Ten years since The IT Crowd began, we’ve picked out our ten all-time favourite episodes of Channel 4’s sitcom.
> Buy the complete Season 1-4 box set on Amazon.
10. ‘The Internet Is Coming’ (2013 Special)
In this hour-long final episode, Jen and Roy become internet-famous for all the wrong reasons when an incriminating video of them goes viral. Also, Roy struggles to show his girlfriend that he can be emotional, while Moss discovers that wearing women’s trousers gives him new confidence and Douglas takes part in Secret Millionaire.
Trivia: This final episode was broadcast just over three years after Season 4 had ended. A fifth season was originally planned, but series creator Graham Linehan decided that it would be best to wrap things up with a single hour-long special instead.
9.‘Yesterday’s Jam’ (Season 1 Episode 1)
Jen arrives for her first day at Reynholm Industries to find that she’s been made Head of IT, after lying on her CV about having a lot of experience with computers. She meets her new co-workers, Moss and Roy, who notice her lack of technical knowledge and take a dislike to her, until she promises that she will try to make them popular.
Trivia: Graham Linehan created the role of Moss with Richard Ayoade in mind. Linehan has said that he was initially averse to casting an Irish actor as Roy, but Chris O’Dowd gave such a good audition that he couldn’t turn him down. O’Dowd already knew Katherine Parkinson from drama school and suggested that she audition for the part of Jen, which was proving difficult to cast.
8. ‘From Hell’ (Season 3 Episode 1)
Jen panics when Roy says that he recognises the builder who’s working on her house from the TV show ‘Builders From Hell’. Meanwhile, Roy tries to teach Moss how to stand up to bullies, and Douglas finds a gun hidden in his desk.
Trivia: This episode features a cameo from Chris Morris as Denholm, who exited the show in the second episode of Season 2. The scene where Denholm tries to lead Douglas towards Hell is the first and only time the father and son are seen interacting with each other in the show.
7. ‘Return of the Golden Child’ (Season 2 Episode 2)
The police arrive at Reynholm Industries because of “irregularities in the pension fund” and Denholm promptly jumps out of a window. As the IT department prepare to attend Denholm’s funeral, Roy becomes obsessed with the result of a quiz which predicts that he is nearing his own death.
Trivia: This episode marks the first appearance of Matt Berry as Douglas Reynholm. Strangely, Denholm’s wife is played in this episode by Belinda Stewart-Wilson (perhaps best known as Will’s mum in The Inbetweeners), who would go on to play another role in The IT Crowd’s fourth season – Douglas’ wife!
6. ‘Are We Not Men?’ (Season 3 Episode 2)
Moss and Roy learn how to make conversation with ‘real men’ using an app which provides them with generic football phrases like “Did you see that ludicrous display last night?”, but the pair soon end up out of their depth when they befriend a group of football fans. Meanwhile, Jen is told that her new boyfriend looks like a magician and can’t get it out of her head.
Trivia: Moss passionately kisses Roy to avoid attention from the police, a tactic he tries to use again (but is rejected) in the Season 4 episode ‘Bad Boys’ when he thinks that he and Roy are being followed by a security guard.
5. ‘The Final Countdown’ (Season 4 Episode 2)
Moss becomes a successful contestant on Countdown and is invited to join an exclusive club as a result. Meanwhile, Jen tries to find out what’s going on at the weekly heads of department meetings, which she has been told to no longer attend, and Roy repeatedly gets mistaken for a window cleaner by someone he wants to impress.
Trivia: You may remember that this episode has guest appearances from Countdown personalities Rachel Riley, Jeff Stelling and Gyles Brandreth. But did you know that it also features Gemma Chan (Humans) and Benedict Wong (The Martian)?
4. ‘Calamity Jen’ (Season 1 Episode 2)
Denholm declares a war on stress and announces that anyone found to be suffering from stress will be fired. This is bad timing on a day when Jen is wearing shoes that are several sizes too small for her and Moss manages to set the office on fire.
Trivia: This is the episode in which the emergency services change their number from 999 to 01189998819991197253. The number is mentioned again in the season four episode ‘From Hell’, and another link between these two episodes is that they both feature Japanese businessman Mr Yamamoto.
3. ‘The Speech’ (Season 3 Episode 4)
Jen wins the employee of the month award and finds out that she has to give a speech to the company’s shareholders about her area of expertise, i.e. computers. Moss and Roy seize the opportunity to play a trick on Jen (who has been looking down on them since she won the award) and advise her to present the shareholders with ‘the internet’ itself, which is nothing but a black box with a red flashing light.
Trivia: Graham Linehan (creator of The IT Crowd) makes a quick cameo in this episode, as the man who hysterically screams “We’re all going to die!” when ‘the internet’ gets broken.
2. ‘The Dinner Party’ (Season 2 Episode 4)
Jen is smitten with her new boyfriend Peter (full name: Peter File, which Jen insists does not sound like something else) and the couple are planning a dinner party to set up three of Jen’s single friends with three of Peter’s single friends. But when the three men drop out at the last minute, Jen is forced to replace them with Roy, Moss and Richmond.
Trivia: Paula, Jen’s model friend who’s just had reconstructive face surgery, is played by Dolly Wells (Doll & Em), who also appears in the Season 4 episode ‘Jen The Fredo’ as a representative of a feminist organisation.
1. ‘The Work Outing’ (Season 2 Episode 1)
Jen is excited to be going on a date to the theatre with ‘Philip from Six’… until Moss and Roy manage to invite themselves along. Things spiral out of control at the theatre when Jen becomes worried that Philip might be gay and Roy panics after being caught using a disabled toilet.
Trivia: The star of ‘Gay! A Gay Musical’ is played by Lydia Fox, who is the real-life wife of Richard Ayoade. Also, The IT Crowd’s producer Asha Atalla makes a quick cameo as the gay disabled man who flirts with Roy at the end of the episode.
> Buy the complete Season 1-4 box set on Amazon.
What’s your favourite episode of The IT Crowd? Let us know below…