The massive news which I just came across this morning is that Red Dwarf is making (yet another) comeback. According to this Radio Times article, the old crew is making one feature length episode which will be cut into three. As a Red Dwarf fan, I certainly think it will be great to see Lister, Rimmer, Kryten and the Cat back; my brothers and I grew up watching this wonderfully anarchic sci-fi comedy, both contrasting with and complementing more serious stuff like Star Trek. Yet I can’t help thinking that we’ve seen so many reunions and comeback shows these days, from Picard to The Lord of the Rings, that this is just another attempt to scrape the bottom of the nostalgia barrel. After all, guys like Craig Charles and Chris Barrie are now so much older than when they first played Lister and Rimmer – surely they won’t have the same dynamic.

Further, towards the end of the article, there’s mention of some kind of Red Dwarf spin off show, set just before the beginning of the original series and involving entirely new characters. If that is indeed in the works, then I am very concerned indeed: Red Dwarf is about the last human alive, marooned millions of years into deep space, whose only company is a hologram of the bunkmate he hated, a strange being which evolved from his pet cat and a neurotic android. Making a show about anything other than that would not be Red Dwarf. This sounds to me like just another attempt to exploit a much loved franchise, while inadvertently yet inevitably ripping the heart out of it.