Laura: I'm sorry Gavin, you'd rather not talk about it.
Gavin: Oh no, I don't care who knows anymore.
Julie: It's alright, he says he don't care anymore.
— Julie Porter interrupting a conversation between Gavin Featherly and Laura Lancing so she and several other members of staff can hear the latest gossip.
- Date First Aired: 07/02/1994
It's Energy Conservation Week here at the centre, and Brittas has surprised Laura by coming in early, having been left home alone after Helen got confused over when their holiday to Cornwall will be and left early. Just like the year before. Laura decides to offer Brittas supper at her place, stating that he doesn't have to take the offer right away, leaving him to think about it.
Meanwhile, for Energy Saving Week, Colin has constructed a generator powered by the centre's waste material, but is having difficulty getting volunteers for it. Afterwards, a redhead named Jennifer comes into the centre, claiming to be Gavin's fiancée. Poor Tim finds out and is horrified.
Brittas talks with Jennifer. Apparently, she's an amnesiac who can't remember anything before her 16th birthday and as such, doesn't remember her parents. They also got engaged five years ago when Gavin was 19 and in relations for some trouble at the gym, although she had a relapse and was sent back to a mental home soon after. However, her attempts to house-hunt are stopped by Brittas' unwillingness to let Gavin shirk his pool duty, leading her to go mad again.
Laura finds out that the suitcases left by the taxi driver contain petrol and other equipment needed to create fires. As it turns out, Jennifer escaped from the mental house and intends to create fires all through out the centre. Brittas, trying to find Colin for putting signs up on all of the bathrooms warning of danger, ends up having his leg catch on fire trying to put out one of the fires and is wired into the waste disposal unit by Jennifer. Thankfully, her fit of anger at Brittas helps a long way to curing her of her mental problems. They attempt to rescue Brittas but he is electrocuted before they can.
Jennifer goes back to the clinic (although the doctors believe it won't be for long), Gavin calls off the engagement, and Brittas decides to go to dinner with Laura in the end.
Tropes featured in this episode:
- "Anger Is Healthy" Aesop: An interesting example in this case as Brittas' tendencies to piss off those he talks to are usually given negative consequences - Jenny starts out being unable to express her anger beyond Pyromaniac tendencies after the death of her parents and is subsequently sent to a clinic to recover. However, Brittas pisses her off so much that the memories of her parents unlock, and she is said to be on the road to recovery by the end of the episode.
- Blatant Lies: Some of Colin's excuses to divert people away from most of the toilets really stretch it, including radiation leaks and adverse weather conditions.
- Bookends: The episode begins and ends with Brittas interrupting Laura from an activity - in the case of the opening, it's her exercising, whilst in the case of the final scene, it's her showering.
- Creature of Habit: The reason that Jennifer tried to burn down the centre in the first place was that Brittas was unwilling to remove Gavin from the timetable so that she and him could go house hunting.
- A Day in the Limelight: For Gavin, as the episode revolves around an old flame of his coming back and driving a wedge between him and Tim. It also reveals a bit more of his previous history before his time at the leisure centre.
- Distressed Dude: Brittas gets hooked up into Colin's waste disposal unit and hit by Jennifer.
- Dramatic Drop: Hearing that Gavin has a fiancee causes Carole to drop the tray of muffins she was holding. Tim manages to hear this over the intercom and comes running in to see what's going on, allowing him to hear of the news.
- Dramatic Thunder: The sound of thunder plays whenever Colin mentions getting his methane digester up to "DOMESTIC VOLTAGE!".
- Earth Day Episode: This episode takes place during "Energy Conservation Week", with Brittas seeing it partially as an opportunity to point out how overuse of energy can hurt the resources of the Earth. The main impact on it comes with Colin's methane generator, but several other jokes relating to it are made as well, such as Brittas actually wasting more energy printing pamphlets and forms for it and Carole plugging in all of her eco-conscious kitchen appliances to the one energy socket.
- Fiery Redhead: Gavin's secret, long-lost fiance Jenny is not only a redhead but also a mentally disturbed Pyromaniac who sets fire to things and plays with fireworks as a form of anger management.
- Genius Ditz: Colin is a massive idiot, yet he still constructs a machine to recycle toilet waste into methane and thence into electricity. The centre could be completely self-powered if only everyone went to the bathroom a little more.
- Harmless Electrocution: Brittas is electrocuted when hooked up to Colin's waste disposal unit, but aside from a few twitches, he is more or less fine.
- Horrible Honeymoon: It's implied that something happened on the second day of Brittas and Helen's honeymoon which made Brittas realize that the woman he had married was... not the most mentally stable of women.Mr. Brittas: Some very successful marriages are to disturbed ladies. At least you have the advantage of knowing now and not finding out two days into the honeymoon!
- I Drank WHAT?!: Colin, discussing his "methane digester" with Laura, mentions that it's so effective, that it makes toilet water safe enough for human digestion. Laura, realising that Colin probably used it for the cup of coffee that she got from him, proceeds to put it away.
- Man on Fire: Downplayed. Brittas finds several small fires that were set up by Gavin’s long-lost fiancée Jenny. As he is trying to put them out, the fire spreads onto his leg, causing him to go around partially on fire yelping "Help me! Help me!".
- Marshmallow Hell: Carole accidentally does this to Tim when she tries to make him feel better after Gavin's fiancée Jenny returns.
- Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: Brittas angers a mentally unstable Jenny into trying to burn down the centre.
- Noodle Incident:
- Brittas tried to get everyone to use a bowel coordination chart at the last staff meeting, although they refused.
- How Gavin was sent to relations in Derbyshire. All that he'll reveal is that it involved trouble at the local gym and that it led to a court case.
- It's implied that something happened on the second day of Brittas and Helen's honeymoon that made Brittas realise that he had married a mentally unstable woman.
- Linda mentions she has no parents but never elaborates on what happened to them.
- No Sense of Personal Space: Brittas, as per his usual No Social Skills, asks Laura out for dinner whilst she's still in the shower and intends to talk to her about it whilst she's getting dressed.
- Old Flame: Jennifer, whom Gavin had intended to marry before she was sent away to a mental home. Naturally, when she reappears, this causes tension in the relationship that Gavin is currently having with Tim, although it's revealed at the end that Gavin no longer has feelings for her.
- One-Shot Character: Jennifer Pelham Young.
- Parental Abandonment:
- Jennifer's parents died in a plane crash when she was 16, which eventually led to her gaining Repressed Memories.
- Linda casually mentions that she's glad that she doesn't have any parents, although how this situation came to pass is never explained.Linda: It's always the parents, isn't it? Glad I didn't have any.
- The Patient Has Left the Building: It's revealed later on in the episode that Jennifer was not cured of her tendency to start fires after all - she was on day release and took the opportunity to flee, prompting a hunt by the clinic holding her.
- Pyromaniac: Gavin's old fiancée Jennifer, who starts several fires.
- Repressed Memories: Jennifer repressed her memories of her parents following their deaths, which is explained as it being the result of an internal conflict where she was angry at them leaving her, (not helped by the fact they had little time for her when they were still alive), but she also had to listen to everyone talk about how good they were as well. They're eventually unrepressed after she lashes out at Brittas.
- Sanity Slippage: Jenny is mostly stable after escaping from the mental home. Then she meets Brittas...
- Serial Homewrecker: Linda has apparently dated a lot of men who were engaged, something which she tells Tim in a bid to calm him down over Gavin being apparently engaged.
- Shower of Awkward: Laura's shower at the end of the episode is interrupted by Brittas, who wants to tell her that he's accepted the offer of dinner with her. Being the sort of man who doesn't understand personal space, he proceeds to wait outside whilst telling her that they can knock out the details as she's getting changed.
- Singing in the Shower: Laura can be heard humming in the shower off-screen just before Brittas disturbs her.
- Something We Forgot: Subverted. Brittas thinks that this is what Helen has done after she and the children head off for a holiday without him. However, it's heavily implied that Helen did this deliberately to get away from him, as she had done the exact same thing the year before that.
- Twitchy Eye:
- Jennifer has one after Brittas tells her that Gavin can't be removed from the timetable.
- Brittas suffers one after being electrocuted by Colin's waste disposal unit.
- When You Coming Home, Dad?: Jennifer's parents didn't pay much attention to her while they were alive.
- Whole-Plot Reference: The episode takes on a lot of plot parallels to Jane Eyre as it goes on, with Gavin as Mr. Rochester, Jenny as Bertha, and Tim as Jane.
- Written-In Absence: The only episode not to feature Pippa Haywood as Helen with the excuse that she was away on holiday without Brittas.Laura: You're not usually in this early, are you Mr. Brittas?Mr. Brittas: No, no, no. No, this is usually family breakfast time, but they're all down in Cornwall.Laura: I thought you were taking a holiday next week?Mr. Brittas: I am Laura. Unfortunately, Helen got a bit confused over the dates and booked the wrong week.Laura: So they've gone on holiday without you?Mr. Brittas: ... Funnily enough, they made exactly the same mistake last year. Still, these things happen, eh?
- Workout Fanservice: When we first see Laura, she's shown to be working out in fairly short workout clothes.
