Green Wing

The first series of Green Wing (Friday, C4) was one of the most freshly funny and crisply innovative comedies for years. The humour was all based in the character, not the situation. The story lines were negligible; there were no catch phrases; it was surreal in a way we hadn't seen since Monty Python; and the cast were actors being funny from inside a characterisation, not stand-up comics bolting a cartoon persona onto the back of gags. There had been a worrying gap between the first and second series, but finally we got the preview ads, and a run of the previous series as a fanfare and a reminder. Then the new one began with a dream sequence. Oh my God, I could hardly believe my eyes. Was I asleep? No, it really was a dream sequence.

Now, every 11-year-old knows dream sequences are the lowest form of plotting solution, lower than unexplained superpowers such as the ability to stop time or become invisible; even lower than a magic get-better potion. Within two minutes, Green Wing had destroyed itself, lost its assured grip on the cliff of comedy and tumbled into the abyss of embarrassing overacting, formless gurning and pointless repetition. What had once looked Dada-ishly brilliant now looked like stoned improv from a show-off's drama school. The lack of plot and coherent narrative that previously had been a blessed freedom was revealed to be a formless free-for-all, brilliant performances as silly mannerisms. Nothing I've seen this year has disappointed me as sharply as the second series of Green Wing. As Tom Paine so poignantly pointed out, only a step separates the sublime from the ridiculous.