Detectorists - Boxing Day Special 75Min!

[Silent Runner]

Yes, it was excellent.

Spoiler

Funniest bit was Lance explaining the childs drawing has three weeks max on his fridge. 

 

[ZOK]

I’ve not really watched the series, but I really enjoyed this Christmas one.

[Davros sock drawer]

I thought this one was a tad dull. The three series are much better IMO @ZOK, so if you enjoyed this one…

[PK]

It was nice seeing the characters again but I wish they hadn't made that special (or at least that I hadn't watched it). It ruined the perfect way the series ended.

[Twinbee]

4 hours ago, PK said:

It was nice seeing the characters again but I wish they hadn't made that special (or at least that I hadn't watched it). It ruined the perfect way the series ended.

I agree. I thought the resolution of the S3 finale, especially with S&G, and the cottage, left me with such a warm feeling. How I imagine those characters moving on from there, and what we learn in this new episode, made me a little sad. 

[smac]

1 hour ago, Twinbee said:

I agree. I thought the resolution of the S3 finale, especially with S&G, and the cottage, left me with such a warm feeling. How I imagine those characters moving on from there, and what we learn in this new episode, made me a little sad. 

 

Yes, me too - we were disappointed with this special. It felt a little mean-spirited to

Spoiler

take all that away just to set it up.

 and the mistrust between  the two main characters felt out of place.

 

[Mike S]

I'm with the naysayers on this.

 

A very disappointing special which adds nothing to the previous, near perfect, three series and, as @Twinbee and @PKsuggest, actually makes the finale of S3, and everything before, retrospectively worse.

 

I'll spoiler for those that haven't seen the last episode yet:

 

Spoiler

 

 

I've no idea why the cottage needs to have burned down as nothing in the plot required them to not be living there happily. Andy possibly getting back into Archeology in order to fund building a new house on the plot was rendered almost unnecessary by the suggestion that they would sell Becky's mother's house. It just seemed a cruel and pointless aside.

 

 

Same with Lance, whose decision to hide the gold and then not tell Andy nor the DMDC seemed weirdly out of character and similarly cruel and pointless.

 

The main find being the Holy Grail was nothing more than cringe inducingly stupid, even for a Christmas special. I realise there has always been a little hint of magic running through the series but this was stretching things to breaking point. 

 

Simon and Garfunkel turning up in their big car with chauffeur and assistant was another idiotic, unnecessary, addition that stretched the series gentle, warm, character observations into OTT, implausible, stupidity. 

 

Finally, the actor playing the kid was scene wreckingly terrible. 

 

 

 

 

I think I'll rewatch the three proper series and try to forget this exists. It seems like something thrown together after Crooke told the BBC he didn't have any new Wurzel material for this year before then succumbing to an offer he couldn't refuse despite not having anything more to say about the characters.

 

Watch all the other episodes @ZOK as they are wonderful.

 

 

 

 

[smac]

Yeah, please do watch the main series from the start, @ZOK. They are way better than this special - if you enjoyed this, you should really appreciate the main series. Each is only 6 episodes long.

[PK]

I know it's a bit pathetic but watching that today has genuinely been quite depressing. It's like the nice little pocket of my brain in which everybody in Detectorists lived happily after has collapsed. A perfect TV series ruined by 75 pointless minutes tacked onto the end for no reason.

[Don Wiskerando]

@ZOK If this was really the first you've paid attention to the series then the best joke in it will have gone over your head. 

 

Spoiler

The guy at the dig who necks the lemonade with no reaction at all. 

 

[ZOK]

Yes, I didn’t get what the joke was.

[Garwoofoo]

Finally watched this (well, the three main series) several years after everyone else.

 

Absolutely loved it but was I the only person who found it a bit stressful to watch at times? I loved the characters so much that I just wanted nice things to happen to them. I'd have been quite happy with a series that just consisted of Andy and Lance pottering around a field and having occasional meetings at the DMDC. Every time the show introduced some sort of artificial conflict for the characters to resolve, I just felt terrible for them. I came to intensely dislike Becky (in the first series in particular) who seemed to be there purely to antagonise Andy, it was very hard to see what he got out of that relationship sometimes. In fact with Mags in there too I would say that the treatment of female characters as plot devices was probably the show's only real mis-step, and it got better at that as it went on.

 

I loved the last series most of all as much of it was clearly just moving towards a happy ending for everyone. The last episode left me quite emotional. From the comments above I am guessing I should probably skip the most recent special, I am very happy leaving things where they currently stand and pretending no more was made.

[PK]

26 minutes ago, Garwoofoo said:

Absolutely loved it but was I the only person who found it a bit stressful to watch at times? I loved the characters so much that I just wanted nice things to happen to them. I'd have been quite happy with a series that just consisted of Andy and Lance pottering around a field and having occasional meetings at the DMDC. Every time the show introduced some sort of artificial conflict for the characters to resolve, I just felt terrible for them.

 

Yes, I know exactly what you mean and I felt like this throughout it as well. I just desperately wanted them all to have a nice quiet, peaceful life, not bothered by all the horrible shit in the world. And if in that context you're happy with how the series ended then I would never watch the special if I were you. It left me a bit devastated to be honest - I know that's a silly thing to say about a sitcom special but the contented feeling the series left me was replaced by special with a strange sort of third-person grief.

[mindgames]

25 minutes ago, Garwoofoo said:

From the comments above I am guessing I should probably skip the most recent special, I am very happy leaving things where they currently stand and pretending no more was made.

 

Definitely

[smac]

Absolutely. The last special was a misstep.

[PeteJ]

We watched the series from start to finish very recently, including the special. I thought the whole run was magical, a real classic in British sitcoms and it perfectly captured the world of the hobbyist and male friendships. There were so many beautifully realised observations. 

 

We enjoyed the special as well, it is perhaps a step down in quality from the rest but for us it was still worth a watch.