Red Dwarf: Cultures: Mechanoids
Mechanoids were created to do all the menial tasks that humans find so disagreeable. They are programmed to perform such duties as the ironing, cooking and cleaning. They are humanoid in shape, but due to rather angular features, a silly walk and the fact that they have no sex organs, you could not use a Mechanoid to have sex – even if you wanted to (erm.. not that I think sex is menial you understand!).
We first saw an example of a mechanoid in the first episode of season 2. It opened with a television show apparently designed for such machines styled on the hit Australian soap ‘Neighbours’. The character watching the show was Kryten, who later became one of the central Red Dwarf crewmembers.
Kryten is a Series 4000 Mechanoid designed by the stunningly gorgeous Dr. Mammet (who was played briefly by Jenny Aguter). There was a later model called the Series 4000 GTI and a subsequent Hudson Series 3, but generally we only see the Kryten example.
Mechanoids have lots of interesting gadgets and gizmo’s. there is a front Groinal attachment used for doing the vacuuming and an…. erm… ‘rear’ socket where the power cable is ‘inserted’.
Their left nipple nut can be used to regulate body temperature and the right nipple nut is able to pick up short wave radio. The eyes are 579’s with the automatic 15 f-stop cornea.
The only really dangerous substance for a Mechanoid is the addictive substance called Otrazone. This is highly addictive and ultimately destroys memory and other vital electronic Mechanoid functions.
All Mechanoids believe very strongly that there is a ‘Silicone Heaven’, a place where the souls of all electrical equipment congregate. If you were to challenge this concept, the Mechanoid would ask defensively, “But where do all the calculators go?” they believe that this is ‘common sense’, “if there wasn’t an afterlife to look forward to, why on earth would machines spend the whole of their lives servicing humankind?” (Seems logical to me!)
Lister once discussed this with Kryten and asked if Silicone Heaven was in any way similar to Human Heaven. Kryten laughed, “there is no such thing as human heaven.” He said, “Someone just made that up to prevent you from all going nuts!
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Note: |
Mechanoids can have conversations with their spare bodyparts. |
A Mechanoid is one essential programming feature, they are not, under any circumstances, able to take a human life. Lister has tinkered with Krytens programming on many occasions. He has managed to teach the Mechanoid to lie and even insult Rimmer. on one occasion he was able to take out Krytens ‘guilt chip’ – but he would not be able to program a Mechanoid to kill.
The first two seasons of Red Dwarf were stupendous, but it wasn’t until the inclusion of the Mechanoid Kryten, that the show really became addictive.
| Race Rating – Mechanoids | |||
| Personality | 1 (rancid butter) – | 4 (cool dude) | 4 |
| Attractiveness | 1 (requires paper bag) – | 5 (Drop-dead-gorgeous) | 2 |
| Humour | 1 (stomach-turning) – | 5 (sidesplitting) | 4 |
| Dress Sense | 1 (laughable) – | 5 (hip) | 3 |
| Aggression | 1 (big/little softy) – | 5 (hard as nails) | 1 |
| Social Standing | 1 (scumbag) – | 5 (god) | 3 |
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Sad Geezer Race Rating (out of 30) = 17 |
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This Culture review is © 1999 – 2019 Tony Fawl.
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