8.9/10122 votesLoading...#1 - The Wind-Break War
Season 3 Episode 5 - Aired 10/8/1976
The Goods are furious when they learn that Margo is planning to put up a large wind-break that will shade their new fruit patch. Mix-ups occur when they ask her to site it elsewhere. To repair their friendship, they have dinner accompanied by bottles of the Goods' Peapod Burgundy, causing them to regain their sense of humour.
Director: John Howard Davies
Writer: N/A
8.5/10105 votesLoading...#2 - Backs to the Wall
Season 1 Episode 7 - Aired 5/16/1975
While starting the harvest, Tom injures his back digging,and since Margo and Jerry are on holiday Barbara is left to look after the farm all on her own. A storm then adds to their problems by turning their garden into a mud bath.
Director: N/A
Writer: N/A
8.4/1094 votesLoading...#3 - The Happy Event
Season 3 Episode 2 - Aired 9/17/1976
Perky gives birth to her litter, which includes a runt, in the middle of the night, observed by the Goods & Leadbetters. Sentimentality overcomes practicality, and they decide to try to help the runt survive. Jerry is stopped for speeding on the way to hospital to obtain some oxygen.
Director: N/A
Writer: N/A
8.4/1091 votesLoading...#4 - Anniversary
Season 4 Episode 7 - Aired 5/22/1977
Although troubles beset them, the Goods are still glad that they've followed the path of self-sufficiency. Jerry thinks he's failed to succeed Andy as head of JJM. Margo installs a burglar alarm system, but the Goods think they've no need of one, as they've nothing left to steal.
Director: N/A
Writer: N/A
8.2/1091 votesLoading...#5 - Mutiny
Season 2 Episode 5 - Aired 1/9/1976
Jerry refuses to put up a foreign businessman visiting the company, as it would interfere with Margo's performances as Maria in a local amateur production of The Sound of Music, and he is consequently sacked. The Goods try to get him reinstated.
Director: N/A
Writer: N/A
8.2/1087 votesLoading...#6 - Going to Pot?
Season 2 Episode 7 - Aired 1/23/1976
Tom's inability to repair the roof decides the Goods on joining evening classes in practical subjects, Barbara taking pottery and Tom taking weaving. Both do badly and decide to swap subjects. Tom achieves outstanding results, resulting in the temptation to go commercial.
Director: N/A
Writer: N/A
8.2/1088 votesLoading...#7 - I Talk to the Trees
Season 3 Episode 4 - Aired 10/1/1976
A fellow allotment holder claims that talking and playing music to his plants gives better yields, so Tom decides to do a scientific experiment, enlisting Barbara's help. Unfortunately, playing music to the crops in the back garden threatens to sour their relationship with Margo, who is standing for election as president of the local amateur operatic society.
Director: N/A
Writer: N/A
8.2/1090 votesLoading...#8 - The Last Posh Frock
Season 3 Episode 7 - Aired 10/22/1976
Various people mistake Barbara for a man, causing her to doubt her femininity, and when she accidentally tears her last good dress, she becomes distraught. Tom compounds things by fawning over an elegantly dressed dinner guest, but then tries to make up by buying her another dress.
Director: N/A
Writer: N/A
8.2/1077 votesLoading...#9 - The Weaver's Tale
Season 4 Episode 4 - Aired 5/1/1977
When Margo buys a spinning wheel, Tom buys a loom so that the Goods can borrow the spinning wheel and make their own clothes. However, Barbara has just convinced Jerry to forbid Margo to spend any more money, and the spinning wheel purchase is canceled. It looks like the loom is a white elephant.
Director: N/A
Writer: N/A
8.1/10110 votesLoading...#10 - Pig's Lib
Season 1 Episode 4 - Aired 4/25/1975
The Goods continue their bartering with local suppliers, but Barbara has a misunderstanding while negotiating with the window-cleaner. They then add a pair of pigs in a sty to their back garden, at which Margo is so appalled she brings in the chairman of the local residents' association to persuade them out of it, but is unsuccessful. However, when one escapes into the Leadbetter's garden, she can only be mollified by getting rid of it.
Director: N/A
Writer: N/A
8.1/1092 votesLoading...#11 - The Day Peace Broke Out
Season 2 Episode 4 - Aired 1/2/1976
Leeks start to go missing from the front garden, and Tom initially suspects Margo. When he discovers the real culprit, he takes the law into his own hands, but ends up in deeper trouble than the thief.
Director: N/A
Writer: N/A
8.1/1081 votesLoading...#12 - The Green Door
Season 4 Episode 2 - Aired 4/17/1977
The Goods need some fertiliser for their land in preparation for sowing the new season's crops. When they try getting it from the pony club that Margo belongs to, they find that although she pretends to, she hasn't been going recently. The Goods wonder where she's been going instead.
Director: N/A
Writer: N/A
8.1/1082 votesLoading...#13 - Our Speaker Today
Season 4 Episode 3 - Aired 4/24/1977
When Margo's society's guest speaker pulls out at short notice, Barbara agrees to give a talk about self-sufficiency. She's so good that Lady Truscott asks her to do several other talks, but it interferes with maintaining the animals & crops.
Director: N/A
Writer: N/A
8.0/1096 votesLoading...#14 - Just My Bill
Season 2 Episode 1 - Aired 12/5/1975
The Goods are faced with paying their rates bill (local property tax). They try to sell their harvest surplus to raise money, but it proves more difficult than Tom imagines.
Director: N/A
Writer: N/A
8.0/1088 votesLoading...#15 - The Early Birds
Season 3 Episode 1 - Aired 9/10/1976
The pressure of work sowing the new season's crops requires the Goods to make the most of the daylight hours. The disturbance of their early morning work sours their friendship with the Leadbetters, and their attempts to go to bed early meet with a variety of frustrations.
Director: N/A
Writer: N/A
8.0/1087 votesLoading...#16 - Whose Fleas are These?
Season 3 Episode 6 - Aired 10/15/1976
The Goods find they have fleas, which they initially believe are from their animals. Then they remember that they have just been next door to the Leadbetters.
Director: N/A
Writer: N/A
8.0/1070 votesLoading...#17 - Suit Yourself
Season 4 Episode 5 - Aired 5/8/1977
The Goods obtain some sheep fleeces, make their own vegetable dyes, and start making their own clothes using their loom. Jerry's boss decides to retire, and invites three potential successors to dinner to choose who to appoint.
Director: N/A
Writer: N/A
7.9/10110 votesLoading...#18 - The Weaker Sex?
Season 1 Episode 3 - Aired 4/18/1975
Tom buys an old-fashioned range for their kitchen from a passing rag-and-bone man, but Barbara becomes irate when she ends up doing most of the hard work to get it ready for use, while he tries to make a system for scaring the birds off their crops.
Director: N/A
Writer: N/A
7.9/10102 votesLoading...#19 - The Thing in the Cellar
Season 1 Episode 5 - Aired 5/2/1975
Tom puts the finishing touches to their own electricity generator in the cellar, which runs on their animals' waste. He then goes fishing with Jerry, and decides to store the surplus in the freezer, until the generator plays up...
Director: N/A
Writer: N/A
7.9/10102 votesLoading...#20 - The Pagan Rite
Season 1 Episode 6 - Aired 5/9/1975
In order to pay for a treat for Barbara, Tom takes a short contract from his old firm, and tries to keep it a secret from her - but his plan is foiled when he fails to account for Margo's nosiness.
Director: N/A
Writer: N/A
7.9/1092 votesLoading...#21 - Home Sweet Home
Season 2 Episode 6 - Aired 1/16/1976
A boar-walker visits the Goods' remaining pig, and recommends they move to a larger smallholding that he knows is for sale. Neither Tom nor Barbara can think of a good reason not to go, but neither really wants to.
Director: N/A
Writer: N/A
7.9/1086 votesLoading...#22 - A Tug of the Forelock
Season 3 Episode 3 - Aired 9/24/1976
The need for some means of transport to replace the broken trolley causes Tom to modify the rotavator. To pay for its fuel, the Goods decide to take temporary work as domestic staff... with the Leadbetters.
Director: N/A
Writer: N/A
7.8/1072 votesLoading...#23 - Sweet and Sour Charity
Season 4 Episode 6 - Aired 5/15/1977
Tom sets his eye on the contents of the other neighbors' heating oil tank when they move out. Barbara just manages to convince him that it would be stealing. Then they get permission to take it.
Director: N/A
Writer: N/A
7.7/10114 votesLoading...#24 - Say Little Hen ...
Season 1 Episode 2 - Aired 4/11/1975
The Goods install the first chickens in their chicken coop, but they prove slow to lay their first eggs. Incensed by the condescension of the Leadbetters when they are invited to dinner together with Tom's former boss & his wife, the Goods decide to sacrifice one of the chickens to make a show of their not being as poor as the Leadbetters think.
Director: N/A
Writer: N/A
7.7/10102 votesLoading...#25 - The Guru of Surbiton
Season 2 Episode 2 - Aired 12/12/1975
The Goods take in a student couple for a week, to help them with the work on the smallholding. The couple rapidly become infatuated with the Goods and their way of life. When they decide to buy the other house next door, to start a commune with similar aims, Margo becomes incensed.
Director: N/A
Writer: N/A
The Best Episodes of The Good Life
Every episode of The Good Life ranked from best to worst. Let's dive into the Best Episodes of The Good Life!
Tom and Barbara Good escape the rat race and pursue a self-sufficient lifestyle in Surbiton, much to the concern, frustration and sometimes envy of their...
Genre:Comedy
Network:BBC One
Best Episodes Summary
"The Wind-Break War" is the best rated episode of "The Good Life". It scored 8.9/10 based on 122 votes. Directed by John Howard Davies and written by N/A, it aired on 10/8/1976. This episode scored 0.4 points higher than the second highest rated, "Backs to the Wall".