all because the backers didn't feel it was worth their while getting involved unless it was a big budget. When they pulled out, different backers wanted me to reduce it so there were a lot of different budgets and stories. So I had a lot of bits floating that could be used. The opening scenes in tonight's episode with Rimmer were taken from the film. Audience sitcoms are now thought of as Miranda, Not Going Out etc. Red Dwarf is a show about big concepts. Did you have to put up a fight to get the audience back? Originally the audience wasn't part of the budget, for some reason that got overlooked. As a consequence, we lost two weeks of location filming so in a way that forced the series to be even more retro. We had one half-day shoot in a forest and that was the only time we left the building. Even on series two, we were able to go to quarries but we couldn't afford it for this one. It's a sorry state of affairs when a science-fiction show can't afford go to a quarry (laughs). SLIGHT SPOILERS FOR THE FINAL EPISODE OF RED DWARF X HERE Moving on to the last episode of this series, there's a big revelation for Rimmer. Do you think it could change how long term fans see him? It's not going to change your perception of Rimmer because he's always presumed something and acted accordingly. Now there's the question of: will