Oscar Lomax



Oscar Lomax is a blind millionaire from Ilkley, West Yorkshire.

Characterization
He lives in a vast mansion with support coming only from Michael Fry, who helps Lomax due to a community service sentence. Lomax calls Michael "Tealeaf" because of his criminal background, "tea leaf" being cockney rhyming slang for "thief."

Lomax spends his time collecting stuffed toy animals which he calls "commodities", a collection which he refers to as his "Holy of Holies" and will not allow anyone else to see, keeping them in a locked room within his mansion. He tends to feel offended if his commodities are referred to as toys.

Lomax only needs one more item to complete his collection, Snappy the Crocodile. He once discovered it online, but two more people, the Crabtree sisters (conjoined twins from Braintree, Essex) bought it before him. Lomax bought Snappy from the sisters in exchange for his eyes, hence his blindness, but after his spell at Ravenhill let him be stolen so he could once more feel the "thrill of the chase".

Series 1
He uses Michael to help him buy Snappy when it appears online, which results in an online bidding war with the Crabtree sisters. The people selling Snappy, from Dudley, West Midlands, withdraw him from sale after seeing the demand for him. At their house they announce that Lomax won the auction but then reveal that they don't know where Snappy is, which nullifies the sale. Lomax tries to coax the information out of the couple's son, but with no luck. Michael, meanwhile, bribes him with money and escapes with the Crabtree sisters, along with the phone number of a third bidder who the son sent Snappy to.

This bidder is shown to be the mysterious blackmailer. Michael cons the Crabtree sisters out of their money and arranges to meet the blackmailer at Ravenhill. There, Snappy has been left on a table in a room. As Michael enters the room to collect Snappy, the door slams behind him and Joy is seen locking it from the outside. Michael phones Lomax and begs to be rescued. Lomax arrives with his new helper, and they free Michael.

Michael gives Oscar Snappy and the two walk out to a nearby cliff, where Lomax throws it off of the cliff. He confesses that the reason he was committed is because he suffered from Paradise Syndrome. Only by having something in the world to truly long for can he be happy, thus he can begin the search for Snappy again. Michael does not accept this and attempts to leave, but the blackmailer steals his car keys. Both he and Lomax are present when the building explodes.

Series 2
Oscar and Michael attend Jolly's funeral, where it is revealed that Michael's broken right arm prevents him from driving, and Oscar is now in a wheelchair and heavily deaf. They and Jelly are interviewed by Detective Finney about the events at Ravenhill, and Michael shows Jelly information displaying Kenchington's hidden stash of embezzled funds, which she planned to collect upon returning to the country after she fled abroad. Her two-year absence is explained by her waiting until the fuss surrounding her disappearance had died down. In the following episode, Lomax reveals the reason why he hates Tony Hancock; they were best friends until Lomax found out that his son, Billy, was not his, but Hancock's. His son has constantly sent letters to him, but Lomax continually bins them. As Michael puts the latest letters in the rubbish outside, we see a glimpse of Billy Lomax in the bushes.

However, Lomax eventually admits to Michael that he himself is Tony Hancock; his best friend whose wife Lomax/Hancock slept with died following the betrayal. Michael persuades Hancock/Lomax to reunite with his son, and arranges for the two to meet. However, Hancock/Lomax is murdered by Detective Finney mere moments before the reunion, the former arranging the body to make the death look like suicide.

Michael goes to visit Peter Bishop, friend of Lomax and owner of Hoyti Toyti's toy shop, which Lomax visited frequently. Bishop tells Michael that the toy shop is a front for his real business and passion: the trading of Nazi memorabilia. They puzzle over the three ex-Ravenhill patients, believing correctly that they were murdered, and discover that Edwina Kenchington was the daughter of a brilliant German scientist called Ehrlichmann, who founded Ravenhill to perform experiments on people after the Second World War. Bishop also finds an old photograph showing a young Edwina wearing the locket, and they both later discover via a television interview that Debbie is now wearing the locket.