Steve Speirs

Ruth Jones's soft-centred drama enjoys a pugilistic diversion tonight as Steve Speirs takes the writing credit for an episode that puts Big Alan in the centre of the action. While Stella feels like boxing Rob's ears for letting son Luke loose in the ring at Pontyberry's fight night, Big Alan is girding his loins for a life-changing battle on two fronts: the custody of Little Alan and the future of his precious rugby club.

Fight night in Pontyberry. Not just hotheads Luke and Lenny clashing in the ring over Zoe, but Big Alan squaring up for a scrap over his beloved rugby club. We know there's a rousing, Churchillian speech in the offing, and it's well worth the wait. It's an Alan-heavy episode, and that's no surprise: Steve Speirs, who plays him so brilliantly, is also this week's writer.

But that's the great thing about Stella star and creator Ruth Jones, who distributes plotlines among her ensemble cast with equanimity. And it works perfectly for the cheek-by-jowl world of Pontyberry, where everyone knows everyone's else's business: look out for an unsuitable choir rehearsal in the room above the undertaker's.

Nudging over the halfway point of the series, Stella has a handful of timebombs ticking away, among them: Alan's ex waltzing back to the Valleys to ruin lives like Alexis in Dynasty; Luke flirting with the girlfriend of monstrous ex-con Lennie; and "Midlife Crisis" Paula being inexplicably allowed to babysit ("He's too young for cheeseburger, in' he?"). It's an almost perfect mix of sweet, sour and funny (a Bobby and Stella two-hander in the undertaker's manages to be all three).

But isn't it time fortune started to smile on downtrodden, cuckolded Alan (Steve Speirs)? He even gets hit on the head with a rugby ball. Three times. Still, he's given the best speech tonight - about community, in many ways the show's party manifesto - and the finest punchline.

Currently in the middle of its second series, Stella is a comedy drama starring and co-written by Ruth Jones. It certainly has a lot of support because a third series has been commissioned already.

Set in the fictional Welsh town of Pontyberry, Jones plays the title character, a woman in her mid-40s who is divorced and with three kids (like in Spy, divorcees appear to be a recurring theme in Sky comedy). Stella's eldest son is in prison, the middle child is a troublesome daughter and the youngest son is bullied for being too clever.

The series follows her life and those of her friends and neighbours, which include Paula (Elizabeth Berrington), an undertaker with a love of booze, and Alan (Steve Speirs) the school lollipop man - and rugby coach - who has loved Stella since school.

Again, another similarity with Spy was the good use of visual humour. There's one scene in which Paula tries to sober up by taking some flowers out of a glass vase and drinking the water that's inside. Then there are the neighbours across the road, who for some reason have a pet donkey.

The characters, however, are more likable than those in Spy. I love Alan's pathetic attempts to win over Stella's affections - like getting her a jar of anchovies. And while the drama can be a bit predictable, I do prefer Stella over Spy. It's more realistic, more likeable, and the created situations are just a lot more fun.

Ruth Jones's deftly written comedy rarely misses a beat. Tonight comic Paul Kaye makes an appearance as Peschman, a Dutch life coach who uses a unique form of therapy to help Stella (Jones) through her continuing troubles. Elsewhere, Paula (Elizabeth Berrington) thinks about turning her night away from home into a permanent arrangement, while the hapless Alan (Steve Speirs) learns that his big love - the rugby club - is closing down.

Tricky times for the Pontyberry menfolk. The university ball is fast approaching for Sunil (Rory Girvan), which means he'll have to fend off his vampish fellow student Leah once and for all, and remember his wife and child at home.

Alan (Steve Speirs) has to think about his next move, with his job as a lollipop man coming to an end after "three years, man and boy" and his snotty ex-wife strutting around with gifts for Little Alan. Worst of all is the predicament that Dai (Owen Teale) finds himself in.

He's jobless and, in a strand that forms part of one of the funniest episodes Stella has yet produced, still unable to perform in the bedroom. Auntie Brenda (Di Botcher) comes to the rescue with some blue pills she picked up in Spain: "They'll turn a button mushroom into a stick of celery before you can say Heston Blumenthal."

Inspired by Dylan Thomas's nostalgic anecdotal tale, Mark Watson's observant comedy is set in the household of young Owen Rhys (Oliver Bunyan/Mark Williams) over a series of Christmases in 1980s South Wales. Every year, the peace of the family home, where Owen lives with his gloomy father (Mark Lewis Jones) and obsessive mother (Ruth Jones), is disturbed by the yuletide arrival of Owen's two uncles (Steve Speirs and Paul Kaye) and nephew (Jamie Burch/Rhys McLellan). In a glimpse of three of these gatherings, while Owen and Maurice are seen maturing into young men, their male elders merely engage in ever-more puerile bouts of sibling rivalry.