Detectorists

Detectorists appears to plot its conclusion

It's only episode 2 of the current series of Detectorists and already we can see the wheels in motion that will bring this story to a climax.

Among this week's surfeit of goodies, there was also an oasis. Not to say that Detectorists isn't great: simply that it feels like not-TV. More like lying on a sand dune in an open shirt, with a warm wind blowing your underarm hairs. Than which there are few finer feelings.

watched this first episode about three times, and couldn't for the world find anything to jot down. Nothing happens, over and over again. And yet it's a beautiful little piece of television, England gone right, with its silences, subtleties, desultory chat, lovely folk music, and Mackenzie Crook and Toby Jones, who often earn fortunes in films, choosing instead to do this slice of joy about the world of metal-detecting, and I for one rise from my sofa and applaud.

I'm told that the last two significant finds of "troves" in Britain were not by archaeologists but by detectorists, and, worse, virgin detectorists: one guy bought the device at a car-boot sale or something, switched it on and instantly found a tranche of Viking gold about 14 inches under his Clark's Commandos. It is a measure of the lovely credibility of the characters that I can, as I write, picture the reactions of Lance and Andy: tag-wrestling between outraged and laconic over over-hoppy beer.

Toby Jones interview

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Detectorists review

Mackenzie Crook and Toby Jones shine in the third and final series of this beautifully written and performed slice of life.

It seems this is to be the final series of Mackenzie Crook's gentle, delicate metal-detection bromance Detectorists (BBC Four, 8 November, 10pm) and though I've never found it unmissable exactly, I mourn its impending departure. Being at times more of a reverie than a sitcom, it is like nothing else on television, for all that its subject - the inability of men to talk to one another, the various ways they get around the problem - is an old one.

If it is sweetly funny, it's also full of pathos, its characters never quite getting what they want, or need. And where else are you going to hear people using expressions like "purse spill"? (In the world of the metal detectorists, this is what you call a hoard that comprises only a couple of pathetic coins.)

Andy (Crook) doesn't like his new job as an archaeologist, and Lance (Toby Jones) is walking on eggshells now his daughter has moved back in. These problems, however, are as nothing compared to the news that a planned solar farm may threaten their favourite detecting spot. Will they be able to stop it? Fans will hope that as the clock ticks, they will make a discovery that will both vanquish the developers and provide Andy and the long-suffering Becky (Rachael Stirling) with enough cash to buy themselves a home. But my guess is that Crook is too much of a realist for happy endings. Don't think Sutton Hoo; think more rusty scaffolding clamps.

Belly Laugh? Motherland (BBC2); Detectorists (BBC4)

Both funny, but in different ways. The question is which way around should I watch them?

Mackenzie Crook: Suffolk the perfect setting for comedy

The creator of the BBC series Detectorists says Suffolk has provided the ideal landscape for the programme and he can no longer imagine it being filmed elsewhere.

TV preview: Detectorists, BBC4

Writer, director and star Mackenzie Crook has said that this is the last series of Detectorists. If that's the case it will be a great shame.

Detectorists series 3 review

For, as so much of this delightful series, while it seems like nothing much is happening, there's such a lot beneath the surface, hidden from view. What a perfect metaphor metal detecting turns out to be.

Detectorists, BBC4, review

Metalhead comedy full of tender moments.