Things Aren't Simple Anymore

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“Things Aren't Simple Anymore”

One Foot in the Grave episode

Victor Meldrew's hand and cap in the gutter after being knocked over.

Episode no.

Season 6
Episode 6

Written by

David Renwick

Directed by

Christine Gernon

Guest stars

Hannah Gordon
Paul Merton

Original airdate

20 November 2000

Episode chronology
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"The Dawn of Man"	"Visiting Uncle Dick (Comic Relief short special)"

List of One Foot in the Grave episodes

"Things Aren't Simple Anymore" is the final episode of the British television sitcom One Foot in the Grave. It was written by David Renwick and starred Richard Wilson, as Victor Meldrew, and Annette Crosbie as his wife Margaret. It was first transmitted on BBC One on 20 November 2000.

The episode was notable for attracting tourists to the scene of the accident, and also for an accusation that ITV had engineered for Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? to have its first jackpot winner on the same night that it was broadcast.^[1]

Although this was the final full-length episode, Victor and Margaret returned for a short sketch for Comic Relief's Red Nose Day telethon on 16 March 2001.^[2]

1 Synopsis
2 Production
3 Scheduling controversy
4 Reception
5 References
6 External links

[edit] Synopsis

The episode is told in flashback. It begins with Margaret (Annette Crosbie) having a heated telephone conversation with a solicitor about an incident where Victor had thrown a syringe into someone's buttock. She reveals that a conviction might be difficult as her husband has been dead for five months. Coming to terms with her husband's death as a hit and run victim, she joins a Church group clearing litter from roadsides. There she meets Glynis Holloway (Hannah Gordon), whose husband had also recently died. The two become good friends. Confiding to a priest (William Osborne), Margaret pledges vengeance for Victor's death, vowing to "kill him with my bare hands".

In the main flashback story, Victor is invited to a school reunion. He reluctantly attends the pub, where the barman (Paul Merton) informs him that most of the other guests are unable to attend. Sitting alone while waiting for Limpy, the one remaining other potential attendee, he is entertained by two cabaret performers (Ed Welch and Jean Challis). Victor eventually leaves the pub, with Limpy arriving seconds after his departure. Victor telephones Margaret for a lift. As he stands at the side of the road waiting for his wife, Glynis approaches him in her car. Drowsy, she begins to fall asleep, mounting the kerb and knocking down Victor. She stops and looks back from a short distance, but decides not to return to the scene when she sees Margaret arrive.

In the present, Margaret prepares some orange juice and paracetamol for Glynis' migraine. She finds a scrap book of press cuttings surrounding Victor's death in Glynis' kitchen drawer and realises that her new friend is responsible for his demise. As non-diegetic ominous music plays, Margaret thoughtfully looks at the box of paracetamol. She is shown to drop two tablets into the glass and hand it to Glynis, who realises that her secret has been uncovered. Margaret watches her drink some orange juice before leaving the house. The total quantity of tablets Margaret had put into the glass remains intentionally ambiguous.^[3]

The episode ends with a montage of some of the events referred to during the episode, accompanied by the song "End of the Line" by The Traveling Wilburys. This includes Victor and his car being covered in artificial snow at a supermarket during the filming of a Christmas television advertisement (in the middle of June), scaring a young couple after grass cuttings are attached to his face from sunscreen, and the incident with the syringe. The final shots are of Victor and Margaret driving through the countryside.

[edit] Production

Writer David Renwick decided to kill off Victor because he thought that he couldn't write any more.^[3] He informed Richard Wilson while the actor was performing in Waiting for Godot in Manchester.^[4] The actor reacted positively to the decision, reflecting in 2006 that he did not want Victor to "take me over."^[3] In an interview for the documentary Comedy Connections, Renwick says that killing off the protagonist "seemed to be the most natural and logical and appropriate end for the character in a show where we had tried to reflect the truthfulness of real life."^[3] Victor's demise had been announced in the press in the summer preceding transmission. In an interview with The Sun, Richard Wilson said "I feel sad, of course, but it's the right time. To keep doing it would have got dull".^[5]

Renwick decided to use the flashback structure because he realised that most viewers would have been aware of Victor's death through the press. There would be little point in a climax in which everyone already knew the outcome. However, the details of the accident were less likely to be reported.^[6] The death scene was filmed outside The Bridge Hotel and pub^[7]^[8] at Shawford railway bridge, next to the River Itchen, Hampshire, on 21 July 2000.^[9] Victor Meldrew had become such a cultural icon that many fans left messages and flowers at the scene.^[3]^[10]

The episode was produced by Jonathon P. Llewellyn and directed by Christine Gernon. The episode does not feature the usual three main supporting characters Patrick and Pippa Trench, and Mrs Warboys. It was forty minutes in length, rather than the thirty minutes of the conventional episodes. The episode's transmission was immediately preceded by I Don't Believe It! The One Foot In The Grave Story, a documentary presented by Angus Deayton which looked back at the hit sitcom.^[2] The documentary was included as a bonus feature on the DVD release.

[edit] Scheduling controversy

The transmission of the episode coincided with the broadcast of Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? first UK jackpot winner. The news of Judith Keppel's win, recorded the preceding Sunday, was leaked to the press, and the resulting publicity led to a ratings win for ITV. Who Wants to be a Millionaire? attracted 13.9 million viewers (48%), with One Foot, which began transmission fifteen minutes later at 21:15, getting 10.7 million (36%).^[11] The episode peaked at 11.6 million when it was directly up against its ITV rival.^[12] It currently has an episode rating of 8.6 at TV.com.^[13]

It was alleged that Millionaire's production company Celador had rigged the show to spoil the BBC's expected high ratings for the sitcom's finale. Wilson in particular was quoted as saying that ITV had "planned" the win, adding "it seems a bit unfair to take the audience away from Victor's last moments on earth."^[11] ITV were upset at the allegation, claiming that it "undermined viewers' faith in the programme." Leslie Hill, the chairman of ITV, wrote to Sir Christopher Bland, the chairman of the BBC Board of Governors, to complain about the issue. The corporation later apologised, saying that any suggestion of 'rigging' "did not represent the official view of the BBC."^[12] Eleven viewers complained about the quiz show to the Independent Television Commission (ITC), but Millionaire was cleared.^[1]

[edit] Reception

Many reviewers reflected that the dark tone of the final episode was characteristic of the overall tone of the series. A reviewer for BBC Comedy said that the episode "was a characteristically dark end to a show which was never afraid to explore the flip side of the comedy coin."^[2] Similarly, UKTV Gold's website says "it was a suitably downbeat end to an equally downbeat man."^[14] Commenting that killing off the protagonist "might seem an odd way for a sitcom to end," the British Film Institute's ScreenOnline says that in a series "where comedy and tragedy are so intertwined, it seems entirely appropriate."^[15]

The Daily Telegraph described it as displaying "an exhilarating flair for rapid change of comic gear" and made positive comments about the scene in which pilgrims descend on the Meldrews' home.^[16] The Guardian called it "a satisfying ending to a series that never went out of its way to be cheerful", referring in particular to the open-ended scene of Margaret dropping the paracetamol into the glass.^[17] The Independent criticised the transition into flashbacks for being "clumsily signalled" and suggested that the direction and score of the paracetamol scene was not on par with the quality of the writing and acting.^[18]