Written by Jeremy Dyson And Mark Gatiss And Steve Pemberton And Reece Shearsmith
Directed by Steve Bendelack
Pauline: "Why are you doing this to me, Ross?"
Ross: "Because you made me hate my job."
At the time of airing, this really was the last stop at Royston Vasey and it had a story that be shown from multiple viewpoints before it's inevitable conclusion. Each episode looking into a different group of characters.
The first one saw former Restart officer Pauline getting out of prison and bunking up with the hapless Mickey. Despite being a lesbian, the two actually get together and their happiness was threatened by a vengeful Ross, who wanted to destroy both Mickey and Pauline. By the time we get to the last episode, he had a change of heart on the matter.
The second episode then put the focus on cruel joke shop owner Lance Longthorn (Gatiss) getting a woman's hand and finding it having a mind of it's own, which drove him mad. However it did lead to an act of unexpected heroism and another character avoiding death.
The third episode focused on the eternally angry Geoff (Shearsmith) changing careers but suffering massive facial disfigurement while Legz Akimbo tried to expand their very small audience with little success. There's also an annoying friend of Oliver's added into the mix that even he ditched by the end of this one.
The fourth episode had the put upon Alvin excuse himself from his wife's sex party, just so he could spend time with his mistress, Judith (Shearsmith) at the garden centre. Add a sex game gone wrong and appearance from Laurence Llewellyn-Bowen resulting in mayhem and this was an enjoyable one.
I think the second half of this series had the better episodes with the penultimate episode having both Charlie and Judee setting up a massage parlour and the former falling in love with Tony while the latter fancied him.
The last episode saw the return of Papa Lazarou, posing as charity shop worker Keith, who enjoyed tormenting Reenie and the unfortunate Brian. His great scheme did leave a bit to be desired but the series did end on a bittersweet note with some characters getting a happy ending and others being trapped inside circus animals.
- Episode titles included The Lesbian And The Monkey, The One-Armed Man Is King, Turn Again Geoff Tipps, The Medusa Touch, Beauty And The Beast (Or Come Into My Parlour) and How The Elephant Got It's Trunk.
- Doctor Who fans got to see Christopher Eccleston in the last episode as Dougal Siepp, who was opening a cat cinema.
- Characters like the Dentons, Edward and Tubbs and Reverend Bernice Wooddall are either missing or are very briefly seen in this series.
- I liked the debt collector characters who popped up in the second episode. Wish we had seen a little more of them.
- Barbara ended the series by giving birth to twins while Alvin and Judith got away with burying several bodies.
- Chronology: Nearly a year since the events of the Christmas special.
Honestly had we not gotten a movie and a few specials, this really would've served as a good ending for this series. Nearly everything got wrapped up enough with most characters while the rest got the macabre fate they did.
Rating: 7 out of 10
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