Starbug is pounded with pulse missiles and is nearly destroyed, but manages to flee into a GELF zone where the probe will not follow. With Starbug on fire, the crew deliberately crash-land on a moon with a shallow ocean to extinguish the flames. However the moon is not uninhabited - a primitive humanoid tribe of GELFs, the Kinitawowi tribe, reside on the moon. Lister is forced to marry the chief's daughter, whose name is Echechechechechech, in return for an oxygen generation unit (or O/G unit) so that Lister and the Cat can breathe on take-off. Lister escapes from his new bride as the others are leaving with the O/G unit and they make their escape in Starbug but they are trailed by the chief's pet emohawk, a domesticated polymorph, which begins stealing the crew's emotions. The Cat loses his cool and morphs into Duane Dibbley, while Rimmer loses his cowardice and becomes Ace Rimmer. After Ace makes a failed attempt to snap Duane Dibbley's neck and vent Starbug to get rid of the polymorph (thereby sacrificing himself), Lister and the crew manage to capture the emohawk and freeze it. This allows them to extract the DNA of Cat and Rimmer to return them to normal.
Quotes
After Lister is married his bride wants to consummate their union.
Lister: "All right, I just want to slip into something more comfortable. It's called Starbug." Outside Lister runs past his pals.
Lister: "Change of plan... LEG IT!"
Trivia
- The working title of this episode was "Polymorph II - Emohawk". The cast jokes in the DVD commentary of this episode that the scrubbed title sounds like a football score.
- This episode marked the first appearance of humanoid GELFs in the form of the Kinitawowi tribe.
- The full name of Lister's GELF bride, as it appears in the subtitles on the series VI DVD and the information on the official Red Dwarf site, is "Echechechechechechech"
- Ainsley Harriot played the role of the GELF chief, a role he asked for due to being a fan of the show. Harriot later became a celebrity chef and hosted the television shows Can't Cook, Won't Cook and Ready, Steady, Cook for the BBC. Later, in 1998, Harriott presented a special edition of Can't Cook, Won't Cook called Can't Smeg, Won't Smeg for the 10th anniversary of Red Dwarf with the cast of Red Dwarf cooking a meal while remaining in character.
- Two much loved "alter egos" make an appearance in this episode: Cat becomes Duane Dibbley and Arnold Rimmer becomes Ace Rimmer.
- Danny John-Jules provides a little known fact in the DVD commentaries: Eddie Izzard, now a famous comedian and international movie star, used to be a warm-up man for the Red Dwarf crew.
- A great line said by Ace Rimmer was unfortunately cut from the final edit: as he struggles to break Cat's neck, he ultimately decides against killing him, stating that "It'd be like garroting Bambi."
- The GELF village set was, in fact, an already standing set left over from the short lived series Covington Cross.
- A running gag in the series involving Lister's marriage is seen in Series VII, where a GELF ship attempts to capture him and bring him back to his wife.
