Reece Shearsmith

A completely different cup of tea this week. Instead of the usual rogues' gallery, we focus entirely on murderous (and hideous) mother-and-son duo the Sowerbutts (Reece Shearsmith and Steve Pemberton), who are bundling their latest victim into a chest as we meet them. But hang on, this looks different, too. Instead of the usual gothic style, we have a simple, stagey approach: one room, a single shot with no edits. Yes, what we have here is Psychoville's very own tribute to Alfred Hitchcock's Rope. It's an ambitious idea and it's slickly done, with the expected touches of the surreal. As they try to get over the unpleasantness of the murder, the pair put "the cheering-up tape" on - an upbeat aerobics workout to which they do a hopeless dance routine. But no sooner have they put the kettle on than there's a knock at the door and they're disturbed by a stranger in a belted mac and trilby, asking uncomfortable questions. He's played by a familiar face (especially to fans of Shearsmith and Pemberton's work), but the show begs us not to reveal his identity.

Alfred Hitchcock was a film-maker who could be relied upon to find the grotesque humour in any given situation. It's therefore appropriate that tonight's instalment of Psychoville, possibly TV's first gothic sitcom-cum-thriller, should pay homage to Alf. More surprisingly, Reece Shearsmith and Steve Pemberton choose to riff off Rope in an episode shot in two long takes, with the murderous David and Maureen at the centre of the mayhem. Prepare for a killing, a trunk, an unexpected caller, a sudden panic and a fixation with pyramid teabags.

Alfred Hitchcock appears to be one of the influences on this weirdly compelling comedy-thriller series. Here The League of Gentlemen's Reece Shearsmith and Steve Pemberton pay homage to his oft-overlooked film Rope, which in turn was inspired by the real-life murder of a young boy in 1924 by two college students. Tonight David (Steve Pemberton) and his mother Maureen (Reece Shearsmith) are mid-murder at their home when an unexpected visitor knocks on the door and throws them into a panic.

The halfway point of Reece Shearsmith and Steve Pemberton's strange and twisted comic delight takes a step back from the blizzard of surreal characters to focus on the most engaging of them all - deadly mother and son duo Maureen and David Sowerbutts. The production of the episode pays tribute to Hitchcock's Rope, being shot virtually seamlessly in two long takes, honing in on more 'bad murders' and 'strangles' as the pair try to clean up their killing spree, while dancing to Black Lace's Superman Song. All this and a special guest star...

Coulrophobics beware: this episode features an exceptionally weird clown sequence in which Mr Jelly (Reece Shearsmith) is tried in "clown court" for bringing his profession into disrepute. His punishment appears, initially, to throw some light on what's happening in this increasingly bizarre (Christopher Biggins in a gold lamé codpiece is the least of it) black comedy but, true to form, the clue proves unreliable.

It is possible to have too much macabre weirdness in one programme. Created, written and largely performed by Reece Shearsmith and Steve Pemberton from The League Of Gentlemen, Psychoville is an exercise in just how far you can push dark comedy.

To this end the pair have assembled a rogues gallery of grotesques, scattered them the length and breadth of the country, and set a mysterious blackmailer on their trail. "I know what you did," ran his first anonymous correspondence to the seemingly unconnected group and, without even knowing what they're accused of, you wouldn't put it past them.

Psychoville is definitely an acquired taste, and I'm afraid my appetite was sated halfway through the second episode, with the introduction of ghoulish conjoined twins with symmetrical facial blemishes. For me it was a case of two freaks too far.

It is very well done, atmospheric and beautifully performed, but the misanthropic tone of the humour is relentless and, after a while, a bit tedious. The introduction of a little shade would have been welcome, even different shades of black.

The macabre comedy gets funnier by the week, as we come to know more about the individual characters. Tonight, for example, we get Mr Jelly's backstory: how he wound up as an embittered, one-handed clown. Also, unhinged midwife Joy's husband George (Steve Pemberton) lets slip that his wife was once "put away". The most hilarious scenario of all, though, is when David Sowerbutts (Steve Pemberton) and his mum Maureen (Reece Shearsmith) dispatch their next victim disguised as beauticians. A must.

Reece Shearsmith and Steve Pemberton's eerie comedy just keeps getting better. That's largely because the plot, in the grotesque manner of a cockroach scuttling for safety across a kitchen floor after the light has been turned on, is accelerating. Tonight, that means a murder most horrid, backstory to explain the tension between Mr Jelly and Mr Jolly, a bidding war between Lomax and the Crabtree sisters, and the appearance of a video in the post. Worth watching just for the soft play pursuit scene.

I am having to watch Psychoville (BBC2) from behind the sofa, lest the equivalent of The League of Gentlemen's Papa Lazarou (the mere thought of whom is enough to have me weeping with fear) emerges. But it is corking stuff. Robert the dwarf has turned out to be telekinetic. Joy is feeding her baby on blood and punching anyone who dares to suggest that the infant strapped to her chest is in fact a doll, while the serial killer-obsessed David "I like strangles" Sowerbutts and his mother Maureen are about to fulfil what one can only assume is a lifelong dream by murdering someone. That's if they can agree on a method. "I like drills." "You're not doing that, I've got a thumping headache."

So far, I am managing to cope with both the one-handed, embittered clown Mr Jelly and the eyeless (not just blind, but eyeless, very, very eyeless) toy collector Mr Lomax, who has taken on Tea Leaf as an employee (contractual terms: "No girls, no smoking and no meat pies") to help him track down on eBay the one Beanie missing from his collection. I am rapidly approaching the limits of my endurance, yet fear we are nowhere near exhausting writers Reece Shearsmith and Steve Pemberton's appalling imaginations. I suspect that when the mysterious blackmailer who is stalking them is finally revealed, none of us will ever sleep soundly again.

What makes this a very special sort of sitcom is that Reece Shearsmith and Steve Pemberton dream up such horribly sinister "sits" for their "com". And the fact that we're on edge at the unpleasantness of it all makes us that bit quicker to laugh when the jokes come. It's a balancing act, but it's one they pull off cleverly, with their eyeless collector, eBay-obsessed conjoined twins and Joy, a deranged Bristolian midwife. Dawn French is great as Joy, cuddling her fake-baby "Freddie" in a papoose and, at one point, filling his drinking bottle from a hospital blood bag. Other highlights tonight include a fabulously daft fight over a Punch and Judy booth and a scene where murderous David Sowerbutts runs a bath in which to drown his next victim, urged on by his mum. This week's mystery messages, delivered to the various apparently unconnected characters by a masked figure, is simply "You killed her" - though naturally, we're no nearer to finding out who or why.