Never Too Old 2013

In a quiet, small-town scene, Mrs Fox stops by the church hall in search of Jones, encountering a kindly Godfrey who explains that the rest of the platoon has headed out for a march and won’t be back for a while. She hints that she was planning to phone Jones to, as she puts it, “put him out of his misery.” The moment captures a gentle, everyday tension—a mix of ordinary life and the undercurrent of military duty that threads through the story.

put him out of his misery

When the platoon returns, they quickly notice Jones is missing. Pike and Frazer step in to reveal the fateful detail: he didn’t turn right on the march and instead kept walking straight ahead. The mood shifts as Jones himself arrives, beaming with cheerfulness, asking for a private talk with Mainwaring. In a candid moment, he shares with Mainwaring and Wilson that he has asked Mrs Fox to marry him and seeks the colonel’s blessing before he takes this big step. Mainwaring gives his consent, and soon after, Mrs Fox herself makes a hopeful call to announce that she will marry Jones.

The wedding scene unfolds with warmth and a sense of ceremony. Mainwaring agrees to give Mrs Fox away, while Wilson agrees to stand as best man. The reception brings a light, comic surprise when Wilson appears in a World War I-era uniform—brought about by Mrs Pike concealing his trousers—reiterating his status as a captain. The humor deepens when Wilson discovers that he must toast the matron of honour, Mrs Pike, turning the spotlight onto a playful, affectionate web of relationships within the group.

A welcome change of pace follows the jubilation, but the mood shifts again as an invasion alert reaches the platoon. Colonel’s message hints that the warning might not be a bluff, pulling everyone back toward the gravity of real-world danger. Jones and Pike are dispatched to the pier to keep watch, while Mrs Fox arrives to meet them, adding a personal thread to the tense moment. Back at the heart of the group, Mainwaring and the others arrive with a bottle of champagne, ready to celebrate Jones’s good fortune and good health.

The tension dissolves under the weight of the false alarm. Hodges interrupts with the news that the invasion alert was a false alarm and that the stand-down order had already been issued half an hour earlier. Yet the mood remains proud and resolute: Mainwaring, Wilson, Jones, Frazer, Pike, and Godfrey acknowledge that they may be ordinary, but they are sure that “no-one is getting past them” and that there are “hundreds of men just like them” who would fight for their freedom.

As the episode wraps, Wilson proposes a toast to the Home Guard, a suggestion that resonates with everyone. Mainwaring agrees, and the platoon lifts their glasses together, turning to the camera to utter in unison: “To Britain’s Home Guard.” The moment captures a blend of humor, camaraderie, and quiet patriotism, leaving viewers with a sense of community, duty, and resilience in the face of uncertainty.