Whatever Happened to the Likely Lads? (TV Series) Birthday Boy (1973) User Reviews

Birthday Boy

[Prismark10 · 7/10 · 22 January 2023]

Nowadays this is the old standard, everyone has forgotten it's my birthday today.

Terry has even more reason to be melancholy on his birthday. No one wishes him a happy birthday and they all seem to be interested in the movie Gone With The Wind.

His mother claims to have gone to watch it before he was born. She does eventually gives him a cheap birthday card.

Bob meanwhile brings something expensive. Earrings for Thelma.

Of course Bob and Thelma have planned a surprise birthday party. However Terry is down an empty pub drowning his sorrows.

When another lonely man turns up, he is whisked off by two strange women as Terry pops into the gents.

Eventually Terry does get his surprise party. Only his gob gets the better of him as he insults several of his old friends.

It is good to see Terry's amusing observations about loneliness.

Christopher Biggins and Stephanie Turner are two of the birthday guests.

Happy Birthday Terry.

[Sleepin_Dragon · 8/10 · 2 June 2023]

It's Terry's birthday, but it doesn't get off to the start he'd hoped for, first of all his mother has forgotten, and then Bob has forgotten, but there's a secret surprise in the offing.

There's actually a bit of sadness to this series finale, it's definitely a bittersweet episode, poor Terry really does feel that his world has caved in, he goes down a few rabbit holes here, even questioning whether his parents actually wanted him or not. Terry is definitely a lonely man.

As you'd expect though, there are some funny scenes. The mishap with Colin was a funny scene, but that moment between Bob and Terry in the living room was brilliant, one of the best scenes on the show so far.

I'd actually forgotten how prolific a young Christopher Biggins was, he didn't half appear in some of the biggest comedies of the 1970's.

Funny end to the first series.

8/10.