Why did they do this in the first Dad's Army episode?

[McDead]

Just get Culshaw to do all the voices

[poodlefaker]

TIL that, despite the fact that it has been constantly repeated on tv my entire life (I'm 54), I've never seen the first episode of Dad's Army.

[JesusAndYourBush]

But why go to the extent of heavily ageing Pike, Walker and Frazer? The audience haven't ever seen them their 'normal' age.

I see what you mean. It's a lot of effort when you've not seen the younger versions yet, there's no vhs, and they'll probably not repeat it. Then they'll bung the films in a skip a few years later.  It's a lot of effort for something they only intend on you seeing the once, when you're only going to appreciate it on a later rewatch.

[Ignatius_S]

I see what you mean. It's a lot of effort when you've not seen the younger versions yet, there's no vhs, and they'll probably not repeat it. Then they'll bung the films in a skip a few years later.  It's a lot of effort for something they only intend on you seeing the once, when you're only going to appreciate it on a later rewatch.

The device of seeing characters aged up first before a flashback when they were younger was a pretty well-established device by this point. On a Home Guard related note, this happens in The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp. It's used to good effect in one of the Hope/Crosby Road films (Utopia).

The scene in DA is a very short, simply shot scene where most characters are seen very briefly. The make-up would be pretty simple (and IIRC, Godfrey is in it and doesn't really look any different) and I don't feel this was a huge amount of effort.

As the establishing scene is 28 years after when the show begins in earnest, some aging is necessary.

[McDead]

The device of seeing characters aged up first before a flashback when they were younger was a pretty well-established device by this point. On a Home Guard related note, this happens in The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp. It's used to good effect in one of the Hope/Crosby Road films (Utopia).

The scene in DA is a very short, simply shot scene where most characters are seen very briefly. The make-up would be pretty simple (and IIRC, Godfrey is in it and doesn't really look any different) and I don't feel this was a huge amount of effort.

As the establishing scene is 28 years after when the show begins in earnest, some aging is necessary.

This is what I couldn't figure out from the first post. It's a pretty standard dramatic effect, even though the audience - in theory - is never going to see the episode again. Should they have looked the same age in the present day stuff? Someone tell me* what's going on??

[Cold Meat Platter]

Probably a reaction to visibly lower production values and commitment to realistic SFX

[Thosworth]

I too am puzzled by the puzzlement. It would make no sense not to age them.

If a sitcom was made today with a set of characters and began with 'Do you remember those high jinks we got up to during Euro '96?', it would just be weird and confusing if in the next scene they all looked exactly the same.

exempli gratia...

[McDead]

EXACTLY, THOSWORTH

[Bad Ambassador]

Who's left alive from Dad's Army now?

Not counting actors who played two obviously distinct characters, the only surviving credited recurring cast according to IMDb are Ian Lavender, Caroline Dowdeswell (Mainwaring's secretary Mrs King in the first series), Michael Knowles (Captain Cutts in the second series, and a couple of other characters later), Therese McMurray ("girl in the haystack" in a running joke in the first two series), Gilda Perry and Linda James (cinema ushers Doreen and Betty in a couple of episodes each, but not the same ones).

[Average Comedy Enjoyer]

There was a Dad's Army Aural Universe because it was the Olden Days.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/It_Sticks_Out_Half_a_Mile

I was under the impression that Parsley Sidings was also in the DACU. I'm aware the characters are different but I was reminded of the episode of DA where Arthur Lowe plays his own deadbeat brother.

Obviously having looked it up on Wikipedia I must admit it's not in the DACU, maybe in universe 161?

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parsley_Sidings?searchToken=2agvhvq1r1b921mxdryppbmls


I'm personally impressed by how the first DA film predicts current trends in superhero films by spending half the film on the origin story of the Walmington Avengers.

[Asclepius]

TIL that, despite the fact that it has been constantly repeated on tv my entire life (I'm 54), I've never seen the first episode of Dad's Army.

The black and white ones didn't get shown on repeat half as much as the colour ones. It's on the Youtubes though.

[Asclepius]

The device of seeing characters aged up first before a flashback when they were younger was a pretty well-established device by this point. On a Home Guard related note, this happens in The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp. It's used to good effect in one of the Hope/Crosby Road films (Utopia).

The scene in DA is a very short, simply shot scene where most characters are seen very briefly. The make-up would be pretty simple (and IIRC, Godfrey is in it and doesn't really look any different) and I don't feel this was a huge amount of effort.

As the establishing scene is 28 years after when the show begins in earnest, some aging is necessary.

Didn't spot Godfrey - is he definitely there? The version on youtube fades in from black and is a little ropey, so potentially there's a second or two missing there.

[Asclepius]

This is what I couldn't figure out from the first post. It's a pretty standard dramatic effect, even though the audience - in theory - is never going to see the episode again. Should they have looked the same age in the present day stuff? Someone tell me* what's going on??

Why include them at all, was my thinking. Wilson and Mainwaring I get, as they're speaking, and the audience will remember that they've seen them when they see the 'young' versions 5 minutes later.

[Norton Canes]

Perhaps they were thinking of concluding the series by returning to the present day but for whatever reason (cast ill health?) were prevented from filming a definitive final episode

[Bad Ambassador]

The last episode ends with the platoon toasting the Home Guard to the camera, and my understanding was that this was definitely intended as the final episode, having a nice happy conclusion with Jones marrying Mrs Fox.

[neveragain]

I too am puzzled by the puzzlement.

I think - and I'll just leave Frank Skinner there - the OP's confusion stems from why the series bothered to have such an opening at all. My own opinion is it doesn't add much either. Ignatius gives us a good history of the device but still... they could have just started during wartime and the audience would have got it surely. It adds insult to make-upry that they never went back to it at the end. Well, it doesn't really but it's weird in retrospect.

The Brittas Empire also did a future flash-forward at the end of a Christmas special that was "ret-conned" or just forgotten about by the time of the disappointing all-a-dream finale.

[Ignatius_S]

Didn't spot Godfrey - is he definitely there? The version on youtube fades in from black and is a little ropey, so potentially there's a second or two missing there.

From what I remember (I have the series in DVD), he is there and it's only Jones missing.

[Ignatius_S]

Why include them at all, was my thinking. Wilson and Mainwaring I get, as they're speaking, and the audience will remember that they've seen them when they see the 'young' versions 5 minutes later.

The alternative would be hiring extra actors for an incredibly short scene at additional cost. Croft was careful when it came to money.

As I mentioned above, to make the platoon in older age look happy and prosperous, could be a way of deflecting any criticism that the Beeb feared about mocking old people and those that had volunteered in the Home Guard.

[Thosworth]

Didn't spot Godfrey - is he definitely there? The version on youtube fades in from black and is a little ropey, so potentially there's a second or two missing there.

The YouTube one is terrible - it's cropped so you only see a tiny square in the middle. This one works:

https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x52afp1

[McDead]

The alternative would be hiring extra actors for an incredibly short scene at additional cost. Croft was careful when it came to money.

As I mentioned above, to make the platoon in older age look happy and prosperous, could be a way of deflecting any criticism that the Beeb feared about mocking old people and those that had volunteered in the Home Guard.

I suppose I understand now: why have the scene at all, why not just start with the characters in situ. Your reasoning - avoid any hint of mockery by showing them in the present day with some degree of dignity and success - makes sense.

[McDead]

This is what I couldn't figure out from the first post. It's a pretty standard dramatic effect, even though the audience - in theory - is never going to see the episode again. Should they have looked the same age in the present day stuff? Someone tell me* what's going on??

*Very sad that no one hit me with "don't tell him, Pike", as I had wished, but you can't have everything.

[Asclepius]

The YouTube one is terrible - it's cropped so you only see a tiny square in the middle. This one works:

https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x52afp1

Christ! Can open. Worms everywhere.
So yes, there's Godfrey aged c97. Someone of similar age to his immediate right (Pike is to his left). A much younger man across the table.

So, everyone except Jones makes it to an age where they can listen to Ob La Di Ob La Da. Fab times. Interesting to kill Jones off (unless he's balls deep in Mrs. Fox?). Jones is only supposed to be a year older than Godfrey and two years older than Frazer.

Thanks for the extra quality clip. And thanks also to the poster highlighting that Croft liked to save money. This does all make more sense.

[Brundle-Fly]

Is it a legitimate flashback though? Guest of honour, Mainwaring nor any of the former platoon members start reminiscing about their experiences of WW2. The screen doesn't go all wibbly-wobbly either. I think it's just a prologue

It would be funny if right after the final series, last episode of Dad's Army, it cuts back to 1968 with Mainwaring at the function now mentioning that he has recently retired as the deputy manager of the department store Dobson and Hawks. Camera fades out, and then the first episode of the 1965 Granada sitcom, 'Pardon The Expression' begins. Sgt. Wilson groans.

[Norton Canes]

I know they've shared actors but has there ever been a (hint of a) Dad's Army/Hot Mum/Hi-De-Hi character crossover?

[Dr Rock]

I'm glad I never saw the prologue, it would have robbed me of the excitement that any minute the Nazis might invade and execute them all. Clearly I was young and hazy about the actual events of WW2.

[A Hat Like That]

I know they've shared actors but has there ever been a (hint of a) Dad's Army/Hot Mum/Hi-De-Hi character crossover?

Someone else on here a few years ago pointed out that Grandad's gun running trip in Only Fools was done with Nobby Clarke, one of the main characters in IAHHM.

If there's going to be a connection, I'd expect it in the form of Donald Hewlett or Micheal Knowles.

[McDead]

/Hot Mum/

Nice

[Norton Canes]

Quintessentially Freudian.

[Average Comedy Enjoyer]

Ideally it would have ended with Clive Dunn machine-gunning Hitler's face off while the Parish Hall burns down around him.

[Jittlebags]

Chitterlings.