June 14, 2025 • 43 mins
Welcome to Long Live Hooky Street, the podcast where we rewatch and discuss every episode of Britain's most beloved TV comedy, Only Fools & Horses. We are Heather & Jenny, two sisters that grew up in the UK in the 80s and 90s, and now we live on opposite sides of the world. From this podcast you can expect detailed episode breakdowns and lots of fun facts and stories surrounding the production of our favourite TV show from our childhood. Thank you for listening! Today we are discussing Series 2 Episode 5 "The Yellow Peril" - Del has another money making scheme in the form of getting Rodney and Grandad to paint a Chinese Takeaway but the paint isn't quite as golden as he thinks! Unfortunately Del has been painting something far more important with the same paint...
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Episode Transcript
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(00:04):
Hello and welcome to Long live Huggy St, the podcast where we
rewatch and discuss every episode of Britain's most
beloved TV comedy, Only Fools and Horses.
I'm Heather and I'm joined from Denver, Co by my Co host and
sister Jenny. Say hello dude.
Hello, yes I've moved. So today we are discussing
Series 2 Episode 5, The Yellow Peril.
(00:25):
So grab a rum and pep and let's get started.
This episode ad on the BBC at 8:30 PM on November 18th, 1982,
still airing after Sorry and Right but ending right before
the Nine O Clock news. The number one movie at the UK
box office was still Tron and the UK number one song was still
I Don't want to Dance by Eddie Grant.
(00:46):
Viewing figures were backed downslightly this week to 8.2
million. A couple of interesting little
episode of facts here. So John Sullivan got the idea
for this episode from an incident in Mitcham.
At the time there had been a break in and a paint store and
the perpetrators had been parkedin a garage and caught
immediately by the police. Apparently they had left a
(01:06):
yellow line of paint behind themwhen they drove away all the way
from the store to their garage. Wow, that's pretty dumb.
So this is the most we've heard so far about Dylan Rodney's
mother. So the first time we hear her
full name and we also learned that she died on March 12th,
1964. So for the daylight scenes in
(01:28):
the cemetery we are they're using Kensal Green Cemetery in
North Kensington. The night time shots were filmed
at Walpole Park in Ealing, whichwas very close to Oakland's road
where the establishing shot of the Golden Lotus was filmed.
So just the outside shot. Another interesting fact about
this episode is that the studio filming for This and A Touch of
(01:49):
Glass were all done on one day. So just the studio scenes, not
the location, because there was so much location filming in both
of those two episodes that not much studio was required.
So it made sense to do it all inone day.
So it mentions in the So assuming that means the same
laugh track for the studio. So that's the same audience
(02:11):
watching the studio scenes for This and A Touch of Glass.
And it mentions in the lovely Jubly book that if you look at
the flat scene in this episode, you can see and the touch of
glass that none of the stuff hasmoved.
So the curtains and the export spirits are all in exactly the
same place. So we've got finally.
Mr Chin was played by Rex Y, whopassed away in 2006 at the age
(02:31):
of 73. Apparently, the part was
supposed to be played by actor Vincent Wong, who had appeared
in many James Bond movies such as Goldfinger and Diamonds Are
Forever, but it doesn't say why.It wasn't him, so I don't know
what the reason was. Maybe he dropped out the last
minute. So that's all I have for the
episode. Facts.
Shall we move on to our episode rankings?
(02:53):
Yes, let's do that. So if you don't already know,
and that probably means that youare new to the podcast, so you
should definitely subscribe. As always, we have each
independently ranked all 64 episodes and we are now going to
reveal and compare our rankings for this episode.
So what is your ranking for The Yellow Peril out of 64?
OK, so my ranking for the yellowFerrell is #43.
(03:17):
Wow, yeah, interesting. And why have you ranked it 43?
I mean, this is, I love this episode.
I think it's great. It fell down a little bit lower,
probably just because again, more memorable episodes are
above it. But I love this episode.
I think it's really good. I love Mr Chin.
I love all the back and forth dialogue.
I think it's quick pace, it's well written, and I think it's
(03:39):
got a good ending. So yeah, I like it.
I just, I think it just fell down because of the perhaps more
more memorable ones to me above it.
What about you, dude? Well, I ranked this as 5364 and
this was an episode that I re ranked when I went back after
watching it because I realised that I'd ranked it quite high
(04:02):
originally and actually that wasnot where I wanted to put it.
It's Yeah. So after rewatching this, I
actually think this episode is alittle bit bland.
It's got some memorable stuff init just because of the plots,
like all of the plots, I think for any Fools and horses are
quite memorable across the board.
But I don't think this episode is that strong regarding sort of
(04:25):
laughs. When I was re watching it, I did
find, you know, there's a lot ofnice sort of dialogue, obviously
always between the characters and maybe a lot more, as you
said, history is mentioned. But for me, I don't think this
is a strong contender for a for a funny episode, which is
honestly what I'm mostly lookingfor for many fools and horses
with the odd exception. So yeah, I think that's why I
(04:45):
ended up, you know, a bit lower.And if I'm even looking at like
all of Season 2 a series to, I don't really go to this episode
to watch it because I think if if you're watching this for the
first time, you get more out of it.
But once you've watched it once,you know what happens, you know,
the reveal at the end and everything.
So yeah, I think that's why I didn't rank this as that high
(05:07):
comparatively to other episodes,yeah.
Well, yeah, So we'll go ahead and I'll just say that the IMDb
ranking for this one is quite high.
It's 24. And I think that's because there
are a handful of episodes that end up high ranked because they
are they have something in them that people remember as like a
big thing. And, and this, this luminous
paint and the Chinese takeaway are a thing that people
(05:30):
remember. So I think that happened.
It's almost in the same like line of people remembering the
chandelier scene. They remember.
And I remembered the big bright yellow walls.
So yeah, it's, it's memorable for that reason.
And it's actually a very, it's aclever plot line.
It's a well written story. Like it's a good idea he had
because the painting, the littlestory from Mitchum was not
(05:50):
luminous. And so, yeah, it's like a good
little idea that he had about them getting luminous paint off
trigger. And of course we love to see
Trigger back. So.
Yeah, Yeah. I don't know.
I don't, I think, yeah, I can see why it fell down low for
you. That's quite low, a lot lower
than I may be expected for you and like very.
Different, like I said, it was higher I think, I think I, I
(06:11):
think I ranked this as like 41 originally and then I realised
that it didn't. It shouldn't be that high on my
rankings because I realised sortof where I put like no greater
love and I would say these episodes are kind of similar to,
for me with rewatch ability. And that was sort of 5050
something. And I was like, oh, I need to
knock this one down. And I really did.
(06:32):
So yeah, I actually had a big reshuffle of my rankings
recently. So yeah, this one got the chop
to be lower down on the list. So yeah, sure, that's all I have
to say. OK, so shall we go ahead start
the episode breakdown? Yeah, go ahead with the
breakdown then, dude. OK, so this episode begins in Mr
(06:56):
Chin's restaurant. So Dell is making a deal and he
tells him that. Today is the anniversary of my
late mother's passing from this immortal curl.
He always says his late mother or his late mother's death.
And then with death as well, it's kind of implied there's a
just, there's not much happens in the scene really.
All we find out is that Dell's got a deal going.
(07:18):
I don't even think we know that he's painting the Chinese
takeaway. I think we find that out in the
next scene when he says it to Rodney.
So I think it's just we see thisinteraction that Dell's got a
deal going with Mr Chin and that's it.
There is a, there is one little bit here that I think is quite
funny because it's just a very short scene where Mr Chin says
then and Dell looks surprised because Dell says, I think.
(07:41):
Soya, Nora. And this is a trope that was
used in all of the Carry On films where they had what they
would consider to be foreign characters saying very British
things. I remember this was always
something that the Carry ONS played on, which is, yeah, I
guess it, again, just something that people found funny at the
time. But yeah, so that's really all I
have to say about that. That scene, it's very short.
(08:03):
Is there anything you want to add?
Yeah, the only thing I wrote here was that it's the first
time we see Dell do the out of order thing on the Metre, which
is a running gag throughout all of Only Fools and Horses.
Because later they have like thebag over the Metre or they put
the midwife on emergency call sign on the car.
So like he never pays for a parking.
Yeah, that carries on throughoutthe whole of the show.
So then we go to the next scene,which is in the cemetery.
(08:26):
So this is quite interesting that we we don't sort of go to
the flat first. I feel I always felt there's
something that's quite unique about this episode to sort of go
to the cemetery. The next time we're in the
cemetery, I think is 1 door closes.
After this, I don't think we're there again.
Until that episode, probably right?
So, yeah, yeah, so quite nice asyou say, to have a bit of
background. So this conversation with Dell
(08:46):
and Rodney is is quite lengthy and I'm just trying to think of
some highlights here. So, yeah, we see their mom's
grave is very extravagant. This is something that's that's
quite funny. And you can totally imagine Dell
like doing that when when his mom died.
And yes, he says that she died 17 years ago.
So I'm sure you wrote that down for continuity purposes and then
(09:07):
Rodney mentions that the grave. Looking a bit tatty nowadays.
And Dell mulls over what he can do to make it look better.
And he starts listing all these things that he can do.
And then Rodney says. If he added fibreglass models of
Snow White and A7 dwarfs, you couldn't already affect to that.
Or yo-yo yo, don't start gettingsacrificial.
So Dell chastises him for not feeling anything.
(09:28):
That this is quite a harsh thing, I think, for Dell to to
do here. He's quite, yeah, he's quite
harsh to Rodney, the way he sortof goes.
Look at you now, loafing about around your mother's graveside.
Don't you feel any emotion? It's sort of like, you know,
sort of making fun of him almostfor his lack of emotion.
And then, yeah, Rodney has this very, you know, understandable
(09:50):
response. I didn't know Mum that well, did
I? When she died, I was just a
little Nipperoni, all odd socks and eczema.
Now you feel a sense of personalloss.
Me, I'm just still cheating and.This is something I don't think
we've ever really had before this to this point, which I
think is quite sad actually. And then of course, we get Dell
(10:11):
apologising, which is not something we see very often.
But in this situation, Dell apologises to Rodney, which is
which is nice, he should do. And then Dell has a funny line
here, he says when he's describing their mother, and he
says she. Had long golden blonde hair
sometimes. And we hear a story that Dell's
mum was in the pub with him whenhe was still at school.
(10:34):
And this is a story that Dell tells to show how caring their
mother was. But.
Every night she used to send across two or three pints of
light and bitter well whiskey. If she was flash come about
10:00, she'd look over where I was sitting and she'd chat.
Come on Dell boy, get off home to bed school in the morning.
(10:55):
So that's not a very responsiblemother, but Dell looks at this
as a really nice thing that his mum did to show that she was a
nice woman and that Rodney was outside in the pram.
And again, I didn't, I didn't really get the the punchline of
this story because Rodney says. Where was I then?
She was outside in the pram, eating a narrow room.
She's worried. You know it's only an old
(11:18):
friend. And then Dale says.
It's all right, put it in your leg.
She was worried. As though that's a good thing
then. Oh, it's OK to leave him outside
in the pram because she was worried about him being outside.
I don't think the audience got that either.
I think like, it made it sound like he was saying, no, I'm only
kidding. You weren't outside in the in
the pram. But instead he was like, no, I'm
only kidding. Of course, she was worried that
(11:40):
you're outside by yourself. So that's a bit weird.
Yeah, that one. There was a really nice moment
here I wrote down where I think Rodney rests his head on Dell's
arm. I think that's lovely.
It's like these two brothers very comfortable around each
other. You don't see that very often,
like that touchy feely thing. So that was really, really nice.
And then Rodney sort of driftingoff to sleep and then Dell
starts sort of talking all this crap and Rodney is just
(12:00):
listening, sort of half listening, and Dell throws into
the middle. You'll decorate in the kitchen
of a Chinese takeaway tomorrow. And then of course, we find out
what the scheme is that Dell hasbeen making this deal with Mr
Chin, who we just met in the last scene, and they're going to
paint the Chinese takeaway. And he says that Rodney needs to
do it because he has AGC in art and that's why he decided Rodney
(12:20):
was going to do it. And Rodney refuses.
And then we get this whole sequence of Dell emotionally
blackmailing Rodney again, againsomething we see a lot of times
happening, and he always goes tothe.
Remember what Mum said to me on her deathbed?
I do think this is quite a funnyline where Dell says.
Dell boy. Dell boy.
(12:41):
Started ditching. And then Dell pulls this really
angry face that Rodney and I think it's quite funny.
And again Rodney apologises immediately because he knows not
to mess with Dell when it comes to their mum.
And then it's Dell talks about sharing everything with Rodney
and these again he's all manipulation to try and get him
to paint the Chinese takeaway. And Dell says that's.
(13:03):
What? I've always done half of
everything I've got. I mean, fair enough, I ain't got
nothing, but half of it is yours.
And he even mentions here of Rolls Royce, which you think is
really interesting because that's maybe that's why John
Sullivan chose to use that in Time in Our Hands as the thing
that Rodney bought for Dell because of this conversation.
(13:24):
Yeah, I put that in my notes as well because he specifically
says if they had two Rolls Royces, you'd give him one.
Yeah. And then it's actually Rodney
that buys Della Rolls Royce and.Yeah, I think that's quite a
nice callback if that was what it was.
So yeah, I think that's that's really nice.
I do like the line where he says.
You'd nick Leola on me lost poloif I didn't keep my mouth shut.
But yeah, so we start listing all the things that Rodney wants
(13:49):
to. Rodney thinks that Dell would
have, as I just mentioned, the Rolls Royce and he says.
What would you do if you had twoof them Deep sea divers watches?
Now you know I got two of them deep.
And then he says that he can have one of the deep sea divers
watches, but Rodney still not biting.
And then the ending of the sceneis a bit weird because we've had
quite a meaningful conversation here.
(14:10):
And then it just goes straight down to the lowest common
denominator, which is porn. I'll give you a lender.
Me dirty books. But yeah, I mean, I think
because of Rodney's age, like that's totally the thing that he
would go for. I mean, he always seems to get
Rodney with money or yeah, like in case like a girl girl or porn
or something. So just, it's just Rodney's
(14:30):
character. He's young, goofy and horny and
like Dell knows because Dell's been that age.
So yeah. Yeah, true.
I mean, I would, I would have thought in a house full of men
that that The Dirty books would have been very easy to get hold
of. If they were in someone else's
room. You just go in and take them, I
would have thought. I don't know.
I don't know how brothers share porn.
(14:50):
No, I don't either, but I would have assumed that was the case
anyway. But yes, so so yeah, that's all
I had for that scene. Anything you want to add to
that? Not much now, anyone note that
you didn't that you did mention,but I'll just elaborate on it a
little bit is the the dates and the ages and stuff.
So we'll sum this up in the in the rap episode at the end of
the series. But yeah, so it highlights that
(15:12):
he says it's been 17 years sincetheir mom died and the date is
on the grave 1964. But if you were to assume that
we're you know that it's 1982 now and this is the episode like
this is the age they would be in1982.
We've already gone a little bit off track because Rodney only
aged half, half a year and a year.
This would have made down 19 when she died, not 16.
(15:33):
So again, we already said there was a couple of, Again, we're
just doing this completely for fun.
John Sullivan probably did not have notes where he wrote down
the continuity and it's completely harmless.
It's just these are a couple of references that we're going to
use in that in that course. Yeah, he wasn't to know that
Internet sleuths in the future would start making notes on all
this continuity about the ages. So, and it really, again, it
(15:54):
really doesn't matter, it's justfor fun, so.
Mum went to know that, was she? Yeah, so she didn't know about
the futures market because therewasn't 1 when she was alive.
Yeah, that's the thing. So like, yeah, I mean, I like
the scene overall. It slows the episode down
considerably because normally you would get right off the and
hit the ground running with the plot.
There's quite a lot of dialogue before they really talk about
(16:14):
painting the Chinese takeaway. So I think that might be what
you were talking about, being quite slow paced.
Yeah, it's it's a necessary but.Not a lot of sort of standout
lines I would say in this particular exchange.
I mean, again, it's not that it's a bad, it's important
dialogue for the sense that we get a lot of history and stuff
from again, we see more of the setup of the relationship
(16:36):
between Dell and Rodney, but there's not really any standout
funny moments in that whole exchange that I would I would
highlight. So a.
Bit of character development, a bit of understanding about how
Rodney feels about his mom's death.
Yeah, it's all kind of necessary, but yeah, that's all
I had. Yeah, we can move on.
Okay, so then they arrive at theGolden Locust, presumably the
next day. It is actually the Golden Lotus,
(16:57):
Dalda says. It.
Yeah. So yeah, yeah.
So I actually, I thought it was the golden locust because, yeah,
you said in the next scene it's the if.
That's what Dell says. But yeah, I was like, why would
anyone name their Chinese takeaway locust?
So that would be pretty gross, but I suppose it doesn't matter.
And then we find out that Granddad is Rodney's assistant,
which is just the most ridiculous choice.
(17:18):
But isn't that always the case? Granddad's always Rodney's
assistant. We get that again when they
decorate Denzel's flat in the next series.
And then a cat runs out and Dellmakes a joke.
He's going to please Mr Chin, isn't.
It oh, was it his pet? No, but #39's off the menu.
And this is quite interesting, the exchange here that they have
about what? Do you write in the rumours
(17:40):
about these places? Is trolling.
No, of course not that. Looked pretty alarmed about
something. And this is quite interesting
for me because when I first saidI was moving to Hong Kong, I
thought and a lot of other people thought in my friendship
group that they ate cats and dogs in Hong Kong, which they
don't. But yeah, I think it's, it's
(18:01):
something that I think, I think the the countries from my
understanding within Asia now that I know do still eat dogs.
Mainland China definitely does. They have the Yulin Dog
festival. I think that's one of the most
famous ones in Korea. I believe they still eat dogs in
certain areas and then also in the Philippines.
Yeah, this is a Chinese takeaway.
(18:21):
So you're right that he's right,right, Because it's mainland
China. Yeah, yeah, that's true.
Yeah, Yeah. I think when I talk about Hong
Kong, because Hong Kong is Chinaalso.
But yeah, I was just. Yeah, that's one of the things
that I thought was a misconception.
Certainly when I moved to Hong Kong that that was the case.
But but yeah, so that's a very specific joke, a culturally
specific joke. And then Dell looks in the till,
(18:42):
which I thought was quite funny.What if?
He'd found money in there. Was he just going to steal it?
I mean, that's like, really bad.Yeah.
The the kitchen. Oh, is disgusting.
If you thought someone was goingto come and paint, would you not
move all the pots and pans? Like, especially the ones that
are hanging on the walls? I mean, surely you need to be
able to get to the walls? Yeah, do you want me to do it?
Strange, I have in my notes what's the description of the
(19:04):
kitchen from the script so I canjust read this it will fit in.
Yeah, absolutely. So it says the kitchen is a
nightmare vision, The kind of kitchen we all fear may exist,
dirty and greasy, littered with unwashed pots and pans, lumps of
meat and veg, like rotting on the worktop.
And Dell notices the look of horror on Rodney's face.
That's what it says in the script.
(19:24):
Oh, that, that explains it then.Yeah.
But yeah, it is. It really is disgusting.
I always remember thinking that when I was a kid.
I think it's what always put me off eating in Chinese takeaways,
to be honest. I was a kid because I saw this
kitchen. Probably not far off realistic.
I mean like all kitchens are greasy.
It's impossible to not have a greasy kitchen.
You have to clean the grease traps regularly.
You have to like scrape grease from the stove like it's very
(19:45):
common unless it's an oil I. Mean Jenny's worked in AI.
Was going to say Jenny's worked in a kitchen so she she knows.
This grease is a big problem because grease is not easy to
clean. So yeah, yeah.
But they wouldn't have been ableto paint a greasy wall because
paint. But yeah, that's what I was.
I was going to say, yeah. So yeah, overall this is just a
bit. Yeah, it's a bit.
It's a bit much, I would say. And yes, I'm surprised they
didn't clean away the tins and the pots and pans and stuff
(20:07):
because it would make it impossible.
Then we have one of my favouriteexchanges here where we start
talking about the the paint and the little tiny tins that it
comes in. Oh yeah, and just what am I
supposed to do with them soppy little tins?
Look, I can't even get me brush in them.
Can't. Even get his brush in them.
He can't even work that little problem out.
(20:29):
Oh God, tell him how to do it, granddad.
You get a pair of scissors and trim your brush up.
Yeah. No, you don't.
Get a pair of scissors and trim your brother.
I mean, it is, it is a pretty ridiculous thing to say because
of course it is a very obvious solution, which is the one Dell
of all people comes up with. You'd think that Dell would be
(20:51):
the one who is is like coming upwith the bad, like the stupid
solutions. But then Rodney and Grounded are
the really dumb ones here. But yes, you pour it into a
bigger container, don't you? Rodney says he won't paint.
Oh yeah, that's right. So he Dell implies that the
paint might be stolen. Everything's stolen, isn't it,
Rodney? Come on.
And we have the classic Rodney'sprotesting again if the paint is
(21:11):
stolen, and Granddad puts it down a bit sharpish as well, and
he thinks it's stolen. But then Mr Chin arrives in the
middle of all this bit. You repeater.
No, no, no. He's the painter.
Army's apprentice. No, they are the best.
The very best. And I mean, I actually have
never met anyone with the surname Chin in in Hong Kong.
(21:34):
I've met a lot of Chans and Jangs, all this sort of stuff,
never a Chin. So I don't know how common that
name is actually. Maybe it's more common in
mainland China, but in Hong KongI've never met anyone called
Chin. But of course, if you didn't
have him called Mr Chin, you couldn't do the classic joke.
Don't worry, Mr Chin. In fact, Chinna.
He lets, Oh yeah. So he asks Dell what the colour
(21:54):
is going to be. Now again, I can't believe that
you wouldn't want to choose the colour that your own kitchen is
going to be painted. But maybe Dell talked him into
it or something. I don't know.
And then even Dell doesn't know what colour the paint is in
these little tins, and Romney's trying to take it off while Dell
is distracting Mr Chin. Well, you see what I thought the
colour these walls should be. Blue.
What? I like blue.
(22:18):
Blue Blue, Just sayings Frontierand.
Then of course the tin gets opened and it turns out to be
yellow and then Dell bullshit and says.
What I thought we'd do is we would paint them gold.
That is yellow. This is gold, Rodney.
What is the matter with you? Are you illiterate or something?
No. I thought of gold because I
remember the name of your beautiful restaurant, Gold for
(22:40):
the Golden Locust. Yeah, obviously Dell is is the
master of these sorts of situations.
His ability to improvise when things go awry is is absolutely
fantastic. And this is where we find out
that the reason Mr Chin is having his kitchen painted is
because he had an anonymous call.
I had a telephone call from a man.
(23:01):
He did not give me his name. What?
He tells me, get your kitchen painted.
Oh, you'll be in big trouble, John, huh?
Then Mr Chin leaves, looking quite happy, I suppose,
considering, and we get again another another line where Dell
says well. Come on, we must now say Chao
(23:23):
Ming. Yeah, then Dell reveals he was,
he set the whole thing up to running Granddad to try and get
rid of the paint because he's got Lombard with the paint and
he takes a load of boxes with him when he leaves.
And finally we have Granddad saying hey what?
About all this, Phil Dell boy. You arrange for anyone to clean
it up. Of course I have.
What do you think I am, a cowboyor something?
(23:45):
There's a tin of Ajax and a rubber glove in that bucket.
So yeah, that's all they have for this scene.
Anything you want to add? No, the only note I had here is
I one of the funniest lines I found was when they first
getting out the car and he and Grandin says.
You can't expect me to paint with my feet, Dell boy.
I don't expect you to paint withyour feet.
But yeah, like, it is a bit harsh having an old man like
(24:06):
Granddad do all that hard work. Painting is really hard and it's
not something you can just blag your way through.
It requires quite a lot of, I mean, maybe I'm just not a
natural at it, but every time I've painted I've had to do a
lot of prep work. And to get it look to look good,
you got to know what you're doing.
And that paint probably wouldn'thave gone on very nicely.
But but obviously we don't know.That's not worth thinking about.
(24:28):
The only other note I had was itwhen Mr Chin is explaining that
he received an anonymous, an anonymous phone call.
He did not tell me his name as he's saying that because David
Jason, like does that look back at Rodney, it, it really looks
like Mr Chin is going to laugh. He had the height like hold it
together pretty well. You can see the laugh coming
(24:49):
because of the way the audience is reacting to David Jason's
face. He gets through it pretty well.
But obviously it was shot in front of the studio audience and
you can see everyone laughing a lot.
Yeah. And actually Dell looking back
at Rodney like that, is giving it away that it was Dell who did
it as well. Otherwise you will be in big
trouble. John.
John. Yeah.
(25:10):
Love that one. OK, Yeah.
It's funny that he recalls the exact words that I said in the
phone call because usually the people don't quote directly from
a phone call they had a few weeks ago.
Presumably so, yeah. Especially when his name's not
John. But yeah, like, yeah.
But anyway, yeah, so and then wego back to the flat for the next
scene and we have Granddad and Rodney are back at the flat and
Granddad is watching 3 televisions again.
(25:33):
Continued all the way through. As long as Leonard Pierce is
there, we have the three television thing.
Is it 3 though or two? Because I thought that Pauline
says 3 and he he always is watching just the black and
white and. I thought it was 3 colour scene.
Maybe I'd have to go back. And I'd have to go back and look
again. I wrote 3, but yeah, maybe I got
confused, but I thought it was 3.
And then Rodney says that Dell has been going out and is acting
(25:55):
evasive, and Rodney surmises that perhaps Dell's been making
money on the side and leaving them out of it while they've
been painting the Chinese takeaway.
But then Dell comes home straight away.
He asks for the money from the job, and then he starts counting
it on the table, and Rodney starts inquiring more.
What you've. Been up to though.
(26:15):
Oh, bits and pieces. Where you've been.
There and back. So what you've been doing?
Listen there. And then he says he's been doing
something private. That's all he'll reveal to
Rodney and Granddad, and they don't seem to pry much more
beyond that, which is I guess quite nice that they don't.
Then Dell says they're going to split the money three ways, and
(26:37):
he gives Granddad 35. This is out of 150.
He gives Granddad 35 and Rodney 40.
And then when soon as Rodney starts to protest, he gives them
the deep sea. Divers watch as a pacifier and
it works. I can't believe this stuff still
works, but it does. And then the doorbell rings and
Dell sends Granddad to go down to the door and Granddad says.
(26:59):
Oh, my legs are older and yours?I know that means I've had more
experience, haven't I? And then we've got this
conversation that's a little bitthrowaway between Dell and
Rodney about the deep sea Divers.
Watch where Dell says. Oh, the bloke said.
Don't get it in the water. So again, you'd imagine, as
always, everything that Dell hashas got something wrong with it.
I wondered if his deep sea divers watch because he said he
got two of them. I wonder if his one works and
(27:20):
the one he gave to Rodney didn'twork and that was why he gave it
to him? I'm not sure.
Yeah, I was just going to say that he.
Yeah. Like, The thing is, Rodney's
amazed by the fact that he only gets £40 and then he gets the
Deep Sea Divers watch and he's like, oh, yeah, I'm happy then
I'm fine with the £40. But the Deep sea Divers watch
was supposed to be a freebie forpainting, not, like, part of the
payment, Right. So like.
(27:41):
But he always forgets. Exactly.
Because Dell always uses that tactic of the long distracting
speeches that take away from theoriginal argument.
And usually by the time he's gotto the end of all that, Rodney's
forgotten. But yeah.
That's exactly what happens nextin the scene.
Yeah, you just mentioned that. So but so we have a Trigger
arrive and he's come around to sell down some more paint.
So here we find out that Dale got the paint from Trigger.
(28:02):
So here we see Trigger being thethe villain again, that side of
him that we don't see in in later years.
And he actually outright admits that they have nicked it from
British Rail. Him and Monkey Harris.
I believe it is because he says they almost got caught stealing
it. And Rodney of course has his
classic reaction to that where he gets all mad because God
(28:23):
forbid Dell would ever get caught off with something that's
that's illegal. It's just not like like Dell at
all. And then Dell does this really.
I think I, I wrote long winded. I maybe it's a little bit much.
This, this thing. I understand the purpose of it,
obviously. But yeah, when he talks about
how stealing this was was good for Britain.
Soon this country will be rich and famous again.
(28:45):
The starving shall be fed, the homeless will be home and.
Then Rodney, as you mentioned earlier, has forgotten while he
was protesting in the 1st place and he just says.
His watch is broke. That bit a bit of a slow moment
in the episode, but actually sorry, just before that speech
Triggered mentioned that they were using the paints in tunnels
because granddad said he recognised the colour and then
(29:06):
Trigger said. This ain't the stuff that I
paint trains with. They use this for painting signs
in tunnels. And then that's when, after
Dell's speech about why stealingfrom British Rail is good for
Britain, Granddad says. Tunnels.
What did you say? No, he said.
That trigger said tunnels, He said.
They use that stuff to paint signs in tunnels.
(29:28):
Well, how can you see a sign in a tunnel?
It's black. Come here.
No. This is luminous paint.
It's luminous Granddad. That means you can see in the
luminous. Bloody luminous.
Which is great reaction from David Jason and he also says a
really funny mix up word hero. He says what do?
(29:48):
You think I am physic or something?
Yeah, it's worth mentioning herethat in the script it actually
says psychic. So I wonder if David Jason maybe
improvise that because he knows Dell gets words wrong.
Yeah, that's it. Well, yeah, if that was an
imperisation, that's really goodthat he did that, because I
think that's really funny, the way he messes that up.
And then then we have the phone ring.
(30:10):
So that, yeah, this scene is quite, you know, one thing after
the other. But we have the phone ring.
And Granddad answers and it's MrChin, and Dell says tell him I'm
out. And Mr Chin asks on the phone to
Granddad where Dell's gone, presumably because Granddad
says. No, no, Dell's gone out.
I'm not sure where you going to girl.
(30:33):
Again, Granddad, he always steals the show when he has
those lines. And then this is a very funny
moment, of course, where we get the big reveal where we just cut
even though we're on the phone to Mr Chin.
We cut to Mr Chin's location andhe's in his restaurant's kitchen
wearing a pair of sunglasses. And he says we see how crazy
they're glowing. I mean, it is insane.
(30:55):
How could you ever work in a room like that?
And then we have another wonderful moment of
improvisation from Dell, where he says it's a new energy saving
paint to cut down on electricitybills.
And to think of that in the moment is very sharp.
And then Mr Chin wants still to paint his living room in it.
Oh. My goodness, Yeah.
Which is just, yeah, unbelievable.
(31:17):
But then at the end of the scenewe have Dell suddenly realising
something is wrong. Oh my God.
Something wrong, Dell? What have I done?
It's all your fault. It's your fault, you and your
stupid. Pain.
So we don't know what it is at this moment, but we we obviously
(31:38):
are quite concerned because he seems really upset about it and
he blames Trigger for it. And then he decides instead of
telling them what the problem is, he says granddad and Rodney
had better go with him. And he keeps giving Trigger
these annoyed looks as though he's going to get even with
Trigger for what he's done. But at this point we don't know
what it is. So I think that's everything for
(31:59):
that scene that I've got writtendown.
Anything you want to add? Yeah, just a couple notes, just
to go back to the beginning. When Trigger comes in, he calls
Rodney Dave. Still no reaction or laugh from
the audience. So we're still, yeah, we've got
most of the way through Series 2here without really getting much
of A reaction on that, but they're keeping it up.
And yeah, I'd actually timed howlong it was between when Trigger
(32:20):
says tunnels to when Granddad realises tunnels.
It's 2 full minutes of dialogue,so yeah, Dells big speech about
stealing from British Rail fillsmost of that time.
Yeah, I think that's quite clever.
His whole speech about how he justifies it.
I think it's interesting becausehe's like looking at the
cultural, like the current times, the unemployment and
stuff. So, you know, he doesn't feel
(32:42):
bad about this stuff, about stealing.
When he looks, looks at it with this point of view, he can, you
know, he can convince anybody ofanything.
And that's an interesting part of his character.
And yeah, the only other note I had was, is it a coincidence
that Rodney's wearing a yellow T-shirt?
Because you never see him wearing this again.
So I just thought maybe it's funny that he's wearing a yellow
T-shirt for a yellow Pearl. That's an interesting
(33:03):
observation. Although I think you do see him
wearing this T-shirt again, but only underneath other stuff,
never just usually just wearing the T-shirt.
Ohh, that's yeah, I have not been paying attention to the
costumes at all really. So it's interesting you
mentioned that. Yeah, it's just a like a maybe.
It maybe means something, it maybe doesn't.
Also, there is one more thing you really say is a.
Bankrupt stock, you said? British royal, same thing.
(33:24):
Right. Anything government is bankrupt,
right? So yeah, that's it.
That's all I had for that scene.OK, so then we go to the final
scene of the episode and we are this time outside the well.
We don't know if it's we don't know it's the graveyard at the
beginning of the team. But they pull up outside this
gate and Dell gets out the car 1st and goes over and we get a
shot, you know, back on to DavidJason and his face is kind of
(33:47):
lit up by this light and we don't know what it is at this
point. Then Dell, and sorry, not Dell,
Granddad and Rodney come on over.
I really love the way that Leonard Pierce delivers this
line when he says 0. My good God.
Just, I just love something about his voice.
It's, it's just fantastic. And then we realise that Dell
has painted their mother's gravein the luminous paint.
(34:08):
They have sort of a few jokes here.
Rodney says a few things about the grave is going to become
like a beacon for, for, for. Every Satanist in acidate in
England. But Granddad steals the show
with the line. What?
Worries me. It's on the main flight path to
East Brow. I'm not really sure the reason
for writing it like this, but Dell makes out that he's not
going to apologise for it and hedoesn't regret doing it.
(34:30):
And it's, you know, it's a good thing.
And then he looks back at it, and then he changes his mind and
he says, we'll. Put it down to vandals, get out
of him before we get our collarsfell.
And that's the last line of the episode.
So I feel like this episode has quite a weak ending overall.
I'm not sure how they could haveended it better, but I think the
(34:51):
ending is a bit, yeah, it's a bit sort of forgettable.
And I almost feel like this episode has two stories
simultaneous. You've got like the story of the
Chinese takeaway and then you'vegot the story of the mom's
grave. And maybe that's why I felt that
it wasn't as strong as an episode because it hasn't got
like a central story that we focus on.
It's got like 2 stories going side by side maybe.
(35:13):
And the paint is the thing that connects them both.
But yeah. Yeah, it's true.
And I think like, so some episodes end on a really good
line, like we just did No Greater Love last week and we
agreed that the line is good. Well, it's a punch line or a
joke of some kind. And some of them end like this,
where it's more of a visual thing and they end with like
them going oh, no or something, I'm just walking away.
(35:36):
So yeah, I do feel like they're a bit weaker when they're like
this where it's more of a visualthing and then they don't have
anything necessarily funny to say about it.
I would agree. I think like, you're right.
The second that Dell is missing,when they get back from the
Chinese takeaway and they're like, oh, where is he?
You get a sense that there's another storyline and it is a
little bit of a pace, like disruption to the pace of the
(35:57):
episode because now we know there's something else.
But for some reason, yeah, it doesn't work very well.
I don't know why it kind of derails the pace of the episode.
I like the fact that they they do the reveal of the grave, and
maybe they should have just revealed the grave and then
kicked in with the credits. I don't know.
Yeah, maybe it's. Still early days and you know
they haven't quite got the the kick at the end of the episode
(36:18):
right in these early series. Yeah, I think, yeah, you're
right. I think, I think the dialogue
after the reveal of the grave probably brings down the energy
a bit because again, it's not like the dialogue is
particularly that funny the the stuff they say to each other
after the grave is revealed, particularly Dells, you know,
protestation that it's, it's fine that he did it and he's
happy with it because he's clearly not.
(36:38):
So I mean that's why he went, yeah, like got all stressed in
the flats when he realised what he'd done so.
I mean, yeah, the I put a note here because this is something
Nicholas Lyndhurst had said. They they put lights inside an
actual fibreglass monument to make it glow like that.
And it was so bright that the nearby traffic kept slowing down
to see what it was. He said we were lucky we didn't
(37:00):
cause an accident. So yeah, like I said earlier,
they actually filmed it outside a proper graveyard gate.
So the glow actually did 'cause probably what would have in real
life if it had been paid luminous, like it would have
attracted a lot of attention. So funny, it's almost like
granddad's lying about the flight path is quite accurate.
Yeah, I mean, it is really. And that makes me think of Sky's
(37:21):
the limit a little bit. Yeah, of course.
But yeah, like, honestly, even if it weren't luminous paint,
can you actually picture a gravepainted bright yellow?
I think it would look kind of ridiculous.
Yeah, I agree with you. I always thought that, yeah,
even if the paint, yeah, as you say, wasn't luminous, just
having a painted grave is very strange to me.
I can't think of any time I've ever seen a painted grave or
(37:42):
like you say, a coloured grave like that.
Maybe sort of some marble, maybegreenish marble or something
like that, or slightly blue, butnothing bright yellow.
I think that would be quite strange.
And or even if it wasn't luminous, it would probably be a
bit of a beacon still. I mean, it is a Dal, so yeah, we
don't know what he's thinking with style and he might think it
(38:02):
looked cool, but I just can't picture in the middle of a
graveyard full of greystone, a bright yellow painted fibreglass
monument would look kind of gaudy.
But yeah, perhaps if it's with Dell style pretty well.
Yeah, that's true. There is one thing I've just
thought of actually, which I don't really, you know, like to
talk too much about the episodesfrom 2000, the 2000s.
(38:22):
But when they go back to the mum's grave, I think it's in
Sleepless in Peckham, I think it's in the last one, they go
back to this grave. And Dell has done exactly what
he said he might do in this episode about adding to the to
the headstone. And they've added loads of
different stuff on top because they became millionaires and
they paid for an upgrade on the headstone.
(38:43):
So I think that's quite a nice call back that they had the
conversation about it. And then when they finally had
enough money, they did exactly that and added loads of stuff to
it. Yeah, that's cool.
Just a nice thing. Yeah, I don't have any other
notes. No, me neither.
Okay, so let's move on to the awards for this week.
And guess what? He's only one.
So as always, we have three awards to announce this week, so
(39:06):
we will start with Plunker of the Week.
Don't believe it? What a plonker.
What a plonker. So let's start with your
nomination this week, dude. Who have you nominated for
Plonker of the Week? So in this episode I was trying
to think because honestly, there's some plonkerish sort of
stuff from a lot of people, but I I guess I'd have to say Dell.
(39:27):
And the reason I, I said Dell isbecause he he kind of cheats and
uses granddad and Rodney to, he's very manipulative in this
episode towards Rodney in particular.
And he kind of gets them to go and do all the painting and he
doesn't, you know, bother with it.
And then he, yeah, I don't know.I just, I just feel like Dell is
a bit stupid in this episode forsome reason and quite
manipulative. Yeah.
(39:49):
Yeah, I mean, I wrote Dell as mynomination too, but for a for a
different reason. Like that he was stupid not to
know anything about the paint. But I guess that's the same
reason he's a plonker a lot of the time.
He does go, yes, in gung ho a lot of the time without checking
on anything. But it's also like Trigger is an
honourable mention of a plonker for not telling him it's
luminous paint. Like it's a very specific type
(40:11):
of paint that he's selling. Like it's not just paint, but
maybe Trigger didn't realise that it glowed even though it
was called luminous. Yeah, that's true.
I mean, we don't know if Triggerunderstands what Luminous is.
Yeah, I guess he kind of does because he goes, Nah, this is
Luminous paint when he he says out the tunnel.
So actually, yeah, he would. You would know.
He does know that. Means it's bright, it bright,
it's brighter if it lights up. But yeah, again, like actually
(40:33):
perhaps he could be excused because he's making a sale.
Like he doesn't care. That's true.
I guess you could also argue that Mister Chin is a bit of a
plonker for for deciding to get his take away painted on an
anonymous phone call from someone.
Yeah. I mean, if some anonymous person
called me and went you need to do this, I wouldn't do it.
That seems a bit strange. Maybe it was more normal in them
days, I don't know. Maybe.
(40:55):
I mean, I guess he did say something.
Did he mention the health inspector or something and
that's why he. Said that it was an anonymous
phone call warning him that the health inspector would be coming
by soon. Right.
Yeah. That reminded me of faulty
towers a little bit, yeah. Something health inspector.
I always think of faulty towers,yes.
So are we going to give it to Dell?
Yeah, let's give it to Dell. Dell is plunger of the week.
Sure, your fault. Well done, Dell.
(41:17):
OK. Well done Dell so.
This week Heather is going to award the best line of the
episode and I will choose the best moment.
So dude, what have you chosen for your favourite line of the
episode? Now, yeah, this was a difficult
one because as I mentioned, I don't really rate sort of the
humour in this episode a lot. And I always think best line is
like a humorous one. But the line that makes me laugh
(41:38):
the most in this episode, I guess every time I hear it is
granddad's solution to the paintbrush not fitting into the
into the the tins and dolls reaction to it.
So when granddad says. You get a pair of scissors and
trim your brush up. No, you don't.
(41:59):
Get a pair of scissors and trim your brother.
Yeah, I think that's, I think that's really funny, that line.
But maybe you have some honourable mentions.
Not really. I I just worked on my favourite
moment. But I think the best moment kind
of speaks for itself. It's really the moment where Mr
Chin is revealed on the phone with the sunglasses and he turns
around and then you see the other employees walking around
(42:20):
the kitchen with their sunglasses on.
I do think that is always the moment everyone remembers the
most of this episode. No, I agree.
Yeah, I, I because I, I have a think about it, obviously, even
though I'm not awarding it. And yeah, I put what have you
done to my world? Yeah.
And also the reveal of the graveis the other one.
Yeah. Because those are the two big
moments that, as you say, everyone remembers, and they're
(42:40):
the funniest moments in the episode.
OK, yeah, so if you don't have any anymore honourable mentions.
No, I think that's everything. OK, drink up, drink up.
We'll even. OK, so that about wraps it up
for this week. Join us next week when we'll be
discussing Series 2 Episode 6, It Never Rains.
But until then, listeners, if you like what you
(43:10):
hear and want to contact us, youcan e-mail us at
longlivehookiestreetpodcast at gmailcom.
All one word, no spaces. Bonjour.
Hello and welcome to Long live Huggy St, the podcast where we
rewatch and discuss every episode of Britain's most
beloved TV comedy, Only Fools and Horses.
I'm Heather and I'm joined from Denver, Co by my Co host and
sister Jenny. Say hello dude.
Hello, yes I've moved. So today we are discussing
Series 2 Episode 5, The Yellow Peril.
(00:25):
So grab a rum and pep and let's get started.
This episode ad on the BBC at 8:30 PM on November 18th, 1982,
still airing after Sorry and Right but ending right before
the Nine O Clock news. The number one movie at the UK
box office was still Tron and the UK number one song was still
I Don't want to Dance by Eddie Grant.
(00:46):
Viewing figures were backed downslightly this week to 8.2
million. A couple of interesting little
episode of facts here. So John Sullivan got the idea
for this episode from an incident in Mitcham.
At the time there had been a break in and a paint store and
the perpetrators had been parkedin a garage and caught
immediately by the police. Apparently they had left a
(01:06):
yellow line of paint behind themwhen they drove away all the way
from the store to their garage. Wow, that's pretty dumb.
So this is the most we've heard so far about Dylan Rodney's
mother. So the first time we hear her
full name and we also learned that she died on March 12th,
1964. So for the daylight scenes in
(01:28):
the cemetery we are they're using Kensal Green Cemetery in
North Kensington. The night time shots were filmed
at Walpole Park in Ealing, whichwas very close to Oakland's road
where the establishing shot of the Golden Lotus was filmed.
So just the outside shot. Another interesting fact about
this episode is that the studio filming for This and A Touch of
(01:49):
Glass were all done on one day. So just the studio scenes, not
the location, because there was so much location filming in both
of those two episodes that not much studio was required.
So it made sense to do it all inone day.
So it mentions in the So assuming that means the same
laugh track for the studio. So that's the same audience
(02:11):
watching the studio scenes for This and A Touch of Glass.
And it mentions in the lovely Jubly book that if you look at
the flat scene in this episode, you can see and the touch of
glass that none of the stuff hasmoved.
So the curtains and the export spirits are all in exactly the
same place. So we've got finally.
Mr Chin was played by Rex Y, whopassed away in 2006 at the age
(02:31):
of 73. Apparently, the part was
supposed to be played by actor Vincent Wong, who had appeared
in many James Bond movies such as Goldfinger and Diamonds Are
Forever, but it doesn't say why.It wasn't him, so I don't know
what the reason was. Maybe he dropped out the last
minute. So that's all I have for the
episode. Facts.
Shall we move on to our episode rankings?
(02:53):
Yes, let's do that. So if you don't already know,
and that probably means that youare new to the podcast, so you
should definitely subscribe. As always, we have each
independently ranked all 64 episodes and we are now going to
reveal and compare our rankings for this episode.
So what is your ranking for The Yellow Peril out of 64?
OK, so my ranking for the yellowFerrell is #43.
(03:17):
Wow, yeah, interesting. And why have you ranked it 43?
I mean, this is, I love this episode.
I think it's great. It fell down a little bit lower,
probably just because again, more memorable episodes are
above it. But I love this episode.
I think it's really good. I love Mr Chin.
I love all the back and forth dialogue.
I think it's quick pace, it's well written, and I think it's
(03:39):
got a good ending. So yeah, I like it.
I just, I think it just fell down because of the perhaps more
more memorable ones to me above it.
What about you, dude? Well, I ranked this as 5364 and
this was an episode that I re ranked when I went back after
watching it because I realised that I'd ranked it quite high
(04:02):
originally and actually that wasnot where I wanted to put it.
It's Yeah. So after rewatching this, I
actually think this episode is alittle bit bland.
It's got some memorable stuff init just because of the plots,
like all of the plots, I think for any Fools and horses are
quite memorable across the board.
But I don't think this episode is that strong regarding sort of
(04:25):
laughs. When I was re watching it, I did
find, you know, there's a lot ofnice sort of dialogue, obviously
always between the characters and maybe a lot more, as you
said, history is mentioned. But for me, I don't think this
is a strong contender for a for a funny episode, which is
honestly what I'm mostly lookingfor for many fools and horses
with the odd exception. So yeah, I think that's why I
(04:45):
ended up, you know, a bit lower.And if I'm even looking at like
all of Season 2 a series to, I don't really go to this episode
to watch it because I think if if you're watching this for the
first time, you get more out of it.
But once you've watched it once,you know what happens, you know,
the reveal at the end and everything.
So yeah, I think that's why I didn't rank this as that high
(05:07):
comparatively to other episodes,yeah.
Well, yeah, So we'll go ahead and I'll just say that the IMDb
ranking for this one is quite high.
It's 24. And I think that's because there
are a handful of episodes that end up high ranked because they
are they have something in them that people remember as like a
big thing. And, and this, this luminous
paint and the Chinese takeaway are a thing that people
(05:30):
remember. So I think that happened.
It's almost in the same like line of people remembering the
chandelier scene. They remember.
And I remembered the big bright yellow walls.
So yeah, it's, it's memorable for that reason.
And it's actually a very, it's aclever plot line.
It's a well written story. Like it's a good idea he had
because the painting, the littlestory from Mitchum was not
(05:50):
luminous. And so, yeah, it's like a good
little idea that he had about them getting luminous paint off
trigger. And of course we love to see
Trigger back. So.
Yeah, Yeah. I don't know.
I don't, I think, yeah, I can see why it fell down low for
you. That's quite low, a lot lower
than I may be expected for you and like very.
Different, like I said, it was higher I think, I think I, I
(06:11):
think I ranked this as like 41 originally and then I realised
that it didn't. It shouldn't be that high on my
rankings because I realised sortof where I put like no greater
love and I would say these episodes are kind of similar to,
for me with rewatch ability. And that was sort of 5050
something. And I was like, oh, I need to
knock this one down. And I really did.
(06:32):
So yeah, I actually had a big reshuffle of my rankings
recently. So yeah, this one got the chop
to be lower down on the list. So yeah, sure, that's all I have
to say. OK, so shall we go ahead start
the episode breakdown? Yeah, go ahead with the
breakdown then, dude. OK, so this episode begins in Mr
(06:56):
Chin's restaurant. So Dell is making a deal and he
tells him that. Today is the anniversary of my
late mother's passing from this immortal curl.
He always says his late mother or his late mother's death.
And then with death as well, it's kind of implied there's a
just, there's not much happens in the scene really.
All we find out is that Dell's got a deal going.
(07:18):
I don't even think we know that he's painting the Chinese
takeaway. I think we find that out in the
next scene when he says it to Rodney.
So I think it's just we see thisinteraction that Dell's got a
deal going with Mr Chin and that's it.
There is a, there is one little bit here that I think is quite
funny because it's just a very short scene where Mr Chin says
then and Dell looks surprised because Dell says, I think.
(07:41):
Soya, Nora. And this is a trope that was
used in all of the Carry On films where they had what they
would consider to be foreign characters saying very British
things. I remember this was always
something that the Carry ONS played on, which is, yeah, I
guess it, again, just something that people found funny at the
time. But yeah, so that's really all I
have to say about that. That scene, it's very short.
(08:03):
Is there anything you want to add?
Yeah, the only thing I wrote here was that it's the first
time we see Dell do the out of order thing on the Metre, which
is a running gag throughout all of Only Fools and Horses.
Because later they have like thebag over the Metre or they put
the midwife on emergency call sign on the car.
So like he never pays for a parking.
Yeah, that carries on throughoutthe whole of the show.
So then we go to the next scene,which is in the cemetery.
(08:26):
So this is quite interesting that we we don't sort of go to
the flat first. I feel I always felt there's
something that's quite unique about this episode to sort of go
to the cemetery. The next time we're in the
cemetery, I think is 1 door closes.
After this, I don't think we're there again.
Until that episode, probably right?
So, yeah, yeah, so quite nice asyou say, to have a bit of
background. So this conversation with Dell
(08:46):
and Rodney is is quite lengthy and I'm just trying to think of
some highlights here. So, yeah, we see their mom's
grave is very extravagant. This is something that's that's
quite funny. And you can totally imagine Dell
like doing that when when his mom died.
And yes, he says that she died 17 years ago.
So I'm sure you wrote that down for continuity purposes and then
(09:07):
Rodney mentions that the grave. Looking a bit tatty nowadays.
And Dell mulls over what he can do to make it look better.
And he starts listing all these things that he can do.
And then Rodney says. If he added fibreglass models of
Snow White and A7 dwarfs, you couldn't already affect to that.
Or yo-yo yo, don't start gettingsacrificial.
So Dell chastises him for not feeling anything.
(09:28):
That this is quite a harsh thing, I think, for Dell to to
do here. He's quite, yeah, he's quite
harsh to Rodney, the way he sortof goes.
Look at you now, loafing about around your mother's graveside.
Don't you feel any emotion? It's sort of like, you know,
sort of making fun of him almostfor his lack of emotion.
And then, yeah, Rodney has this very, you know, understandable
(09:50):
response. I didn't know Mum that well, did
I? When she died, I was just a
little Nipperoni, all odd socks and eczema.
Now you feel a sense of personalloss.
Me, I'm just still cheating and.This is something I don't think
we've ever really had before this to this point, which I
think is quite sad actually. And then of course, we get Dell
(10:11):
apologising, which is not something we see very often.
But in this situation, Dell apologises to Rodney, which is
which is nice, he should do. And then Dell has a funny line
here, he says when he's describing their mother, and he
says she. Had long golden blonde hair
sometimes. And we hear a story that Dell's
mum was in the pub with him whenhe was still at school.
(10:34):
And this is a story that Dell tells to show how caring their
mother was. But.
Every night she used to send across two or three pints of
light and bitter well whiskey. If she was flash come about
10:00, she'd look over where I was sitting and she'd chat.
Come on Dell boy, get off home to bed school in the morning.
(10:55):
So that's not a very responsiblemother, but Dell looks at this
as a really nice thing that his mum did to show that she was a
nice woman and that Rodney was outside in the pram.
And again, I didn't, I didn't really get the the punchline of
this story because Rodney says. Where was I then?
She was outside in the pram, eating a narrow room.
She's worried. You know it's only an old
(11:18):
friend. And then Dale says.
It's all right, put it in your leg.
She was worried. As though that's a good thing
then. Oh, it's OK to leave him outside
in the pram because she was worried about him being outside.
I don't think the audience got that either.
I think like, it made it sound like he was saying, no, I'm only
kidding. You weren't outside in the in
the pram. But instead he was like, no, I'm
only kidding. Of course, she was worried that
(11:40):
you're outside by yourself. So that's a bit weird.
Yeah, that one. There was a really nice moment
here I wrote down where I think Rodney rests his head on Dell's
arm. I think that's lovely.
It's like these two brothers very comfortable around each
other. You don't see that very often,
like that touchy feely thing. So that was really, really nice.
And then Rodney sort of driftingoff to sleep and then Dell
starts sort of talking all this crap and Rodney is just
(12:00):
listening, sort of half listening, and Dell throws into
the middle. You'll decorate in the kitchen
of a Chinese takeaway tomorrow. And then of course, we find out
what the scheme is that Dell hasbeen making this deal with Mr
Chin, who we just met in the last scene, and they're going to
paint the Chinese takeaway. And he says that Rodney needs to
do it because he has AGC in art and that's why he decided Rodney
(12:20):
was going to do it. And Rodney refuses.
And then we get this whole sequence of Dell emotionally
blackmailing Rodney again, againsomething we see a lot of times
happening, and he always goes tothe.
Remember what Mum said to me on her deathbed?
I do think this is quite a funnyline where Dell says.
Dell boy. Dell boy.
(12:41):
Started ditching. And then Dell pulls this really
angry face that Rodney and I think it's quite funny.
And again Rodney apologises immediately because he knows not
to mess with Dell when it comes to their mum.
And then it's Dell talks about sharing everything with Rodney
and these again he's all manipulation to try and get him
to paint the Chinese takeaway. And Dell says that's.
(13:03):
What? I've always done half of
everything I've got. I mean, fair enough, I ain't got
nothing, but half of it is yours.
And he even mentions here of Rolls Royce, which you think is
really interesting because that's maybe that's why John
Sullivan chose to use that in Time in Our Hands as the thing
that Rodney bought for Dell because of this conversation.
(13:24):
Yeah, I put that in my notes as well because he specifically
says if they had two Rolls Royces, you'd give him one.
Yeah. And then it's actually Rodney
that buys Della Rolls Royce and.Yeah, I think that's quite a
nice callback if that was what it was.
So yeah, I think that's that's really nice.
I do like the line where he says.
You'd nick Leola on me lost poloif I didn't keep my mouth shut.
But yeah, so we start listing all the things that Rodney wants
(13:49):
to. Rodney thinks that Dell would
have, as I just mentioned, the Rolls Royce and he says.
What would you do if you had twoof them Deep sea divers watches?
Now you know I got two of them deep.
And then he says that he can have one of the deep sea divers
watches, but Rodney still not biting.
And then the ending of the sceneis a bit weird because we've had
quite a meaningful conversation here.
(14:10):
And then it just goes straight down to the lowest common
denominator, which is porn. I'll give you a lender.
Me dirty books. But yeah, I mean, I think
because of Rodney's age, like that's totally the thing that he
would go for. I mean, he always seems to get
Rodney with money or yeah, like in case like a girl girl or porn
or something. So just, it's just Rodney's
(14:30):
character. He's young, goofy and horny and
like Dell knows because Dell's been that age.
So yeah. Yeah, true.
I mean, I would, I would have thought in a house full of men
that that The Dirty books would have been very easy to get hold
of. If they were in someone else's
room. You just go in and take them, I
would have thought. I don't know.
I don't know how brothers share porn.
(14:50):
No, I don't either, but I would have assumed that was the case
anyway. But yes, so so yeah, that's all
I had for that scene. Anything you want to add to
that? Not much now, anyone note that
you didn't that you did mention,but I'll just elaborate on it a
little bit is the the dates and the ages and stuff.
So we'll sum this up in the in the rap episode at the end of
the series. But yeah, so it highlights that
(15:12):
he says it's been 17 years sincetheir mom died and the date is
on the grave 1964. But if you were to assume that
we're you know that it's 1982 now and this is the episode like
this is the age they would be in1982.
We've already gone a little bit off track because Rodney only
aged half, half a year and a year.
This would have made down 19 when she died, not 16.
(15:33):
So again, we already said there was a couple of, Again, we're
just doing this completely for fun.
John Sullivan probably did not have notes where he wrote down
the continuity and it's completely harmless.
It's just these are a couple of references that we're going to
use in that in that course. Yeah, he wasn't to know that
Internet sleuths in the future would start making notes on all
this continuity about the ages. So, and it really, again, it
(15:54):
really doesn't matter, it's justfor fun, so.
Mum went to know that, was she? Yeah, so she didn't know about
the futures market because therewasn't 1 when she was alive.
Yeah, that's the thing. So like, yeah, I mean, I like
the scene overall. It slows the episode down
considerably because normally you would get right off the and
hit the ground running with the plot.
There's quite a lot of dialogue before they really talk about
(16:14):
painting the Chinese takeaway. So I think that might be what
you were talking about, being quite slow paced.
Yeah, it's it's a necessary but.Not a lot of sort of standout
lines I would say in this particular exchange.
I mean, again, it's not that it's a bad, it's important
dialogue for the sense that we get a lot of history and stuff
from again, we see more of the setup of the relationship
(16:36):
between Dell and Rodney, but there's not really any standout
funny moments in that whole exchange that I would I would
highlight. So a.
Bit of character development, a bit of understanding about how
Rodney feels about his mom's death.
Yeah, it's all kind of necessary, but yeah, that's all
I had. Yeah, we can move on.
Okay, so then they arrive at theGolden Locust, presumably the
next day. It is actually the Golden Lotus,
(16:57):
Dalda says. It.
Yeah. So yeah, yeah.
So I actually, I thought it was the golden locust because, yeah,
you said in the next scene it's the if.
That's what Dell says. But yeah, I was like, why would
anyone name their Chinese takeaway locust?
So that would be pretty gross, but I suppose it doesn't matter.
And then we find out that Granddad is Rodney's assistant,
which is just the most ridiculous choice.
(17:18):
But isn't that always the case? Granddad's always Rodney's
assistant. We get that again when they
decorate Denzel's flat in the next series.
And then a cat runs out and Dellmakes a joke.
He's going to please Mr Chin, isn't.
It oh, was it his pet? No, but #39's off the menu.
And this is quite interesting, the exchange here that they have
about what? Do you write in the rumours
(17:40):
about these places? Is trolling.
No, of course not that. Looked pretty alarmed about
something. And this is quite interesting
for me because when I first saidI was moving to Hong Kong, I
thought and a lot of other people thought in my friendship
group that they ate cats and dogs in Hong Kong, which they
don't. But yeah, I think it's, it's
(18:01):
something that I think, I think the the countries from my
understanding within Asia now that I know do still eat dogs.
Mainland China definitely does. They have the Yulin Dog
festival. I think that's one of the most
famous ones in Korea. I believe they still eat dogs in
certain areas and then also in the Philippines.
Yeah, this is a Chinese takeaway.
(18:21):
So you're right that he's right,right, Because it's mainland
China. Yeah, yeah, that's true.
Yeah, Yeah. I think when I talk about Hong
Kong, because Hong Kong is Chinaalso.
But yeah, I was just. Yeah, that's one of the things
that I thought was a misconception.
Certainly when I moved to Hong Kong that that was the case.
But but yeah, so that's a very specific joke, a culturally
specific joke. And then Dell looks in the till,
(18:42):
which I thought was quite funny.What if?
He'd found money in there. Was he just going to steal it?
I mean, that's like, really bad.Yeah.
The the kitchen. Oh, is disgusting.
If you thought someone was goingto come and paint, would you not
move all the pots and pans? Like, especially the ones that
are hanging on the walls? I mean, surely you need to be
able to get to the walls? Yeah, do you want me to do it?
Strange, I have in my notes what's the description of the
(19:04):
kitchen from the script so I canjust read this it will fit in.
Yeah, absolutely. So it says the kitchen is a
nightmare vision, The kind of kitchen we all fear may exist,
dirty and greasy, littered with unwashed pots and pans, lumps of
meat and veg, like rotting on the worktop.
And Dell notices the look of horror on Rodney's face.
That's what it says in the script.
(19:24):
Oh, that, that explains it then.Yeah.
But yeah, it is. It really is disgusting.
I always remember thinking that when I was a kid.
I think it's what always put me off eating in Chinese takeaways,
to be honest. I was a kid because I saw this
kitchen. Probably not far off realistic.
I mean like all kitchens are greasy.
It's impossible to not have a greasy kitchen.
You have to clean the grease traps regularly.
You have to like scrape grease from the stove like it's very
(19:45):
common unless it's an oil I. Mean Jenny's worked in AI.
Was going to say Jenny's worked in a kitchen so she she knows.
This grease is a big problem because grease is not easy to
clean. So yeah, yeah.
But they wouldn't have been ableto paint a greasy wall because
paint. But yeah, that's what I was.
I was going to say, yeah. So yeah, overall this is just a
bit. Yeah, it's a bit.
It's a bit much, I would say. And yes, I'm surprised they
didn't clean away the tins and the pots and pans and stuff
(20:07):
because it would make it impossible.
Then we have one of my favouriteexchanges here where we start
talking about the the paint and the little tiny tins that it
comes in. Oh yeah, and just what am I
supposed to do with them soppy little tins?
Look, I can't even get me brush in them.
Can't. Even get his brush in them.
He can't even work that little problem out.
(20:29):
Oh God, tell him how to do it, granddad.
You get a pair of scissors and trim your brush up.
Yeah. No, you don't.
Get a pair of scissors and trim your brother.
I mean, it is, it is a pretty ridiculous thing to say because
of course it is a very obvious solution, which is the one Dell
of all people comes up with. You'd think that Dell would be
(20:51):
the one who is is like coming upwith the bad, like the stupid
solutions. But then Rodney and Grounded are
the really dumb ones here. But yes, you pour it into a
bigger container, don't you? Rodney says he won't paint.
Oh yeah, that's right. So he Dell implies that the
paint might be stolen. Everything's stolen, isn't it,
Rodney? Come on.
And we have the classic Rodney'sprotesting again if the paint is
(21:11):
stolen, and Granddad puts it down a bit sharpish as well, and
he thinks it's stolen. But then Mr Chin arrives in the
middle of all this bit. You repeater.
No, no, no. He's the painter.
Army's apprentice. No, they are the best.
The very best. And I mean, I actually have
never met anyone with the surname Chin in in Hong Kong.
(21:34):
I've met a lot of Chans and Jangs, all this sort of stuff,
never a Chin. So I don't know how common that
name is actually. Maybe it's more common in
mainland China, but in Hong KongI've never met anyone called
Chin. But of course, if you didn't
have him called Mr Chin, you couldn't do the classic joke.
Don't worry, Mr Chin. In fact, Chinna.
He lets, Oh yeah. So he asks Dell what the colour
(21:54):
is going to be. Now again, I can't believe that
you wouldn't want to choose the colour that your own kitchen is
going to be painted. But maybe Dell talked him into
it or something. I don't know.
And then even Dell doesn't know what colour the paint is in
these little tins, and Romney's trying to take it off while Dell
is distracting Mr Chin. Well, you see what I thought the
colour these walls should be. Blue.
What? I like blue.
(22:18):
Blue Blue, Just sayings Frontierand.
Then of course the tin gets opened and it turns out to be
yellow and then Dell bullshit and says.
What I thought we'd do is we would paint them gold.
That is yellow. This is gold, Rodney.
What is the matter with you? Are you illiterate or something?
No. I thought of gold because I
remember the name of your beautiful restaurant, Gold for
(22:40):
the Golden Locust. Yeah, obviously Dell is is the
master of these sorts of situations.
His ability to improvise when things go awry is is absolutely
fantastic. And this is where we find out
that the reason Mr Chin is having his kitchen painted is
because he had an anonymous call.
I had a telephone call from a man.
(23:01):
He did not give me his name. What?
He tells me, get your kitchen painted.
Oh, you'll be in big trouble, John, huh?
Then Mr Chin leaves, looking quite happy, I suppose,
considering, and we get again another another line where Dell
says well. Come on, we must now say Chao
(23:23):
Ming. Yeah, then Dell reveals he was,
he set the whole thing up to running Granddad to try and get
rid of the paint because he's got Lombard with the paint and
he takes a load of boxes with him when he leaves.
And finally we have Granddad saying hey what?
About all this, Phil Dell boy. You arrange for anyone to clean
it up. Of course I have.
What do you think I am, a cowboyor something?
(23:45):
There's a tin of Ajax and a rubber glove in that bucket.
So yeah, that's all they have for this scene.
Anything you want to add? No, the only note I had here is
I one of the funniest lines I found was when they first
getting out the car and he and Grandin says.
You can't expect me to paint with my feet, Dell boy.
I don't expect you to paint withyour feet.
But yeah, like, it is a bit harsh having an old man like
(24:06):
Granddad do all that hard work. Painting is really hard and it's
not something you can just blag your way through.
It requires quite a lot of, I mean, maybe I'm just not a
natural at it, but every time I've painted I've had to do a
lot of prep work. And to get it look to look good,
you got to know what you're doing.
And that paint probably wouldn'thave gone on very nicely.
But but obviously we don't know.That's not worth thinking about.
(24:28):
The only other note I had was itwhen Mr Chin is explaining that
he received an anonymous, an anonymous phone call.
He did not tell me his name as he's saying that because David
Jason, like does that look back at Rodney, it, it really looks
like Mr Chin is going to laugh. He had the height like hold it
together pretty well. You can see the laugh coming
(24:49):
because of the way the audience is reacting to David Jason's
face. He gets through it pretty well.
But obviously it was shot in front of the studio audience and
you can see everyone laughing a lot.
Yeah. And actually Dell looking back
at Rodney like that, is giving it away that it was Dell who did
it as well. Otherwise you will be in big
trouble. John.
John. Yeah.
(25:10):
Love that one. OK, Yeah.
It's funny that he recalls the exact words that I said in the
phone call because usually the people don't quote directly from
a phone call they had a few weeks ago.
Presumably so, yeah. Especially when his name's not
John. But yeah, like, yeah.
But anyway, yeah, so and then wego back to the flat for the next
scene and we have Granddad and Rodney are back at the flat and
Granddad is watching 3 televisions again.
(25:33):
Continued all the way through. As long as Leonard Pierce is
there, we have the three television thing.
Is it 3 though or two? Because I thought that Pauline
says 3 and he he always is watching just the black and
white and. I thought it was 3 colour scene.
Maybe I'd have to go back. And I'd have to go back and look
again. I wrote 3, but yeah, maybe I got
confused, but I thought it was 3.
And then Rodney says that Dell has been going out and is acting
(25:55):
evasive, and Rodney surmises that perhaps Dell's been making
money on the side and leaving them out of it while they've
been painting the Chinese takeaway.
But then Dell comes home straight away.
He asks for the money from the job, and then he starts counting
it on the table, and Rodney starts inquiring more.
What you've. Been up to though.
(26:15):
Oh, bits and pieces. Where you've been.
There and back. So what you've been doing?
Listen there. And then he says he's been doing
something private. That's all he'll reveal to
Rodney and Granddad, and they don't seem to pry much more
beyond that, which is I guess quite nice that they don't.
Then Dell says they're going to split the money three ways, and
(26:37):
he gives Granddad 35. This is out of 150.
He gives Granddad 35 and Rodney 40.
And then when soon as Rodney starts to protest, he gives them
the deep sea. Divers watch as a pacifier and
it works. I can't believe this stuff still
works, but it does. And then the doorbell rings and
Dell sends Granddad to go down to the door and Granddad says.
(26:59):
Oh, my legs are older and yours?I know that means I've had more
experience, haven't I? And then we've got this
conversation that's a little bitthrowaway between Dell and
Rodney about the deep sea Divers.
Watch where Dell says. Oh, the bloke said.
Don't get it in the water. So again, you'd imagine, as
always, everything that Dell hashas got something wrong with it.
I wondered if his deep sea divers watch because he said he
got two of them. I wonder if his one works and
(27:20):
the one he gave to Rodney didn'twork and that was why he gave it
to him? I'm not sure.
Yeah, I was just going to say that he.
Yeah. Like, The thing is, Rodney's
amazed by the fact that he only gets £40 and then he gets the
Deep Sea Divers watch and he's like, oh, yeah, I'm happy then
I'm fine with the £40. But the Deep sea Divers watch
was supposed to be a freebie forpainting, not, like, part of the
payment, Right. So like.
(27:41):
But he always forgets. Exactly.
Because Dell always uses that tactic of the long distracting
speeches that take away from theoriginal argument.
And usually by the time he's gotto the end of all that, Rodney's
forgotten. But yeah.
That's exactly what happens nextin the scene.
Yeah, you just mentioned that. So but so we have a Trigger
arrive and he's come around to sell down some more paint.
So here we find out that Dale got the paint from Trigger.
(28:02):
So here we see Trigger being thethe villain again, that side of
him that we don't see in in later years.
And he actually outright admits that they have nicked it from
British Rail. Him and Monkey Harris.
I believe it is because he says they almost got caught stealing
it. And Rodney of course has his
classic reaction to that where he gets all mad because God
(28:23):
forbid Dell would ever get caught off with something that's
that's illegal. It's just not like like Dell at
all. And then Dell does this really.
I think I, I wrote long winded. I maybe it's a little bit much.
This, this thing. I understand the purpose of it,
obviously. But yeah, when he talks about
how stealing this was was good for Britain.
Soon this country will be rich and famous again.
(28:45):
The starving shall be fed, the homeless will be home and.
Then Rodney, as you mentioned earlier, has forgotten while he
was protesting in the 1st place and he just says.
His watch is broke. That bit a bit of a slow moment
in the episode, but actually sorry, just before that speech
Triggered mentioned that they were using the paints in tunnels
because granddad said he recognised the colour and then
(29:06):
Trigger said. This ain't the stuff that I
paint trains with. They use this for painting signs
in tunnels. And then that's when, after
Dell's speech about why stealingfrom British Rail is good for
Britain, Granddad says. Tunnels.
What did you say? No, he said.
That trigger said tunnels, He said.
They use that stuff to paint signs in tunnels.
(29:28):
Well, how can you see a sign in a tunnel?
It's black. Come here.
No. This is luminous paint.
It's luminous Granddad. That means you can see in the
luminous. Bloody luminous.
Which is great reaction from David Jason and he also says a
really funny mix up word hero. He says what do?
(29:48):
You think I am physic or something?
Yeah, it's worth mentioning herethat in the script it actually
says psychic. So I wonder if David Jason maybe
improvise that because he knows Dell gets words wrong.
Yeah, that's it. Well, yeah, if that was an
imperisation, that's really goodthat he did that, because I
think that's really funny, the way he messes that up.
And then then we have the phone ring.
(30:10):
So that, yeah, this scene is quite, you know, one thing after
the other. But we have the phone ring.
And Granddad answers and it's MrChin, and Dell says tell him I'm
out. And Mr Chin asks on the phone to
Granddad where Dell's gone, presumably because Granddad
says. No, no, Dell's gone out.
I'm not sure where you going to girl.
(30:33):
Again, Granddad, he always steals the show when he has
those lines. And then this is a very funny
moment, of course, where we get the big reveal where we just cut
even though we're on the phone to Mr Chin.
We cut to Mr Chin's location andhe's in his restaurant's kitchen
wearing a pair of sunglasses. And he says we see how crazy
they're glowing. I mean, it is insane.
(30:55):
How could you ever work in a room like that?
And then we have another wonderful moment of
improvisation from Dell, where he says it's a new energy saving
paint to cut down on electricitybills.
And to think of that in the moment is very sharp.
And then Mr Chin wants still to paint his living room in it.
Oh. My goodness, Yeah.
Which is just, yeah, unbelievable.
(31:17):
But then at the end of the scenewe have Dell suddenly realising
something is wrong. Oh my God.
Something wrong, Dell? What have I done?
It's all your fault. It's your fault, you and your
stupid. Pain.
So we don't know what it is at this moment, but we we obviously
(31:38):
are quite concerned because he seems really upset about it and
he blames Trigger for it. And then he decides instead of
telling them what the problem is, he says granddad and Rodney
had better go with him. And he keeps giving Trigger
these annoyed looks as though he's going to get even with
Trigger for what he's done. But at this point we don't know
what it is. So I think that's everything for
(31:59):
that scene that I've got writtendown.
Anything you want to add? Yeah, just a couple notes, just
to go back to the beginning. When Trigger comes in, he calls
Rodney Dave. Still no reaction or laugh from
the audience. So we're still, yeah, we've got
most of the way through Series 2here without really getting much
of A reaction on that, but they're keeping it up.
And yeah, I'd actually timed howlong it was between when Trigger
(32:20):
says tunnels to when Granddad realises tunnels.
It's 2 full minutes of dialogue,so yeah, Dells big speech about
stealing from British Rail fillsmost of that time.
Yeah, I think that's quite clever.
His whole speech about how he justifies it.
I think it's interesting becausehe's like looking at the
cultural, like the current times, the unemployment and
stuff. So, you know, he doesn't feel
(32:42):
bad about this stuff, about stealing.
When he looks, looks at it with this point of view, he can, you
know, he can convince anybody ofanything.
And that's an interesting part of his character.
And yeah, the only other note I had was, is it a coincidence
that Rodney's wearing a yellow T-shirt?
Because you never see him wearing this again.
So I just thought maybe it's funny that he's wearing a yellow
T-shirt for a yellow Pearl. That's an interesting
(33:03):
observation. Although I think you do see him
wearing this T-shirt again, but only underneath other stuff,
never just usually just wearing the T-shirt.
Ohh, that's yeah, I have not been paying attention to the
costumes at all really. So it's interesting you
mentioned that. Yeah, it's just a like a maybe.
It maybe means something, it maybe doesn't.
Also, there is one more thing you really say is a.
Bankrupt stock, you said? British royal, same thing.
(33:24):
Right. Anything government is bankrupt,
right? So yeah, that's it.
That's all I had for that scene.OK, so then we go to the final
scene of the episode and we are this time outside the well.
We don't know if it's we don't know it's the graveyard at the
beginning of the team. But they pull up outside this
gate and Dell gets out the car 1st and goes over and we get a
shot, you know, back on to DavidJason and his face is kind of
(33:47):
lit up by this light and we don't know what it is at this
point. Then Dell, and sorry, not Dell,
Granddad and Rodney come on over.
I really love the way that Leonard Pierce delivers this
line when he says 0. My good God.
Just, I just love something about his voice.
It's, it's just fantastic. And then we realise that Dell
has painted their mother's gravein the luminous paint.
(34:08):
They have sort of a few jokes here.
Rodney says a few things about the grave is going to become
like a beacon for, for, for. Every Satanist in acidate in
England. But Granddad steals the show
with the line. What?
Worries me. It's on the main flight path to
East Brow. I'm not really sure the reason
for writing it like this, but Dell makes out that he's not
going to apologise for it and hedoesn't regret doing it.
(34:30):
And it's, you know, it's a good thing.
And then he looks back at it, and then he changes his mind and
he says, we'll. Put it down to vandals, get out
of him before we get our collarsfell.
And that's the last line of the episode.
So I feel like this episode has quite a weak ending overall.
I'm not sure how they could haveended it better, but I think the
(34:51):
ending is a bit, yeah, it's a bit sort of forgettable.
And I almost feel like this episode has two stories
simultaneous. You've got like the story of the
Chinese takeaway and then you'vegot the story of the mom's
grave. And maybe that's why I felt that
it wasn't as strong as an episode because it hasn't got
like a central story that we focus on.
It's got like 2 stories going side by side maybe.
(35:13):
And the paint is the thing that connects them both.
But yeah. Yeah, it's true.
And I think like, so some episodes end on a really good
line, like we just did No Greater Love last week and we
agreed that the line is good. Well, it's a punch line or a
joke of some kind. And some of them end like this,
where it's more of a visual thing and they end with like
them going oh, no or something, I'm just walking away.
(35:36):
So yeah, I do feel like they're a bit weaker when they're like
this where it's more of a visualthing and then they don't have
anything necessarily funny to say about it.
I would agree. I think like, you're right.
The second that Dell is missing,when they get back from the
Chinese takeaway and they're like, oh, where is he?
You get a sense that there's another storyline and it is a
little bit of a pace, like disruption to the pace of the
(35:57):
episode because now we know there's something else.
But for some reason, yeah, it doesn't work very well.
I don't know why it kind of derails the pace of the episode.
I like the fact that they they do the reveal of the grave, and
maybe they should have just revealed the grave and then
kicked in with the credits. I don't know.
Yeah, maybe it's. Still early days and you know
they haven't quite got the the kick at the end of the episode
(36:18):
right in these early series. Yeah, I think, yeah, you're
right. I think, I think the dialogue
after the reveal of the grave probably brings down the energy
a bit because again, it's not like the dialogue is
particularly that funny the the stuff they say to each other
after the grave is revealed, particularly Dells, you know,
protestation that it's, it's fine that he did it and he's
happy with it because he's clearly not.
(36:38):
So I mean that's why he went, yeah, like got all stressed in
the flats when he realised what he'd done so.
I mean, yeah, the I put a note here because this is something
Nicholas Lyndhurst had said. They they put lights inside an
actual fibreglass monument to make it glow like that.
And it was so bright that the nearby traffic kept slowing down
to see what it was. He said we were lucky we didn't
(37:00):
cause an accident. So yeah, like I said earlier,
they actually filmed it outside a proper graveyard gate.
So the glow actually did 'cause probably what would have in real
life if it had been paid luminous, like it would have
attracted a lot of attention. So funny, it's almost like
granddad's lying about the flight path is quite accurate.
Yeah, I mean, it is really. And that makes me think of Sky's
(37:21):
the limit a little bit. Yeah, of course.
But yeah, like, honestly, even if it weren't luminous paint,
can you actually picture a gravepainted bright yellow?
I think it would look kind of ridiculous.
Yeah, I agree with you. I always thought that, yeah,
even if the paint, yeah, as you say, wasn't luminous, just
having a painted grave is very strange to me.
I can't think of any time I've ever seen a painted grave or
(37:42):
like you say, a coloured grave like that.
Maybe sort of some marble, maybegreenish marble or something
like that, or slightly blue, butnothing bright yellow.
I think that would be quite strange.
And or even if it wasn't luminous, it would probably be a
bit of a beacon still. I mean, it is a Dal, so yeah, we
don't know what he's thinking with style and he might think it
(38:02):
looked cool, but I just can't picture in the middle of a
graveyard full of greystone, a bright yellow painted fibreglass
monument would look kind of gaudy.
But yeah, perhaps if it's with Dell style pretty well.
Yeah, that's true. There is one thing I've just
thought of actually, which I don't really, you know, like to
talk too much about the episodesfrom 2000, the 2000s.
(38:22):
But when they go back to the mum's grave, I think it's in
Sleepless in Peckham, I think it's in the last one, they go
back to this grave. And Dell has done exactly what
he said he might do in this episode about adding to the to
the headstone. And they've added loads of
different stuff on top because they became millionaires and
they paid for an upgrade on the headstone.
(38:43):
So I think that's quite a nice call back that they had the
conversation about it. And then when they finally had
enough money, they did exactly that and added loads of stuff to
it. Yeah, that's cool.
Just a nice thing. Yeah, I don't have any other
notes. No, me neither.
Okay, so let's move on to the awards for this week.
And guess what? He's only one.
So as always, we have three awards to announce this week, so
(39:06):
we will start with Plunker of the Week.
Don't believe it? What a plonker.
What a plonker. So let's start with your
nomination this week, dude. Who have you nominated for
Plonker of the Week? So in this episode I was trying
to think because honestly, there's some plonkerish sort of
stuff from a lot of people, but I I guess I'd have to say Dell.
(39:27):
And the reason I, I said Dell isbecause he he kind of cheats and
uses granddad and Rodney to, he's very manipulative in this
episode towards Rodney in particular.
And he kind of gets them to go and do all the painting and he
doesn't, you know, bother with it.
And then he, yeah, I don't know.I just, I just feel like Dell is
a bit stupid in this episode forsome reason and quite
manipulative. Yeah.
(39:49):
Yeah, I mean, I wrote Dell as mynomination too, but for a for a
different reason. Like that he was stupid not to
know anything about the paint. But I guess that's the same
reason he's a plonker a lot of the time.
He does go, yes, in gung ho a lot of the time without checking
on anything. But it's also like Trigger is an
honourable mention of a plonker for not telling him it's
luminous paint. Like it's a very specific type
(40:11):
of paint that he's selling. Like it's not just paint, but
maybe Trigger didn't realise that it glowed even though it
was called luminous. Yeah, that's true.
I mean, we don't know if Triggerunderstands what Luminous is.
Yeah, I guess he kind of does because he goes, Nah, this is
Luminous paint when he he says out the tunnel.
So actually, yeah, he would. You would know.
He does know that. Means it's bright, it bright,
it's brighter if it lights up. But yeah, again, like actually
(40:33):
perhaps he could be excused because he's making a sale.
Like he doesn't care. That's true.
I guess you could also argue that Mister Chin is a bit of a
plonker for for deciding to get his take away painted on an
anonymous phone call from someone.
Yeah. I mean, if some anonymous person
called me and went you need to do this, I wouldn't do it.
That seems a bit strange. Maybe it was more normal in them
days, I don't know. Maybe.
(40:55):
I mean, I guess he did say something.
Did he mention the health inspector or something and
that's why he. Said that it was an anonymous
phone call warning him that the health inspector would be coming
by soon. Right.
Yeah. That reminded me of faulty
towers a little bit, yeah. Something health inspector.
I always think of faulty towers,yes.
So are we going to give it to Dell?
Yeah, let's give it to Dell. Dell is plunger of the week.
Sure, your fault. Well done, Dell.
(41:17):
OK. Well done Dell so.
This week Heather is going to award the best line of the
episode and I will choose the best moment.
So dude, what have you chosen for your favourite line of the
episode? Now, yeah, this was a difficult
one because as I mentioned, I don't really rate sort of the
humour in this episode a lot. And I always think best line is
like a humorous one. But the line that makes me laugh
(41:38):
the most in this episode, I guess every time I hear it is
granddad's solution to the paintbrush not fitting into the
into the the tins and dolls reaction to it.
So when granddad says. You get a pair of scissors and
trim your brush up. No, you don't.
(41:59):
Get a pair of scissors and trim your brother.
Yeah, I think that's, I think that's really funny, that line.
But maybe you have some honourable mentions.
Not really. I I just worked on my favourite
moment. But I think the best moment kind
of speaks for itself. It's really the moment where Mr
Chin is revealed on the phone with the sunglasses and he turns
around and then you see the other employees walking around
(42:20):
the kitchen with their sunglasses on.
I do think that is always the moment everyone remembers the
most of this episode. No, I agree.
Yeah, I, I because I, I have a think about it, obviously, even
though I'm not awarding it. And yeah, I put what have you
done to my world? Yeah.
And also the reveal of the graveis the other one.
Yeah. Because those are the two big
moments that, as you say, everyone remembers, and they're
(42:40):
the funniest moments in the episode.
OK, yeah, so if you don't have any anymore honourable mentions.
No, I think that's everything. OK, drink up, drink up.
We'll even. OK, so that about wraps it up
for this week. Join us next week when we'll be
discussing Series 2 Episode 6, It Never Rains.
But until then, listeners, if you like what you
(43:10):
hear and want to contact us, youcan e-mail us at
longlivehookiestreetpodcast at gmailcom.
All one word, no spaces. Bonjour.
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