Examining the submerged wreckage of the seeding ship Esperanto, Lister, Kryten and Cat discover that every form of life they find has committed suicide for reasons unknown. Upon the discovery of a venom with hallucinogenic properties, they start high-tailing it back to Starbug, unaware that the enormous, New-Mexico-sized squid from which this rather disgusting substance emerged is heading for Starbug even faster than they are. Trying to run for it, they are caught in a huge blast of the venom and Starbug crashes into the ocean floor. When they come to, the guys find that they’ve been playing a virtual reality game called “Red Dwarf” for the past four years, and they aren’t who they thought they were. Kryten is a cybernetic traffic cop named Jake Bullet; the Cat is Duane Dibbley, a completely uncool individual with no style, grace or dress sense, and an overbite that could eclipse most stars; Rimmer turns out to be the non-hologrammatic bum Billy Doyle; and Lister is revealed to be small-time fascist dictator Sebastian Doyle – Billy’s half brother. Things in the real world aren’t what they expected, and before they know it, our heroes Jake, Duane, Billy and Sebastian wish they were back on Red Dwarf. Since that option seems to be out of the question at the moment, they decide that suicide is comparitively painless.
written by Rob Grant & Doug Naylor
directed by Grant Naylor
SSS Esperanto scenes directed by Juliet May
music by Howard GoodallGuest Cast: Timothy Spall (Andy), Lenny Von Dohlen (Cop), Anastasia Hille (New Kochanski), Marie McCarthy (Nurse), John Sharian (New Lister)
LogBook entry by Earl Green