Confidence and Paranoia (1988) Review

 

Confidence and Paranoia marks a huge step forward for Red Dwarf: a truly original and funny and character-revealing idea played to the hilt. 

PLOT

After visiting the contaminated officers' quarters, Lister develops a mutated form of pneumonia that causes his hallucinations to come alive, particularly two beings that embody his confidence and paranoia. 

THOUGHTS

One of the great strengths of Red Dwarf is its innate ability to tool the various sci-fi shenanigans so perfectly to the personality traits of its characters. Most famous of course are the 'Rimmer episodes', but here, the same applies to Lister. 

Through the wonderful plot device of three-million-year-old-pneumonia-mutated-into-a-nightmare (that old chestnut), we are quite literally exposed to different facets of Lister's personality: his goofy charm, recklessness and irreverent attitude towards authority in Confidence, and his intelligence, self-awareness and regrets in Paranoia. There's also subtler facets, like how Lister himself perceives the two: Confidence is a muscular, tall, flashy standout whilst Paranoia is your typical Establishment figure, black-suited and speaking in Received Pronounciation. Interestingly, it's only Confidence who turns into a bit of a maniac whilst Paranoia - despite being a prick - seems to have no ulterior motives towards Lister. 

I thought it was all super neat, and the climactic spacewalk sequence in particular was extremely funny and well done. A nice touch I really enjoyed in this episode was the depiction of time and weather, which is something you don't ordinarily see. The early scenes are very quiet, just Lister watching a movie, eating breakfast, casually chatting with Holly, all indicative of a slow morning. Then during the day, there's a storm outside of the ship which adds a sense of atmosphere. And finally, in the scenes set during the evening, the model shots featuring Red Dwarf have been dimmed slightly. Just a little thing I wanted to point out.

CHARACTERS

There's some standout Cat scenes, namely the famous moment where Rimmer demands his help in carrying Lister to the medical bay (also a really cute bit for Rimmer) and he flatout refuses in order to finish his lunch. That's a classic. But I also like the more understated scene where he delivers gifts to Lister: an orange peel and a bunch of eaten grapes. I can't even tell what type of cat behaviour it's supposed to indicate, but it's still funny. I don't think it's greed because he seems genuinely hurt when Rimmer drives him off. 

Rimsy is as caring as he could be, trying to cope with Lister's illness. Given that Rimmer cheered for Lister's upcoming death in Future Echoes, it's somewhat ambiguous whether he genuinely cares or if he just worked out that Lister's death would mean he gets switched off. I like it either way. I'm also noticing that Grant Naylor are still taking full advantage of the jokes that can be mined from Rimmer's inability to touch anything (soon to be forgotten). 

Craig Ferguson (!!!) and Lee Cornes both give great performances as Confidence and Paranoia, respectively. I especially love the black humour in the way Confidence gradually reveals his deeds to Lister in that spacewalk scene, with the music still being all the jaunty. It gets really dark and creepy for a moment there, and it's played wonderfully. "What do you mean you killed him, cha-cha-cha?!"

NOTES

•  Craig Charles types on a keyboard like someone who's never been near a computer in his life (tap tap tap). It's very endearing. 
• I love the recurring gag of Rimmer's PE obsession. I wish they'd kept that. All of his anal retentive habits are incredibly fun to watch, really. 
• Begging someone to tell Charles and Barrie to stop background acting. The bit where Holly gives Rimmer a shave was almost ruined by Lister randomly imitating it behind his back for no reason. It's just distracting. 
• Rimmer was apparently a member of the "Love Celibacy Society". Quite literally, an incel. 
• The fact that Craig Charles imitates the voices of Ferguson and Cornes before we actually see them onscreen as Confidence and Paranoia is a really clever touch. 
• Paranoia actually wanting Lister to listen to Rimmer is interesting. It seems that there really is a side of Lister that admires Rimmer a little. 
• I vaguely recall reading that the twist of Kochanski's disc being actually Rimmer's was a last minute addition. I believe it, because Barrie really plays up Rimmer's terror of Lister finding it. I refuse to believe Rimmer could entirely hide his secret glee for fooling Lister. 

THANKS FOR THE MEMORY

• This may be a massive stretch, but could Yvonne McGruder confusing Rimmer for someone really hot called Norman be a callback to Holly taking on the image of the world's greatest lover?
• References to Kochanski and Chen. 

FUNNIEST MOMENT

"Ahh, you haven't met Stabbim. He's one of our skutters."

SMEG OFF!

Not really a huge deal, but they could've found funnier hallucinations for Lister than the combusting Mayor of Warsaw and the fish rain. 

CONCLUSION

I really enjoyed this one. It wasn't a masterpiece, but it was well thought out, imaginative and had a few great laughs. We are getting closer to masterpiece territory, though.