Only Fools And Horses: 10 Times Del Boy Was ALMOST A Millionaire

The scheme:

The big one. In 'The Frog's Legacy', arguably one of the most famous episodes of the show, Del and Rodney learn all about the secret history of the Trotters - that is, their familial ties to bank robber Freddie The Frog and his secret hidden treasure worth millions.

At a friend's wedding, Del bumps into Irene Turpin, an old friend of his mum's, who tells him all about Freddie and his relationship with Joan Trotter, before she reveals that when he died (after sitting on his own detonator), he left all his possessions to Joan, including a chest of gold bullion he'd stolen in a bank robbery. Whether she actually had a right to own stolen gold is up in the air, but it was certainly Del's take on the situation.

What went wrong:

After Del becomes obsessed with finding what he believes to be his birthright, the Trotters manage to track the gold to a coffin, which they believe to be buried in a church on the Hampshire coast. It's only when they arrive they realise that Freddie, who used to be a frogman in the Royal Navy, had actually buried the coffin at sea.

It's yet another gut-wrenching moment when you realise how close they could have come to being millionaires, but it's also quite sad in how the episode fits into the wider mythology of the show. It's implied in this episode, and later confirmed, that Freddie is Rodney's biological father, meaning the gold really was the Trotters' birthright.

If Freddie and Joan had never died, it's likely the brothers would have had very different lives.