'Fathers and Suns' by Doug Naylor

Because Lister is his own father (due to a very complicated time paradox – keep up!), every year he makes himself a Father's Day card, gets hammered on booze so that he forgets all about it, and then is surprised and delighted when the previous year’s card is delivered to him by Kryten. This year is no exception – until Rimmer points out what a terrible father he has been to himself. Lister seeks advice from Red Dwarf’s Medi-Bot, who encourages him to motivate his son, and helps register ‘Dave Lister Jnr.’ as a member of the ship’s crew. Meanwhile, Rimmer and Kryten bring online the new ship’s computer, a hot Goth blonde called Pree, who comes equipped with predictive behaviour technology; she immediately sends the gang into confusion, pre-empting them with the results of conversations that they have yet to have. Later on, Lister wakes up in a shopping cart with a traffic cone and the mother of all hangovers; he also finds a series of video messages from his father, trying to motivate his son while getting smashed on shots. Ignoring his dad’s advice to enrol in the Jupiter Mining Corp Engineering programme (and to face up to the Denti-Bot), Lister scans forward in the messages – and loses his guitar in the process. As furious as a spoilt teenager, Lister declares that he hates his dad and storms off. Pree continues to smeg off Rimmer: she watches his favourite show, decides to hate it for him and deletes it before he can actually see it for himself; she then repairs B Deck the way Rimmer would have, sending it into chaos. Elsewhere, after chickening out of seeing the Denti-Bot yet again, Lister decides to teach his dad a lesson and de-registers himself from the Red Dwarf crew. However, as a result the coldly logical Pree terminates Lister’s free oxygen allowance, refuses to let him to re-enlist in the Corp because he is too old for the entry-level of the programme, and then uses the ship’s robots to herd him into an airlock. Lister only just manages to put on a space-suit, before he is ejected out into space… Pree then informs Rimmer, Cat and Kryten that their mission goal to return Lister to Earth is no longer applicable; she then begins ‘Operation Sizzle’: flying Red Dwarf into a nearby sun! With just ninety minutes until they melt to death the trio fly into panic – until they see Lister outside, jetpack engaged and flying straight into the ship’s ramscoop! Reunited with Lister, the gang plan to use the air vents to reach the machine room and shut down Pree; however, the computer is already way ahead of them, flooding the vents with laughing gas and setting the fork-lift robots against them. With sharp, pointy death closing in Lister suddenly remembers that while his dad is no longer a crewmember, Dave Lister Jnr. is; this information catches Pree in a logic trap, and to everyone’s relief she turns herself off, halting the robots’ attack. A while later, Lister finally resolves to enlist in the Corp’s training programme – until the mail brings him a new Zero G game to play…


Chris Barrie (Arnold J. Rimmer), Craig Charles (Dave Lister), Danny John-Jules (Cat), Robert Llewellyn (Kryten), Rebecca Blackstone (Pree), Kerry Shale (Medi-Bot / Taiwan Tony)

Directed by Doug Naylor

Produced by Richard Naylor
Executive producers Charles Armitage and Doug Naylor

TX: (Dave)
11th October 2012 @ 9:00 pm

Notes:
*Featuring Dave Lister, Arnold Rimmer, Cat and Kryten

*This episode runs longer than in previous seasons, at forty minutes