Lister decides that it’s about time he took more interest in his son’s life, and a new computer is a little too quick on the uptake…

Weaker than the first episode, but still streets ahead of some of the poorer segments of the 1990s show, this has a few good gags, and even some vaguely tense moments. The running jokes through the episode get a little tiresome, and unlike with the moose routine from last week, there’s not really a great payoff.

If you weren’t aware that Dave Lister is his own father, as shown in the episode Ouroboros, then a very brief line of explanation is given, and this is the crux of the story. It’s not a rewrite of the “missing” episode Dad but focuses strongly on Lister’s apparent self-loathing (and self-knowledge) when drunk… or it’s an excuse for Craig Charles to do his comedy drunk routine.

The new computer has her moments – again, the creation sequence between Rimmer and Kryten could have been tightened further to prevent the gag overplaying – and for a few moments, we drop into a Star Trek episode for the necessary resolution (which no doubt everyone, especially the new computer, Pree, sees coming).

Verdict: The sort of episode that done in the States would have been tightened in front of a studio audience as they filmed it; instead, it’s slightly flabby but still with some good moments.  6/10

Paul Simpson

1 Comment »

  1. To be fair they don’t have the budget or the resources that most US sitcoms do and it’s questionable whether “tightening” on the night would have been feasible anyway. One could argue that changes could have been made in the editing but I think the flaws in this, at times, problematic episode would have to be caught at the writing stage. I don’t think that invoking the American system makes much sense here really besides which there are plenty of US sitcom episodes that are still weak even after tightening!

Leave a comment