‘MIND MY MAHARAJAH’

Please feel free to comment on my review.

In this ‘It Ain’t Half Hot Mum’ episode, the Concert Party is sent to the palace of the Maharajah of Bharatpur. It’s been rumoured that one of the sons of the Maharajah is planning to murder his father. The Concert Party have to protect him, so that means they must be soldiers, not performers.

The episode features McDonald Hobley as Colonel Standish, the British officer who issues Colonel Reynolds, Captain Ashwood and the Concert Party with the task of protecting the Maharajah. I thought it rather stupid of the Sgt-Major to tell Colonel Standish to “SHUT UP!!!” when he phone-called.

The Sgt-Major assumed that Standish was Gunner Graham trying to play the role of a British officer. This is before Gunner Graham enters the officers’ office and the Sgt-Major realises his mistake. 😀 There’s also Renu Setna who plays the Maharajah in the episode. Renu Setna is getting everywhere!

First, he was a clerk in ‘It’s a Wise Child’, then he was a district officer in ‘The Natives Are Revolting’, then he was a tailor in ‘Has Anyone Seen My Cobra?’, and now he’s the Maharajah in both this and the next episode. Is Renu Setna playing the same guy but he gets different roles each time he appears?

I mean, Indians don’t look all alike, do they? 😀 Oh yeah, that’s another thing. This episode is the first of a two-parter, as ‘Mind My Maharajah’ and ‘Bang Goes the Maharajah’ are linked together. This is like the second time this has happened in the series where two episodes are linked with each other.

The first time that this happened was in Series 2 with the two episodes ‘Showing the Flag’ and ‘Down in the Jungle’. ‘Mind My Maharajah’ also concludes on an open-ended note with Lofty being chosen to jump out in front of the Maharajah to save him from attack before Rangi Ram breaks the fourth wall.

This is because Lofty is the shortest and tubbiest member of the group, making him qualified for the role. Although Lofty often gets chosen for these things by the Sgt-Major. The episode also features Cy Town (who is often a Dalek operator in ‘Doctor Who’) as Colonel Standish’s aide in the episode. 🙂

There’s also Ashwin Patel as Pandit, the Maharajah’s ‘butler’/’valet’, I think. It was funny when the Maharajah thrashed the Sgt-Major about at snooker by cheating. I also found it rather unfair. It was funny when Rangi Ram tried to help the Sgt-Major out in his match, but he got held at knife-point. 😀

‘Mind My Maharajah’ rating – 7/10