Complete Guide
Bodyswap
Series III, Episode 4
Recorded: 26.09.1989, BBC Manchester
First Broadcast: 05.12.1989 (BBC 2)
VHS Release: 04.11.1991 (BBCV 4707)
DVD Release: 03.11.2003 (BBCDVD 1215)
Blu-ray Release: 14.01.2019 (BBCBD 0441)
Written by Rob Grant & Doug Naylor
Directed by Ed Bye
Synopsis
A skutter goes berserk and rewires all the ship's circuitry. So when Lister orders a chocolate bar from one of the snack dispensers, he accidentally triggers off the ship's self-destruct sequence. There is only one way to diffuse the bomb, but it involves Lister lending his body to a female officer. This gets Rimmer thinking...
Cast
Chris Barrie (Rimmer), Craig Charles (Lister), Danny John-Jules (Cat), Hattie Hayridge (Holly), Robert Llewellyn (Kryten)
Did You Know?
Beating Series VII to the punch by several years, this was the first episode of Red Dwarf not to be shot in front of an audience - so as to enable Chris Barrie and Craig Charles to overdub each others' dialogue after filming. The completed episode was then shown to an audience at a special screening in order to capture the requisite reactions.
Robert Llewellyn's very first day on Red Dwarf took place during this episode (despite his first full episode recorded being Marooned). Location footage at a sauna saw the actor accidentally electrocuted multiple times by a device designed to produce flames from Kryten's fingertips.
Although not credited, production manager Mike Agnew voiced the vending machine in the opening scenes. Having stepped into Lister's spacesuit in Thanks for the Memory, Series III saw him appear in the pub in Backwards and also provide noises for the "voice" of the Polymorph. Officer Carol Brown, meanwhile, was voiced by Lia Williams.
