BBC One
One thing as palpable as it is painful when watching The Crimson Field is Sister Joan‘s enduring cold turkey German sausage withdrawal after her enforced separation from her disgusting sauerkraut fiancé. She perks right up though when a pal’s battalion from her hometown of Liverpool roll up to be treated for a parade of non-injuries like itchy eyes, fizzy foot and hurty finger. “The Lucky Thirteen” these Scousers call themselves, convinced they live a charmed life as long as they stick together which by coincidence is exactly what the Romanov family thought.
The Thirteen are led by Wilfred “Dad” Tyrell (Lee Ingleby) who seems strangely worried about his medical. He has good reason. Pleurisy, double pneumonia and the Aids wrack his thoracic cavity. He’s been bribing doctors to pass him at his medicals. Half a crown is all it takes apparently – market forces and all that. I mean, who actually wants to pass a medical that grants you entry into history’s most unforgiving killing fields? Joan can relate but she has to call it how she sees it and he goes from A1 to C3 in about the length of time it takes for Oscar Pistorius to go from In a relationship to It’s complicated on Facebook on Valentine’s Day.
He goes from A1 to C3 in about the length of time it takes for Oscar Pistorius to go from In a relationship to It’s complicated on Facebook on Valentine’s Day.
When the rest of the battalion get the bad news Dad’s oppo Peacock tries to run away like a little bitch but his comrades track him down and sexually assault him to put him right. It works. Sometimes the old ways are the best. But Private Charlie Dawlish (Dan Parr) isn’t going to take a medical professional compassionately sparing a critically ill man lying down. He knows ALL about the Joan’s proclivity for chomping on Braunschweiger and he blackmails her good and proper. All of a sudden dad’s back from A1 to C3 and all the Scousers are deliriously happy.
[In a scene we don’t see they are all beaten to death by Hartlepool fans on the march to the front. Not so fucking lucky now, eh Dad?]
Back in the fight for access rights to Craplin‘s vagina Thomas arranges to meet her “in the woods” at 2 PM – a clear reference to his Scottish schlong. But Craplin has other ideas. She insists on meeting her ex-husbland in a hotel so she can abandon their child all over again. The husbland is a punchy sort and just as things are about to get uglier than Vinegar Tits’ coming face Miles whiteknights Craplin out of there. He may have a shot with her after all.
Just as things are about to get uglier than Vinegar Tits’ coming face Miles whiteknights Craplin out of there.
Jock waits in the woods like a halfwit for seven days and nights saying things like “Och I’m sure there’s a perfectly reasonable explanation”. When she eventually runs into him she tells him she came to Belgium to work “not take one Jock cock after the other like this: nom-nom-nom-nom-nom-nom” and all things considered he’s pretty cool about it.
Hey remember that PTSD bag of shit Lance-Corporal Lawrence Prentiss who cried like a bairn listening to opera from episode one ? He’s back in a complete fucking state – even worse than before – and Ro-land wants to know why his express wishes to send him back home have been ignored by Sister Cake Stealer. She lies and says it wasn’t her fault. In an attempt to clean up the mess Ro-land breaks out the opera and it works a treat until it sends Prentiss into fucking seizure. Ro-land you’re such a twat. I hope they shoot you next.
In other news at turns out Vinegar Tits is into pussy and Cake Stealer confronts her with the truth which buys her a two-week ticket back home to think about getting the hell out of the hospital for good. That’ll show her.
The verdict: Unlucky for some (mainly the viewers).
Marks out of 10: 5