For those of us who are accident prone, this beautifully plotted episode together with the previous one - The Chop - offers the prospect of redemption.
Brittas, having been sacked, has a job as a petrol pump attendant and as would be expected, creates chaos, concentrating on meaningless superficiality, rather than selling petrol - causing frustration and anger, especially to a tanker driver with a delivery for the Leisure Centre.
After being sacked, Gordon goes onto the Centre with a gift for former staff, he is surprised how busy it is, meets Alan the slightly grubby new manager, who nevertheless does seem to know how to run it. And bangs a Swiss Clock with moving parts - his gift - into the wall of the staff room.
The incident with the drill flying off and landing between the new manager's legs, ensuing gas leak, the spark from the motion of the clock causing a fireball as the Centre explodes while Alan is in Town, is like a cartoon jigsaw, each piece neatly fitting in place.
Having chased Gordon around the Centre, the furious tanker driver who blamed him for all his problems at the petrol station and thereafter, hooks him to a stake, which amazingly helps him hold the roof up as it collapses around him, until like a latter-day war hero he walks through the dust to waiting emergency services and camera crews with Ben, Carol's son and some others he's rescued.
It's a lesson for us all. You don't have to be heroic to be a hero, nor a clown to be a fool. Sometimes, with luck on your side, you can do the right thing and push many of your personal deficiencies aside.
Doing the right thing the wrong way almost always leads to disaster. In this case, Brittas does the wrong thing the right way and achieves some sort of salvation - with tabloids clamouring for him to be reinstated as Manager. As long, one would assume, as their readers don't need to visit a leisure centre.
An epic, expensively made episode with true pathos at its end. In the end, anyone whose heart is in the right place, deserves some sort of credit.
Brittas, having been sacked, has a job as a petrol pump attendant and as would be expected, creates chaos, concentrating on meaningless superficiality, rather than selling petrol - causing frustration and anger, especially to a tanker driver with a delivery for the Leisure Centre.
After being sacked, Gordon goes onto the Centre with a gift for former staff, he is surprised how busy it is, meets Alan the slightly grubby new manager, who nevertheless does seem to know how to run it. And bangs a Swiss Clock with moving parts - his gift - into the wall of the staff room.
The incident with the drill flying off and landing between the new manager's legs, ensuing gas leak, the spark from the motion of the clock causing a fireball as the Centre explodes while Alan is in Town, is like a cartoon jigsaw, each piece neatly fitting in place.
Having chased Gordon around the Centre, the furious tanker driver who blamed him for all his problems at the petrol station and thereafter, hooks him to a stake, which amazingly helps him hold the roof up as it collapses around him, until like a latter-day war hero he walks through the dust to waiting emergency services and camera crews with Ben, Carol's son and some others he's rescued.
It's a lesson for us all. You don't have to be heroic to be a hero, nor a clown to be a fool. Sometimes, with luck on your side, you can do the right thing and push many of your personal deficiencies aside.
Doing the right thing the wrong way almost always leads to disaster. In this case, Brittas does the wrong thing the right way and achieves some sort of salvation - with tabloids clamouring for him to be reinstated as Manager. As long, one would assume, as their readers don't need to visit a leisure centre.
An epic, expensively made episode with true pathos at its end. In the end, anyone whose heart is in the right place, deserves some sort of credit.