Dad's Army

Captain Mainwaring is like a pig in mud when the platoon takes delivery of a 13-pounder QF mark V (a big gun). This being a naval weapon, the men look to Private Frazer for operational tips. But it turns out the self-aggrandising Scot was only ever a cook, though he insists: "When the shells are flying it takes a man to stay below and make shepherd's pie."

One failed firing-rehearsal later, the squad crowd into the office to plan strategy with a model of Walmington, using tins of Spam and toy soldiers ("Don't lean on the gasworks, boy!").

It's actually an unusually sloppy episode, which would have benefited from some better line-learning or a few retakes. But it's still an endearing snapshot of Little England dithering in a crisis.

It's rare that Mainwaring is so shocked he loses the power of both speech and motion, but that's what happens in Room at the Bottom. It's the one where he loses his commission - twice. Wilson, of course, relishes delivering the news to him, and practises in front of a mirror.

Writers Perry and Croft are on top form here. A letter-writing sequence allows us to hear what the men are thinking - and it's all beautifully in character. But this is Arthur Lowe's episode through and through; after some initial embarrassment, Mainwaring's nobler qualities come to the fore. One speech even draws an emotional nose-blow from Godfrey. Fantastic pay-off, too.

Incidentally, we rarely learn in Dad's Army what point the war has reached, but one announcement by the Verger anchors the action precisely.

The assault-course scrapes and don't-like-it-up-'ems were all very well, but there was nothing like a bit of life-or-death to vary the pace and bring out the best in the cast. When an air raid leaves Mainwaring and Wilson cradling an unexploded bomb in the bank vault, the rest of the platoon run about like headless chickens. Walmington's well-oiled machine soon cranks up a gear, however: Frazer's fishing skills come to the fore, Pike keeps away the riff-raff; Godfrey rustles up some coffee.

Arthur Lowe and John Le Mesurier sell their sweaty predicament like the seasoned pros they were, and the former's "Oh come on, Wilson, cheer up" brings quite a lump to the throat.

The contrast between line-toeing optimist Mainwaring and corner-cutting realist Wilson is neatly scripted at the top of this 1969 episode. Needless to say, when the platoon uses up all its ammo on a low-flying German plane, their approaches to the problem are very different.

The resultant court of inquiry (Mainwaring wins) is, of course, a shambles, disrupted by elderly visitors to the hall and choir practice in the office. There are some ripping one-liners, and it's the first surviving story to credit Edward Sinclair as the Verger, whose gurning indignation was to become his stock-in-trade. Jones soon puts him in his place with, "Why do you take the collection home to count it?"

"Godfrey, would you take your arm from my throat?" is the unlikely request from Captain Mainwaring in tonight's slice of superannuated square-bashing. Not quite the deadly scenario it sounds, however. In fact, it's the consequence of a lesson in public telephone usage. In a packed episode, boasting an abnormally large guest cast, the men get to put their newly acquired skills to the test when a German plane crashes in the reservoir.

Passing over the creaky studio-as-outdoors antics, there's a lovely bit of nonsense with a camouflage class, an artfully conceived central misunderstanding, the rare sound of Mainwaring swearing and Wilson's unexpected hijacking of Jones's catchphrase.

Some cute rarities in tonight's old boys' parade, among them a train trip, the sight of Frazer knitting and the self-referential gag of the platoon whistling the show's theme tune. But to begin with, spirits plummet after Mainwaring's map-reading deficiencies cause the men to miss supper at a weekend camp. A surly Spanish captain (Alan Tilvern) who's determined to catch them out just compounds the misery.

Footage from the ensuing field exercise (filmed at an actual Second World War training area in Thetford, Norfolk) will be familiar from the series' end credits, and the episode's broad-as-a-barn comedy is carried off with such aplomb you can't help but smile.

A justly lauded 1969 episode, full of well worked gags and delicious confusion. For many years it was missing presumed lost, but returned to the archives in 2001. It follows the platoon's separation when church bells signal an invasion, but what's fun is seeing Godfrey's oft-mentioned sisters Dolly and Cissy, and hearing Wilson deny he's Pike's father (the writers always insisted he was).

The despised Hodges elicits the usual groans, there's a vintage Mainwaring pratfall, and the elderly sisters try to carry on with their tea while gunshots fly all around their cottage. The song "There'll Always Be an England" sums it all up beautifully.

James Beck: the Dad's Army star cut off in his prime

James Beck, aka Dad's Army's Private Walker, died 40 years ago today.

Prepare for a blast of monochrome nostalgia with the first ever episode, The Man and the Hour. It opens in the "present day" (1968) as the aged members of Walmington on Sea's defunct Home Guard gather to support the economy-boosting I'm Backing Britain campaign.

Then the years roll away and we are at the town's bank at the start of the war with pompous manager Mr Wainwaring (Arthur Lowe) preparing for the Nazi onslaught: "They'll be as dead as mutton from Stead and Simpson's to Timothy White's". He's galvanised by Antony Eden's radio appeal for Local Defence Volunteers, and urges Pike to put the word out that there will be a meeting in the church hall. And so it begins...

To support Walmington-on-Sea's Wings for Victory week, Captain Mainwaring has decided the Home Guard are going to restage the battle of St George and the Dragon as a grand finale. He's not letting on his plan to the rest of the parish council, though, which is unfortunate as the wardens are doing something similar.

Naturally Mainwaring is playing the part of St George, borrowing a heavy suit of armour that leads to some wonderfully daft moments as he tries to mount his horse while the dragon, despite being emblazoned with swastikas, is a hilarious pantomime creature that looks more like a drunken centipede than a ferocious beast.