Dave Lister (Red Dwarf) - Alternative Listers

Alternative Listers

As well as Deb Lister, there have been various other alternative versions of Lister.

In the alternate reality where we first meet Ace Rimmer, there is a version of Lister who goes by the nickname Spanners. This Lister is a highly skilled technician, married to Kochanski, with twin boys, Jim and Bexley. Unlike Rimmer, Lister is pleased a version of him is doing so well.

During an encounter with The Inquisitor, Dave is replaced with an alternative version of himself. This Dave Lister, one of the sperm who didn't have the chance to fertilise his mother's egg, was given the chance to live a better life than the one lived by the real Lister. However, the fact that he is dressed identically, and also stranded on Red Dwarf, suggests that this Dave fared no better. This Dave was ultimately killed by The Inquisitor whilst the real Dave tried to escape deletion from existence.

Under the influence of a despair squid's hallucinogenic ink, Lister is fooled into thinking that his time aboard Red Dwarf was just a realistic encounter in a Total Immersion Videogame. After leaving the game, Lister briefly gets to watch the action as another group plays the game as it was intended to be played - the scenario observed involves the team having exciting adventures in outer space and interacting in a far less dysfunctional manner, and where the role of Lister is filled by a good-looking and suave new player.

Discovering a temporal rift in normal space, Lister, along with the rest of the crew, travel through it and encounter an alternative Red Dwarf crew, with some small differences: in this reality, it is Lister who is the hologram, having failed to survive the accident which wiped out the crew. His hologramatic status led to this Lister becoming a better person, more caring and attentive, and cured of his slobby habits.

During the novel Last Human, the crew fought an alternate version of Lister who was adopted by different parents, this Lister choosing the wealthy but psychotic Thorntons over the poorer but more emotionally stable parents which the normal Lister had. As a result, this Lister grew up to be a sociopath, often manipulating others with his efforts, claiming not to believe in even the concept of love, and perfectly willing to murder his shipmates in order to achieve his goals. This Lister is eventually killed when he is destroyed by the gestalt telepathic entity known as the Rage.