Season 6 Episode 26: England Show (3)

The conclusion of the England trilogy and the end of season 6. Al and Bud are brought onto a stage in Lower Uncton to be honored, and it takes both of them an uncomfortably long time to notice the two nooses hanging behind them. Al, assuming this is a civic tribute, delivers an address to the assembled villagers in the register of a man accepting a lifetime achievement award, opening with the line Lou Gehrig used and closing with a warning to the children of England about the one great danger facing them, which is marriage. Kelly arrives in the crowd, having knocked out a local woman and taken her shawl, and gets her family off the gallows. What follows is a chase to the boundary between the two villages, where the Bundys end up surrounded by two mobs with opposite objectives, each trying to persuade Al and Bud to die on their particular side of the line. Peg and Kelly, informed that the women are free to leave, leave. The standoff is finally resolved commercially: the two Unctons work out that there is more money in a shared attraction than in a dead shoe salesman, and the dispute is settled by a joust. Al puts on his Polk High uniform, which he has somehow brought to England, and the show cues up “Bad to the Bone” before he announces that it is time to joust. Meanwhile Marcy and Jefferson are finally enjoying their holiday, in a bondage club. For a show that spent six years trapped in one living room, ending a season with a medieval joust in an English field was a genuine swing, and it lands.

Episode Facts

• Original air date: May 17, 1992
• Season and episode: Season 6, Episode 26
• Overall episode number: 131
• Written by: Kevin Curran
• Directed by: Gerry Cohen
• Taped: March 30 to April 17, 1992
• Production note: The season 6 finale and the conclusion of the three part England arc.
• Production note: The working title was “England Show III: We’re Spending as Fast as We Can.”

Guest Cast

• Bill Oddie as Winston
• Alun Armstrong as Trevor
• Steven Hartley as Igor
• Tony Steedman as Mayor Fivshaw
• Mark Addy as a Lower Uncton local (uncredited)
• Chris Langham as the customs officer (uncredited)
• Kevin Curran as the voice of Buck

The Thumpin’ in Upper Uncton

Al’s gallows speech is the best thing in the episode and possibly in the arc. He has misread the entire situation, which lets him deliver a genuinely heartfelt address about his high school football career to a crowd assembled to hang him, and the pivot into advice for the local children is pure Al Bundy. The borrowed Gehrig line at the top is doing a lot of work.

The standoff at the boundary is the arc’s sharpest piece of writing, because both villages make their pitch directly to the men they intend to kill. Winston’s selling point is a quicker death. Trevor counters with the assurance that his side will not eat them afterward. Winston’s rebuttal, that this is an ugly rumour started by jealous people and that in any case it is dark over there so it is hard to know what you are eating, gets agreement from his own townspeople.

The joust is the resolution, and the business reasoning behind it is the funniest part. Neither village actually wants a dead Bundy as much as it wants the tourist revenue, so the whole centuries-old blood feud gets settled by a concessions arrangement and a sporting event. Mayor Fivshaw announces it in full Michael Buffer mode and names it the Thumpin’ in Upper Uncton.

Al facing a five-time all-European champion on horseback while wearing his Polk High jersey is the image the season ends on. Nobody explains why he brought the uniform to England. The best available theory is that he thought he was being presented to the Queen, having been told in part one that he would be the guest of honour at an Elizabethan Expiration Ceremony.

Famous Quotes

• Al, mounting what he believes is a podium: “My people. Today I feel like the luckiest man on the face of the earth.”
• Al, concluding his remarks to the children of England: “There is a killer out there, a temptation… Kids, please just say no to marriage!”
• Peg, moments before: “Don’t worry, Al! Whatever happens, I’ll be by your side!” Trevor: “The women are free to go! We only want to kill the men!” Peg: “Have a nice life, Al!”
• Kelly, on her way out: “I hope your death is less painful than your life!”
• Winston and Trevor, competing for custody: “Come over to our side, yeah? Your death will be quicker.” / “No! Come to our side! At least we won’t eat you afterwards.”

Notes

• Peg reveals Al earns $3.25 an hour, five cents more than the figure given in season 5’s “A Man’s Castle.”
• Al may have broken the Lower Uncton curse, but the episode is clear that the curse on the Bundys themselves continues.
• Chris Langham, uncredited as the customs officer, was a well-known British comic writer and performer.
• Marcy and Jefferson’s club is identified on Jefferson’s souvenir shirt as the Red Fanny, a name that means something rather different in British English than the writers appear to have intended.
• Goofs: Al’s jersey number changes from 33 to 27 and back during the joust, and the studio lights and boom microphone are both visible reflected in his helmet.

Watching It

Amazon’s Prime Video catalog for season 6 stops at the first part of the England story and does not carry separate entries for parts two and three, so there is no direct link to offer here. The episode is included on the complete series DVD and Blu-ray releases, and it turns up in syndication packages. If Prime adds the remaining parts to the season 6 listing, a link will go up here.