Plot hole: When Holly discusses what the crew can do as a result of activating the self-destruct, she comes up with three options which all end with "And get blown up." Since it turns out that Holly disconnected the bomb "ages ago," wouldn't she have known that they wouldn't be blown up?
Andy Benham
4th Mar 2025
Red Dwarf (1988)
Upvote valid corrections to help move entries into the corrections section.
Suggested correction: It's been a while since I've seen the show, but Holly is more than a little eccentric and silly, and if memory serves, it's implied he/she has gone a bit "senile"/glitchy due to sitting around mostly unused for three million years while Lister was in stasis. From the sound of it, it's likely just that Holly was being a bit thick and forgot in the moment about disarming the bomb.
7th Jun 2018
Red Dwarf (1988)
Plot hole: Cat wasn't manufactured by the Jupiter Mining Corporation and had no connection with them, being born three million years or so after they lost control of Red Dwarf. The takeover by M-Corp would mean nothing to him. Why, then, does he become invisible to Lister?
Upvote valid corrections to help move entries into the corrections section.
Suggested correction: Cat was a descendant of the cat Lister brought aboard Red Dwarf. Would it be possible that the new owners might have stricter security controls, and Lister was sent to Stasis for a different reason?
Inventing Deux ex machina explanations for a plot hole doesn't make it any less of a plot hole. M-Corp erases all of the Jupiter Mining Corporation's equipment, personnel and infrastructure from Lister's life. In no way is Cat a part of that. He has no connection at all to the Jupiter Mining Corporation, and until he meets him in Episode 1 no connection to Lister, either.
If M-Corp only erased JMC equipment from Lister's life, then Kryten, who belongs to DivaDroid and not the JMC, wouldn't have disappeared either. He disappears as he doesn't belong to M-Corp, not because he belongs to the JMC. Cat has no connection to M-Corp, as he wasn't a part of the JMC (as you pointed out), and is therefore erased for Lister.
21st Nov 2005
Red Dwarf (1988)
Corrected entry: If The Inquisitor has generated a replacement Lister and Kryten, why does Holly not recognize the original Lister and Kryten's authorizations? They should have had the same authorization - certainly Kryten, who is registered as "Additional 001", indicating he is the one and only CPU that has been added to Red Dwarf's compliment during it's voyage; the replacement Kryten would likewise be "Additional 001".
5th Nov 2005
Red Dwarf (1988)
Corrected entry: During Rimmer's appeal against his 9,000 year sentence for second degree murder, Kryten's entire defence strategy is proving that Rimmer is "a jumped-up grease monkey" who would never be trusted with critically important repairs on the Red Dwarf - that is, the drive plate. The court accepts this and Rimmer is released. The trouble is, Rimmer WAS trusted with the drive plate repairs and he WAS responsible for the crew's death. Kryten's defence is wrong, and on the court's terms the charge is correct and Rimmer is guilty. It's not as if Rimmer and Kryten believe Rimmer is too dumb to be guilty - they know the facts of the case and they are under 'polygraphic surveillance'. Their opinions don't count, the facts stand, and Rimmer is doomed.
Correction: Kryten's argument was that whoever gave Rimmer the orders to repair the drive plate was at fault, and not Rimmer, as he was not properly trained to repair something as critical as a drive plate. Rimmer, never one to doubt his superiors, decided that he was at fault, so was found guilty in the first place.
Wrong. Read the posting again. Kryten's entire defence strategy is proving that Rimmer is "a jumped-up grease monkey" who would never be trusted with critically important repairs on the Red Dwarf - that is, the drive plate. The court accepts this and Rimmer is released. The trouble is, Rimmer WAS trusted with the drive plate repairs and he WAS responsible for the crew's death. The fact that other people are equally responsible for the disaster is irrelevant. Rimmer was as guilty as anyone.
12th Sep 2005
Red Dwarf (1988)
Corrected entry: We learn in this series and at The End of series 7 that the nanobots have 'resurrected' the entire crew and red dwarf itself. If this is so where is Kristine Kochanski? The Kochanski we see is from a different dimension. So when the Starbug crashland on Red Dwarf, surely Captain Hollister who had them arrested would have been a little confused as two Kochanshkis would have been present. And as Kochanski is a Navigation Officer, surely she would have had a lot of contact with the Captain?
2nd Jan 2004
Red Dwarf (1988)
Corrected entry: It's established that Rimmer's shift of technicians get useless, irrelevant jobs (such as repairing chicken soup machines) - so why would Rimmer have been trusted to repair a drive plate that, if not repaired properly, could (and in fact did) lead to the deaths of the whole crew?
Correction: Perhaps it was too urgent to leave for another shift. If the ship was in danger, wouldn't you get the shift on duty to repair it pronto?
16th Jul 2005
Red Dwarf (1988)
Corrected entry: Even though Legion has shown he is completely willing to hurt the Dwarfers, he stands by and does nothing while Kryten takes nearly two minutes incapacitating Lister, Cat and Rimmer, thereby incapacitating Legion. (00:23:35 - 00:25:10)
Correction: He hurts the Dwarfers by self-mutilation (he is a composition of all of them). He might not be able to attack them directly.
23rd Feb 2005
Red Dwarf (1988)
Timeslides - S3-E5
Corrected entry: When Lister changes the past so he does not get stuck on Red Dwarf, Rimmer is still there as a hologram, but he was only revived in order to keep Lister sane. If the history of Red Dwarf still remained the same (the radiation leak, Red Dwarf flying 3 million years into deep space etc.), despite Lister's absence, the captain would have surely been the only one revived as the most senior person on board. However, if for some reason, Rimmer WAS revived as a hologram, then he would have no memory of Lister as he would never have met him. Also, Kryten would still be aboard Nova 5, would never have discovered the developing fluid and would not have been able to show it to Lister anyway, so Lister could have never gone back to his 17 year old self to give him the tension sheet, therefore this whole episode is a paradox of itself and the Universe will now implode. Well, that's what you get for messing with causality.
28th Dec 2003
Red Dwarf (1988)
Corrected entry: When the crew are in the recuperation lounge, a woman comes in and asks if anyone in the room is called Dwayne Dibley. After everyone denies that it could be them, the woman leaves the case for someone to look at. After she leaves, Lister looks at the case and says it has to be Cat because his photograph is on the case. If this is so, then why did the woman not just look at the picture and tell for herself who Dwayne was instead of repeatedly asking?
Correction: It's probably standard procedure to do so in order to jog players' memories - after 4 years being someone else in a total immersion video game, wouldn't you forget who you are?
27th Jan 2004
Red Dwarf (1988)
Corrected entry: Kryten says he hasn't seen his nanobots since the crew encountered the Esparanto in 'Back To Reality'. If this is true, then how did they repair him when he got crushed in 'Psirens'?
Correction: Perhaps they didn't. It has been established that Kryten has a few replacement parts on Starbug - more than likely he used those.
18th Sep 2004
Red Dwarf (1988)
Corrected entry: When Kryten is lying to Lister and saying that his deletion is not Lister's fault, his right foot (and eventually his whole body) is jiggling: Lister says that this is how he knows Kryten is lying. However, Kryten has told lies many times since Lister taught him to, and this foot-jiggling has never been seen before or since.
7th Sep 2004
Red Dwarf (1988)
Timeslides - S3-E5
Corrected entry: When Lister convinces his past self to "invent" the Tension Sheet, he, Cat and Kryten vanish, having never become part of the Dwarf's crew. When Rimmer visits Lister, Lister does not remember him, because they have never met - if Lister can't remember people he's never met, why can Rimmer and Holly?
18th Feb 2004
Red Dwarf (1988)
Corrected entry: At the start of the episode, Lister is trying to teach Kryten how to lie. Yet in "The Last Day", Kryten lied in order to prevent himself from being killed.
25th Jan 2004
Red Dwarf (1988)
Corrected entry: Both Rimmer and Lister go through a door on the left hand side of the drive room which wasn't there in the previous episode, "The End".
Correction: I believe there was a door - it was the entrance to the Captain's office.
7th Jan 2004
Red Dwarf (1988)
Corrected entry: If the entire crew has been resurrected, shouldn't there be another Kochanski because the one from starbug is the Kochanski from another Dimension?
Correction: Simple. We can assume that Kryten's nanobods know there already is a Kochanski. They didn't feel the need to resurrect another.
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