When it comes to the ultimate smeghead, there’s nobody more deluded and stuck-up than Arnold J. Rimmer who becomes the focus of ridicule by the fellow Dwarvees throughout the show. But in the Season Six finale, he showed his heroic side in one surprisingly gripping sitcom cliffhanger where Starbug faced being blown up unless someone would destroy the time device before the duplicate Starbug ship finished them off. With the others being killed, it was left up to Rimmer to race through the ship with his gun and destroy the device. But a further twist beckoned as the real Starbug was blown up leaving us to wonder whether it really was the end of Red Dwarf. But fortunately, we were rest assured about the character’s fates in the Series Seven opener which did lead to confusing continuity issues. This led to some Dwarf fans (who didn’t like the later series) to regard this moment as the true end of the show.

#3 – The return of Dwayne Dibley

During the Series five finale, the Dwarves initially discovered that they were back in their own reality where Lister and Rimmer found out they were half-brothers and Kryten was a traffic cop. The Cat on the other hand discovered he was a geeky individual named Dwayne Dibley who had with big teeth and funny hair. However to his and the rest of the Dwarves relief, it turned out they were part of a hallucinatory paradox that had led them to believe that Red Dwarf was a computer game. The personalities had looked to have been forgotten in the next series but the writers decided to make an excuse of bringing Dibley back as a running gag. His first comeback came in Emohawk where the Polymorph attacks Cat who suddenly finds himself back to being his alternative ego. The cheering from the audience sums up how big an impression Dwayne Dibley must have made in his original appearance!

#2 – Shrinking Boxers

When it came to laugh-out-loud moments in Red Dwarf, this classic scene of sexual innuendo proved why Red Dwarf deserved to be spoken of in the same breath as Only Fools and Horses and Fawlty Towers proving that sci-fi could be hilarious too. This cracker from the episode Polymorph once again involves the sneaky polymorph as it tries to form itself in the most unlikeliest of places….Lister’s shorts! Not exactly pleasurable for either of them. But as Kryten uses his cleaning socket to try and help Lister, the homo-erotism in the scene leaves the pair in a compromising position as Rimmer walks in on them. His unsurprised reaction says it all though the beast eventually reveals its identity in rather grotesque fashion as the episode progresses. Imagine that sort of scene in Doctor Who or Star Trek!

Visual humour wins it for my favourite moment in Red Dwarf (as you’ll eventually see in my other sitcom lists) as we are left howling with laughter at the weird yet painstakingly funny scene from the Series 7 episode Stoke Me a Clipper. To most people, Ace Rimmer shared similarities with Rik Mayall’s scene-stealing character Flashheart in Blackadder in terms of his smug and boisterous attitude. However Chris Barrie excelled as a comedy actor whether he’d be playing the snobby Rimmer or his heroic alternative Ace and it was as the latter character which saw him involved with the ‘greatest’ moment of the show. When our hero battles it out with a Nazi general (played by Ken “Reg Holdsworth” Morley), it leads to their plane heading for destruction especially when the general escapes with the only parachute. But what he doesn’t know is that Ace has an ‘ace’ up his sleeves….Two words: Alligator Surfboarding! Red Dwarf was always recognised for its bizarre humour but this moment summed up the randomness of it all and makes the scene complete genius. As our hero would say: “Smoke me a kipper, I’ll be back for breakfast”