Stolen Shetland ponies, kidnapped policemen and a surprise proposal - A handy recap of Brassic season 1

It’s Sky’s most successful comedy drama in years, with a third series commissioned before the second has even aired on TV.

The brainchild of Joe Gilgun (This is England) and Danny Brocklehurst (The Stranger), Brassic follows a group of cash-strapped working class mates living in the fictional village of Hawley in Lancashire.

But as fans gear up for its eagerly-anticipated second season, we’ve got a quick recap about what happened in season 1 - from stolen Shetland ponies to kidnapped policemen.

And don’t forget, you can stream all six episodes of Brassic season 1 right away with the NOW TV Entertainment Pass. 

*SPOILERS for Brassic season 1 below*

Episode 1 

In the first episode of Brassic, we meet Vinnie (Joe Gilgun), who has Bipolar disorder, and his gang of mates. That’s his best pal Dylan (Damien Molony), champion kebab eater Cardi (Tom Hanson), traveller Ash (Aaron Heffernan), and sexually liberated Tommo (Ryan Sampson). 

Vinnie’s having the day from hell. Firstly the task of stealing a car to order for his mate JJ (Parth Thakerar) descends into a high-speed cross-country car chase with the police.

Vinnie’s day goes from bad to worse when he and the lads - who meet at their secret, underground weed farm - are forced into stealing a Shetland pony for Jim (Steve Evets). 

Jim’s a xenophobic farmer who wants to outshine his foreign neighbour at this year's county fair and horse show, and is concealing the lads’ secret weed farm.

After a short, off-road mishap involving Cardi's pet pigeon Nigel and a jar of chloroform, it looks like the gang finally manage to pull off their tiny horse heist, although the Shetland is the wrong colour and Vinnie’s forced to dye the stolen poly.

All this trouble gets Vinnie and the gang noticed by Terence McCann, the local criminal heavyweight, who sets out to make an example of them.

Episode 2

Next up, we see Dylan’s girlfriend Erin (Michelle Keegan) absolutely distraught as she arrives at Vinnie’s shack in the woods. She delivers the sad news that their friend Big Sandy has died.

With no money for a proper funeral for Big Sandy, Erin pleads with Vinnie to help. Not before long, Vinnie and the boys are planning a heist at a local strip club to get hold of some cash.

Knowing that the safe in the strip club’s basement is stuffed with money, the boys come up with an elaborate plan to travel down the sewers and blow up the safe from underneath the strip club. 

Then, they can steal all the takings from the strip club and give Big Sandy the send-off she deserves!

Except, the boys’ plan goes awry when they find that their escape route is blocked by a colossal fatberg… Better get digging!

Episode 3 

Halfway through the series, we meet Ash’s Traveller family at their caravan site. Ash has been challenged to a bare knuckle fight against a fighter from a rival Traveller family, so Vinnie and the gang set out to support him.

As an accomplished boxer, Ash is in for the win, but all bets are off when he ends up in hospital. It turns out Ash is drugged during the fight by the rival traveller family.

With Ash recovering in hospital, Vinnie steps up to fight a rematch in honour of his friend.

Meanwhile, during sessions for his Bipolar, Vinnie’s GP Chris (Dominic West) reveals to him that he has a fetish for womens’ knees. 

Vinnie fights the rival traveller family, but he gets badly injured, and ends up lying wounded on the floor. At his moment, Ash steals an ambulance and turns up to the fight still in his hospital nightie. 

As Dylan and the rest of the lads support an injured Vinnie in hospital, Erin sneaks into his room to pay him a visit. She reveals to Vinnie that - spoiler alert - he’s the dad of her son Tyler (Jude Riordan), following a one-night-stand from when before she was with Dylan.

Episode 4

Scrambling to pay back his debt to gangster Terence McCann, Vinnie and the lads accept some fast cash from a disgruntled housewife who hires them to take revenge on her ex-husband by killing his prized koi carp collection. 

When Vinnie has the ingenious idea to try and double their money by stealing the carp then selling them onto an enthusiastic buyer, it's a plan that quickly leaves Tommo like a fish out of water. 

Meanwhile, Cardi gets to tee-up on the local golf course when he finds an ingenious way to earn some extra cash.

Erin discovers she’s pregnant with Dylan’s baby, but as it’s not the right time for them to start a family, she has an abortion behind Dylan’s back. She attends a wedding with her college mate Jake, who plants a kiss on her during the ceremony.

Episode 5

In what is arguably the funniest single episode of the series, Vinnie plans to make some money by carrying out a raid on a rival grower's weed farm. But, his plan is sabotaged when Ronnie (Carl Rice), Erin's older and diabolical brother, turns up on the run from prison. 

The gang’s rival weed raid is further sabotaged by on-duty police officer Carl Slater - the lads’ former school enemy - so they kidnap him to keep him quiet.

Dealing with the added problem of Ronnie, and Carl, things are further complicated when Vinnie's doctor Chris turns up out of the blue. 

Erin turns up and gets emotional about her brother Ronnie dragging her down again. She has a heart-to-heart with Vinnie, where Vinnie shares his concerns about Tyler inheriting his Bipolar. 

Except they don’t realise that Dylan can hear them - and Dylan’s just overheard that Vinnie is Tyler’s real dad.

It's left to Erin to hatch a plan to get the gang out of there, so she employs a hypnotist to make Carl forget the kidnapping that he’s just been subject to.

Episode 6

It’s more bad luck for Vinnie as he spontaneously steals a car, only to discover that there’s stolen antiques belonging to Terence McCann in the boot. 

Threatening him with horrific violence, McCann tasks Vinnie with returning the antiques and finding the individual who stole them. 

But it's easier said than done. When Vinnie locates one of the oddest items from McCann's prized collection, it’s in the jaws of a tenacious dog. 

Meanwhile Dylan discovers that Erin had a secret abortion, and confronts her at college, just as she’s about to take her final exam. The pair have a blazing row, before Dylan storms off, and Jake drags Erin into the exam.

Unable to source all of the antiques, Vinnie fears for his life and comes up with an elaborate plan to fake his own funeral to get Terence McCann off his case.

At Vinnie’s pretend funeral wake/party, Erin gets a phonecall from Jake telling her to go outside, before he surprises her by going down on one knee and proposing. Dylan walks out at that moment.

In the series’ final moments, Vinnie gets a call from Terence McCann - it turns out Terence didn’t believe Vinnie was dead, after all...

Brassic season 1 is streaming on the NOW TV Entertainment Pass. All episodes of Brassic season 2 are available on Sky One with NOW TV from Thursday, May 7.