History Series / Rev

* StoryArc: In series 2 Adam and Alex are trying for a baby, which becomes both a major and minor plot point in the episodes.

** Archdeacon Robert worries a few times about what the Dean might have to say about what's going on in Adam's parish, giving the impression that the Dean is senior to him in the church hierarchy. In actual fact, though, in the Church of England, a diocese is divided into archdeaconries, which are in turn divided into deaneries -- so the reverse is actually true. Unless of course he's talking about the Dean of St. Paul's Cathedral, although it is unlikely that he would be interested in the goings-on in an East London parish church.

* ImpersonatingAnOfficer: An ecclesiastical variation: In "Ever Been to Nando's?", Adam is picked up by the police on suspicion of ''impersonating a vicar''. Even though the officers aren't entirely sure if that's actually illegal. Turns out, though, someone has been going round London pretending to be a vicar in order to enjoy the various benefits that that entails. [[spoiler: It's later revealed to be Colin.]]

'''Rev.''' (2010-14) is a [[Creator/TheBBC BBC]] television sitcom. The Reverend Adam Smallbone (Tom Hollander) is an Anglican vicar who has recently been transferred from a small rural parish to the "socially disunited" inner-city parish of St Saviour in the Marshes in East London. Unable to turn anyone away from his new appointment, Smallbone is faced with a collection of moral challenges as he balances the needs of genuine believers, people on the streets and drug addicts as well as with the demands of social climbers using the church to get their children into the best schools.

'''Rev.''' (2010-14) is a [[Creator/TheBBC BBC]] television sitcom. Reverend Adam Smallbone is an Anglican vicar who has recently been transferred from a small rural parish to the "socially disunited" inner-city parish of St Saviour in the Marshes in East London. Unable to turn anyone away from his new appointment, Smallbone is faced with a collection of moral challenges as he balances the needs of genuine believers, people on the streets and drug addicts as well as with the demands of social climbers using the church to get their children into the best schools.

Adam has an impossibly difficult job being a good modern city vicar and his wife, Alex, does her best to support him, but she's got her own career as a solicitor to worry about and she is no one's idea of a conventional vicar's wife. He is also supported by lay reader Nigel, although he firmly believes that he should be the one running the church. In immediate supervision is Archdeacon Robert, who continually puts pressure on Adam to increase the congregation and church income.

** When Adam blesses the marriage of a gay couple in such a way that causes everyone to think that he actually ''married'' them, Archdeacon Robert says that he could get defrocked as a result. In actual fact, defrocking is very rare in the Church of England; the suspension of his licence to preach and administer the sacraments within the diocese would be a more likely punishment.
* AsHimself: In a series 1 episode where Adam is trying to get onto the media like rival reverend Roland Wise, [[NewscasterCameo John Humphrys, Jonathan Dimbleby]] and ''The One Show'' presenters Christine Bleakley and Adrian Chiles appear as themselves.[[note]]Unfortunately, between filming and broadcast both Bleakley and Chiles had defected to ITV and were no longer presenting ''The One Show''.[[/note]]

** A more subtle one: Early on in Matthew Feld's episode, he and Adam are both seen riding bicycles. Adam's bike seems to be a somewhat slow and cumbersome model in comparison to Matthew's much lighter racing bike. Also, Adam is wearing a luminous jacket and a helmet, while Matthew ... isn't. [[spoiler: Later on, Matthew is the one who gets killed as a result of being hit by a lorry while cycling.]]

* StraightGay: While he is, in retrospect, a little bit camp, [[spoiler:Robert]]'s being gay is only revealed when Adam and Nigel catch him and his boyfriend bed-shopping.

* VillainWithGoodPublicity: Darren, whose church has attracted a large and mostly young following despite the fact that it openly offers courses which purport to "cure" people of homosexuality.

** The strange tramp Adam encounters in episode five of season three seems to be little more than a weird, cliche-babbling eccentric ... [[spoiler: until [[{{God}} He]] suddenly refers to Adam by name, despite having no possible way of knowing who he is.]]

* {{Novelization}}: In 2014, ''The Rev. Diaries'' was published. It's [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin Adam's "diary"]], retelling the events of the first series. In the introduction, he states that he decided to keep a diary of his tenure at St. Saviour's in the hope that in years to come, he'll be celebrated as the C of E's equivalent of [[Literature/TheDiaryOfSamuelPepys Samuel Pepys]], or maybe Literature/BridgetJones.

* AesopAmnesia: Adam needs to learn the lesson he [[RecycledScript keeps being taught]] about not {{envy}}ing people who are [[AlwaysSomeoneBetter better at their jobs than him]] before their inevitable bad luck gets someone ki- [[KilledOffForReal oh, too late]].

* OverzealousUnderling: The guys with the low-loader who tow away ''a hearse'' from outside the church definitely count. Even though we only hear Adam's side of his subsequent complaint to the council, it's clear that whoever is on the other end of the phone can't quite believe that anyone would actually do that.

** The night before Adam's goddaughter comes to stay, Alex is sitting in bed reading ''Literature/TheSlap''. She's severely tempted to hurt the EnfanteTerrible by the end of the weekend, while Nigel very nearly gives her a slap in the face.

** When Adam and Nigel are holding a minute's silence at the local war memorial, everyone else is carrying on with their daily business as usual. A group of uniformed schoolkids are playing football, and one of them comes over to verbally abuse them. Although it is ''possible'' that Adam and Nigel are doing this on Armistice Day (11th November) itself [[note]] which fell on a Thursday in 2010, the year in which that particular episode was first broadcast [[/note]], they would be more likely to be doing it on the nearest ''Sunday'' which is commemorated as Remembrance Sunday in Britain; it's therefore unlikely that there would be uniformed schoolkids and roadworks. Plus, you'd think a few others (Adoha and Colin at the very least) would've shown up as well.

* {{Hypocrite}}: Most of the parents who suddenly start going to church when the primary school gets a good inspection report count as this, especially the MP.
* ImpersonatingAnOfficer: An ecclesiastical variation: In "Ever Been to Nando's?", Adam is picked up by the police on suspicion of impersonating a ''vicar''. Even though the officers aren't entirely sure if that's actually illegal. Turns out, though, someone has been going round London pretending to be a vicar in order to enjoy the various benefits that that entails. [[spoiler: It's later revealed to be Colin.]]