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EPISODE
Nanarchy
Series VII

Written By	Paul Alexander, Jamie Hendrie and Doug Naylor
Director	Ed Bye
Guest Star(s)	Norman Lovett as Holly
Episode Chronology
Episode 44
Previous Episode: Epideme
Next Episode: Back in the Red: Part I

OverviewEdit

Lister tries to deal with the loss of his arm whilst Kryten searches for a way to rebuild it, with shocking results involving the recovery of two important machines

SummaryEdit

Detailed summary of the episode

Last week, on Red Dwarf...something terrible happened to Mr. Lister's arm!

Lister is finding one-armed life difficult, despite the help Kryten gives him to play the guitar, dunk biscuits, scratch his nose and operate doors. His shipmates try to cheer him up but, when pressed, they come up with a pretty inadequate list of historical figures who have lost an arm and yet achieved something. Kochanski also disagrees with Kryten's nannying attitude: she believes in tough love, to help Lister become independent, and she suggests the mechanoid takes time to build Lister an artificial arm. He does, but the replacement is hardly suitable. Lister would have to take the morning off each time he wanted to pick up a ball - and when Kryten adjusts the impulse valve to make the aid more sensitive, it responds to it's owner's subconscious thoughts, and takes to punching the mechanoid who left him in this predicament in the first place. There's no question of allowing him near Kochanski with it, of course. So it's back to square one - until Kochanski recalls that the Kryten of her universe had a self-repair system made up of subatomic nanobots. They are capable of breaking anything down into its component atoms, and rebuilding it in a different form, so they could probably make Lister a new arm from his own excess body tissue. The only snag is the nanobots deserted Kryten after the incident on the SSS Esperanto ("Back to Reality", Series V finale). There is no chance of finding them - but Lister won't give up anyway.

The crew go intro deep sleep while Starbug returns to the ocean world on which the Esperanto was found, but the computer wakes them early as, towards the end of the journey, it detects a strange planetoid straight ahead. Kryten can't believe the evidence of the scanners, which indicate that the planetoid is Red Dwarf. The Cat explores, happy to brave the electrical storms which whip sand all over the planetoid - as long as he has a comb to hand.

(Taken from the Third revised edition of the Red Dwarf Programme Guide)

NotesEdit

This is the first appearance of Holly since the episode "Back to Reality" and the first appearance of the male Holly since the episode "Parallel Universe" in 1988.
This is the first appearance of Red Dwarf since the episode "Demons & Angels" back in Series V from 1992.
Holly breaks the fourth wall by saying "He's back, kicking bottom or what?" to the audience.
The episode's name is a play on the words nanobot and "anarchy", to reflect the disobedient nature of the bots.
This episode, alongside the series opener "Tikka to Ride", both feature recaps of the events of the last episode.

Noteworthy DialogueEdit

Kryten: "Your Brain is saying Pick up the ball but you sub-consious is saying HIT KRYTEN IN THE HEAD!"

Background InformationEdit

Chloë Annett was highly visible on British TV the week "Nanarchy" aired; on March 1 her science fiction detective series Crime Traveller debuted on BBC One, and would run for a further seven episodes after Series VII ended its run. However, despite good ratings, it would not be renewed, whereas Annett and Red Dwarf would return.

Guest StarsEdit

Actor and character they played.

ReferencesEdit

Other articles of things featured in this particular episode

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Red Dwarf: Episode List

Series VII

Wikia

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RD: Nanarchy

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