- Series 1 - Primary Phase
- An epic adventure in time and space including some helpful advice on how to see
the Universe for less than 30 Altairian dollars a day.
- s01e01 - 1978-03-08 - Fit the First
- In which the earth is unexpectedly destroyed and the great hitch-hike begins.
- s01e02 - 1978-03-15 - Fit the Second
- After being saved from certain death during the demolition of the earth,
Arthur Dent now faces a hopeless choice between meeting certain death
in the vacuum of space or finding something pleasant to say about Vogon poetry.
- s01e03 - 1978-03-22 - Fit the Third
- After being improbably rescued from certain death in the vacuum of space,
Arthur Dent and his new companions now face a missile attack and certain death.
- s01e04 - 1978-03-29 - Fit the Fourth
- It has been revealed to Arthur that the earth has been built by the Magratheans and run by mice.
Meanwhile his companions have been suddenly confronted by something nasty, probably certain death.
- s01e05 - 1978-04-05 - Fit the Fifth
- Sent to find the Ultimate Question of Life, The Universe and Everything,
Arthur Dent and his companion have been cornered by two humane cops who,
nevertheless, have left them in a certain death situation.
- s01e06 - 1978-04-12 - Fit the Sixth
- Will the Ultimate Question to Life, The Universe and Everything (to which the answer is 42) be discovered?
Will our heroes be able to control their newly stolen space-ship
and the enormous fleet of black battle cruisers that is following them?
Will it end happily or in the certain death that has threatened them so persistently?
- Series 2 - Secondary Phase [1]
- A new epic adventure in time and space, including some helpful advice on how to avoid certain death.
- s02e01 - 1978-12-24 - Fit the Seventh
- The show that began with the end of the world continues with Arthur Dent and Ford Prefect stranded on prehistoric earth,
and Zaphod Beeblebrox and Marvin thoroughly devoured by a carbon-copy of the Ravenous Bugblatter Beast of Traal.
- s02e02 - 1980-01-21 - Fit the Eighth
- Zaphod Beeblebrox and his mysterious friend Roosta are being taken in a flying building to the evil Frogstar,
whilst Ford Prefect and Arthur Dent are stranded on pre-historic earth. Some of them are getting hungry.
FORD: "I don't believe it. It's impossible."
ARTHUR: "But it's happening."
- s02e03 - 1980-01-22 - Fit the Ninth
- New Year Season. In which our heroes have the chance to chew the fat with some old enemies and Arthur Dent has an unpleasant cup of tea.
EDDIE: "Man and machines share in the stimulating exchange of... aaargh."
- s02e04 - 1980-01-23 - Fit the Tenth
- In which our heroes have some close encounters with others and themselves.
MARVIN: "This is the sort of thing you life forms enjoy, is it?"
- s02e05 - 1980-01-24 - Fit the Eleventh
- In which our heroes do a lot of running and digging.
ARTHUR: "Don't ask me how it works, or I'll start to whimper."
- s02e06 - 1980-01-25 - Fit the Twelfth
- In which all is resolved, everyone lives happily ever after, and pigs fly.
- Series 3 - Tertiary Phase
- s03e01 - 2004-09-21 - Fit the Thirteenth
- Arthur Dent awakes to find that he has spent the last four years on prehistoric Earth,
alone in all that time save for five minutes with an infuriating alien called Wowbagger who arrived, insulted him, and left.
Reunited with Ford Prefect, Arthur discovers that the Hitchhikers Guide he threw in the river still works - and is being updated.
Rescue appears in the form of a sofa caught in the Space-Time Continuum and Arthur and Ford disappear
in a fashion which would cause stern looks from the Campaign For Real Time.
Aboard the Heart of Gold Zaphod Beeblebrox is nursing a large Pan Galactic Gargleblaster and two headaches.
He believes that he survived the Total Perspective Vortex while pursuing a Hitchhikers Guide employee called Zarniwoop
and that Arthur marooned him by stealing the Heart of Gold, which of course Zaphod himself stole
(but then Zaphod thinks he alone has the right to indulge in excitement, adventure and really wild things).
His girlfriend Trillian (who, as Tricia McMillan, is the only human apart from Arthur to survive the Destruction of Earth
by the Vogon Constructor Fleet) has no memory at all of these events and is therefore convinced that Zaphod has had a psychotic episode
brought on by too many drinks. Tired of his selfishness she snaps and leaves him, having herself beamed by Eddie the shipboard computer in any direction but here.
- s03e02 - 2004-09-28 - Fit the Fourteenth
- Arthur and Ford have travelled in time and arrive at Lords Cricket Ground, where England are defeating Australia to win The Ashes.
It turns out our heroes have arrived 24 hours before the destruction of the planet, but this fact almost pales into insignificance
with the appearance of Slartibartfast, the elderly planet designer Arthur first encountered on Magrathea (see Primary Phase).
Slarti is here to avert the disastrous abduction of The Ashes (which have some intergalactic significance we can as yet only guess at)
by the villainous and lethal Krikkit Robots. This he utterly fails to do, as they arrive, blow up Lords, and leave with their booty.
Slarti, Arthur and Ford give chase in the unlikely Starship Bistromath which is powered by the equally unlikely (though not improbable) Somebody Else's Problem Field. On the swamp planet Squornshellous Zeta, Marvin the Paranoid Android is still helplessly trudging in circles, anchored to one spot by an artificial leg he was fitted with after surviving a near miss with the heart of a blazing star (again, see Primary Phase, and try and keep up for goodness' sake). It is something of a relief for him to have the leg removed by the same eleven Krikkit Robots who have stolen The Ashes. It is even more of a relief when they decide to remove him as well, leaving his talkative but very boring companion, Zem the Mattress, to ponder the infinite and globber gently.
- s03e03 - 2004-10-05 - Fit the Fifteenth
- Slartibartfast provides a rather startling Informational Illusion to give Arthur and Ford the history of the Krikkit Wars,
an intergalactic conflict of billions of years ago, where a seemingly innocuous and pleasant race of hominids
journeyed beyond the black and opaque dust cloud surrounding their solitary planet with its solitary star
and were appalled to discover they were not alone in the universe but surrounded by many other planets teeming with life.
The Krikkitmen built lethal white robots wielding war clubs which were used to propel small red grenades over vast distances,
to destroy everything in their path - in fact, to kill everything everywhere but their masters.
Eventually defeated, the People of Krikkit (along with robots and family pets) are sentenced to have their solar system
with its Dust Cloud sealed in a Slo-Time envelope, locked by The Wikkit Gate, upon an asteroid which orbits it.
When all of Creation has become extinct the gate will automatically open, allowing them to finish their existence
in a dying universe, alone at last as they have so craved. Unfortunately eleven Krikkit Robots were unaccounted
for at the time the punishment was carried out, and these unpleasant machines are now re-uniting the disparate elements of The Key to that Wikkit Gate.
Having collected the Wooden Pillar (The Ashes, now reconstituted into a Cricket stump),
The Steel Pillar (The Artificial Leg Marvin was fitted with by a kindly scrap collector),
they now board the Heart of Gold to steal the Gold Bail (the driving force behind its legendary Improbability Drive).
Bad as this might be, worse is to come when the robots are caught in the act by Zaphod Beeblebrox,
who discovers they are about to go to a Party, but not intending to take him with them.
In fact they add injury to insult and shoot him instead. Attempting to reach the same party Arthur,
Ford and Slartibartfast use the - surprisingly clean - toilet transportation cubicles of the Starship Bistromath.
But something goes wrong and Arthur finds himself diverted to a labyrinth wherein dwells a creature who appears to nurse a very deep and ancient grudge against him...."
- s03e04 - 2004-10-12 - Fit the Sixteenth
- Arthur Dent has been diverted from arriving at the Longest Party Ever Held to find himself in a sinister labyrinth,
leading him to a subterranean Cathedral of Hate in which a fifty-foot high statue of himself is depicted causing harm to various creatures.
It turns out that the organisms that he has inadvertently killed - and/or eaten - throughout his life have all been the same person,
reincarnated over and over again, only to be killed - over and over again - by Arthur.
Its last, most desperate incarnation, one it had to fight for, and one which gives it a last chance for revenge against his tormentor,
is as a four-foot fruitbat with an orthodontic condition called Agrajag. Can Arthur escape Agrajag's clutches and get to the party?
- s03e05 - 2004-10-19 - Fit the Seventeenth
- As Arthur Dent, Ford Prefect, Trillian and Slartibarfast helplessly watch, the Krikkit Robots open the Wikkit Gate
and the planet Krikkit is released from its chronostasis in a mind-hurting instant.
- s03e06 - 2004-10-26 - Fit the Eighteenth
- Can Arthur Dent save his friends from the friendly but murderous citizens of Krikkit and stop them returning the Ashes to the cosmos?
- Series 4 - Quandary Phase
- s04e01 - 2005-05-03 - Fit the Nineteenth
- With Ford's original Earth entry in the Guide reinstated, he and Arthur make their ways back.
- s04e02 - 2005-05-10 - Fit the Twentieth
- Having rediscovered a mysteriously intact Earth, Arthur Dent finds his way home to his cottage.
Then he finds Fenchurch, before promptly losing her again....
- s04e03 - 2005-05-17 - Fit the Twenty-first
- Now an item, Arthur and Fenchurch head for California to discover what happened to the dolphins.
- s04e04 - 2005-05-24 - Fit the Twenty-second
- Fenchurch and Arthur return to England, to discover that a large spaceship has landed in London, bringing Ford Prefect with it.
- Series 5 - Quintessential Phase
- s05e01 - 2005-05-31 - Fit the Twenty-third
- Arthur returns to where Earth should be to find a barely occupied planet, and no Fenchurch.
- s05e02 - 2005-06-07 - Fit the Twenty-fourth
- Ford Prefect returns to the Guide's headquarters and uncovers the new editor's dastardly secret.
- s05e03 - 2005-06-14 - Fit the Twenty-fifth
- Arthur is employed as a sandwich maker, and learns that he has become a dad.
- s05e04 - 2005-06-21 - Fit the Twenty-sixth
- Arthur and Ford are reunited on the distant and backward planet of Lamuella.
- Series 6 - Hexagonal Phase
- s06e01 - 2018-03-08 - Part the 0.16
- Following the publication of his diaries, Arthur Dent's hopes for a secluded life soon evaporate.
- s06e02 - 2018-03-15 - Part the 0.3
- One head is better than two - as long as you have a spare in a jar.
- s06e03 - 2018-03-22 - In Space, No One Can Hear You Complain
- Are Arthur Dent, Trillian and Random really the last remaining humans in The Galaxy? Maybe not.
- s06e04 - 2018-03-29 - The 0.6666667th Part
- Ford Prefect calls upon Arthur Dent for help. Now, there's desperation...
- s06e05 - 2018-04-05 - Part the 0.83333
- Thor vs Wowbagger in a fight-to-the-death, followed by cheesy nibbles and drinks.
- s06e06 - 2018-04-12 - A Thor in the Air
- Yet another fight-to-the-death for Thor, but will this one have a happy ending?
- Footnotes
1. When originally broadcast, s02e01 was a special for Christmas 1978. The second series itself was broadcast on five consecutive days
in January 1980, and the episodes were given titles of "Fit the First" through to "Fit the Fifth". Since then, in the many repeats, the special episode has been included
with Series 2, and they have been given the now accepted titles of "Fit the Seventh" through to "Fit the Twelfth". This is the convention that I have followed here.