List of Red Dwarf characters
This is a list of characters from the TV sitcom Red Dwarf.
Major characters
Overview
Details
Alter egos
Ace Rimmer
Arnold "Ace" Rimmer is an alter ego of Arnold Rimmer, also played by Chris Barrie. Ace first appears in the episode "Dimension Jump" and is the antithesis of Rimmer. He is modest despite being a popular, knowledgeable, charming, daredevil hero. He comes from a seemingly perfect universe, in which Rimmer and Lister lived happy, successful lives and were good friends.Ace's childhood paralleled Rimmer's up until the age of seven, when one of them was kept down a year at school while the other was not. The one kept down became Ace, who claimed that the shame of being a clear foot taller than his classmates inspired him to buckle down, fight back and work hard, while Arnold spent the rest of his life making excuses for his many failures.
Ace travels from planet to planet wearing a gold, fur-lined flight suit and saving people's lives. He was originally a test pilot for the Space Corps in his own universe, which also features an alter ego of Lister who is a flight engineer married to Kochanski and has twin sons, Jim and Bexley. Ace's other friends included the Space Corps chaplain, a receptionist named Mellie, and Admiral Sir James Tranter, a superior officer whom Ace nicknames 'Bongo'. Despite being a happily married heterosexual, Bongo has a crush on Ace, who takes it in stride despite not reciprocating his feelings. Unlike Rimmer who desperately wanted to be an officer but turned out to be a vending machine attendant—Ace is a commander, but is always modest about the attention he receives. He spends time with Spanners, the engineering crew, and the enlisted men/ratings. He even refused to attend a lavish party his fellow officers threw for him, instead planning to go to a smaller one with Spanners and the enlisted.
Ace was offered the chance to pilot a brand-new spacecraft, one that can cross dimensions—leading to him meeting the Red Dwarf crew. Rimmer was instantly bitter that Ace was everything he dreamed of becoming himself. Ace had hoped that Rimmer was like him, but later regarded him as a "weasly maggot". In contrast, Ace and Lister became firm friends, prompting a lot of snide remarks from Rimmer about their 'relationship.'
Following his visit to Red Dwarf, Ace extended his adventures through the multi-verse and meeting many alternative versions of himself. When he finally became unable to carry on, he passed his legacy on to another version of himself, who became a new Ace. In turn, when it was the new Ace's time, he passed the torch on. As each Ace died, their light bees were sent in orbit in small yellow 'coffins' around an unknown planet, and by the time Red Dwarfs Rimmer took on the mantle in "Stoke Me a Clipper", the billions of Ace Rimmers who came before him had formed a golden ring similar to Saturn's.
Ace's catchphrase is "Smoke me a kipper, I'll be back for breakfast!", and a running gag in the series is that everyone who encounters Ace exclaims "What a guy!" in adoration, once even in German: "Was für ein Kerl!"
After encountering a polymorph in "Emohawk: Polymorph II", the original hologram Rimmer is robbed of his emotional bitterness, and as result takes on a personality identical to Ace. The now brave and heroic Rimmer saves the lives of the crew when the Emohawk turns into a grenade, but must reluctantly return to his cowardly ways upon defeating the creature.
Duane Dibbley
Duane Dibbley is the dorky alter ego of the Cat, played by Danny John-Jules with a bowl haircut and a large overbite. He first appears in the Series V episode "Back To Reality ", as part of a hallucinogenic experience, designed to cause despair in the Dwarfers. He then returns in "Emohawk: Polymorph II," caused by a polymorph absorbing the Cat's cool. In the BBC's Red Dwarf Night he appears in the Can't Cook, Won't Cook parody after The Cat refuses to take part in the show on the same team as Rimmer.In Series VIII episode "Back in the Red", the Cat, Lister, Kochanski and Kryten disguised themselves as "The Dibbley Family" by wearing mop heads on their heads and large false teeth.
Duane has the opposite personality to the Cat—he is a lot more nervous and shy than the Cat. He is very clumsy lacking the Cat's grace, he also treats others with more respect. Not having the Cat's ego he referred to Rimmer as 'sir', something the real Cat would not do.
Duane appears to possess a great deal of self-hatred as he is aware of his differences and often states that he hates Duane Dibbley.
The character's brief appearances have proved incredibly popular. John-Jules' explanation for this was "No-one's ever written a black nerd before."
Arlene Rimmer, Deb Lister, the Dog and Hilly
Played by Suzanne Bertish, Angela Bruce, Matthew Devitt and Hattie Hayridge.They are alternative versions of Arnold Rimmer, Dave Lister, the Cat and Holly from a parallel universe in the episode "Parallel Universe". With the exception of the Dog, the others are female versions of the regular characters. Dog has dog-like traits—for example a hatred of bathing. The Cat takes an instant dislike to him, but the Dog does not pick up on this and continues to mistake Cat for another dog.
Queeg 500
Queeg 500 is a "back-up" computer AI system with an IQ of 500, played by Charles Augins. Queeg claims that Holly's IQ is not 6,000 but 6 and that Holly gets his information from a children's science book, called the Junior Colour Encyclopaedia of Space. He demotes Holly to night-watchman and takes over the ship.Queeg soon makes the crew's lives hell. Rimmer is forced to take regular long-distance runs whilst Cat and Lister are made to work for tiny amounts of food. They appeal to Holly who challenges Queeg to a game of chess, with the loser being deleted. Holly loses the game and fades from view. He then returns and announces that he was Queeg all the time. The whole thing was a practical joke to teach the crew to appreciate Holly even though he has gone a bit "computer senile".
"Queeg" is a reference to Lieutenant Commander Philip Francis Queeg, USN, a fictional character in Herman Wouk's 1951 novel The Caine Mutiny and 1954 film of the same name. Both Queeg and Queeg 500 are in command of a vessel and prone to eccentric behaviour. Both display an oppressive command style and are prone to unprovoked angry outbursts.
Shipboard robots
The Skutters
The skutters are motorized service and maintenance robots that stand at around tall, appearing as motorized boxes with a single limb each, ending in a three-clawed hand with an electronic eye. They perform menial tasks around the ship, such as sweeping the cinema floors after a movie, or painting the corridor walls. The skutters are unable to speak, but can usually make their feelings clear. Their hands are particularly well designed for flicking the V or flipping the bird, most often to Rimmer. Their behavior is rather more human-like than might be expected for such crudely designed robots; they play cowboys-and-Indians, enjoy watching films, are highly emotional and appear to be somewhat unstable and malfunctional, presumably as a result of three million years of continuous operation.The tiny, motorized, three-clawed service droids were actual working models, save the episode "The End", where the skutters were a post-production addition to the chicken soup nozzle scene. They were made up of various parts including old shoe boxes and the engines of radio-controlled cars. Interference originating from the radios of a nearby taxicab company, which was particularly busy during filming of the episode "Future Echoes", caused havoc with the skutter models on set. One reportedly poked Craig Charles in the eye, and another launched an attack on Chris Barrie's groin. Coincidentally, the skutters had been scripted as very inept towards their maintenance work and mischievous towards humans.
Kryten referred to a skutter by the name Bob in the episode "The Last Day". Series VIII also featured a skutter named Bob along with his "wife" Madge. The skutters are fans of John Wayne, having their broom cupboard filled with Western props and pin-ups of Wayne, and are members of the John Wayne Fan Club.
Two skutters appeared in the US pilot playing poker until one of them gives Rimmer what looks like "the finger". These skutters were given a revamp in design: a wider, rounded body with a complex neck and a narrow head with concealed eyes that pop up.
The skutters are unusually capable of sex, as in the episode Parallel Universe, a "male" Skutter and its "female" equivalent from the parallel universe are seen with "children".
In "Back to Earth", the skutters had been given a complete redesign, and were added in post as a CG effect rather than being a remote controlled mechanism, as there was not enough money in the budget to even revamp the casing. Due to this, as the actors had no visual cue, Danny John-Jules was required to step in as a replacement for a skutter so that Chris Barrie had something to react to.
Talkie Toaster
Talkie Toaster is a minor character, a monomaniacal talking toaster that tries to steer every conversation to the subject of toast.Owned by Lister, Talkie Toaster is a toaster with artificial intelligence that is completely obsessed with making toast and annoys everyone on board. In Series I, it appears as a standard 1970s-style toaster made from stainless steel but with a circular light on the side which flashes as he speaks, and is voiced by John Lenahan, with a transatlantic accent. In Series IV, it appears as a red toaster made of plastic, with its name "Talkie Toaster" emblazoned on the side, and rather more flashing red and green lights and is voiced by David Ross.
The Toaster repeatedly interjects in conversations and whenever possible tries to steer the conversation towards toast. Eventually Lister smashes the Toaster with a hammer. Kryten repairs the toaster in order to use it as a guinea-pig for "intelligence compression"—restoring Holly's former intelligence at the cost of reducing her operational lifespan. The toaster's repaired personality is somewhat different from the original: it now has a different voice and no longer tries to hide its obsession with toast.
The Talkie Toaster returns in the Series XII episode "Mechocracy", where it is again voiced by David Ross and depicted in its Series IV appearance. In the episode, the toaster has spent nearly two decades switched off in the garbage hold. Kryten and Lister make a deal with the toaster to swing the election for president of the machines on Red Dwarf in Kryten's favour. After Kryten wins, the Cat locks Rimmer in the garbage hold alone with the toaster until Monday.
Outside the TV series, Talkie Toaster plays a secondary, yet vital role in the book Better Than Life, where Holly revives him in order to have someone to talk to while the crew are stuck in the virtual reality game. In this version, it is toaster who figures out how to restore Holly's IQ after perusing Holly's manuals, and later is also the one who informs the Dwarfers how to survive a black hole, Holly having given him this information while showing off his intelligence before he had to shut himself down.
Talkie Toaster's interviews with various Red Dwarf characters can be found on Red Dwarf