'Tikka to Ride' Rob Grant and Doug Naylor

SCENE 1 - INT. STARBUG

(Camera P.O.V.)

LISTER:
(Talking to camera) Hello? Testing one, two, three. Hello? Yeees! Here we go. Ship's Log… erm… one! I've decided to keep a journal of life on board ship and send it off in a probe. Since turning twenty-eight I feel a new maturity about myself. In fact, I can't even remember the last time I tried to urinate on Rimmer from the top of D deck. No, wait a minute, Friday. But apart from that one lapse, maturity-wise I'm practically up there with Abe Lincoln and Moses. Now. Just recently, we came across a craft piloted by ourselves from fifteen years into the future. We had a bit of an argument, and they attacked us. See attached.


SCENE 2 – CLIP FROM ‘OUT OF TIME’

RIMMER:
Another lock!

LISTER:
Incoming message!

FUTURE RIMMER's face appears on the view-screen.

FUTURE RIMMER:
Either you give us access to the data we require, or be prepared to be blasted out of the sky.

Huge explosion, which throws CAT on top of KRYTEN's console.

RIMMER:
Cat!?

KRYTEN:
... Dead ... But there may be -

Yet another explosion sends KRYTEN flying. RIMMER rushes to KRYTEN's body.

RIMMER:
Kryten?! There may be a what? A way out of this? Is that what you were gonna say? ... Speak, Kryten! How can we change what's happening?!

A look of realization comes over RIMMER’s face. While Starbug is being rocked with explosions, he hurries to the Mid-section and grabs the bazookoid. He kicks open a smashed door and runs through the ship, avoiding the falling pieces of ceiling, before arriving at the engine room. He takes aim at the time drive and pulls the trigger on the bazookoid. The time drive is destroyed.


SCENE 3 – CLIP FROM ‘OUT OF TIME’

Starbug moving through space. A blast hits it and it is completely destroyed.


SCENE 4 - INT. STARBUG

(Camera P.O.V.)

LISTER:
We were no match. They killed us. Teh! And destroyed everything on the ship, including the time drive. Which meant there was no time drive for them to have in the future, to bring back into the past to destroy the future of their past selves in the present. Put simply by killing us they killed themselves because once we were dead it was impossible for us to become them in the future and return in time to kill ourselves in the past even though it was the present.

(Camera explodes. We go back to ‘normal view’)

LISTER:
Smeg!

KRYTEN:
Have you been trying to explain about our future selves again sir?

LISTER:
I just thought I'd give it one more go.

KRYTEN:
Oh, that's the third camera this week, the machines just can't take it, sir.

LISTER:
But I want to try and explain why Starbug's damaged as part of the time line being erased, 'cos this reality's unstable, and anomalies have emerged from both dimensions to cope with the paradox.

KRYTEN:
Garbled, confusing and quite frankly duller than an in-flight magazine produced by Air Belgium. Now just state our position and explain we're down on supplies.

LISTER:
All right, all right.


SCENE 5 - INT. STARBUG

(Camera flicks on)

LISTER:
This is Dave LISTER of the J.M.C. transport vehicle Starbug. We're down on supplies, we need help, out.

(Camera flicks off. Then back on again)

LISTER:
By the way we're in space. We just past a sort of reddy moon a couple of days ago. Co-ordinates enclosed. It's about that shape (he makes a circle with his fingers). You can't miss it.

OPENING TITLES


SCENE 5 - SPACE

(Starbug flies through space)

LISTER:
Ship’s log update, Friday a.m. The battle with our future selves has had the most terrible consequence.


SCENE 6 – INT. STARBUG. LISTER’S QUARTERS

(Lister and Kryten)

LISTER:
Wiped out? Kryten man, they can't be.

KRYTEN:
I'm afraid so sir. The laser cannon breached the main water tank and flooded supply deck B. They didn't stand a chance.

LISTER:
Yeah, but sure-

KRYTEN:
There was nothing we could do to save them, sir.

LISTER:
So you mean, now we've got no popadoms at all?

KRYTEN:
No popadoms, no curries, all the Indian food supplies have been totaled.

(Lister hugs his guitar and rocks backwards and forwards in trauma)

LISTER:
I'll have to survive without them then. I'll have salads.

KRYTEN:
Sir, you're in shock, you don't know what you're saying.

LISTER:
It's only curry.

KRYTEN:
“Only curry”. The enormity hasn't sunk in. You must mourn sir, don't you see you must mourn.

LISTER:
Curries!

KRYTEN:
Oh, sir, get it out, cry like a baby.

LISTER:
What am I gonna do. Curry night was the one little beacon I had. Made me feel like a normal ordinary guy, not some sad freak stuck in deep space. No woman. No hope. No curry.

KRYTEN:
And worse still, a choice of only two alcoholic beverages: ‘Chinzano Bianco’ or ‘Advoca’. It's a human tragedy.

LISTER:
No lager?

KRYTEN:
Sir, there is nothing unmanly in howling like a hungry prairie dog.

LISTER:
No lager!

(He rocks more furiously)

KRYTEN:
All the supplies on B deck were destroyed, sir, there wasn't even any wreckage, no debris, zip!

LISTER:
A few beers and a curry. It was the highlight of my week.

KRYTEN:
I used to look forward to curry night too, sir. Seeing your little face all happy and smiling. Come rain or shine we always made time for curry night, every Friday.

LISTER:
Saturday.

KRYTEN:
Sunday.

LISTER:
Tuesday.

KRYTEN:
Wednesday.

LISTER:
And Thursday. Always the same meal, three popadoms with mango chutney.

KRYTEN:
Those little onions.

LISTER:
Dill pickle.

KRYTEN:
That day-glow green mint sauce that just doesn't wash out.

LISTER:
And that weird red stuff that no one knows what it is.

KRYTEN:
Then a shami kebab starter.

LISTER:
Followed by a chicken vindaloo, kamikaze hot, with a fire extinguisher on standby.

KRYTEN:
Two scoops of coffee ice-cream

LISTER:
And two indigestion tablets. Oh, life without curry! It's like Laurel without Hardy, the Lone Ranger without… that Indian bloke.

KRYTEN:
Sir, perhaps you could learn to love pasta.

LISTER:
Pasta? Are you sick?


SCENE 7 – INT. STARBUG COCKPIT

(Starbug in flight)


SCENE 8 – INT. STARBUG COCKPIT

(Rimmer and Cat are at their stations. Lister and Kryten enter)

LISTER:
You heard the news? All the curry supplies have destroyed.

CAT and RIMMER:
We heard.

RIMMER:
As a mark of respect we thought on Sunday at twelve o'clock we could have a minute’s flatulence.

(He and Cat break into fits of laughter)

LISTER:
It's nothing to you guys, is it? Curries were my life.

KRYTEN:
Sirs, the altercation with our future selves caused anomalies which have expanded the cargo deck by two-hundred-and-twelve percent. We should ascertain that the new structure is stable.


SCENE 9 – INT. STARBUG CARGO HOLD

(The hold is now huge, and swirls of mist waft across the floor. The lads walk through)

CAT:
So let me get this straight. Time has returned to the point we discovered the time machine, right? So what's to stop us going back on board the Gemini 12 and picking it up all over again?

RIMMER:
We have to avoid all forms of time travel. It's the only way of breaking our destiny line and assuring we don't end up like our future selves.

LISTER:
Yeah, but surely we can use the time drive if we're careful. You know, if don't abuse it like our future selves did. You know, if we're sensible and mature.

RIMMER:
And do what?

LISTER:
Go back in time to an Indian takeaway and order five-hundred curries.

KRYTEN:
Sir, the scheme is irresponsible, moronic and preposterous.

CAT:
All your hallmarks, Bud

LISTER:
Look, one really big takeaway order once every two years and our problems are over.

CAT:
Your problems are over, are problems are just beginning.

KRYTEN:
What about causality? Interfering with the past, no matter how minutely always alters the Present. Cause and effect!

LISTER:
Look I'm a curryaholic. I've only got two taste buds that work. I need curry!

RIMMER:
We can't afford to take any more chances. I say the time drive stays where it is.

CAT:
You know I'd rather wear sideways-pressed flares and a clip-on polyester tie than agree with goal post head, but this time he's right.

LISTER:
Oh, OK, OK.


SCENE 10 – INT. STARBUG CARGO HOLD

(The lads climb down a ladder, past a giant fan, onto another section of the hold)

KRYTEN:
Since that completes the D deck inspection, sirs, permission to off-line for the next twelve hours while I discard some old cache files.

CAT:
How come you need more memory? Over the years you've had more RAM than a field of sheep!

KRYTEN:
My head is littered with unnecessary information, sir. The ability to sing the Bay City Rollers’ greatest hits is no longer a priority. For most cultural purposes, crooning ‘Bye Bye Baby’ is more than sufficient.

LISTER:
This cleaning thing, how does it work, exactly?

KRYTEN:
I simply attach my RAM to the ships computer, and download the unwanted files into its trash file.

LISTER:
Your RAM's in your head, isn't it? So you won't actually be using your body, then?

KRYTEN:
Why do you ask?

LISTER:
Just interested. Robotics. Fascinating, isn't it?


SCENE 11 – INT. STARBUG LISTER’S QUARTERS

(Middle of the night. LISTER wakes and climbs out of bed noiselessly.


SCENE 12 – INT. STARBUG CORRIDOR

(LISTER, now holding a plastic carrier bag, enters KRYTEN’s quarters, where the android is ‘asleep’, plugged into a recharging socket. LISTER unscrews and removes KRYTEN’s head, reaches into the plastic bag, and removes KRYTEN’S Spare Head 2. LISTER kisses the head, and screws it onto KRYTEN’S BODY. The android wakes up)

KRYTEN:
By heavens, I'm Head head!

LISTER:
Shhhh. This is only temporary.

KRYTEN:
I don't understand.

LISTER:
Look, I want to go back in time on a curry hunt. Kryten said “no way”. What do you say?

KRYTEN:
I can't go behind Kryten's head. What would he say if he found out. It's deceitful, wrong and dishonest. I'm in. Those are emotion I've longed to experience. But first you'll have to override my guilt chip and disable my behaviour protocols.

LISTER:
OK, show me how.

KRYTEN:
Press the skull release catch behind right ear.

(LISTER opens KRYTEN’s head and props up the lid with its little stand)

LISTER:
OK, here we go.

(Later. The two of them look at the chip, now removed from KRYTEN’S head)

KRYTEN:
My guilt chip. No behaviour protocols. Just call me Badass!


SCENE 13 – INT. STARBUG GALLEY

(LISTER, RIMMER and CAT are sitting at the dinner table)

LISTER:
Hey, that smells good, what's for breakkie?

(KRYTEN enters with a heavily-laden tray)

KRYTEN:
Waffles, sir, dripping in honey and jam, with three fried eggs on the side, coated with cheese.

(Kryten puts the tray down onto the table)

CAT:
That sounds about as healthy as jumping off a cliff!

KRYTEN:
Healthy? Who cares! Pork away!

(KRYTEN stirs their milkshakes with a whisk fitted to his groinal attachment)

LISTER:
So, erm, Kryten, now that you've had time to think, what about that curry-hunt to the Twenty-Second Century?

KRYTEN:
Oh I meant to mention that, yes, I overreacted yesterday. On reflection I think it'd be quite safe.

CAT:
Safe?

RIMMER:
What about causality?

KRYTEN:
Causality, well, OK, you know, one event causes another, OK, but sometimes you've just got to say “the laws of time and space, who gives a smeg”!

LISTER:
I think what Kryten's trying to say is ...

(As he is speaking KRYTEN puts a cigarette in his mouth and lights up)

CAT:
You're smoking!

KRYTEN:
Oh, is my generator over heating again?

RIMMER:
A cigarette!

KRYTEN:
Do you want one?

RIMMER:
Of course I don't want one.

KRYTEN:
Do you want me to go outside?

LISTER:
I think what Kryten's trying to say is that it's OK to go back in time and order a small legsworth of vindaloo to go, isn't that right?

(KRYTEN slings his groinal attachment over his shoulder)

KRYTEN:
You bet your ass!

LISTER:
OK, so lets navigate those reality bubbles and do it. Kryten, can I have a word.

(LISTER drags KRYTEN out to the corridor, pulling him by his groinal attachment)

LISTER:
What is wrong with you? You don't smoke, you never say bet your ass, and you never use your groinal attachment to stir anybody's milkshakes.

KRYTEN:
I didn't get any error commands.

LISTER:
Because you've got no behaviour protocols you spammy! Now get a grip or we'll be rumbled.

(KRYTEN's whisk starts going. LISTER walks off)

KRYTEN:
So uptight!

(KRYTEN takes a bottle and starts drinking)


SCENE 14 – SPACE

(Starbug approaches the derelict spaceship)


SCENE 15 – INT. DERELICT

(The CREW go out to get the time drive. LISTER and CAT wear spacesuits, whilst RIMMER is dressed normally. KRYTEN is humming a mad tune)

RIMMER:
What is wrong with that demented Tonka Toy now?

LISTER:
He's just got a bit of a bio-glitch in his transponder calibrations. It's only temporary. Hey Mister Time Drive. OK Krytn, we want the ‘Taj Mahal Tandoori’ restaurant behind the J.M.C. building in London. Back table. Quiet.

KRYTEN:
I'll need a moment to acquaint myself with the controls.

RIMMER:
But you've used it before.

KRYTEN:
Have I?

(LISTER elbows him)

KRYTEN:
Oh, yes, of course I have. Sorry, stupid of me. Just programming it now, matey boy.

(KRYTEN jabs the controls)


SCENE 16 – DALLAS, 1963

(We see JFK in his motorcade, cheers by huge crowds of enthusiastic Americans.


SCENE 17 – BOOK DEPOSITORY

(Standing by a window, LEE HARVEY OSWALD takes out a gun and gets ready to shoot the President. Cut to JFK waving. Cut back to LEE HARVEY OSWALD as he shoots twice. Suddenly, four red beams of light appear behind him, and the Red Dwarf crew materialize. LISTER loses his balance and falls backwards, knocking LEE HARVEY OSWALD out of the window)

RIMMER:
Nice landing, Kryten. That was about as smooth as Egyptian whisky.

KRYTEN:
Oh, apologies, sir, I'm er, I'm not sure what I did then.

LISTER:
This isn't right. Where are we?

KRYTEN:
Well, according to the time drive the date is November the 22nd 1963, and we're in the city of Dallas.

CAT:
Ah. Gimme that thing. (He grabs the Time Drive) I've always been a bit of a technical whiz when it comes to these kind of gizmos.

(He knocks the time drive on the window-frame, just as LEE HARVEY OSWALD is trying to climb up. It crushes LEE HARVEY OSWALD's fingers)

CAT:
Yep, Dallas, '63, no doubt about it.

LISTER:
Dallas. Wasn't that that place where that American King got assassinated?

RIMMER:
(Quickly) JFK.

LISTER:
No, it was John something, not Jeff K!

RIMMER:
J-F-K, not Jeff K you gimboid, like the airport. I did a paper on him at school.

LISTER:
I wonder why anyone would want to name their kid after an airport?!

RIMMER:
The airport was named after the President.

LISTER:
Right.

(Cut to outside the window, as LEE HARVEY OSWALD is climbing, then crawling along the window-ledge)

CAT:
Where did this gunman dude shoot from exactly, anyway?

KRYTEN:
Well if my histo-chip serves me correctly the gunman's location was in the Texas Book Depository.

(KRYTEN notices a stack of boxes behind them marked ‘Texas Book Depository’, and does a comedy double-take. Cut to: outside, LEE HARVEY OSWALD pulls a piece of cable from the wall and ties it around waist, using it like a safety rope. He then edges back along the window-ledge)

RIMMER:
It was probably from this very window!

LISTER:
What, do you reckon?

(He opens the window and looks out, just as LEE HARVEY OSWALD climbs in through the other window in the same room. He attempts to untie himself from his safety rope)

LISTER:
Hey what's this?

(LISTER starts to pull the other end of LEE HARVEY OSWALD's safety rope, which is still hooked around his foot. In shot now is LISTER pulling the wire and LEE HARVEY OSWALD trying to stop himself being pulled out of the window)

LISTER:
Hey, there's someone on the end of this, give us a hand.

(RIMMER, CAT and KRYTEN rush to help)

LISTER:
Pull – whoever they are – or we’re in trouble!

(LEE HARVEY OSWALD falls out of the window, and the Red Dwarf crew drop the rope, still not realising what's just happened. They look out of the window, down at the street.)

LISTER:
Hey, what's going on down there. What are all those people doing gathered round that giant pizza?

KRYTEN:
That is not a giant pizza, sir.

LISTER:
It's eight foot across, man. You don't think that's giant? What kind of pizza house have you been going to? ‘The Fat Basteria’?

CAT:
Hey, look at this, (He holds LEE HARVEY OSWALD's gun) I think we just pulled the gunman out of the window!

(The door bursts in – it’s a man in a dark suit and a policeman. Both hold guns leveled at the boys)

FBI:
FBI! Drop the gun.

CAT:
Don't shoot.

FBI:
Hands on heads.

(Cat puts his hands on his crotch)

FBI:
You are hereby charged with the murder of Lee Harvey Oswald, who valiantly tried to foil your attempt to assassinate the President. Thanks to Mister Oswald the President is alive but wounded.

COP:
What is that, some kind of weapon? (Points at the time drive) Kick it over here.

(KRYTEN Presses some buttons with his foot and the crew vanish. The FBI and COP fire at the empty space. Then the Time Drive next to them vanishes. They fire there too)


SCENE 18 – BOOK DEPOSITORY

LISTER:
Nice one, Kryts.

RIMMER:
Where are we?

KRYTEN:
(Looking at the time drive) It says 1966. I must have prodded us forward three years.

RIMMER:
At least it'll give us time to analyse the original error.

(Cat looks out of the window)

CAT:
Hey, there's nobody here. The entire city's deserted.


SCENE 19 – DALLAS STREET

(Empty cars and desolation. In one car we see a newspaper with the headline ‘Millions Flee’. The boys walk along the street)

LISTER:
I don't understand it. All we did was save Kennedy's life.

CAT:
Is that bad? What kind of a dude was he?

RIMMER:
He was a fine man.

(Later)

CAT:
Look! (He points at a dead man lying on the ground)

LISTER:
Can you get anything for us from his scent?

CAT:
(Sniffing the man) Male! (Sniffing ) Mid-thirties!

RIMMER:
Looks like he was trampled to death. Some kind of stampede.

(KRYTEN picks up a newspaper)

KRYTEN:
Just processing. I'll play the results through my chest monitor.

(Black-and-white pictures appear on his chest-screen)

KRYTEN V.O.:
President Kennedy was impeached in 1964 for sharing a mistress with Mafia boss Sam Giancana. It was the biggest scandal in American history. Kennedy was sentenced to three years in an open prison in July '65. J. Edgar Hoover became President. He was forced to run by the mob who had pictures of him at a transvestite orgy.

LISTER:
So America had a President controlled by the Mafia?

KRYTEN:
Soon after his election the USSR were allowed to install a nuclear base in Cuba in return for Mafia cocaine trafficking between Cuba and the states. With a Soviet nuclear base thirty miles from the US mainland people fled from all the major cities.

(Later. The boys are walking along another street)

CAT:
So am I right in thinking there's a chance I could get a major nuclear explosion all over this suit, because I'm telling you guys that stuff does not dry-clean.

RIMMER:
Back to Starbug.

KRYTEN:
Starbug isn't there, it doesn't exist.

CAT:
What?

RIMMER:
How come?

KRYTEN:
Best guess Kennedy's impeachment in '64 traumatised the American nation, allowing the USSR to win the space race. In this reality, it was probably the Russians who were the first to land on the moon.

CAT:
So we're marooned?

LISTER:
How was I supposed to know a chicken vindaloo was gonna cause all this?

CAT:
But you guys said Kennedy was a great Pres.

KRYTEN:
He was!

RIMMER:
He was also an inveterate womaniser. His affairs were legendary. They never came out when he was alive.

KRYTEN:
Every man has his weak spot, his Achilles Heel.

RIMMER:
Kennedy's was just higher up.

LISTER:
If I knew this was going to happen, I'd have had an egg sarnie and finished the Chinzano. Kryten, what have I done, man?

KRYTEN:
Well, you've brought the twentieth Century to the very brink of extinction, sir. (Offers LISTER a packet) Gum?

LISTER:
What is wrong with you? Where is your compassion? You've got about as much warmth as a service station chip. That's right, you've got no behaviour protocols, have you?

RIMMER:
(To KRYTEN) And you thought causality didn't matter. Every action we take, has trillions of implications, how come you forgot that?

KRYTEN:
Oh, I didn't forget, sir, I just didn't care. I've got no guilt!

LISTER:
Aah. (Looks guilty) I nicked Kryten’s body. That's Spare Head Two. I removed his guilt chip.

RIMMER:
You have altered the entire course of civilisation from the Twentieth Century onwards. You brought the world to the brink of nuclear war, and worst of all...

LISTER:
I know, I know, I still haven't had a curry!

(KRYTEN looks at the Time Drive)

KRYTEN:
No, worst of all the time drive has frozen.

(RIMMER takes the Time Drive)

RIMMER:
(Examining it) Let me see. Do you think it's because the sub-space conduits have locked with the transponder calibrations and caused a major tachyon surge that has overloaded the time matrix?

KRYTEN:
Er, no sir, I've just been jabbing it too hard.

CAT:
So what now?

RIMMER:
(Sighs) We need to have time to work out how to unfreeze it. I suggest we set up camp here for the night and KRYTEN can go and look for some food.

KRYTEN:
I'm on my way, sir.


SCENE 20 – CAMPFIRE

(Night. The CREW sit around a camp fire. LISTER and CAT are eating hunks of meat)

RIMMER:
It's hopeless, I can't fix it. We're trapped.

CAT:
Chicken's good!

LISTER:
Yeah, yeah. Pretty good.

KRYTEN:
That's not chicken, sirs.

CAT:
What is it?

KRYTEN:
It's that man we found.

LISTER:
What?

KRYTEN:
Well, it seemed such a waste just to leave him lying there when he'd barbecue so beautifully.

(RIMMER sniggers evilly. LISTER and CAT slowly spit out the human meat)

KRYTEN:
Did I do wrong? I didn't get any error commands. Obviously I thought about it because without my guilt chip or moral imperatives I had nothing to guide me. But it seemed to me that if humanoids eat chicken, then obviously they'd eat their own species, otherwise they'd just be picking on the chickens.

RIMMER:
(Drinking from a mug) One minute you're down, the next you're right back up again.

LISTER:
I just said I was enjoying that!

CAT:
(Horrified) knew it didn't smell right! Oh my God!

LISTER:
(Appalled) I'm a cannibal! (The time drive beeps into action)

RIMMER:
Look!

CAT:
Right, let's get out of here, I badly need to floss a piece of roasted dead person out of my teeth.

RIMMER:
Where to?

KRYTEN:
Hawaii, let's catch some surf!

LISTER:
No, no, we've gotta go back and stop ourselves interfering with the assassination.

CAT:
I don't care where we go, as long as it's before we had dinner!

(He holds up the meat)


SCENE 21 – BOOK DEPOSITORY

(The Red Dwarf CREW sit in the Texas Book Depository playing cards. LEE HARVEY OSWALD walks in, carrying a gun)

CAT:
Decorators. Try up on the sixth floor.

(LEE HARVEY OSWALD leaves. Cut to: The 6th Floor, LEE HARVEY OSWALD gets his gun out and aims. Cut to the JFK motorcade and the crowd. Cut to the 5th Floor, and LISTER, RIMMER, CAT and KRYTEN)

KRYTEN:
Stand back, sir, our original selves are about to beam in. When they realise their mistake they'll beam out again. I propose we go down to the fourth.

(The CREW burst in through the door at the fourth floor. A gunshot is heard)

LISTER:
First shot!

(They run to the window. There are two more shots fired. The lads look out the window)

CAT:
It doesn't smell right. I think he's missed.

RIMMER:
How come?

KRYTEN:
He's right, sir. By sending Oswald up to the sixth we've made the trajectory of his shot so steep he's only wounded him.

RIMMER:
Let's start again, and bring him back down to the fifth.

LISTER:
We can't use the fifth. Our original selves are destined to beam in there as he fires his third shot, and this version of us is now on the fourth.

CAT:
We've been copied more times than that poster of the tennis girl scratching her butt!

LISTER:
If we could arrange somehow for a second gunman to fire from behind that little hill over there covered in knoll… (He points)

KRYTEN:
You mean the, er, the grassy knoll?

LISTER:
Yeah, that'd solve it, wouldn't it?

CAT:
Shoot the Pres? Who?

RIMMER:
You can count me out.

CAT:
And me.

(They go back inside)

LISTER:
Hang on, maybe, just maybe, there's someone who can get us out of this mess.

(He grabs the Time Drive)

RIMMER:
Where are we going?

LISTER:
Idlewild Airport, July '65.

(The CREW beam out)


SCENE 22 – IDLEWILD AIRPORT

(At the airport, JFK steps exits an airplane, accompanied by two police officers. They walk down the steps and show him into the back of a van)

LISTER:
This is right. He's being escorted to Hoover Open Prison open prison in New York. Give me five minutes.

(LISTER takes the Drive, and beams into the van)


SCENE 23 – INT. VAN

LISTER:
Don't be alarmed, sir, but I have a very strange tail to tell.

JFK:
I have had plenty of time to reflect on my days in the White House. In all important respects I believe I did a good job. It was right to plan a pull out at Vietnam, to fight for civil right, and to fight congress to put a man on the moon. It was wrong, however, to act like an irresponsible jackass with all those women. And allow my enemies to reek havoc on our nation.

LISTER:
But I can help, man. I mean Mister President, man. I mean: sir.

JFK:
How, er, can you help?

LISTER:
Well come with us back to Dallas in November '63. Be a second gunman - the gunman behind the grassy knoll.

JFK:
You mean, assassinate myself?

LISTER:
Yeah, it'll drive the conspiracy nuts crazy, but, they'll never figure it out.

JFK:
But I still have a future here. Jackie left me, but when I get out I can still make a contribution to the world.

LISTER:
See this airport – ‘Idlewild Airport’ - in our reality they renamed it ‘JFK’ - after you. Where I come from you're a liberal icon, and that's the person you should be, but if you're gonna be that person, you're gonna have to sacrifice your life.

JFK:
And only then will my reputation be restored in history?

LISTER:
Mmm, and I can get a smeggin' curry!

JFK:
Ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country.

LISTER:
Hey, that'd make a pretty neat speech, that.

JFK:
It did.


SCENE 23 – DALLAS 1963

(We see the motorcade. Cut to the grassy knoll, where LISTER, RIMMER, CAT and KRYTEN, dressed in period clothes, stand with JFK, dressed as a COP. JFK takes a drink from a bottle, and the, with a sympathetic nod, LISTER hands him a rifle. Cut to: the motorcade. Cut to: LEE HARVEY OSWLAD at the Depository window. Cut to: JFK takes aim. Cut to: LEE HARVEY OSWALD fires three times at the motorcade. Cut to: JFK fires the rifle. Cut to: The ‘other’ JFK is hit. People panic. As a bystander films the historic events on a cine camera, bodyguards jump on the President’s car to protect Jackie, and the crowds screams in panic)


SCENE 23 – GRASSY KNOLL

(JFK turns round slowly)

JFK:
I thank you all for giving me the opportunity to be reborn.

(JFK walks off, and vanishes… The boys all look)

LISTER:
Smeg, I forgot to ask if there were any curry houses in Dallas.

RIMMER, CAT and KRYTEN all look at each other. At a nod from CAT, they casually walk either side of LISTER… then knock him down and kick the crap out of him.


Chris Barrie (Rimmer), Craig Charles (Lister),Danny John-Jules (Cat), Robert Llewellyn (Kryten), Michael J. Shannon (John F. Kennedy), Tony Aspin (Lee Harvey Oswald), Peter Gaitens (FBI Agent), Robert Ashe (Cop)

Directed by Andy De Emmony

TX:
BBC2 - 17th January 1997

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