A group of friends in a small Lancashire town find their loyalties tested by romance and their misadventures in the Territorial Army.
The serial follows a close-knit group of friends in the fictional town of Roker Bridge, whose lives are intertwined through their membership of the local Territorial Army unit. The central figures are the thoughtful horticulturalist Eric (Paul Haigh) and his more cynical best friend Hodge (Colin Buchanan). Their dynamic is complicated by the arrival of Laura (Lucy Akhurst), a singer who becomes Hodge’s girlfriend but for whom Eric harbours a secret and unrequited affection. Other members of the TA unit include the intellectual Spock (Stephen Tompkinson) and the perpetually stressed Lloydy (Adrian Hood). Their various personal and romantic entanglements are set against the backdrop of their weekend training exercises and mundane civilian jobs.
The title is a direct parody of Erich Maria Remarque’s anti-war novel, a fact that immediately signals the series’ comic intent. Instead of the trenches of the First World War, Tim Firth’s scripts focus on the domestic squabbles and romantic entanglements of a Territorial Army unit in a small Lancashire town. The military setting is used not for high drama, but as a backdrop for a warm and witty examination of male friendship. The comedy arises from the contrast between the characters’ modest civilian lives and their weekend attempts at soldiering. The production’s strength was its gentle, observational humour and a firm sense of Northern English identity, making it a distinctive entry in the 1990s comedy-drama landscape.
Broadcast: BBC One, 19 Episodes, 4 January 1994 – 27 May 1997
Written by: Tim Firth
Director: Brian Farnham
Executive Producers: Barry Hanson, Chris Parr
Producer: Chris Griffin
Theme Music: Milltown Brothers
Main Cast: Colin Buchanan (Hodge), Paul Haigh (Eric), Stephen Tompkinson (Spock), David MacCreedy (Polson), Kate Gartside (Ally), Adrian Hood (Lloydy), Lucy Akhurst (Laura), Tony Marshall (Diesel), Caroline Catz (Dawn), Susan Wooldridge (Jeanetta)
