The show was writer David Renwick’s first situation comedy after having spent a number of years writing sketches for the likes of the Two Ronnies and Alexei Sayle. Renwick created the lead character, Victor Meldrew, with Scottish actor Richard Wilson in mind, but Wilson initially turned down the role because he felt he was too young to play a 60-year-old man. Luckily, he reconsidered and a new hero for the 1990s made his debut on January 4, 1990.

The first episode, “Alive and Buried,” introduced Victor Meldrew just as he was about to be made redundant from his job as a security guard, and replaced by a computer chip. From then on Victor’s life is portrayed as a never-ending battle against the rest of the world. Everything conspires against him, from his neighbors, to shop assistants, to God. The series showed that elderly people did not have one foot in the grave, but wanted to lead lives actively like anybody else. However, Renwick cleverly created situations which would anger anyone but which, bizarrely, could only happen to Victor Meldrew. In “Valley of Sleep,” for example, Victor finds himself in hospital with suspected appendicitis. It is only when the male nurse who is shaving him begins discussing the price of property on the moon that we, along with Victor, gradually become aware that the nurse is, in fact, a mental patient. In “The Worst Horror of All” Victor is convinced that the skip (dumpster) he has hired will have an old mattress dumped in it in the morning. When he wakes, his familiar cry of “I don’t believe it” reveals that someone has in fact dumped a Citroen 2CV into the skip. Renwick skillfully returns to his original joke, however, for when Victor opens the car door, out falls the mattress which he had so feared he would find.

The program’s other constant character is Victor’s long-suffering wife Margaret, played by the often underrated Annette Crosbie. She has to bear the brunt of most of Victor’s grumpiness, and, although he sometimes irritates her immensely, we are never left in any doubt that she loves him dearly. It is to Renwick’s credit that he has occasionally been able to insert some moments of great pathos in which we learn a little more about Margaret and come to understand why she and Victor may be unable to live without each other. Although they are childless, we do learn in “Timeless Time” that they had a son who died as a baby, but we never learn how.

The series has not been without controversy. Some viewers objected when Margaret found a dead cat nestling among the fish-sticks in her freezer, and others when an old lady got trapped overnight in their loft. The program was censured for content in the “Hearts of Darkness” episode. In one scene, set in an old peoples’ home, a resident was abused and kicked, actions that offended a number of elderly viewers. The scene was cut slightly when the episode was repeated.

In addition to his two main characters, Renwick also created an idiosyncratic supporting cast: Margaret’s friend Mrs. Warbouys (Doreen Mantle), to whom Victor can barely be civil; Nick Swainey, the social worker who lives next door and constantly refers to his (unseen) bedridden mother; and Patrick and Pippa, next-door neighbors, whose lives are made a misery from the moment they first meet the Meldrews.

Renwick has constantly tried to extend the boundaries of situation comedy, not only with the situations his characters have to face, but also within the confines of the 30-minute program. In “Timeless Time” the whole episode is devoted to a sleepless night, in which Victor and Margaret toss and turn, agonizing over life, and during which no other characters are involved and we never leave the bedroom. The first ten minutes of “Heart of Darkness” contain virtually no dialogue; the only sound is a musical accompaniment. “The Beast in the Cage” sees the Meldrews stuck in a traffic jam for the whole episode. This daring culminated in “Trial,” when Victor was given an entire episode to himself as he waited at home to be called for jury service. As many newspapers pointed out, this was the first time any actor had been given this comedy accolade since the great Tony Hancock.

Renwick finally decided to write one last series, and in November 2000, Victor was killed in a road accident—ironically by a new friend of his wife. It was a sad and tragic end for one of Britain’s greatest comic heroes, and even Meldrew himself would have railed against the injustice of his final moment being upstaged by ITV, which screened the first millionaire winner of Who Wants To Be A Millionaire as a spoiler on the same night. It was probably a fitting end, as Victor Meldrew was the comic hero of his time, and just as much a part of it as were Harold Steptoe and Basil Fawlty of theirs.