Sharon Lougher

Lucy Davis carves out a fine career

The Office actress speaks about her new role in comedy Married Single Other and the advantages of pulling off an American accent.

Three cheers for the return of the Chatsworth Buccaneers. Frank is now 50, doing community service and still seriously lacking the basic parenting skills, Liam's decided he needs a hero and everyone else is thinking about sex (or stealing stuff) as per usual. Some promising new plot threads emerge, though, chief among them Frank's love-at-first sight encounter with a librarian called Libby.

The top-notch panel show returns with guests Mark Watson, Patrick Kielty and Milton Jones - but how will it fare without the savage brilliance of Frankie Boyle?

The Beeb's latest sitcom is hewn from the same rock as The IT Crowd: it's big, bold, colourful and obvious. The setting this time is a hapless advertising agency - waters charted much better in the recent Martin Clunes remake of The Fall And Rise Of Reginald Perrin. Still, it might be a grower, in the same sledgehammer way that Miranda was - and fans of Iain Lee and Adam Buxton will appreciate their putting in an appearance.

Remember that scene in Four Weddings And A Funeral when Andie MacDowell lists her sexual partners to a beleaguered Hugh Grant? Well, this is sort of that, stretched out over two parts. This time, our leading lady is Michelle Ryan playing a statistics-obsessed maths teacher who reckons the 11th sexual partner is the one you should marry - the appearance of an ex on her wedding day prompts a romp through her hot-under-the-collar past. It's not entirely successful because Ryan's not much of an actress and the script is a bit lacklustre. But the eye-candy credentials of Sean Maguire and Adam Garcia, and an appearance by sweet Slumdog Millionaire star Dev Patel are enough to keep you paying attention.

The world would be a sadder place if Russell Brand quit the public eye - he's scarily intelligent, supremely funny, startlingly honest and can't last a day without pushing buttons. In this documentary, ex-alcoholic Frank Skinner interviews Brand about his wild career, drug addiction, relationship with the media and even his dandy image, which Brand makes sense of using Simpsons creator Matt Groening's maxim that 'good cartoon characters are recognisable in silhouette'. A fascinating account, interspersed with early and recent performance footage.

Flight Of The Conchords's star Rhys Darby anchors tonight's comedy test-out pilot. He's Dermot, a not so amazing magician trying to get his life on track by checking himself into a rehab clinic after screwing up a hypnotising trick. he has a rubbish catchphrase and is as uncool as he is un-PC - qualities that bring to mind Alan Partridge's spell holed up in a Linton Travel Tavern in I'm Alan Partridge. It worked for Steve Coogan: will it work for Darby?

Another gem of a pilot from C4's Comedy Showcase testing ground. Todd (David Cross) is a brash American sent to London to sell an energy drink to an unsuspecting British public. Trouble is, our culturally narrow-minded protagonist soon finds himself a fish out of water, and hindered further by his unhelpful English assistant (Russell Tovey). It plays out well, and there is enjoyable support from an Anglo-American cast that also includes Will Arnett and Pulling's Sharon Horgan.

We like James Corden a lot more when he's putting his talents to this Bafta-winning series rather than letting his ego run riot on other formats. It's the christening of Nessa and Smithy's baby that warrants the bringing together of the Essex and Welsh families in this first episode of the final series. Of second concern is jobs: Nessa's got two, Smithy and Stacey don't have any and Gavin's got a new one at which he's thoroughly embarrassed after family and friends bombard him with impromptu visits, phone calls, packed lunches and other well-wishing surprises.

Miranda Hart, aka the dozy cleaner out of Lee Mack and Tim Vine's one-liner-thon Not Going Out, gets her own sitcom, in which she runs a joke shop - badly - and fawns over the sexy chef in the restaurant next door - badly. At first, the humour is all a bit trouser-round-the-ankles obvious but once the fabulous Sally Philips turns up as one of Miranda's toff school friends, the high levels of daffiness bludgeon us into submission.