through the top.'"
LISTER: "Does it say what happened to the rest of the Cats?"
HOLLY: "Holy wars. There were thousands of years of fighting, Dave, between the two factions."
LISTER: "What two factions?"
HOLLY: "Well, the ones who believed the hats should be red, and the ones who believed the hats should be blue."
LISTER: "Do you mean they had a war over whether the doughnut diner hats were red or blue?"
HOLLY: "Yeah. Most of them were killed fighting about that. It's daft really, innit?"
LISTER: "You're not kidding. They were supposed to be green! Go on, Hol."
HOLLY: "Well, finally they called a truce, and built two arks and left Red Dwarf in search of Fyushal."
LISTER: "But there's no such place as Fyushal. It's Fiji. I mean, how are they supposed to find it?"
HOLLY: "And Cloister gave to Frankenstein the sacred writing, saying, `Those who have wisdom will know its meaning.' And it was written thus: `Seven socks, one shirt--'"
LISTER: "That's my laundry list! I lined the cat's basket with me laundry list!"
HOLLY: The Blue Hats thought it was a star chart leading to the promised land."
LISTER: "Well it wasn't, it was my dirty washing.What happened next, Hol?"
HOLLY: "And the ark that left first followed the sacred signs, and lo, they flew straight into an asteroid. And the righteous in the second ark flew ever onward, knowing they were indeed righteous."