Psirens

Lister comes out of Deep Sleep (a less-efficient version of stasis) aboard Starbug. Kryten brings him up to speed on the situation: Red Dwarf was lost 200 years ago and he has been chasing the ship alone and upgrading Starbug for long-term habitation. There is a chance of recovering Red Dwarf at last by heading through an asteroid belt that Red Dwarf is forced to circumnavigate. However, the belt turns out to be a spaceship graveyard inhabited by Psirens, shape-changing GELFs who lure unwary travellers to them and suck out their brains through a straw. Cat is almost lured away by two attractive women and Lister sees Kristine Kochanski (who tells him that she has two children, Jim and Bexley, that are his). Starbug crashes and Lister has to blast the front landing gear out, but is tricked twice while on the surface: once by an attractive woman, then by a Psiren masquerading as Kryten. Two Listers manage to get on board, however. It is determined who the wrong Lister is by asking them to play guitar, which Lister does poorly but the Psiren does extremely well. Lister is suitably upset by their accusations that he is a poor guitar player, though.


Trivia

• The scene where Lister has to convince his crewmates that he is the true Lister and the other Lister is in fact a psiren, seem somewhat inspired by a similar scene in Star Trek VI where there are two James T.Kirk and the real one has to convince someone not to kill him but the other.
• Captain Tau was named after the commanding officer in the American pilot of the show.
• Anita Dobson was cast in the role of Captain Tau, after Rob Grant had approached her husband (Queen guitarist Brian May) to be Lister's hands in the guitar scene (he was unavailable however)
• The actress Samantha Robson (Pete Tranter's sister) later went on to a successful career in The Bill as Vicky Hagen.
• The snogging scene between Lister and the Psiren was a result of Craig Charles being frustrated that Chris Barrie got more kissing than he did on screen. Naturally the Red Dwarf crew decided it should come at a price, in this instance a mouthful of KY Jelly. This became a running gag, with Lister being forced to kiss a number of disgusting creatures over the course of this and the next series.
• This is Clare Grogan's final appearance as Kristine Kochanski. When Kochanski returns in Season VII, she is played by Chloë Annett
• An episode of The X-Files pits Mulder against a creature similar to the Psirens.
• In the scene where the Psiren, disguised as Lister, plays the guitar, the hands didn't belong to Craig Charles: they in fact belonged to Phil Manzanera of Roxy Music.