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Seven British construction workers escape Britain's ever growing dole queues and travel to Germany to work on a site in Dusseldorf. We follow their trials and tribulations of working away from home and away from the women they left behind.
2002
The lads reunite in Middlesbrough for Oz's funeral, only to be approached by the man himself and he has an 'Irresistible offer' of work at home and abroad. They of course still have their problems and most with their lack of money. With Barry is problems with his marriage to beautiful wife Tatiana, and for Moxey, getting himself on the hit list of a Liverpool gangster called Mickey Startup hasnt really made his day, but things don't get much better.
The foreign workforce arive and immediatley there are problems as half are Serbs and half are from Kasavo, who have been at war for years! The boys start their roles as gaffers and the bridge begins to come down!
There is trouble all round and the deal to sell the bridge falls through. Oz finds out his son is a 'pillow biter' (gay) and has to deal with it in his own way. And men are sent looking for Moxey but help arrives in the most unusual form, a native American!
A Native American appears on the banks of the river and wants to buy the rbidge, but there is a problem the boys don't own the bridge, will granger fall for their scheme? Barry finds out that Tatyana is not Kadi's brother and throws her and Kadi out, Kadi seeks his revenge by shooting up the house! The boys fly out to America on Kadi's old plane with several tonnes of the steel. But Kadi has left a few of his 'possesions' and the motels the boys are staying in is raided by the D.E.A.!
The lads find themselves united once more as workers, with a grim little hut for their new home. Barry begins to go off the rails whilst awaiting trial on drugs charges, Neville falls in love with a prostitute on the road to Las Vegas, and Oz is forced to make a heroic act of bravery to rescue the bridge project from ruin. Granger finds out about the bridge project and threatens revenge. Wyman goes missing after Oz almost comes to blows with some guys in a local pub.
The lads discover that the past has a habit of coming back to haunt them. A police inspector arrives looking for Moxey and a vengeful Grainger puts a spanner in the works with the bridge-build. Dennis negotiates a peaceful solution, and Grainger agrees to go to Arizona. The bridge is finally completed - but they have a little surprise planned for Grainger! N.B. The Transporter Bridge is still in Middlesborough!
1983
Dennis, Neville and Oz head for Germany, looking for work as bricklayers. They get work in Dusseldorf, but only two bricklayers are needed. Dennis makes out that Neville is a carpenter so that the trio can stay together. Neville isn't too happy with his work, since his carpentry skills are very limited. He decides to call it a day and head back home. That night, he goes out on the town and has too much to drink. He wakes up next morning with a tattoo on his arm, dedicated to someone named Lotte. He decides that he'll have to stay in Dusseldorf for the time being.
Neville is suspended from work when his boss finds out that he's a bricklayer rather than a carpenter. Watching a group of men playing football, Neville spots an unexploded bomb which has been unearthed by a mechanical digger. He raises the alarm and is hailed as a hero. The boss finds a bricklaying job for him. There's a sudden vacancy because Oz has been in a fight with a group of Germans and has been sacked. The German workers go on strike until Oz is reinstated.
Oz's wife, Marjorie, hasn't heard from him for quite a while and she's getting desperate for money. She goes to see Dennis' wife, Vera, and asks her where the lads are in Germany. Oz gets a letter from Marjorie, but marks it 'not known at this address' and sends it back. He takes a trip to watch a football match, gets drunk and wakes up on a plane bound for Newcastle. He makes his way home and gives Marjorie a sob story about not having any money. When Oz is still missing after several days, the lads back in Dusseldorf auction off his belongings and send the proceeds to his Newcatle address. He reappears to find that Marjorie has, apparetly, got the money she wanted from him after all.
Something very expensive goes missing from the hut and they all begin to suspect each other. So in a bid to catch out the culprit various plans are hatched but as usual all of them end in failure. But in the ed it turns out that the thief isn't one of them at all but someone from outside the hut.
Bomber's sixteen-year-old daughter runs away from her home in Bristol, so Bomber returns home to be with his wife while the search for their child continues. The missing daughter finds her way to Germany and turns up on the site looking for her father. The lads decide to hide her in the hut until Bomber returns. But can they keep her a secret from the Germans until Bomber returns?
Neville meets a German girl in a bar and they share a taxi home. The girl is later assaulted and Neville is arrested by the police for the assault and protests his innocence. but none of his English friends are of any use to him it takes a group of German workers from the building site track down the real culprit and force him to give himself up to the police, and therefore freeing Neville.
Dennis is getting it together with Dagmar from the site office. He takes her off to a hotel for a romantic interlude. Meanwhile, Wayne and Barry are 'on the pull' and have met up with a couple of Swedish air hostesses staying at the same hotel. Oz decides to play a practical joke on them, so he rings the hotel and leaves a message telling Barry and Wayne to go up to a particular room. The room is occupied by a German couple who think they're being mugged. Wayne and Barry have to 'do a runner' from the hotel. Their escapades ruin Dennis and Dagmar's chances of a romantic evening.
The lads go off for a weekend's fishing in the country, where they meet up with an English hitchhiker who is very mysterious, they lads suspicions grow when he later runs away from the police. However after a large confruntation the lads find out the truth, the boys turns out to be AWOL from the Army. The lads persuade him to do the right thins and return to his unit.
MacGowan is a violent Irish nutcase. Nobody on the building site likes him and he's always getting into fights and causing trouble. And with Bomber away he ends up as an unwelcome guest in the hut. However the lads find an ingenius way of getting rid of him.
While visiting a local hospital, Dennis and Neville become friendly with a Geordie expatriot named Hedley. He stayed in Germany after 'leaving' the Army and now has a terminal illness. Meanwhile, Oz has come up with a scheme to make money by exporting hardcore pornaographic videos from Germany to England. He talks Barry and Moxie into investing in the scheme and looks for a way to smuggle the videos to England. When Hedley dies suddenly, Oz talks the rest of the lads into paying for the body to be taken back to England for burial. He plans to hide the porno videos in the coffin. Wayne is going home for a family wedding, so he's talked into visiting Hedley's sister and arranging for the body to be handed over. He discovers that she doesn't want anything to do with her brother, who was apparently thrown out of the Army for racketeering. Hedley is cremated in Germany and Oz learns that his investment has gone up in smoke.
Barry talks the lads into redecorating the hut, using paint 'redistributed' from the site stores. Oz pretends to be a rich man's son to impress a German girl. He falls in love with her, only to discover that she has a Turkish boyfriend who owns a local 'sauna parlour'. Oz almost ends up being knifed by the Turk, but is rescued when the Turks on the building site convince the wouldbe attacker that Oz is 'otherwise inclined'.
Dennis' wife, Vera, visits him in Dusseldorf and tells him that she wants to try to rescue their marriage. With Vera and the kids back home to consider, will he sty in Germany or Returnt the Sunny shores of England? Meanwhile, Wayne has fallen in love with Christa, a secretary in the site office.
It's just about time to pack up and go home now that the German government has decided that all foreign workers will have to register and pay income tax. Dennis has decided to go back to Vera, so he plans to spend one last night with Dagmar. The rest of the lads go out on the town. When they get back to the building site, a fire starts and the hut is burnt to the ground. They all go round to stay the night at Dagmar's place. Next day, the lads go their separate ways and Dennis, Neville and Oz catch the ferry back to England.
2004
Russia. A marble staircase. Oz descends in his dirty, worn white underpants to join the others over a morning cuppa. The house is magnificent - another job well done. It is payday, and after a celebratory vodka, the boys head outside for a final photo, where the house explodes behind them, leaving them penniless and with no way home. The lads head to the British Embassy, where Oz knows an old Geordie contact who tells the team about the existence of the Overseas Estates Development department which arranges for British workmen to travel round the world fixing up British Government property. The gang plan their letter of application on the way home: ""We are independent building contractors with a vast amount of experience. We recently reassembled the Middlesbrough Transporter Bridge in Arizona, which must count as one of the most famous erections in recent years."" Neville turns down the opportunity this time, but he is approached by a member of MI6, and is asked to work undercover.
Perhaps it's the heat, or the Cuban rum, or maybe it's just creeping middle-age but strange things are happening to TV's best-known gang of Geordie brickies. Neville, for instance, has turned into Newcastle's version of ""Our Man in Havana"", furtively sneaking around the place muttering the name of Heather to everyone in the hope of finding his ""contact"" in the British Embassy. Meanwhile Oz is giving flowers to a beautiful Cuban prima ballerina, and dear Barry is still having therapy by mobile phone.
The lads are sent out into the Cuban countryside to collect an antique bath, a present from Castro to the British Ambassador. Sounds like an easy job, until Barry goes missing…
Neville's first mission is to get to know Michael works for a pharmaceutical company. As if being suspected of spying isn't bad enough, Michael is also a Manchester United fan. Neville is given a Man U shirt in order to pass himself off as a fan to get close to Michael. The things some people will do for their country.
The Cuban's are convinced Barry is a spy after discovering his Russian connections. Oz faces a major blow in his relationship with Ofelia after word comes from the British Embassy that they want his relationship with Ofelia to end.
Pru comes to the aid of Neville after he is kidnapped. Pru explains to Neville that Tarquin has not been entirely honest with him. Oz visits Barry in jail and finds that he's suffering badly. Oz makes a decision that will help Barry, but will damage his relationship with, Ofelia.
Streaming availability information not available
1986
Barry needs some help to finish renovating his house in Wolverhampton before he marries his girlfriend, Hazel. He sends out an SOS to his old pals from Dusseldorf. Dennis, Neville, Wayne and Bomber turn up to help out. They all go off for a drink and come back to find an intruder in Barry's house. It's Moxie - unknown to the others, he's escaped from prison.
Tim Healy
Dennis Patterson
Kevin Whately
Neville Hope
Jimmy Nail
Leonard 'Oz' Osborne
Christopher Fairbank
Albert Moxey
Timothy Spall
Barry Taylor
Pat Roach
Brian 'Bomber' Busbridge
Julia Tobin
Brenda Hope
Dennis has to go back to Newcastle to see his boss, Ally Fraser. While he's there, he meets up with Oz and brings him back to Wolverhampton. Ally Fraser asks him to put together a work gang to renovate an old manor house in Derbyshire.
The gang, minus Barry, arrive at Thornley Manor to start the renovation work. One of the locals reports them to the police, thinking they're housebreakers. They're staying at a local pub, where landlord Arthur Pringle takes an instant dislike to them.
It's discovered that Thornley Manor is a listed building, so the lads are forced to stop work. Arthur Pringle throws everyone out of the pub after he catches Wayne in bed with his daughter.
The lads can't find accommodation because Arthur Pringle has 'put the word out' about them. They have to 'rough it' in Thornley Manor. Then they find an amateur video showing sexy goings on at the Manor - with Arthur Pringle as one of the stars.
A plumber named Harry Blackburn, who's mad about Country and Western music, joins the gang temporarily. He talks the gang into going for a night out at a Country and Western pub, where ""Big Willie Osborne"" does a turn. The lads go on strike in protest against Ally Fraser's treatment of Dennis. Fraser sends a gang of 'heavies' around to teach the strikers a lesson. The lads give them a ""good kicking""
Ally Fraser wants the conversion work at Thornley Manor to be finished quickly. He offers the lads some more work renovating his villa in Spain. Arthur Pringle discovers that Wayne didn't bother to get an import license for his German car. He tells the Customs & Excise and they impound Wayne's car. The lads help to get the car back and manage to finish the work at the manor. Before leaving, they brick up Arthur Pringle's front door.
Oz goes back to Newcastle and finds that his wife Marjorie has moved away and someone else is living in his flat. He goes to his son Rod's school and waits for the lad to come out. He learns that Marjorie is now living with an Italian named Sandro. She plans to move to Italy with him, taking Rod with her.
After some delays, the lads finally set out for Spain, Dennis gets a phone call from Ally in the departure lounge saying they are not going yet due to complications. These are all sorted out, and they fly out that weekend, pretending to be tourists and sharing a plane with the Spennymoor and district senior citizens society. .
Spain turns out to be a bit of a let-down, with a distinct lack of the 'action' some of the lads were looking forward to. The gang have problems with the local police after they go swimming in someone's pool, thinking it belongs to Ally Fraser. A British journalist thinks the lads are a gang of bank robbers on the run. They end up being featured in all of the British tabloid newspapers.
The lads have a few days off work. Ally tells them to make a real effort to persuade everyone that they're tourist rather than illegal workers.
Hazel arrives in Spain and Barry tries to get wedding plans sorted out. Ally Fraser suggests that the happy couple should get married on Kenny Aimes' yacht. Unkown to the lads, Fraser plans to use the wedding as a cover for smuggling his money into Spain.
Dennis manages to get the upper hand, forcing Ally Fraser to ""wipe the slate clean"". Oz has a fling with Ally Fraser's girlfriend, Vicki. He also wins the Spanish lottery. The day of the wedding arrives and Barry and Hazel are married at sea. Ally Fraser turns up in another boat, closely followed by a Customs boat. The series ends with Kenny Aimes' yacht heading for Tangiers, with the Customs in hot pursuit.
Zoë Eeles
Tina
Javier Alcina
Raúl Ortiz
Caroline Harker
Pru Scott-Johns
How to Sell Drugs Online (Fast)
2019
