History RedDwarf / TropesAToI

** Averted in the books with the Belief Chip, an AI component implanted into the minds of any computer or robot sufficiently advanced to potentially pose a real threat if it decided to rebel against its makers. The chip creates an unshakable belief in the idea of Silicon Heaven, the eternal reward that mechanoids will earn in the next life for diligantly serving their human masters without question or complaint in this life. Simple AI that couldn't pose a danger aren't fitted with such chips to keep manufacturing costs down, resulting in atheistic toasters and the like.

* AndThenISaid: Rimmer pulls this out in "[[Recap/{{Red Dwarf Season II Better Than Life}} Better Than Life]]" but can't come up with something he might have said and is forced to admit he "doesn't remember". Since it's his fantasy, his dinnermates laugh anyway.

* AwesomeButImpractical: Holograms, at least before the radiation leak, require an absurd amount of power and computer runtime that a ship can only sustain one at any one time with ''Red Dwarf'' able to generate a second if all non essential systems are shut down. In the event of the death of an essential crewmember, that crewmember is brought back. If another more vital crewmember dies, that crewmember supercedes the previous hologram, something George [=McIntyre=] jokes about after his funeral. HardLight holograms are even more of a power drain, which leads Rimmer to suspect that something is seriously amiss when Katerina shows up in ''Back To Earth''.

** Lister implies that his uncle was also a brain in a jar in "Balance of Power".

* DubInducedPlotHole: In the Czech dub of "Future Echoes", Lister says that he's never eaten chicken vindaloo before (prawn vindaloo in the original), when in a flashback in "Balance of Power" he says that he'd dropped Rimmer's revision timetable into one (he spilled goat vindaloo on it in the original).

** In the pre-accident flashback in "Balance Of Power", Rimmer admits that he's taking learning drugs to help him revise. Unfortunately, they work a little ''too'' well and all he ends up memorising is the conversation he has with Lister, Petersen, Chen, and Selby in the ship's bar regarding his revision timetable.

* FreezeFrameEnding: "Balance of Power" ends on a freeze frame of Lister leaping into the air in victory. This was done as a pragmatic measure: while filming the scene, Craig Charles landed badly and injured his back, rendering the end of the shot unusable and preventing reshoots.

** Rimmer does this to [[spoiler:the Grim Reaper]] in "Only the Good...", has it done to him (in a way) by [[spoiler:Lister]] in ''Back to Earth'', and gets it from Petersen's arm in "Balance of Power" after he thinks he's outsmarted it. It had previously been aiming much higher.

** The Old Lister from Future Echoes is missing his right arm. He has a robot prosthetic arm in its place (with a knuckle modified into a bottle opener, according to the book!)

* FasterThanLightTravel:
** Explicitly done in "Future Echoes".
** The teleporter apparently works based on 'subspace', allowing for instant transportation.

* HesitantSacrifice: In "Future Echoes", when Lister accepts that Rimmer's vision of his death is going to come true, Lister's still determined to fight it all the way to the end. He even rips a towel rack off the wall so he has something to whack the Grim Reaper with.
-->'''Lister:''' I'm going out as I came in, screaming and kicking.\\
'''Rimmer:''' You can't just whack Death on the head!\\
'''Lister:''' If he comes near me, I'm gonna rip his nipples off!

* AllThereInTheScript: According to the original script for "[[Recap/RedDwarfSeasonITheEnd The End]]", George [=McIntyre=] was killed by the radiation leak (albeit more contained than what would occur later) from the faulty drive plate that Rimmer would later fail to repair properly.

** In universe is Lister's reaction to Holly's comment about Kochanski's only use on Fiji being something to grit a snowy path in "[[Recap/RedDwarfSeasonITheEnd The End]]".

* FiveFingerFillet: In a blink-and-you'll-miss-it moment in "[[Recap/RedDwarfSeasonITheEnd The End]]", Petersen can be seen doing this (badly) with a pen.

** Lister's horror upon learning the strange white powder he'd been eating was the remains of the ''Red Dwarf'' crew in "[[Recap/RedDwarfSeasonITheEnd The End]]".

* IronicEpisodeTitle: The very first episode was called "The End". Borderline because the episode actually did deal with a massive accident that wiped out almost the entire crew, setting up the series for AfterTheEnd. (And with that situation set up, the episode ended with a caption in the same font, saying "The Beginning".)

* AcceptableTargets: One of Holly's earlier opening jokes was "We have learned that the highest form of life is man, and the lowest form of life is a man who works for the post office." When the series was later remastered, the latter was changed to "a man who has a train set."

* GameMod: The AR machine allows for this quite easily, allowing anyone with a bit of knowhow to be able to take assets from one game and add them to another, such as Kryten modding a T-72 tank into ''Jane Austen World'', Lister being able to project the characters from ''Streets Of Laredo'' into Kryten's dreamscape, or Kryten creating an Indian restaurant experience mixed with the Jane Austen characters with ''Curry World'', [[spoiler: which turns out to be an ObviousBeta thanks to the spiciness of the curry being set too high, even for Lister.]]

* GenderBender: Holly.
* GenesisEffect: In the episode "Rimmerworld", Rimmer does this to a barren planet.

* ADateWithRosiePalms: A lot of the comedy revolves around the build up of sexual frustration in a small group of males trapped alone with no female companionship.
** Rachel the inflatable sex doll, naturally.
** Inflatable Ingrid.
** Lister broke the groinal attachment on the Artificial Reality machine. In three ''weeks''. It had a lifetime warranty...
** Lister's libido nearly causes a drought due to the endless cold showers he was taking.
** When Nirvanah Crane asks Rimmer what the ''Red Dwarf'' crew do when they want to have sex, he responds that they go for runs or watch gardening programmes.

* ForWantOfANail: One little split in the destiny line created Ace Rimmer. However, it turns out that it's ''not'' getting a break and passing a test that created Ace - it's being held back a year and humiliated that made him finally fight back, which makes ''our'' Rimmer's "it's not my fault, I just had a bad childhood" line technically true.

** Kochanski appears twice in Series I, once in Series II and once in Series VI (actually a GELF in disguise) and becomes a regular in Series 7. Clare Grogan was replaced by Creator/ChloeAnnett as Kochanski because Grogan had retired from acting in favor of becoming a TV host.

** The {{Shout Out}}s to the ''Franchise/{{Alien}}'' series could be seen as one to Mac [=McDonald=] having played a colony commander in ''Film/{{Aliens}}''.

* DistressedDamsel: Princess Bonjela in "[[Recap/RedDwarfSeasonVIIStokeMeAClipper Stoke Me a Clipper]]".

* FemBot: Female droids do turn top, such as Crawford from "Trojan" and the unnamed female simulant from "Gunmen Of The Apocalypse" and "Rimmerworld", the latter of which is convincingly human looking and attractive enough for Lister to hit on. The 4000 series has female models as well with many of them appearing in "Siliconia". Camisole is a subversion in that her 4000 series appearance is an illusion, since she's actually a GELF.

** Kochanski appears twice in Series I, once in Series II and once in Series VI (actually a GELF in disguise) and becomes a regular in Series 7. Clare Grogan was replaced by Chloe Annett as Kochanski because Grogan had retired from acting in favor of becoming a TV host.

** Given that the show did return for Series XI and XII in 2016-17, "The Beginning" proved not to be, er, the end -- but the show did however insert another sort of bookend into Series XII's final episode "[[Recap/RedDwarfSeasonXIISkipper Skipper]]". "The End" contains the famous ''"[[EverybodysDeadDave Everybody's dead, Dave]]"'' scene with Holly the ship's computer attempting to explain the gravity of the situation to a newly-revived-from-stasis Lister. 30 years on, in "Skipper" [[spoiler:Rimmer temporarily ends up on a version of the ''Red Dwarf'' looking uncannily like he and it did in the original series, including Norman Lovett returning as Holly to walk him through a nearly identical scene where ''"'''Nobody''''s dead, Arnold"''.]]

* AmusinglyShortList: There are countless people who have lost an arm and then lead a perfectly normal life. Thousands. More than thousands. Millions. The definitive list: Lord Nelson, the Art/VenusDeMilo, the one-armed man from ''The Fugitive'', Creator/VicentVanGogh (that dude managed to cut off his own ear with just one arm ) and Dave Lister.

* AmusinglyShortList: There are countless people who have lost an arm and then lead a perfectly normal life. Thousands. More than thousands. Millions. The definitive list: Lord Nelson, the Venus de Milo, the one-armed man from ''The Fugitive'', van Gogh (that dude managed to cut off his own ear with just one arm ) and Dave Lister.

* BuxomIsBetter: When choosing the breast size for a new female computer, Rimmer insists on choosing 36D as her breast size, as opposed to Kryten's 30A choice.

* HistorysCrimeWave: In "Cured", the crew encounter a scientific base where Adolf Hitler, Joseph Stalin, Vlad the Impaler, and Messalina have been recreated through cloning and cured of 'evil'. (Lab notes reveal that UsefulNotes/RupertMurdoch proved resistant to the treatment.) However, it turns out the evildoers are [[spoiler:actually androids who were originally the medical staff of the base who have been reprogrammed to believe they are historical villains]].

* ArchivedArmy: The waxdroids in "[[Recap/{{Red Dwarf Season IV Meltdown}} Meltdown]]" form less literal versions of this.

* HotScientist: Katarina.
** Professor Edgington, once she's been [[ItMakesSenseInContext re-evolved from a monkey.]]
** Parodied in "[[Recap/{{Red Dwarf Season XI Twentica}} Twentica]]" with Harmony, a scientist in an illicit underground science club who dresses like a Prohibition-era floozie.

** Holly is male, and plays a central role in the story. He would often explain to Lister what was going on. This was often handled by Kryten later on. Series I portrays him as more of a GeniusDitz who understands advanced concepts and sometimes even belittles Rimmer for his stupidity, which gives way to him being more outright stupid in Series II, and especially after he became female.