Alice-Azania Jarvis

Charge of the dark brigade

So. The plot thickens. I really didn't devote enough time to Psychoville last week. It's rapidly becoming clear that this might be the new Best Thing on Television, or at least the Best Thing on Thursday.

I've got Psychoville to entertain me, and it's sure as hell going to do that. The first episode was mesmerising, made up of lots of little stories that (I'm guessing) are soon linked together. There's the jealous dwarf, obsessed with taking Snow White out for a date; the one-handed clown whose act consists primarily of fixing novelty hands to his stump (he was my favourite), and the incestuous, serial-killer-obsessed mother and son. A chirpy bunch. Every time it flitted between them I'd be disappointed because I'd been engrossed, only to find myself just as fascinated by what followed. Except for the incestuous mother and son, that was a bit much, especially when she starts scratching the dry skin from his back. But apart from that, it was great. Creepy, but great. Indeed, the only problem I can foresee is the inevitable smugness it'll inspire in The League of Gentlemen lovers. I failed to cotton on to that one, which apparently - or at least according to the boyfriend - relegates me to some sort of lower order of TV viewer. Psychoville is from the same writers, Reece Shearsmith and Steve Pemberton, and bares more than a few similarities, which meant much of the programme was spent straining to hear over said boyfriend's regular outbursts of ohmygodthat's-justlikeleagueofgentlemen. Not to worry, I'll lock him out next time.

Bad comedy is a peculiar thing, isn't it? Watching it is rather like looking at the emperor's new clothes - slightly uncomfortable, more than a little embarrassing, with the lurking dread that maybe it isn't them at all who's at fault, but you, you and your own lame-arsed sense of humour.

Disclaimers aside, I think we can all agree on one thing: BBC2's spoof-adventure Kröd Mändoon and the Flaming Sword of Fire is definitely not funny. Worse: it's boring. Had the emperor walked out wearing it, no one would have been fooled, though they may have had a few laughs, which is more than I got last night.

Basically, Kröd, for reasons unknown, is on a mission to free General Arcadius (no, me neither) who's been imprisoned by the evil emperor (him again!) for some or other reason. Of course, Kröd - played somewhat improbably by the Nineties pin-up Sean Maguire - isn't alone. With him he brings a hapless band of conspirators: Zezelryck the warlock, doing his best Eddie Murphy impression, Aneka the knickerless warrior princess who'd rather be stripping than duelling (incidentally, the only female character. Thanks for the thought, guys!) and Loquasto, half-man, half-pig. Or, possibly, just suffering from some kind of swine flu.

Speaking of emperors, what's Matt Lucas doing playing this one? He's actually funny, the only decent thing in it. I wonder if he gets to write his own lines? I could've sworn the script improved considerably when he appeared, playing a David Brent-inspired dictator, out to claim the blood of Maguire's Kröd. I don't know about you, but as far as I'm concerned the sooner he does, the better. Though I won't be sticking around in the meantime. Next!

Ah. Another prime-time comedy from the BBC. Brace yourselves, fun-lovers. Actually, this one isn't bad. It may not be Peep Show, but give me That Mitchell and Webb Look over Kröd and his (not-so)-merry men any day. The problem I've always had with sketch shows is the transparency of the thought process. The really great ones are either so extremely astute as to poke fun at something everyone can recognise but no one's noticed, or they're so left-field as to be absurd.

Not too worry. Last night delivered, on the whole. It wasn't great, but it wasn't terrible, either, and it was a considerable improvement on the rather mediocre first two series. We could, probably, have done without the door-bell replacing, dog-firing cannon, but the hopeless spooks with their floating duck disguises and newspaper peepholes were laugh-out-loud funny, as was the competitive dinner-party chat between rocket scientist and brain surgeon, though I think my favourite would have to be the poor community-support policeman who's ridiculed for being unable to commit police brutality, only, you guessed it, "community support brutality". I wonder if that happens? Probably.

No such one-upmanship in May Contain Nuts, ITV's two-part adaptation of the John O'Farrell novel and the final mainstream comedy offering of the night. Oh, who am I kidding? It's Clapham for goodness sake, of course it's competitive. What else do you expect from life in London's most bourgeois suburb? This is Keeping Up Appearances ("don't say what darling, say pardon, we're speaking French") for the New Labour generation. Or should that be New Tory? I've lost track. Talking of Tories, this was pretty funny: one of the families had a "scare-chav" (something to do with a scarecrow; it isn't important) whose face, according to Mum, "looked like a startled child". Cue Dad: "Yes, we modelled it on Cameron." Not Dave, though, their son, Cameron. Ba-boom-chh. Mm. Perhaps you had to be there?

Anyway, in Clapham, it's very important indeed that your child goes to Clapham School for Girls, even if it means dressing up as your daughter to do the exam. Under no circumstances do you want them to end up at Clapham Comprehensive, with all its underage sex, and drugs and, you know, equality otherwise - who knows? - they might end up working street corners in exchange for heroin, or something like that.

And so proceeds ITV's version of what might loosely be termed satire (I'm sure that's what the writers think it is anyway). Except that it's not really satire, is it? There are plenty of wink-wink-nudge-nudge-look-how-silly-modern-parents-are moments but it's all a bit hammy and ornate; there's no bite to speak of. And isn't the whole laughing-at-the-middle-classes-with-their-organic-lollypops-and-vegetarianism a bit predictable now? It's been done. And done, and done...

At any rate, these particular organic lollypop-eaters were far too annoying to warrant their own show, especially Alice (it's not in the name, honest), with all her bubble-wrap popping and wide-eyed whinging, though the other mums were just as bad. My vote goes to Alice's cross-dressing son. At least he's got character. But aside from Dave's fleeting cameo, there wasn't a joke to speak of. Just lots and lots of overacting.

A rollicking teen comedy, the show revolves around Will and his gang of geeky friends. Will's basically an (even) shorter David Mitchell: posh, calamity-stricken and with a tendency to lodge his foot somewhere in the vicinity of his tonsils. He - for those who skipped the first series - used to be educated privately, but is currently roughing it in a comprehensive thanks to his mum who, he said ,"hasn't scraped enough money together to send him to his old, frankly better school". I know, I know: what a nob, right? Well, yes - except for the fact that he's rather likeable - likeable to the audience, at any rate, if not to the female population of his school. In last night's episode, the class got sent off on a geography trip. Cue lots of Jolly-Boys-style misdemeanors and school-level smut.

Bit by bit, the series has plenty to recommend it. The acting's strong, especially from half-dozen or so main players. And it's properly funny, too. But - well, what to say? - it's just not Skins. There's no sex (aside from a failed attempt at fumbling from their teacher "paedo Kennedy"), no drugs (just a half-bottle of vodka that Will seems to think can be shared between - get this - the whole class). And, crucially, there's none of that knuckle-gnawing self-importance that characterises most teen show. Which, perhaps, is the problem: instead of laughing with the characters, we're laughing at them, at their naiveté, their youth. In fact, it's almost impossible to avoid the feeling that it has been written for adults, or, if not for adults, then by adults without much memory of adolescence. Most teenagers don't view themselves as quite the humorous bundle of awkwardness and charm that they seem here. That's something you develop later, a convenient way off shrugging of your own humiliating youth. Or maybe not, perhaps retrospect, like padded bras and pregnancy, arrives earlier with each generation.