Fatal Extraction

"**Fatal Extraction**" is the twelfth Christmas special episode of the BBC sitcom *Only Fools and Horses*, first broadcast on 25 December 1993. In the episode, Raquel leaves Del so in response he asks out another woman. When he and Raquel are reconciled, Del becomes convinced that the woman is stalking him.

## Synopsis

With Christmas coming to Peckham, which is suffering from recent riots, Del Boy has been drinking every night at *The Nag's Head* as well as picked up a sore tooth. Raquel is not pleased about it, since she hardly sees him now. Meanwhile, Rodney and Cassandra's marriage has been going so well that they have decided to try and have a baby. At Sid's café, Del talks about the time he first met a woman at a betting shop in Lewisham Grove when he was a teenager.

Rodney catches Del gambling at the One-Eleven Club one night, and Del explains that he is striking a deal with the club's owner Ronnie Nelson to get hold of some Russian Army camcorders to flog for Christmas. Rodney pleads with Del to spare a thought for Raquel, however the brothers eventually gamble all the way through the night until 8:00am the next morning, only to be told Ronnie wasn't in that night.

At the market, Del and Rodney are flogging ski gear, until Cassandra calls Rodney back to their flat. Rodney is surprised when he finds Raquel and Damien at his flat. Raquel explains that she has left Del, and Rodney are letting her and Damien are staying at their flat until Del apologises.

Later, at *The Nag's Head*, Boycie, Del, Denzil, Mike and Trigger discuss their problems with women. Boycie then tells them about how he met a woman in the same betting shop when he was also younger, and it turns out to be Marlene. Uncle Albert then enters to inform Del that Raquel has left him.

That afternoon, Rodney forces a reluctant Del to go to the dentist. The dentist is able to remove the bad tooth from Del's mouth. Del then arranges a date with an attractive receptionist named Beverly.

That night, back at Nelson Mandela House, the Russian camcorders have arrived, but Rodney points out two problems; they're too heavy, and they take videotapes that don't fit in UK VCRs. Del, dressed in his Gordon Gekko outfit, tells Rodney and Albert about his date with Beverly. They believe that Del is making a big mistake, and successfully talk him out of it. Del cancels the date by leaving a message on Beverly's answering machine.

Later, back at his flat, Rodney tells Cassandra about the time Del had a violent fight with his father Reg over Del flogging Tom Jones LP's instead of attending his O-level school exams, which got him eight grade A's (which stood for "Absent").

The next evening at The Nag's Head, after Albert tells another one of his boring war stories, Del enters, and Rodney berates him for ignoring Raquel. Del finally phones Raquel, apologises to her, and promises that he'll stop gambling from now on, and they can still go to The Nag's Head on weekends. After he promises to pick up both her and Damien tomorrow night, Del celebrates with a big bottle of champagne.

Later that night, Del walks home drunk from too much champagne, and decides to sing "One Voice", which starts a riot between some of the neighbours. Albert phones Rodney to tell him that Del is singing, and Rodney heads over to Nelson Mandela House. Del later goes down to the riot to sell some of the ski gear. The next morning at the market, while getting the Russian VCRs, Del spots Beverly (who was in the Nag's Head the previous night), and becomes frightened she may be stalking him.

That night, Del picks up Raquel and Damien in the Capri Ghia, and they return home to see the riot. Del honks his horn, and the rioters and the police clear the way for him. He passes through, stopping to inform the occasional person about something they are buying off him, and when out of the way promptly sounds his horn, to which the riot resumes.

The following day, Del comes home from work, only to see Beverly in his flat, because she wants Damien's high chair for her grandson, who is also named Damien. Del rushes over to the Nag's Head to tell Rodney that Beverly is stalking him, because she's an ex-psychiatric hospital patient. Rodney does not believe him, but Del tells him to deliver the high chair to Beverly. At the dentist, Del finally confronts Beverly and tells her to leave him and his family alone. But Beverly tells Del that she thought *he* was stalking *her*, as well as mention that the date they arranged to go on was a big mistake. Beverly then explains to Del that she works at the psychiatric hospital - as a receptionist. No longer frightened, Del promises to leave Beverly alone.

Back at Nelson Mandela House, the Trotter family are having fun at their Christmas Day party, at least until Raquel plugs in Del's new answering machine (which she acquired from Beverly in return for the high chair) only to hear Del's message about his cancelled date to Beverly. Del returns to the lounge, only to get hit by ornaments thrown by Raquel, and the entire family end up in a huge argument. Meanwhile, outside by the new Christmas tree, a group of carol singers sing "Silent Night", and Beverly looks up at the Trotters' flat with a smile, implying that Del was right and she was out for revenge all along for cancelling their date.

## Featured characters

* Del Boy
* Rodney
* Uncle Albert
* Raquel
* Cassandra
* Damien
* Mike Fisher
* Boycie
* Denzil
* Trigger
* Mickey Pearce
* Sid
* Beverly
* Arthur
* Mick
* Texo
* Vi

## Other notes

### Story arc

* Rodney and Cassandra decide to have a baby. They fail at first in "Modern Men", but will eventually succeed by having Joan Jr. in "Sleepless in Peckham".

### Continuity errors

* Denzil tells Del, Mike, Boycie, and Trigger about how he has been split up from his wife Corrine for seven years (which would've placed the divorce in 1986 since this episode took place in 1993), yet in "Danger UXD" (which took place in 1989), Denzil was still together with his wife. Between those two episodes, the gap is less than seven years.
* Rodney has difficulty carrying one Russian camcorder since they're very heavy, but in "Time On Our Hands", Rodney was able to lift two camcorders at the same time with relative ease.
* Rodney tells Cassandra that Del did not turn up for his O-Level/GCE Exams and got eight A's which stood for "Absent", yet in the second episode of ***Rock & Chips***, "Five Gold Rings", Del was shown to have left school before taking his GCE's (and he mistakes them for "GVD's"). His family were fully aware of it, and they did not send Del back to school because he was their breadwinner. This means Rodney could've possibly been lying.
* After Del sings to start the riot and Rodney arrives at Nelson Mandela House, when Albert says he's not going to the window because a brick might come through, Rodney tells him that they're on the 12th floor. But at the end of "A Royal Flush" when Rodney was yelling at Del, the floor number on top of the lift said 13th floor.

### Production goofs

* When the riot starts (due to Del's drunken singing), the outside scene shows the block of flats used for Nelson Mandela House clearly is built in a way that the door is on the side of the kitchen and not from the lounge, unlike in "The Sky's the Limit", where the studio scene on the balcony when the satellite dish is seen for the first time showed a small window in the kitchen wall.
* When Del goes into the kitchen to find Albert's boiling pants, the steam is falling and not rising, clearly a case of dry ice and not steam.

### Miscellaneous trivia

* It is widely reported that Aled Jones, who was training at the Bristol Old Vic Theatre School at the time, was an extra in the riot scenes.
* After this special, the cast of *Only Fools and Horses* took a three-year break before returning in the 1996 Christmas trilogy.
* The building that BBC used for the One-Eleven Club is the same building they used in "Yuppy Love" for the wine bar. It is known as the Old Granary in Welsh Back, Bristol.
* Series producer Gareth Gwenlan, who held an Equity card from his time as an actor, played a riot policeman, enabling him to direct the actors, and stopping them from getting carried away during the riot scene.
* Del would later pitch The Trotters Crash Turban on Dragon's Den roughly 15 years later according to his autobiography "He Who Dares"

"Go West Young Man" ·
"Cash and Curry" ·
"The Second Time Around" ·
"A Slow Bus To Chingford" ·
"Ashes to Ashes" ·
"A Losing Streak" ·
"No Greater Love" ·
"The Yellow Peril" ·
"It Never Rains..." ·
"Healthy Competition" ·
"Friday the 14th" ·
"Yesterday Never Comes" ·
"May the Force Be with You" ·
"Wanted" ·
"Strained Relations ·
"Hole in One" ·
"It's Only Rock and Roll" ·
"Sleeping Dogs Lie" ·
"Watching the Girls Go By" ·
"The Miracle of Peckham" ·
"The Longest Night" ·
"Tea for Three" ·
"Video Nasty" ·
"Danger UXD" ·
"Chain Gang" ·
"The Unlucky Winner Is..." ·
"Sickness and Wealth" ·
"The Chance of a Lunchtime" ·
"Stage Fright" ·
"The Class of '62" ·
"He Ain't Heavy, He's My Uncle" ·
"Diamonds Are For Heather" (1982) ·
"Thicker than Water" (1983) ·
"Licensed to Drill" (1984) ·
"To Hull and Back" (1985) ·
"A Royal Flush" (1986) ·
"The Frog's Legacy" (1987) ·
"Dates" (1988) ·
"The Jolly Boys' Outing" (1989) ·
"Rodney Come Home" (1990) ·
"Miami Twice" (1991) ·
"Mother Nature's Son" (1992) ·
"**Fatal Extraction**" (1993) ·
"Heroes and Villains" (1996) ·
"Modern Men" (1996) ·
"Time On Our Hands" (1996) ·
"If They Could See Us Now" (2001) ·
"Strangers on the Shore" (2002) ·
"Sleepless in Peckham" (2003)
"Beckham in Peckham" (2014)