The Green Green Grass

This series has a great feel to it. Of course it cannot be compared to Only Fools, nothing can. But it's great to see how Sullivan developed these characters. Makes me wish he'd done it with others, too. A great series to have on in the house.

For those who have BBC Three , they will be surprised to see Simon Day's "Grass" being well and truly ripped off by John Sullivan in this Only Fools and Horses spin off . In "Grass" Simon Day's character Billy Bleach "grassed" on a local London gangster and through the witness protection act was relocated to the sticks of Norfolk. The underrated six part comedy tackled the ideas of country meets city and a fish being out of a water. Replace Billy Bleach with Boycie and add Marlene and son Tyler and you have the plot for the "Green Green Grass" staring you in the face . The basic idea of the show is taking Sullivan's well loved east end (of London) humour from Only Fools And Horses and setting it in a completely different background , the opportunities for humour being how will a cockney con man interact with manure kicking yokels instead of the likes of his own ? Coming on BBC 1 on a Friday at 830 vastly limits and waters down the potential for border line humour and leaves the audience with the sort of harmless weak humour that has done "My Family" and "My Hero" no favours and also being an Only Fools And Horses spin off within the early moments the jokes feel very tired because we've had twenty years of it in Sullivan's first sit-com , for instance there is a scene at the beginning where Boycie finds that his satellite navigation system is not up to scratch and guess who sold it to him ?? This joke sets the tone for tired Only...jokes to be repeated again and again , I can imagine Boycie meeting country high society types in the next few episodes and making "hilarious" faux pas , which could be funny if Del Boy hadn't of done it for two decades of Only... . This show will ultimately fail because of the writer and because it is on 8.30 on BBC 1 , devoid and humour and ideas , the strings in your heart it will try to tug are better served by watching old episodes of Only on DVD.

As a massive Only Fools and Horses fan, I began watching the first episode of John Sullivan's new sitcom with a certain degree of trepidation. My fear was that my fondness for OF&H would be ruined by a cheap, quickly knocked out spin-off featuring the classic comedy creations that are Boycie and Marlene. However, I was almost completely wrong. I think that a true Only Fools fan would find it impossible not to laugh at this fish-out-of-water caper, even if it is Boycie just doing almost exactly what he did in OF&H (slagging off Marlene, being tight, and just being quite nasty). Just this time it's got a new, nicer setting. Another of my worries was that Sullivan would just milk Only Fools for all its worth, by name dropping the entire population of Peckham. Wrong again, he didn't do this. Del-Boy was mentioned once or twice and there was a cameo from Paul Barber (Denzil), but apart from that there was no real mentions of any core Only Fools characters. For anyone walking around saying things such as "The Only Fools And Horses Cash Cow Has Been Well Milked" clearly hasn't got a clue what they're talking about. Although this comedy series isn't exactly a fresh concept, it is very entertaining indeed. To summarise, I think that the legend that is John Sullivan is on top form, and the rest of the series should hopefully be a joy to watch.

I am also a OF&H fan.I was worried than show spin offs like this won't work. Like the Friends spin off Joey...which honestly made feel sleepy. After watching the first episode I am eagerly waiting for the next one, where we will meet rest of the new characters. The characters of Boycie and Marlene work great together so it would make an interesting show based around their family life. The show is set in the present as their son is now teenager and will be interesting how his character develops. They moved to Shropshire out in the sticks and it would be interesting if they evolve or still have the London banter going on. But,John Sullivan has made a good first humorous episode and long it may continue be that way.

This show works great as a spin off but it's not as good as Only Fools And Horses to be fair though nobody said it would be and I never expected it to be either. The dry wit is still there and it's very amusing when it comes up with the right dialogue. There's been times I've thought this just isn't working but then there's been other times where I've really laughed at what the characters have been saying. On the whole I'm glad that this spin off series was made as it's been great to see the characters involved again. Only the beeb could make a spin off to such an iconic program work and this is what they have done here. Looking forward to the Christmas special and then hopefully a new series in the new year.