After five series of Emu's World, Rod and the gang relaunched the programme as Emu's All Live Pink Windmill Show on Friday, 13th July, 1984. (By a staggering coincidence, that's 28 years ago today - "today" being the day of upload.) To be perfectly frank, if you've got fond memories of the live era and think this is a good place to start re-watching them, well, there are quite a few teething troubles in this one, plus nerves I'm sure played their part - so personally I'd recommend skipping ahead to the 1985 series for your quick fix, and then come back later if you like. Nevertheless, even though things go wrong and it clearly hasn't found its feet yet, this is the episode that set the tone for the next three years of Pink Windmill fun, and that tone was "live panto".

So how has the format changed? Well, whereas Emu's World was basically a drama show with a coherent storyline in each programme - only broken by the one or two songs per episode - now there are a lot more distractions. In this particular video, you'll see the series debuts of Robot Redford and Boggle's Kingdom (the latter previously only seen in Christmas and Easter specials), plus the introduction of a studio audience and their participation. Emu's Spin Quiz, Grotbags's Grotto (a.k.a. the Cauldron Game) and the Post Office arrive for the first time, too. In fact, it all rather has the feel of Saturday morning TV, with Rod regularly breaking the fourth wall and addressing the viewer continually for the first time.

As for the Pink Windmill kids, in previous series they were many, but have now been trimmed down to ten regulars:

Catrina Hylton-Hull
Hugh Harper
Sarah Jeffs
Emma Whitlock
Joe Greco
Spencer Roberts
Lorraine Plummer
Anthony Hosier
Debbie Harper
Abbie Shilling

Quite a lot of hearsay and guesswork has gone into that. Can anyone help confirm any of it? Or, even better, tell us where they are now?

The songs, incidentally, are Can't Stop the Music by the Village People and The Beautiful Briny from Bedknobs and Broomsticks. Many thanks to Louise for lending me this tape.

(Please remember that this is an old VHS recording, so don't go expecting 1080p HD quality. I'm fairly certain that this video isn't commercially available, and I've uploaded it for its historic interest only. That said, if you are a copyright holder and object, please don't hesitate to contact me.)