Jane Anderson (II)

Political and polemical do not always a great comedian make, but Jeremy Hardy keeps his revolutionary fist in an amusingly silky glove for Radio 4. This series of comic lectures - in which he is joined for mock interviews by guests such as Alison Steadman, Rebecca Front and, as is the case here, Gordon Kennedy - started back in 1993. Subjects covered down the years have helped the nation grow to the fulsome state of cultural, intellectual and spiritual awareness that we are blessed with today. None of this would have happened if Jeremy Hardy had not lectured us upon How to Argue Your Position, How to Improve Your Mind and the seminal How to Have Sex. Why was this man not in the Queen's Birthday Honours? Oh, yes. He's a socialist.

Writer Nigel Smith conducted exhaustive research for this comedy series about a man in a coma: he was lying in one himself a few years ago. The central character Ben (played by Neil Pearson) is not the most reliable of narrators - his mind wanders from real memories to imagined conversations with his toddler daughter who drinks vodka from a baby's bottle and is voiced as a middle-aged vamp by Leslie Ash. From the ghastly fear of the music one's family might play in the hope of speeding up a return to consciousness to the arrival of Robbie Williams at another patient's bedside - where he is mistaken for Jesus - this is full of restorative laughs.

This is as topical as sport meets comedy gets, so there is no material to listen to beforehand. But I have no doubt in recommending the show: Garry Richardson makes me bellow with his sports bulletins for the Today programme and, as the format remains unchanged, it has to have a sporting chance as a winner.

It's a freezing day in 1931 and Eric Gill is high up on a platform at the front of London's Broadcasting House, dressed in a member-chilling smock - listen to the play to find out why this is so pertinent a fact. He's carving his controversial statue of Prospero, clasping a young Ariel to him. The rest of this cleverly written drama permits the buried personal stories of Gill and the then director-general of the BBC, Sir John Reith, to unfurl in parallel with the governors' concerns about the sculpture.

You might not have heard of Micky Flanagan before but this new comedy series should ensure he becomes a regular - on TV as well as radio. His astute take on social mores and the class system are spot on.

England's laziest and most offensive cricketer has, since his last special on Radio 4, fallen upon even harder times. Tipped off that there was still money to be made as an MP he had no choice but to stand as an independent candidate at the recent election with the winning slogan of "Leave me alone and I'll leave you alone". Writers Christopher Douglas, Nick Newman and Andrew Nickolds are on fire again and Pod fans need not worry - his election success is quickly spoiled by scandal.

Devotees of John Shuttleworth (aka Graham Fellows), his wife Mary and his next-door-neighbour-cum-entirely-useless-manager Ken Worthington will already be gearing up for the return to the airwaves of the greatest retired security guard turned singer/songwriter there has ever been. For those who have never encountered The Shuttleworths before, it will be an experience akin to plunging into 24 or Lost without any previous series knowledge - entirely incomprehensible. But don't let that put you off, for this is one of the cleverest character comedies on radio, on a par with Count Arthur Strong and Ed Reardon's Week. This week John encounters the thrilling highs followed by the angst-ridden lows of using...no, not drugs, but eBay. Listen to this and the functions of a modern electric toaster will take on an enchanting hue for the rest of your life, thanks to Mr and Mrs Shuttleworth. It's great to have them back.

Never a shrinking violet when it comes to offering up a strong opinion, Charlie Brooker is the perfect host for a series that celebrates abject failure. That could be reality television, going on holiday or the human race in general. Brooker's bite and bark are just as vicious as one another, so it's fortunate that he has three comedic guests to lessen the full-on savagery.

Musical comedies have to work that little bit harder because breaking into song can, frankly, be very irritating. Tim Minchin, who wrote this, sits on the surreal side of the fence without even thinking about his balance, so this could be a paradisal piece of humorous harmony - or we could see it fall into the pit of never-to-be-commissioned comedy pilots.

"There's no much opportunity for self-advancement in toilets," says Jim Bloggs, as he takes a break from swabbing the public conveniences clean. If only he'd got some 'levels' at school. Who knows? He could have become a Bachelor of Arts, but then he's married, to Hilda, so it's probably too late for that as well.

Originally published as a graphic novel in 1980, Raymond Briggs has brought his work up to date (in terms of GCSEs and the cost of living) and turned it into a magical piece of radio drama.

Jim and his wife are a poor working-class couple who long for a better, albeit a fantasy, lifestyle, where she can dress as a bar floozie in fishnet tights and he can be a swaggering cowboy.

Briggs shows the stifling effect that a lack of education and wealth has upon their dreams without needing to hit the listener round the head with a copy of Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels's Communist Manifesto.

At every plot juncture in the play Jim's childlike naivety is crushed closer to despair by his encounter with faceless, uninterested and even cruel bureaucracy. The final run-in with authority has him sentences to an indefinite stay in prison for the various crimes that he's been charged with, including wearing obscene and indecent apparel in a public place and fouling the pedestrian footways - he took an elderly donkey out, while dressed as a highway man in second-hand rubber waders and his mother-in-law's frilly shirt.

This is utterly faithful to Briggs's original story, with some striking sound effects when Jim and Hilda indulge in their fantasies. It's warm, it's funny, but it also hurts.