Radio Times review

"He's used to being unpopular... he's a bank manager." A nice gag; funny then, topical now. It opens this 1977 episode, a surprising little rite-of-passage tale in which a proud-as-punch Mainwaring gets a staff car, and Pike borrows it for his date with Hodges' flirty niece Sylvia.

It's a chance to see other sides of Walmington (a café serving brightly coloured pop) and its characters (Pike with a girlfriend; Wilson giving him a men-of-the-world chat). It's heady stuff for dear old Dad's Army, but comfort yourself with more traditional fare, such as Mainwaring being needled by Wilson's public-school ways (sadly, John Le Mesurier looks noticeably gaunt) and some prolonged, panto-style musical chairs in the staff car.

Radio Times review

Some Home Guard admin elicits the expected peevishness from Mainwaring in this late-era episode. The Captain reveals his written character assessment of his sergeant to the man himself: "Your general bearing is very slack." Wilson's disparaging laughter at all the red-tape nonsense sounds so genuine that you wonder whether something tickled John Le Mesurier during recording.

It leads to a platoon recruitment drive that requires a face to go on the accompanying poster, but whose should it be? "We should all vote in a secret ballet," suggests Jones. Among other delights are Godfrey's mortified expression at the suggestion that he's being rude, and some top-drawer doddering from Harold Bennett as Mr Blewitt.

Radio Times review

The show goes a bit Swallows and Amazons this week (Arthur Lowe meets Arthur Ransome, if you will) in a largely lake-based adventure. The platoon's fieldcraft training is capsized by the arrival of the Vicar, Verger and Hodges with the sea scouts and, later, three Germans who have bailed out of their aircraft and float helplessly in a dinghy.

If the story is all a bit loose and lacking urgency, there's still pleasure in predicting what's going to happen when (a certain someone ending up in the water, for example), and listen out for Wilson's somewhat out-of-character spikiness to Captain Mainwaring: "I don't think even you can walk on the water."

Note the day-for-night filming, and the mismatch between videotaped studio recordings and the filmed location scenes, both of which root it firmly in the 70s. And the cast must have loved the outdoor shoots, because it was always sunny!

This week's "who knew?" is Hodges' ability to speak German, having been a guard in a prisoner of war camp during the previous conflict.

Radio Times review

This episode's mini-drama serves as a neat mission statement for the show, when the tussle over Godrey's home becomes a metaphor for the struggle against Germany. "This cottage stands for England," says the loyal, smiley private, as his comrades dither over telling him his house will have to be demolished to make way for a new aerodrome.

Mainwaring and Wilson visit the picture-postcard property, only to be sidetracked by tea and upside down cake. How nice to see Godfrey's sister Cissy (Kathleen Saintsbury) as well as the more often mentioned Dolly, there's plenty of comic business with a paper door and Jones takes Frazer down a peg or two: "How dare you interfere with my offal queue!"

Radio Times review

It's teatime in the Pike household, and young Frank joins mum and Sergeant Wilson after a day-long medical. Despite his croup, wonky ankles and a touch of "verdigris" if he stands on anything, "They passed me fit. I'm A1!"

Before he goes on active service - and before his celebratory fish-and-chip-and-fizzy-pop supper, Pike and Mainwaring give blood in the church hall. If only the captain hadn't boasted that his platoon would rustle up 100 pints to beat the total offered by the despised Hodges...

It's a delightful episode: a tidily constructed story, spicy glimpses of home life and a soupçon of pathos. A prize-winning pun from Wilson, too.

Pamela Cundell obituary

Warmhearted actor who played the amorous Mrs Fox in Dad's Army.

Radio Times review

Die-hards always look forward to certain things in a Dad's Army episode: for example, one of Jones's windy speeches. This one results in one of Mainwaring's most despairing puffs of the cheeks.

But before that the simmering resentment the captain has for his sergeant surfaces once more. The occasion is a visit from Lady Maltby (Mavis Pugh, who played shi-tzu-loving Mrs Chase in Fawlty Towers) to offer the platoon her Rolls-Royce towards the war effort. But despite the ill feeling between Wilson and Mainwaring, they are at least united in their dislike of the abhorrent Hodges, who is the butt of the final joke. Even Mainwaring smiles.

Radio Times review

You'd think the squad would welcome the chance to get out of their battledress, but donning morris-dancing outfits to raise money for a new Spitfire is another matter. Frazer moans like a drain about this "pansy Sassenach get-up", Wilson finds his dummy horse most awkward and Jones, too, is in a spot of trouble - and not just with his whiffling.

It seems the loyal lance corporal is having woman trouble: cue a deliciously awkward tête-à-tête between Mainwaring and Mrs Fox in the Marigold Tea Rooms - overheard by half the platoon. The captain is a picture of discomfort as the flighty Fox gets hold of the wrong end of the whiffling stick. Increasingly fraught discussions ensue over who should play Lady Godiva at the town carnival (listen out for Pike's brilliant Town Clerk impression). Writers Croft and Perry display their intimate understanding of the comedy motto "End with a topper, then top the topper". Dad's Army didn't go in for pay-offs very often, but this one is a corker.

Radio Times review

"Over the years that I've come to know the members of this platoon, I've grown quite fond of them, but I can't help feeling sometimes that I'm in charge of a bunch of idiots." It's not often that Captain Mainwaring is quite so scathing about his platoon, but he's prompted by a classic piece of long-windedness from leering loon Private Frazer. It's a towering moment in the midst of some lightweight field-exercise shenanigans, but you'll enjoy the effete expression from Wilson tanning his face while his captain blethers on, and another brief but heavenly example of under-the-influence acting from Arthur Lowe.

Fans of 70s comedy will enjoy the sight of Dave Allen stooge Michael Sharvell-Martin as the Lieutenant.

Radio Times review

The sight of the Vicar and Verger in battledress is just one of many rarities in this extraordinary affair. Among the others are Mainwaring laid up in a hospital bed (with ingrowing toenails), Frazer brandishing a live white mouse on parade and Godfrey having a big speech to remember. Also, poignantly, a note on the floor where James Beck should be standing. This was the first story not to feature Walker; thereafter, bizarrely, he was never mentioned again.

Overlooking a few old-school lines that don't bear repeating, there are a handful of treasures, including Wilson's annoyance at Mainwaring treating him like a labrador, and Frazer comparing the Verger's face to a sour prune.