Review of Goodies At LWT, The

Introduction

I used to love the Goodies. I watched the show religiously when I was a child, glued to the set for thirty minutes of live action cartoon mayhem. The Tom and Jerry style antics appealed to this five-year-old wannabe anarchist, and wild horses couldn`t drag me away from the television. Of course the little bearded chap who always got picked on was my favourite. Everyone roots for the under-hobbit. But it`s been nearly thirty years now; I don`t remember a single episode due to a certain channel`s odd view on repeats (Bloody Hyacinth Bucket every Sunday). All that I do recall are Kitten Kong, a giant Dougal, the trandem, and Ecky Thump, in other words the few brief snippets that the powers that be magnanimously deign to share with us whenever there is a tribute programme.

So comparing and contrasting my memories to a 21st century perspective is out of the question, and I approach this series afresh, as if I`m watching it for the very first time. After 25 years, Network release The Goodies At LWT, their complete output after they parted company with the Beeb. Six episodes and one Christmas special from 1981 serve as their swansong, details listed above.

Graeme Garden (the brains), Tim Brooke-Taylor (dim and occasionally randy nationalist), and Bill Oddie (short and grumpy) have an agency, ostensibly to work and make money, but they more often than not wind up in all sorts of surreal and bizarre situations. It`s a thinly veiled excuse for a fast paced, anarchic, zany hailstorm of visual and verbal gags, with a bit of satire thrown in. It`s humour that is targeted at all ages, the question being, is it still funny today?

Video

A rather creased 4:3 transfer of some aging video stock. The studio scenes were shot on video tape, and are suitably soft and prone to colour bleed, while the exterior scenes were shot on film, cue print damage and grain, then transferred to video tape, add softness and colour bleed. It`s all indicative of a certain televisual era, and I`m not sure if it`s worth the expense of a restoration. There is a bit of nostalgia in seeing the old LWT logo again though, and placeholders come up for the absent adverts.

Audio

Good old DD 2.0 mono and there is no subtitle track to make things easy. The dialogue is clear throughout, and the iconic theme tune is there in all its glory. Unfortunately so is the LWT laugh track. Why is there always some hysterical bint left cackling five seconds after the rest of the audience have stopped laughing?

Features

A whole disc worth of extras will have you rubbing your hands in glee. We begin with two bonus episodes.

Doctor In The House: Doctor On The Box (25 min)
The routine of St Swithin`s is thrown into chaos when a film crew from London Weekend show up to do an expose on the medical students. Guest starring Graeme Garden, and written by him and Bill Oddie.

From The Top: Growing Up… And Out (25 min)
In this episode of the children`s show that sees aging would-be entertainer William Worthington enrolled in a drama school, the new term begins with everyone outgrowing their school uniforms, necessitating a radical redesign. Written by and starring Bill Oddie.

You can`t have the Goodies without the songs, and on this disc you`ll find:

The Funky Gibbon and Black Pudding Bertha recorded at Shangalang.
Nappy Love, Wild Thing and Make A Daft Noise For Christmas recorded from Look Alive.

I used to love the Goodies pop act, Bill Oddie looked to be the big megastar pop star of the three, Graeme Garden looked as if he wanted to be anywhere else, while Tim Brooke-Taylor danced like everyone`s Granddad.

The most irrelevant extra is this, Tim Brooke-Taylor Judges A Turkey Competition, in which he does just that, in a news report that is horribly faded and muffled. It`s a case of Bernard Matthews versus the animal rights campaigners, with poor Tim caught in the middle.

There is a 2-minute slideshow of a stills gallery.

The disc rounds off with a set of interviews.

The best is from Sunday Sunday, with Gloria Hunniford chatting to Tim Brooke-Taylor for 11 minutes, and it is a nice intelligent chat.

Then in the first This Morning chat, Richard Madeley talks over his wife and Bill Oddie for 9 minutes about comedy. This is followed by another 8-minute segment from This Morning, where Richard Madeley talks over his wife and all three of the Goodies, again about comedy. All clips have been removed for contractual reasons, so you don`t ever see what they are talking about.

Right at the end, there is a piece with Tim and Graeme at the Cambridge Arts Theatre, which lasts 4 minutes, and is something of a trip down memory lane. Tim looks and sounds a lot like Alan Rickman in this segment.

Both discs have animated psychedelic menus, with the theme tune playing.

Oh, I almost forgot, place the extras disc into a PC, and you`ll be able to access the PDF files for the scripts. I only received check discs, but in the retail release there should be a commemorative booklet as well.

Conclusion

What just happened? The Goodies weren`t as funny as I remembered, although given the golden haze of nostalgia with which my memories are coated, that is to be expected. But they weren`t as funny as I rationally expected them to be, which is disappointing. These episodes weren`t a laugh riot, they weren`t even hilarious, and instead they engendered merely the rarest of chuckles. By the time I got to the extra features and watched Doctor In The House (humour vacuum) and From The Top (depressingly silly), I thought I had lost my sense of humour. Fortunately, I stuck in an episode of M*A*S*H straight afterwards, and found it again.

I suppose there is something to be said of the likelihood of last season malaise. With this as their last hurrah, they may have been resting on their laurels somewhat, and the LWT experience may be diminished compared to their early BBC work. I can`t tell, as my rose tinted memories are understandably suspect. A lot must do with the sheer amount of choice we have now, with umpteen channels and shows that are aimed at their target audiences to a high degree of precision. Sketch shows, political satire, surrealism, laddish comedy, middle of the road humour, it`s all there if you know where to look, and most of it is professional, well written and highly polished. In comparison, coming from an era of three channels, The Goodies had to be as broad as possible to attract a large audience. There is something for everyone in their humour, but that doesn`t mean that everyone laughs at the same bits. The cartoon antics that so entertained me at age five barely raise a smirk today, instead I found myself chuckling at the satire and the few topical gags that didn`t go over my head.

It`s like a variety act, and it`s as if they take a handful of darts, and throw them all at once at a dartboard of mirth. Only a couple are going to hit the bull, and most will miss completely. Still, at their best they are very funny, and there are moments of that brilliance on this disc. The Football Crazy episode is one such, which blends then current affairs with surreal imagination, and goes completely bonkers. Change Of Life is also well done, and cleverly recycles some of their better gags. Animals is positively subversive and scary, with humans taking the place of pets, and eventually livestock bred for food. It`s an episode that I must have seen and blanked out, as it explains a pants-browning nightmare I had a couple of years ago. Unfortunately, the throw everything at the screen approach means that even these episodes seem diluted, and when placed with dull mediocre fare as Holiday and Snow White 2, it really doesn`t do this release any favours.

If anything, this disc does explain why The Goodies doesn`t get repeated. Coming from the era of rampant political incorrectness, the Goodies is fairly tame in that respect, with only a few limp-wristed gay stereotypes, and about three frames of blacked up white people to complain about. But OFCOM would have a fit if these episodes were to be broadcast today, with the jokes often heading into macabre and dark directions that would have the `protect our children` lobby complaining. There is the trivialisation of violence, especially in episodes like Football Crazy, while Snow White 2 begins with pensioners so bored with the pantomime that they shoot themselves, and in Change Of Life, Graeme constructs a suicide machine to put himself out of his misery. As OFCOM will no doubt remind us, suicide is a serious matter that mustn`t be trivialised, and shouldn`t be the subject of childish jokes. I wonder how they`d react to the cannibalism?

So there we have it, another childhood illusion shattered. Curse you DVD! The Goodies haven`t aged at all well, and what was hilarious 25 years ago is nothing of the sort now. I wonder how future audiences will regard Little Britain. Now if you remember these episodes and love The Goodies, then there is no reason why you should refrain from buying this disc. It`s loaded with extras and the episodes are all present and correct. But if like me, your curiosity is overwhelming your common sense given 25 years of comedy evolution, then a trip down memory lane may have to be carefully judged. I`d suggest going with the hungry, eager, fresh Goodies of the early seventies and working your way forward, rather than starting with the sated, comfortable media personalities of the early eighties as I did. But sometimes it`s just not worth dispelling that golden haze of nostalgia.