Seven British construction workers escape Britain's ever growing dole queues and travel to Germany to work on a site in Düsseldorf. We follow their trials and tribulations of working away from home and away from the women they left behind.
Work on the site ends with a bang as Barry's bike explodes, demolishing the hut and destroying most of the lads' possessions. As the smoke subsides, the crew decides who will stay on in Germany and ...
With his divorce proceedings underway Dennis is dating Dagmar from the site office and he takes her to spend the night at the Intercontinental hotel. Meanwhile Barry and Wayne chat up two Swedish air...
The magnificent seven are forced to camp out in Thornley Manor. Wayne is given the cold shoulder by the other lads and is forced to start thinking seriously about how to regain his popularity.
Arthur Daley (George Cole), a small-time conman, hires former boxer Terry McCann (Dennis Waterman) to be his "minder", so Terry can protect him (Arthur) from other small-time crooks. While ... See full summary »
Stars:
George Cole,
Glynn Edwards,
Dennis Waterman
Ken Boon and Harry Crawford are two middle-aged ex-firemen. Harry retires and opens a hotel (The Grand Hotel), with Ken as a temporary odd-job man. During the seven seasons (1986-1992), Ken... See full summary »
Stars:
Michael Elphick,
David Daker,
Neil Morrissey
Jack Regan is a hard edged detective in the Flying Squad of London's Metropolitan Police. He pursues villains by methods which are underhanded and often illegal, frequently violent, and more often than not, successful.
Stars:
John Thaw,
Dennis Waterman,
Garfield Morgan
Hard-bitten Flying Squad officer Jack Regan gets embroiled in a deadly political plot when an old friend asks him to investigate the death of his girlfriend. Framed on a drunk-drive charge ... See full summary »
Bodie and Doyle, top agents for Britain's CI5 (Criminal Intelligence 5), and their controller, George Cowley fight terrorism and similar high-profile crimes. Cowley, a hard ex-MI5 operative... See full summary »
Disillusioned after a long career at Sunshine Desserts, Perrin goes through a mid-life crisis and fakes his own death. Returning in disguise after various attempts at finding a 'new life', ... See full summary »
Stars:
Leonard Rossiter,
Pauline Yates,
John Barron
Martin Bryce (Richard Briers) is a committee man. He has numerous schemes and committees organized around the neighborhood. He is so obsessive about every detail of everything he does, he ... See full summary »
Stars:
Richard Briers,
Penelope Wilton,
Peter Egan
Comic goings on in this series set in an English holiday camp called Maplins. The title comes from the camp's greeting, which the staff are meant to say with enthusiasm but all too often ... See full summary »
Second theatrical spin-off from the popular 1970's police series. Regan and Carter head a Flying Squad investigation into a series of bank raids by a team of well-armed villains who are flying in from the continent.
Director:
Tom Clegg
Stars:
John Thaw,
Dennis Waterman,
Denholm Elliott
Jacko is a house painter who "appreciates" women. He sees the best in each one of them and they in turn, like him. Will he find true love? Will he settle down as he gets older?
The adventures of a gang of British workmen abroad. Combines black and white humour with moments of drama, poignancy and drunkenness. In series 1, the lads head to Germany seeking work, and are thrown together by virtue of shared nationality and a run-down wooden hut. The story follows the lads' relationships with women, Germans and each other, and their attempts at passing the time away from home, saving money and ordering food in a German curry house. The series ends with new employment legislation forcing some of the Brits having to choose between the UK and their new-found pleasures abroad. Two years later the gang are reunited for a second series, in which they travel to Wolverhampton to rebuild both the "magnificent seven" and Barry's home for his impending marriage. A further offer of work sees the lads head to a Derbyshire stately home in need of refurbishment. Here they fall foul of an irritable pub landlord, suspicious locals, a less than enlightened employer and the Inland ...Written by
Mike Cryan
Actor Gary Holton, who played Wayne Norris, died of a drugs overdose in 1985 while filming the second series, leading to a somewhat watered-down appearance in the last few episodes. As they had filmed all of the exterior scenes with Wayne in them but had not started any of the interior scenes, they decided to dress one of the production team in a wig to look like Wayne for backshots during indoor scenes to keep some form of continuity going. For many of the indoor scenes, he was written out entirely, and his presence was accounted for by explaining he was elsewhere at the time. See more »
Goofs
Most of the German location shots in Series 1 were filmed in Hamburg, not Dusseldorf. One of the giveaways is that many of the cars have HH (Hamburg) number plates. See more »
The last ever episode (at the end of Series 5) is dedicated "In memory of Pat Roach, 1937-2004": Roach, who played Bomber, had died of cancer a few months earlier. See more »
Alternate Versions
A rather curious expurgated version of both series 1 & 2 was aired on ITV in 1988. Each 55-minute episode was cut down into two separate programmes, edited for pre-watershed viewing (no swear words, nude scenes or striptease artist) and shown twice-a-week at 7-7.30pm. See more »
Very few things capture a time and spirit as eloquently as this TV series. Germany is the setting for a band of 'brothers' fleeing the mass unemployment and uncertainty of Thatcher's Britain in search of work, money and hope. This TV series contains natural acting, pathos, humour and a gritty realism that manages to combine drama and comedy without an emphasis on sentimentality or bawdy laughs. The series chronicles the debacles of a motley crew of British workers uncertain about Germany, their lives and their futures. Promised a hostel with swimming pool, they end up in a barren hut with no amenities yet friendships are forged and a social life centered on Beck's Beer and brothels ensues. With a memorable soundtrack and performances from relatively unknown actors that inspire, their pursuits become a part of the viewers' lives in a way that very few modern TV series capture. Oz, Dennis, Moxey, Bomber, Barry, Neville and Wayne become personal friends of the viewing public along the way in this story of the working man, ordinary lives and extraordinary situations that although filmed over twenty years ago remain timeless.
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Very few things capture a time and spirit as eloquently as this TV series. Germany is the setting for a band of 'brothers' fleeing the mass unemployment and uncertainty of Thatcher's Britain in search of work, money and hope. This TV series contains natural acting, pathos, humour and a gritty realism that manages to combine drama and comedy without an emphasis on sentimentality or bawdy laughs. The series chronicles the debacles of a motley crew of British workers uncertain about Germany, their lives and their futures. Promised a hostel with swimming pool, they end up in a barren hut with no amenities yet friendships are forged and a social life centered on Beck's Beer and brothels ensues. With a memorable soundtrack and performances from relatively unknown actors that inspire, their pursuits become a part of the viewers' lives in a way that very few modern TV series capture. Oz, Dennis, Moxey, Bomber, Barry, Neville and Wayne become personal friends of the viewing public along the way in this story of the working man, ordinary lives and extraordinary situations that although filmed over twenty years ago remain timeless.