Follow TV Tropes

Following

Recap / Only Fools And Horses S 3 E 05 May The Force Be With You

Go To

Why's he keeping Del Boy in there?

The first Roy Slater episode. First broadcast 8 December 1983.

Del Boy's arch-enemy from school turns up in Peckham, but this time he's known as Detective Inspector Slater of the Metropolitan Police. Having known Del and his wily ways since they were at school together, Slater knows exactly who to watch when he's on the trail of some stolen microwaves.

Rodney, on the other hand, has no idea who Slater is when he gets chatting to him in The Nag's Head. It's only when he sees the horror on Del's face, after bringing Slater back to the flat for a reunion meal, that Rodney realises something is wrong. Despite Rodney's best efforts, the game appears to be up — one of the microwaves in question is sitting on the sideboard in full view of everybody. Slater immediately begins to question Del, and after threatening Rodney with fictitious drug charges, he forces Del to turn snitch.

Much against his better judgement, Del decides to protect his family and spills the beans, but only after bartering for immunity for the whole Trotter family. Once free from the threat of prosecution, he gladly tells Slater that he stole the microwaves!

Tropes:

  • Artistic License – History: Bluebeard (Gilles de Rais) was not a pirate or seafarer. Of course, Del and his childhood friends could have confused him with Blackbeard (Edward Teach).
  • Batman Gambit: Del defeats Slater by exploiting his desire to have him under his thumb for all time - he gets himself immunity from prosecution if he reveals who stole a microwave. It was him.
  • Black-and-Gray Morality: Del may be a chancer, con-man and petty criminal but at the end of the day he is well-meaning and will always try to do right by the people he cares for. Roy Slater, on the other hand, is a mean-spirited Dirty Cop who will use any means necessary to get what he wants.
  • Create Your Own Villain: Del and his gang’s childhood bullying of Roy Slater comes back to haunt them in a big way.
  • Dirty Cop: Roy "The Slag" Slater.
  • The Dog Bites Back: Slater's grudge against Del and his friends comes from his being the Butt-Monkey to them as a child.
  • Establishing Character Moment: In his very first scene, Slater tells his old schoolmate Trigger to address him as "Mr Slater" or "Sir", then makes Trig buy him a drink. Then when he's talking to Del, he reveals that he's no longer on speaking terms with his father due to an incident where Slater arrested him for having a broken light on his bicycle. A bicycle which Slater lent him. Of course, these are fairly light-hearted examples. Just how much of a bastard he really is comes later, when he threatens Grandad.
  • Implied Death Threat: Slater tells Del that if he and Rodney get arrested, Grandad will be left in their council flat ... alone. Del immediately grasps the implications of this and it cements Slater's status as a genuine threat rather than a Sitcom Arch-Nemesis.
  • Inspector Javert: Roy Slater will nick for anything you've done! In fact he will nick you for anything you haven't done and he won't let a little thing like "Innocence" get in his way!
  • Jerkass Has a Point: Loathsome he may be, but Slater is definitely onto something when he suspects Del of being behind the stolen microwaves.
  • Kick the Dog: Slater in every other scene in which he appears, from petty crimes like sending his assistant on his break just as the police station canteen closes, to serious offences like blackmail and extortion. Perhaps the biggest moment comes after Del tells him that he'd rather go to prison than reveal who gave him a stolen microwave. Slater tells him that if he does that, he'll also make sure that Rodney gets convicted on made-up charges of drug possession and ends up with a sentence at least as long as Del's, and to really put the boot in he also says that he'll use his contacts on the street to make sure the local criminals know that Grandad would be alone and vulnerable.
  • Literal-Minded: Granddad recoils when he sees a Watch Out, There's A Thief About poster while waiting with Rodney.
  • Loophole Abuse: Del is given the choice of either he and Rodney going to prison or giving up the name of the thief. He opted for the latter, on the condition that he and his family all get signed immunity for charges relating to the microwave. After receiving this, he tells Slater that he was the thief.
  • Oh, Crap!: After Granddad learns Slater is in the police, his jaw drops for about thirty seconds. A couple of minutes later in the same episode, the whole family gets one when Slater arrests them. At the end, Slater himself has one when Del's Batman Gambit pays off.
  • Shame If Something Happened: Slater invokes this when he suggests that if Del and Rodney were to go to prison, Grandad would be left to live alone on their estate.
  • Suspect Is Hatless: The Trotters' combined description of the microwave thief leaves a little to be desired...
    Slater: According to you and your family, we are looking for a 6ft 7in dwarf, aged between 15 and 50. A white male with oriental features, who's as black as Newgate's knocker!
  • Walk the Plank: Roy Slater complains that he was always the one who had to walk the plank when they played pirates in the local park pond as kids. Del points out that they did let him play Bluebeard once. Slater responds that was the day that Bluebeard had to walk the plank.

Top