"And all because Erik Chitty loves Milk Tray!"

"And all because Erik Chitty loves Milk Tray!"

We tend to work on 'Round The Archives' in fits and starts (or possibly the Spoonerised version of that phrase, if you ask Warren) and yesterday we had a mad flurry of activity and finished recording and editing Episode 20 which is now available to all and sundry.

As hinted at by Joe Podcast's letter towards the end of Episode 19, we have a new idea to examine shows that were on the week we were born, so we kicked off with 'Doomwatch : Project Sahara' from 9th March 1970.

We try and vary the format from time to time, so we thought we'd watch the story and make notes as we went along, then immediately talk about what we'd noticed that was unusual or amusing. It resulted in a rather more irreverent piece than normal (and we were subject to the odd fit of the giggles) but we hope our love of the series comes across.

'Project Sahara' might not be the most iconic episode of 'Doomwatch' but it still asks important questions and features some familiar actors giving their usual fine performances.

And this is what this Birthday Episode theme is all about. Often when reviewing a show, we'll pick a famous episode or one that is a personal favourite. But there is an argument for simply choosing a story at random as that gives you a better idea of what an average one is like. Not every episode can be spectacular and the production-line approach of many old series still produces some highly watchable television.

We were worried that Episode 20 might run a bit too short - sometimes real life gets in the way and with Nick and Paul being unable to join us this time, I was worried that people might get a bit fed up if the rest of the issue was just us.

But thankfully, the wonderful Martin Holmes came to our rescue with a look at 'The Young Ones : Demolition'. We'd asked Martin if he would be interested in doing something at some point and he came up with the idea of looking at first episodes of things. This tied in nicely with the overall theme and our email pinged with the article soon after we'd started work on editing. A fine example of very good timing and we look forward to Martin joining us again in the very near future...

Although I'd planned to do 'Dad's Army : Museum Piece', this has now been bumped to a later issue. As always, the running order for most of our podcasts tends towards the fluid side. Warren will tell you that I have an affinity for fluids, usually ones that are at least 4.5% ABV...

To round off Episode Twenty, Lisa turned her attention to October 1972 in general (when she was meant to have been born) and August of that year when she actually arrived just in time for 'Ace Of Wands : The Power Of Atep'.

If we were to pick a showcase story for this particular series, it would have to be P.J. Hammond's 'Peacock Pie', but every show has to attempt something based around Egyptology at some point. With a diversion into the time Lisa played the Curator (not the Creator!) of the British Museum, we consider the magic of Ali Bongo and Tutankhamen's successful One-Mummy Show....

So that's another one done and dusted. It's no secret that we're aiming to cover 'The Computer Programme' fairly soon, so hopefully Episode 21 will cover the BASIC's of this early 80s show.

No, my convoluted jokes don't get any better, do they...?

(By Andrew Trowbridge.)

(Thanks to Martin Holmes for permission to reprint part of 'The Young Doctor' strip.)