Peterson has found Lister's guitar in the wreckage of Starbug and Lister can't wait to play it again (much to the horror of Rimmer). However, none of the strings are included. However, an apparent opportunity comes in for Rimmer and Lister to appeal their case.
Two days later, coming back from a suicide mission involving a horrifying mutant, the Dwarfers find out from Kryten that he gets to shower with the girls. Kill Crazy and the others suggest that Kryten bring in a camera for the boys but Kryten refuses to do so.
Meanwhile, someone has taken Ackerman's glass eye and he's looking for whomever stole it to return it. Rimmer proceeds to snitch and claim another prisoner did it (which leads to him getting beat up).
As the crew are milling about, Kryten is knocked out and reprogrammed. As the prisoners watch a terrible B-Movie, it is replaced by "Krytie TV", a pay-ver-view airing of the women's bathrooms. Kryten becomes a ruthless and rich executive, willing to exploit the women for financial gain. Kochanski finds out and is pissed at both Lister and Kryten for it. The girls proceed to kick out Kryten and get him reclassified as a man.
Kryten then tells Lister that Kochanski has been let out temporarily so she can go out with her ex-boyfriend Tim. Kryten proposes that they trash Tim's quarters. Lister does so, only for Kryten to reveal that he trashed Ackerman's quarters instead, that Kryten was never reprogrammed back to normal, and this is all being shown on Krytie TV. Cue Lister (alongside Rimmer) trying their best to clean up the place before Ackerman finds out.
Eventually, Lister's appeal is successful. Unfortunately (for Rimmer especially), the appeal was actually so that Lister can get his guitar strings back.
Tropes In This Episode:
- Actually Pretty Funny: Until she found out she was part of it, Kochanski found Shower Night amusing, even wondering if Kryten was paying the girls to do it.
- All Men Are Perverts: Shower Night goes down very well with the Canaries. Justified, given that they're prisoners.
- Brainwashed and Crazy: The other inmates reprogram Kryten into going through with their plan to spy on the women as they bathe.
- Bullying a Dragon: Some of the inmates mug Ackerman. He responds by threatening to rescind all Canary privileges for a month. Later on, Kryten tricks Lister and Rimmer into messing up his apartment, and they scramble to unprank it before Ackerman gets there and goes nuclear.
- Comically Missing the Point: Lister gets a letter from Petersen:Rimmer: My God, that is tragic.Lister: What's happened to him, has he died?Rimmer: Died? You think he'd write and tell you?Lister: No, you're right, you're right, you're right. I'm not thinking straight. He'd be too busy with his funeral and everything, wouldn't he.
- Continuity Nod: Lister and Rimmer's discussion of Lister's song "Om", previously described in "Timeslides" is supposed to be this but is actually a continuity error, as this particular version of Rimmer wasn't present in that episode and thus never heard the song. Noticeably Lister and Rimmer's opinions on the song have both shifted to the other extreme.
- Creator Cameo: Doug Naylor appears as one of the men in the B-Movie that the prisoners watch, which is to date his only appearance in the show that he helped create.
- Foreshadowing: At the start of the episode, Lister is given back his guitar, but without any strings. Soon after, Rimmer is informed that Lister is undertaking an appeal. This sets things up for the ending revelation.
- Head-Tiltingly Kinky: Rimmer and Lister's reaction to the Shower Night video.
- Invisible Monsters: Parodied, with a B-Movie titled Attack of the Giant, Savage, Completely Invisible Aliens, which consists of Bad Bad Actors pointing at the sky and saying "It's the giant, savage, completely invisible aliens!"
- Luxury Prison Suite: After being reprogrammed into a ruthless TV executive, Kryten is seen with a cell full of luxuries, with the guards calling him "Sir".
- Noodle Incident: Their latest Canary mission was the least enjoyable suicide mission Kochanski has ever been on, thanks to Kill Crazy.Kill Crazy: There was this mutant with two heads and lots of tentacles. It took one look at me and ran off. Why did it do that?
- Pass the Popcorn: Kryten's goons even hand out chocolate ice-cream on movie night.
- Pay Evil unto Evil: Rimmer rats out a fellow inmate who stole Ackerman's glass eye. Ratting out inmates is an unwritten law in prison, so the other inmates are more than happy to beat Rimmer to a pulp for it.
- Oh, Crap!: "THE APPEAL!"
- Raging Stiffie: As Kryten explains how he has to suffer through showering with the female inmates, all the men on the shuttle go very quiet. Rimmer has to explain to him they're not frozen in a time warp, just thinking. Cue them all crossing their legs, and a very smug Holly.Holly: It's times like this that make me thankful I'm just a head.
- Suckiness Is Painful: Rimmer figures this is the reason the prison shows the inmates so many terrible b-movies; to sap their moral, or just outright drive them to suicide.Rimmer: Next week it's George Formby season. (imitating Formby) Git yer han'gin' rope while there's some left! Wah-hey!
- Suddenly Shouting: Ackerman gets very upset about his missing eye.Ackerman: I have a date with Miss Patricia Carling from Supplies on Saturday night. She says my eyes are my loveliest feature. If I go like this... I'M ONLY HALF LOVELY!
- Threaten All to Find One: Warden Ackerman demands that whoever stole his glass eye returns it to him, or else all Canary (the group of prisoners who volunteered for dangerous missions) privileges will be suspended for a month.
- Visual Pun: Lister takes two bags of flour as a present to Kochanski, passing them off as "Flowers."Lister: Flour. Flours. It was as close as I could get.
- What the Hell, Hero?: When Kochanski finds out that she was one of the girls filmed by Kryten, she was not happy about it. With either Kryten and Lister.
- Yank the Dog's Chain: After all that hard work and suffering, Lister's appeal is successful! ...And then it's revealed to have been all about getting the strings back for his guitar, with an incredulous Lister asking if Rimmer believed it was an appeal to get out jail.
