Let Me Be Surprised

I need Brazil,
The throb, the thrill,
I've never been there,
But someday I will.

Adventure and danger,
Love from a stranger,
Let me be surprised.
Ladadadada...

Today there's sun,
They said there'd be snow,
When all's said and done,
It's fun not to know.

What keeps my heart humming,
Is guessing what's coming,
Let me be surprised.

Oh, ain't it great?

Ain't it great...

When fate makes you wait,
The world seems mirthless,
You feel worthless,
And suddenly there's a big bone on your plate.

Oh Charlie, please remember,
Down there's a world of used cars,
And single's bars,
Broken dreams and out-of-reach stars,

But it isn't over,
Not for this Rover,
I don't like to steal,
But I don't buy this deal.
In about three seconds, she'll have realised...

And she's gonna be...

Charlie, what are you doing?

Wait'll you see...

What's that you have behind your back?

She's gonna be...

Charlie, don't wind that watch!

Surprised....

Warning: This Post Contains Some Spoilers for Red Dwarf and All Dogs Go To Heaven.

I'm not entirely sure how many people are intimately familiar with both Red Dwarf and All Dogs Go to Heaven. And I'm not entirely certain how many of them notice the similiarities

between Arnold J. Rimmer (Chris Barrie) and Charlie B. Barkin (Burt Reynolds).

With both characters, we enter their stories shortly before their deaths - Charlie, at the hands of his double-dealing partner, Scarface, and Rimmer, at his own. They then spend much of the story (I'm using the word 'story' in place of 'film/series') dead. They are also both weirdly

attractive (considering one is an animated dog, and the other is a cowardly gimboid), but that's neither here nor there.

Now, the original dead Rimmer eventually becomes Ace Rimmer, his ultimate self. He is then reborn when the Red Dwarf is rebuilt by nanos and dies once again. This time, he defies death - as does Charlie.

Both do so out of fear. Rimmer, through fear of the unknown, and Charlie, through fear of the known. They are both cowards in their own way.

Charlie rejects heaven with the above song, claiming that he has too much left to live for, and

that the predictability of heaven would drive him crazy. Incidentally, there is one version of the Twilight Zone with a similar idea to this. A man dies, and believes he is sent to heaven. There, everything he tries works out. Everything he wants, he gets, and every time he gambles - which was his hobby in life - he wins. Which, most would say, defeats the point of gambling. Eventually, he realises he's in hell. For Charlie, a conman (dog), this heaven would have a similar effect.

Rimmer never learns what this afterlife would consist of. It's unlikely he'd be brought back as a hologram again. So, rather than Charlie's elegant song-and-dance, Rimmer simply knees Death in the groin (I need to say groin, since it's the only part I can reliably state that Death has) and makes a run for it.

It's ironic that Annabelle's warning to Charlie - down there's a world of used cars, and single's bars, broken dreams, and out-of-reach stars - consists of what doesn't bother Charlie, but that which would terrify Rimmer. While Charlie's heaven would probably suit Rimmer a lot more than it does Charlie (except for all the dogs), Charlie might also prefer Rimmer's slightly threatening, unknown end to his safe, structured heaven.

It could be said that both Red Dwarf and All Dogs Go To Heaven follow, respectively, Arnold J. Rimmer and Charlie B. Barkin from their deaths to their heavens - Rimmer's as Ace Rimmer, the man he both hates and always wanted to be, his ultimate self, and Charlie's as someone who has actually earned a place in heaven, and come to terms with the end of his life. Or perhaps not, as the reprisal It's Too Heavenly Here states in the sequel.