Paul Whitelaw

One doesn't expect a sitcom at this time of year to revolve around a plot to assassinate the Queen, especially one starring Sir David of Del Boy. But The Royal Bodyguard - which marks his return to BBC comedy after several austere years on t'other side - does just that, albeit in the most inoffensively silly way.

His titular security ace is a Clouseau-esque incompetent utterly convinced of his superior prowess; hardly an original creation, but Jason plays him with his usual aplomb. And you get the sense that he's really enjoying playing comedy again. But at 71, watching him take constant pratfalls - despite the understandable use of doubles at times - can be more worrying than funny: the latterday Norman Wisdom effect.

But I can't deny the appeal of this cheerfully basic slapstick farce from the writers behind The Worst Week of My Life, which exists purely to make its audience laugh and nothing more. Its very predictability is part of the gag, although it remains to be seen whether it can sustain over a series.

Incidentally, the only thing he doesn't fall through in episode one is a bar-hatch. But there's still time yet. Come on, Dave, just for old time's sake.

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It initially feels like a misjudged disaster, but once you get used to what Tony Roche is trying to achieve, it's difficult to resist its giddily freewheeling pull.

There's nothing particularly, ah, fresh about Fresh Meat, but this new teen comedy drama has an inbuilt likability which ensures that it's instantly preferable to the likes of Skins.

Created by Peep Show overlords Sam Bain and Jesse Armstrong, it stars Joe Thomas from The Inbetweeners as a hapless first-year student sharing a house in Manchester with a gaggle of contrasting characters, including a quietly scene-stealing Greg McHugh (star of BBC Scotland's Gary: Tank Commander) and - this will take some swallowing, I know - hitherto useless comedian Jack Whitehall proving perfectly acceptable in his first acting role. Mind you, he's playing an objectionable posh twit, so it's hardly a stretch.

The distinctive fingerprints of Armstrong and Bain are all over the opening episode, which leans more towards comedy than drama, as the various misfits get to know each other while desperately trying to reinvent themselves.

Rather sweet at heart, it should be applauded for generally eschewing the puerility, moralising and self-conscious "edge" which usually blights this genre. And if all it achieves is in some way vaguely justifying the existence of Jack Whitehall, then that has to count for something. Doesn't it?

I recently wrote to television to ask it, in polite yet vigorous terms, to cease making whimsical comedy-dramas set in idealised northern towns which promulgate the tired view that Britain is populated entirely by loveable eccentrics and pantomime villains. Did it listen? Did it 'eck as like.

Or perhaps Sugartown was already in the can by the time my urgent missive arrived, and that seeing as the BBC don't appear to have much faith in it - shunting it out almost apologetically at the unedifying slot of 10:25pm on a Sunday - this will be the last programme of its type we shall ever see, paving way for a new golden dawn where populist drama isn't a euphemism for "bland, cosy, unambitious nothingness starring a man in a bobble hat".

One can but hopelessly dream.

Set in a fictional seaside town financially supported by the local rock factory (hence the title), and populated by the likes of Sue Johnston doing her daffy yet dependable older woman act, it is pitched somewhere between Victoria Wood and an Ealing comedy, but without the wit or spark of either.

You know how it goes: unscrupulous entrepreneur threatens to close the factory, forcing the plucky locals to fight back in a variety of unamusing ways. That their principle method of rebellion is the feel-good factor of dance should also come as no surprise to you.

What may startle you slightly, however, is the villain's stewardship of a mini Playboy club, which is of course precisely the sort of establishment you'd find in a nowhere town where nearly every resident is an OAP. Yes, I know it's not a Ken Loach film, but you can only suspend your disbelief so much.

Featuring a mayor who arrives to work on a bicycle wearing full ceremonial attire - presumably as a concession to those who wish to believe that Trumpton was a documentary - and a character seemingly intended to illustrate the lighter side of bipolar disorder, Sugartown succeeds neither as comedy nor drama.

Pastel-coloured in sugary shades of CBBC, it should be studiously avoided if you're lactose intolerant or simply intolerant of vacuous entertainment.

I recently wrote to television to ask it, in polite yet vigorous terms, to cease making whimsical comedy-dramas set in idealised northern towns which promulgate the tired view that Britain is populated entirely by loveable eccentrics and pantomime villains. Did it listen? Did it 'eck as like.

Or perhaps Sugartown was already in the can by the time my urgent missive arrived, and that seeing as the BBC don't appear to have much faith in it - shunting it out almost apologetically at the unedifying slot of 10:25pm on a Sunday - this will be the last programme of its type we shall ever see, paving way for a new golden dawn where populist drama isn't a euphemism for "bland, cosy, unambitious nothingness starring a man in a
bobble hat".

One can but hopelessly dream.

Set in a fictional seaside town financially supported by the local rock factory (hence the title), and populated by the likes of Sue Johnston doing her daffy yet dependable older woman act, it is pitched somewhere between Victoria Wood and an Ealing comedy, but without the wit or spark of either.

You know how it goes: unscrupulous entrepreneur threatens to close the factory, forcing the plucky locals to fight back in a variety of unamusing ways. That their principle method of rebellion is the feel-good factor of dance should also come as no surprise to you.

What may startle you slightly, however, is the villain's stewardship of a mini Playboy club, which is of course precisely the sort of establishment you'd find in a nowhere town where nearly every resident is an OAP. Yes, I know it's not a Ken Loach film, but you can only suspend your disbelief so much.

Featuring a mayor who arrives to work on a bicycle wearing full ceremonial attire - presumably as a concession to those who wish to believe that Trumpton was a documentary - and a character seemingly intended to illustrate the lighter side of bipolar disorder, Sugartown succeeds neither as comedy nor drama.

Pastel-coloured in sugary shades of CBBC, it should be studiously avoided if you're lactose intolerant or simply intolerant of vacuous entertainment.

Sirens is a dire, dreary sitcom about three spectacularly charmless ambulance drivers.

Rhys Thomas of Bellamy's People and Fonejacker's Kayvan Novak are able comic performers, but they're all at sea in this virtually jokeless cauldron of mediocrity.

With its unedifying mix of crass sex jokes, gruesome imagery and ham-fisted "pathos", it's a tonal train-wreck. It's also stretched to breaking point at an hour, when its barren dialogue and slim plot (lazily derived from Seinfeld's infamous masturbation episode) couldn't sustain even half that time. If you're a young male who finds the very idea of turgidity amusing, knock yourself out. Otherwise, run for the hills.

The barmy brainchild of League of Gentlemen alumni Steve Pemberton and Reece Shearsmith, comedy thriller Psychoville returns for a mildly disappointing second series, in which their army of grotesques is plunged into a new set of mysteries.

Despite feeling short-changed by its ending (an anti-climax knowingly mocked within this opening instalment), I thoroughly enjoyed series one. But having watched the first four episodes of this sequel, it appears to be treading water. It just doesn't feel as fresh or compelling as before, which is to say, it's still more inventive and amusing than most current comedies, but rather patchy by its creator's usual high standards.

Nevertheless, there are moments of inspired lunacy - such as recurring intrusions from a hilariously unnerving apparition known as The Silent Singer, and a ludicrous storyline detailing Mr Lomax's relationship with a certain dead comedian - that redeem the weaker material. Plus, I'll always have time for the twisted pathos and coal-black comedy of Pemberton and Shearsmith, who remain two of the best comic actors in the business: the latter's deranged Tina Turner impression in episode two has to be seen to be believed.

And any comedy in which the epithet "tea-leaf" makes me giggle, no matter how often it's uttered, has to be doing something right.

Comedy-drama Candy Cabs takes an altogether different approach to the subject of class by relying on the default portrayal of Britain's proles as a wacky, tacky, loveable bunch of feisty fruitcakes.

Wearing its bittersweet Northern credentials like a pair of oversized glittery epaulettes, it concerns a group of female underdogs opening a novelty cab firm in the face of the recession.

When this army of stereotypes isn't bantering cheekily, they're bickering loudly and berating their hapless menfolk, in a bland and predictable production that's basically the televisual equivalent of a middle-aged divorcée enjoying a "naughty" box of chocolates in a bubble bath.

I'm not one for hyperbole, but Limmy's Show, which concludes this week, is clearly the best British sketch comedy since The Fast Show. Charming, original, surprising, inventive, ambitious, and above all funny, it's a pleasure to wallow in the singular vision of its creator, Brian Limond.

I love its willingness to fail, perplex and alienate, despite this series being more consistent than the first. I love that, with Falconhoof and Dee Dee, Limond has created two hilarious characters far richer than any devised by the disproportionately popular Little Britain.

And a fragment of my faith in the world has been restored by the fact that an offbeat comic auteur has been allowed to experiment unfettered on the BBC.

Comedy this unique is always going to polarise opinion, which can only be a good thing. Better that than adequate, committee-formed sketch comedies such as The Armstrong and Miller Show.

My only complaint is that this BBC Scotland production hasn't received the nationwide screening it deserves, despite the niggling suspicion that widespread exposure would result in BBC executives tampering with everything that's good about it. But for now, Limond has succeeded in hijacking the airwaves with some truly inspired and inspiring comedy.