Limmy's Show!

DVD Review: Limmy's Show

BBC Three ought to show this - F*ck Me I'm Fat ain't cutting it no more.

I'm not one for hyperbole, but Limmy's Show, which concludes this week, is clearly the best British sketch comedy since The Fast Show. Charming, original, surprising, inventive, ambitious, and above all funny, it's a pleasure to wallow in the singular vision of its creator, Brian Limond.

I love its willingness to fail, perplex and alienate, despite this series being more consistent than the first. I love that, with Falconhoof and Dee Dee, Limond has created two hilarious characters far richer than any devised by the disproportionately popular Little Britain.

And a fragment of my faith in the world has been restored by the fact that an offbeat comic auteur has been allowed to experiment unfettered on the BBC.

Comedy this unique is always going to polarise opinion, which can only be a good thing. Better that than adequate, committee-formed sketch comedies such as The Armstrong and Miller Show.

My only complaint is that this BBC Scotland production hasn't received the nationwide screening it deserves, despite the niggling suspicion that widespread exposure would result in BBC executives tampering with everything that's good about it. But for now, Limond has succeeded in hijacking the airwaves with some truly inspired and inspiring comedy.

The main event: Limmy's Show

The legend so far: in 2002, Glaswegian web designer Brian Limond began posting surreal, funny, homemade comedy videos on his website. In 2006, after gaining a cult following, he released a series of daily podcasts titled Limmy's World Of Glasgow, featuring characters such as over-sensitive ex-junkie Jacqueline McCafferty and spaced-out waster fantasist Dee Dee.

A welcome return for Limmy's Show, not just the most inventive Scots sketch show for yonks but nationally far superior to the lazy likes of Come Fly With Me or Tramadol Nights. Not all of Brian Limond's ideas work, but even the ones which puzzle are at least interesting and many are hilariously original. I'm particularly pleased to see the naively earnest phone-in adventure game host Falconhoof again, this time with an annoying jester sidekick, while a new TV psychic who looks oddly familiar is a good addition. But it's the funny peculiar elements which really make the show stand out, like Limond's running chats to camera in which he makes great use of his disconcerting stare. It's almost scary (though not as much as Come Fly With Me being recommissioned).

Limmy wonders what he should tell son about his career

Brian Limond has a dilemma - how does he explain to his son what dad did for a living when he was younger?

Limmy: New king of angry comedy

There are lots of angry young men out there who are fed up with being ignored by terrestrial television. They don't want celebrity, stupidity or faux bonhomie; they don't want phone-ins and nostalgia; they want honesty. Frankie Boyle's Tramadol Nights should have delivered, but it failed. It was unfunny and smacked of him being given a chance and not knowing what to do with it.

Limmy: Fatherhood's made me more responsible

He's Scotlands most controversial new comedian and is loved and loathed in equal measure. But Brian Limond, aka Limmy, isn't bothered that he has divided opinion among Scots viewers - two of the biggest names in British TV comedy have given him their full seal of approval.

Radio Times review of Limmy's Show

Holding up a mirror to our childish, base urges - and doing it in a fierce Glasgow accent - make Limond a bit much for the regular Beeb, even if there's well-constructed comedy and gentle humanity underneath all the bile and paranoia. So Limmy's Show is BBC2 Scotland only, but you can catch the whole series on iPlayer.

Scottish comic jumps from cyberspace into TV

If you can design a swearing Internet xylophone you may end up with your own BBC comedy show one day - just ask Brian "Limmy" Limond.