For some reason Kryten is no longer finding satisfaction in the menial tasks that he enjoyed most and feels that he has achieved nothing; Lister surmises that he must be going through a midlife crisis; this is confirmed when he changes his standard grey body for a sporty new red one. To make Kryten feel better about himself the crew search out another mechanoid, an earlier model, so he can see just how much he has developed. The find one, named Butler, but when they get to him it doesn't help Kryten at all; since his crew died Butler has mastered fine arts, classical music and fine cuisine as well as a variety of other skills; Kryten feels more useless than ever
until a repair carried out by Butler threatens to kill everybody! This at least gives him a chance to feel superior.
This was another fun episode; Kryten's new look was amusingly ridiculous without being too different, apart from headgear that seemed to be based on a car's spoiler. Given how the cast have aged over the lifetime of the series it seemed perfectly natural that there would be an episode where one of them experienced a midlife crisis and it is amusing to make that one Kryten as he has always had a few neuroses. Robert Llewellyn does a fine job in the role so it was nice to see him take centre stage; I like the fact that this season seems to be giving each character a chance to lead a story. Guest star Dominic Coleman impressed as Butler; a fun one-off character who was clearly superior to the Red Dwarf crew. As one would hope for there are plenty of good laughs as well as a fun story.
This was another fun episode; Kryten's new look was amusingly ridiculous without being too different, apart from headgear that seemed to be based on a car's spoiler. Given how the cast have aged over the lifetime of the series it seemed perfectly natural that there would be an episode where one of them experienced a midlife crisis and it is amusing to make that one Kryten as he has always had a few neuroses. Robert Llewellyn does a fine job in the role so it was nice to see him take centre stage; I like the fact that this season seems to be giving each character a chance to lead a story. Guest star Dominic Coleman impressed as Butler; a fun one-off character who was clearly superior to the Red Dwarf crew. As one would hope for there are plenty of good laughs as well as a fun story.
