When I saw this DVD on offer at Amazon recently I just had
to pick it up. This very best of contains six episodes from the fantastic follow up series
of The Likely Lads. Whatever Happened to
The Likely Lads (from the same writers as Ronnie Barker’s Porridge) takes place
about six years after the original 1960’s series originally ended after Terry
(James Bolam) is enlisted into the Army and his best friend Bob (Rodney Bewes)
is rejected for having ‘flat feet’.
After an unlikely reunion on a train both Bob and Terry have much to
discuss as a lot has changed in the five years since they’d last spoken, Bob
has become a successful worker, has his own house, car, and is soon to be
married to his long time girlfriend Thelma (Brigit Forsyth).
Episode Listing:
- Stranger on a Train
- Home is the Hero
- Cold Feet
- No Hiding Place
- Count Down
- Boys Night In
Terry on the other hand has nothing except an
(alleged) injured leg from the service and a German ex wife who can’t speak a
word of English. Terry missed the
climatic years of the swinging sixties and naturally is very disappointed not
to have been able experience the culture of free loving and drug taking. Will Terry be able to reacclimatise to
seventies Britain and will he and Bob continue to be friends after such a long
absence? It all could depend on the soon
to be Mrs Bob Ferris as she’s always disliked Terry as she considered him to be
a bad influence on Bob. Whatever Happened To The Likely Lads is a
classic BBC sitcom which expertly covers everything from Politics, Sexism and
the Class System in probably the funniest way since Steptoe and Son. The series might visually look dated but the
humour certainly isn’t. There may be the
occasional ‘They couldn’t say that
nowadays’ moment which some people may think find a little politically incorrect
for TV nowadays, but this is 70’s Britain on tape, you can’t ignore the
attitudes of the past be they good or bad as they were relevant at the time and
many to be honest are still relevant now too.
Sadly the visual and audio quality isn’t great, the BBC wasn’t renowned for
spending mega bucks on its sitcoms at the time and in 2008 the lack of budget
does show somewhat, however you can’t complain about a program from 1973 not
having widescreen and high definition like quality, those technologies weren’t
readily available at the time – especially for a public funded organization like
the BBC.
There are other Whatever Happened To The Likely Lads series available on DVD
but this particular release is a cheap entry for those who maybe new to the
show, the thing I am most pleased about though is that the chosen episodes have
been placed sequentially onto the disc and you don’t end up watching episodes
out of order like on some cheap Best Of DVD’s. It’s a shame there are no extras to peek at
but to be honest, I’d rather the BBC saved them for the full disc box sets. I
highly recommend this to all situation comedy fans.