A roadside-bomb squad in Helmand call themselves Bluestone 42, but the real ordnance is the insults they lob at each other between deadly jobs. Oliver Chris’s posh, womanising Captain Nick Medhurst keeps trying to bed padre Kelly Adams while Gary Carr’s Corporal Millsy maintains morale with hip-hop bravado and Katie Lyons’s no-nonsense Corporal Bird keeps the boys from blowing themselves up. Filmed in South Africa, the BBC Three sitcom ran three short series (2013-2015) and a Christmas special, using genuine military slang and gallows humour picked up from veterans. Writers Richard Hurst and James Cary folded farce into firefights: paperwork wars with the CO, cricket with unexploded grenades, dating rituals under mortar fire. Critics dubbed it “The Hurt Locker meets Miranda”; a real bomb-disposal NCO said the black humour was “spot-on”. When BBC Three shifted online and British troops pulled out of Afghanistan, the creators closed the base. 21 episodes, zero sentimental farewells. The squad simply packed up and flew home, leaving the desert to echo with their last profane punchlines.
Production Details
BBC Three / 3 Seasons / 20 Episodes / 2013
Created by: Richard Hurst, James Cary
Showrunner(s): Stephen McCrum
Writer(s): James Cary, Richard Hurst
Producer(s): Michelle Farr-Scott
Cinematography: Giulio Biccari
Music: Vince Pope
Main Cast
Tony Gardner as Lieutenant Colonel Smith
Keeno Lee Hector as Faruq
Scott Hoatson as Rocket
Katie Lyons as Bird
Jamie Quinn as Mac
Stephen Wight as Simon
Oliver Chris as Nick
Kelly Adams as Mary
Matthew Lewis as Tower Block
Gary Carr as Millsy
Chris Spinas as Soldier
Laura Aikman as Ellen
