Episode guide > The lottery experiment

The costs of keeping the time machine going are starting to take their toll on Turner. So to help her out Slade devises a plan to win the lottery and thus solve all her money worries. Turner isn't convinced as time won't let you cheat, however Slade has found a loop hole! He will wait to find out what the numbers are, and travel back in time, tell Holly who then buys a ticket and collects the money. As he himself isn't buying the ticket no paradox can occur. Some what convinced Turner agrees to let him try.

Slade goes back in time, and try as he does, he can not get the winning numbers to Turner in time. Either she doesn't answer the phone, her fax machine has run out of paper, or she wipes her notice board without looking at it. A note is covered by a tray, or a portable phone has a dead battery! To make matters worse, as he leaves the office (as he is supposed to be on a training course!) Grisham, stops him and puts him on a bank robbery case. A case which if the culprits aren't caught and the gold returned could cost her, her job.

In the end Slade is left with no choice but to get Nicky to buy a lottery ticket for him, which he does. However he mis-reads the numbers Slade gave him, and only gets four numbers right out of the six. Winning only £186 instead of a share of the jackpot.

Guest cast

Du Cann

Sissons

Comissioner

Frank

Janine

Charlie

James

Bayly or Green?

Bayly or Green?

Episode review

by Stephen Henning

The penultimate episode of the series is unusual in that the focus of the story is not the crime. The bank robbery is the sideshow to perhaps the fullest development of Jeff Slade's relationship with Holly Turner out of all the episodes, despite the fact that Holly's role in the story is minimal.

The question posed throughout the series is, does Slade really care for Holly, or is he just using her for her time machine? Michael French, an expert at playing rogue characters, is as much a cad as ever in this episode, and ultimately he remains enigmatic on this issue.

In the previous episode, Death Minister, Slade and Holly fall out over Slade's reliance upon, and illegal use of, the time machine. At that point, Slade's character risks being damaged as it almost portrays him as a poor policeman, reliant on Holly to further his career, who cares little for her feelings as long as he can solve the case and take the credit. The Lottery Experiment partly redresses that, and begins with a reconciliation. Holly looks flustered and almost swoons at Slade's feet when he gives her the flowers, and we soon see them cosily sharing a bottle of wine, with Slade plausibly repentant. The flowers, however, are stolen, and his ulterior motive in coming round is to use the machine to win the lottery, although he is quick to point out that this isn't for his own personal gain, and Holly believes him.

In this episode, however, Slade's preoccupation with winning the money, which he ultimately hopes to keep at least half of himself, even puts the importance of the case into the shade. It is ironic, that when he is least interested in solving the crime, ie the bank robbery, this is the one case that he does solve all by himself without the aid of the machine.

The ingenuity of Slade never being able to contact Holly, interlinked with his investigations into the robbery, make this episode one of the best. Perhaps it was part of the appeal of the series that Slade never wanted to play by the rules, and this made his relationship with Holly, who lived her life by rules and principles, all the more exciting.

Footnote

For those not in the UK, and bit of background into our lottery might be useful.

Here in the UK we have two lottery draws, one on Wednesday (The Mid-Week Draw), and one on Saturday (The Main Draw). To play you must chose 6 numbers between 1 and 49, and mark them off on a card. You then give the card to a lottery vendor, and pay for it much the same way as other lotteries. The cost is £1 (sterling) per line. The draw takes place at roughly 20:00 hours with jackpots of roughly £4 million (sterling) on Wednesdays and £8 million (sterling) on Saturdays.

The draws are made on live TV and broadcast on BBC1, and radio 5 live. A total of seven balls are drawn, six main balls, and the bonus ball. To win any money you must have one of the following:-

If no-one wins the jackpot on any given draw, it is rolled-over to the next one. So if no-one wins on Saturday, the jackpot is added to the Wednesday draw and vice-versa.