My Journey Through the Cult Science Fiction Comedy Red Dwarf Continues with the Shape-Shifting Absurdity of "Polymorph" and "Bodyswap"
Welcome, friends, to the latest entry in Control Nathan Rabin 4.0. It’s the career and site-sustaining column that gives YOU, the kindly, Christ-like, unbelievably sexy Nathan Rabin’s Happy Place patron, an opportunity to choose a movie that I must watch, and then write about, in exchange for a one-time, one hundred dollar pledge to the site’s Patreon account. The price goes down to seventy-five dollars for all subsequent choices.
The great thing about science fiction is that the possibilities are infinite. Science fiction is a world where anything can happen. Its only boundaries are the boundaries of the human imagination.
“Polymorph,” the third episode of the third season of Red Dwarf, takes full advantage of this freedom. The first indication that the episode will be markedly different from any that came before it comes with the opening disclaimer.
For the first time, Red Dwarf opens with a warning that some scenes might be unsuitable for younger viewers and those with a nervous disposition.
“Polygraph” finds the beloved science-fiction cult institution veering into horror with an episode about a shape-shifting monster bio-engineered on Earth as a weapon that feeds off its prey’s negative emotions.
The riotously funny science-fiction/horror mash-up takes inspiration from The Thing, Alien and Aliens.
We open with the introduction of the malevolent intruder, followed by Dave Lister (Craig Charles) using medical supplies as silverware and Arnold Rimmer lovingly watching home movies from the long-ago era when he was still alive.
He characterizes his relationship with the brothers who costar in the home movies as warm and loving, but the deranged glee with which they hold him down and pour fire ants on his face suggests otherwise.
The crew soon has more important things to worry about. They learn that they are not alone. The wily predator takes the form of a deeply disgusting, sentient, moving sausage that attacks Lister and removes his fear.
By sucking out and removing their predominant characteristic, the beast from beyond turns the crew into antithetical versions of themselves.
Easygoing, ferociously unambitious slacker Lister turns into a gung-ho man of action who fears nothing and no one. He’s like Bill Paxton in Aliens but more aggressive.
Next, the unwanted visitor takes the form of a beautiful woman who plays to Cat’s vanity (his primary quality) by praising his looks, intelligence, and charisma. Cat is not the sharpest tool in the shed, so he repeatedly tells the fetching flatterer that he has to be hyper-vigilant because there is an intruder onboard who can assume any form without realizing that she is the form that it most recently assumed.
The anti-Cat is a shabbily dressed hobo with low self-esteem. He cares about nothing and no one, particularly himself. Cat’s preening narcissism has been replaced by sloppy apathy.
Excessively polite robot Kryten turns into a raging asshole after his run-in with the wily intruder. It’s a kick to see the cast stretch by playing characters that aren’t just a little different; they are the complete opposite.
“Polymorph” earns its opening warning and TV-14 for violence but also an unexpected raunchiness.
As part of its assault on the psyches of the poor, beleaguered crew, the thing takes the form of Rimmer’s homely mother so that it can traumatize the hologram with graphic reports of her sexcapades with Lister.
Rimmer’s fake mother brags to her pseudo-son that Lister fucked her so hard she “honestly thought my false teeth were going to fall out.”
They copulated five times, as Lister was like a “wild stallion.”
Rimmer, meanwhile, loses his anger and becomes a goateed, bespectacled hippie professor type wearing a “Give Quiche a Chance” tee-shirt who has some very mild proposals for defeating the shape-shifting monster in their midst.
First, he proposes a leafleting campaign, followed by street theater, benefit concerts, and, if all of that does not work, tee-shirts reading, “Mutants out!” and “Chameleonic life forms? No thanks!”
Incidentally, I would wear the crap out of a “Chameleonic life forms? No thanks!” tee shirt.
Incidentally, these are similar to the tactics that the Democratic Party is employing to fight Donald Trump’s Fascist destruction of the government.
Then Rimmer focuses on what’s truly important: finding an appropriate name for their monster-hunting endeavor. First, he proposes the League Against Salivating Monsters, and then his preferred choice, the Committee for the Liberation and Integration of Terrifying Organisms and Rehabilitation into Society, or CLITORIS.
I quite like hippie Rimmer. I hope we have not seen the last of them.
“Polygraph” is the most violent episode to date, thanks in part to an old-school, conventional monster realized through nifty practical effects and special effects that are charming in their primitiveness and also perhaps the raunchiest so far, if only for the prominent mom-fucking. It’s also one of the funniest episodes. It’s a horror comedy that does right by both sides of the equation.
“Polygraph” is unlike any episode that came before it. The same cannot be said of the episode that follows. “Bodyswap” has so much in common with "Polygraph" that it's surprising that they follow one another rather than being spaced out.
As its title suggests, “Bodyswap” involves more shape-shifting and characters behaving wildly out of character.
In “Polygraph”, the characters become their opposites. In “Bodyswap,” Rimmer manages to convince Lister, who really should know better, to let him borrow his body for a while so that he can use his self-discipline and rigid personality to spiff it up.
Lister and Rimmer aren’t just different in the manner that mismatched buddy comedies demand; they’re damn near antithetical. Lister is a slob. Rimmer is a snob despite a more or less total lack of achievement.
Rimmer manipulates his coworker and crewmate by insulting his body, personal habits, diet, lack of willpower, and pretty much every other aspect of his body, mind, and personality.
He manages to convince Lister that he’ll help him lose weight and curb some of his bad habits if he lends him his body for two weeks.
During that time, Lister’s mind and spirit will become a hologram like Rimmer's. Rimmer has spent an eternity without the satisfaction of a good meal, a bath, or any of the other pleasures that come with having a body.
I’m autistic, so I have a complicated relationship with my body but even I will concede that there a number of advantages to having a body and not just being a brain in a jar, or a hologram of the future.
Rimmer immediately goes back on his word. Instead of eating healthily and stintingly, he gorges himself on the most fattening food imaginable. He doesn’t just eat; he feasts.
He quickly develops other bad habits as well, like smoking cigars. Lister quickly wises up. He realizes that Rimmer is only interested in taking his body for unhealthy joyrides and demands his body back.
The scheming hologram reluctantly acquiesces but sneakily uses Kryten to steal his flesh and blood compatriot’s body permanently.
In a fit of madness, Rimmer takes a ship out of the Red Dwarf to permanently occupy Dave Lister’s body.
This is where things get dark. In an O.J. Simpson-like development, Rimmer threatens to blow his brains out if his crewmates don’t keep pursuing him.
He doesn’t just threaten suicide once; he threatens suicide repeatedly, albeit with a goofy smile that undercuts the menace.
Rimmer isn’t just a jerk here; he’s a goddamn villain. His actions are both unethical and criminal but apparently have no lasting repercussions in a show that deals with continuity by more or less ignoring everything that’s come before.
“Polygraph” and “Bodyswap” are conceptually very similar and similarly hilarious.
Nathan needed expensive, life-saving dental implants, and his non-existent dental plan didn’t cover them, so he started a GoFundMe at https://www.gofundme.com/f/support-nathans-journey-to-dental-implants. Give if you can!
Did you enjoy this article? Then consider becoming a patron here.