Man Down

Third series of misadventures for Greg Davies's shambolic teacher. A disciplinary carpeting from the authorities is on the cards due to a simple misjudgment over a wine box and Dan's drama class. The route to avoid being ostracised by Ofsted lies with the school's tempestuously eccentric caretaker (played, in keeping with the show's knack for grabbing big names, by Steven Berkoff). What could possibly go wrong? Regular viewers of Man Down might well guess.

Greg Davies on Man Down Series 3

This series, Davies says Dan will be "forced into more decisions".

That dreadful series of Top Gear was good for one thing at least: it featured the gigantic Greg Davies one week as the Star In A Reasonably Priced And Frankly Humiliating Cheap Copy Of Clarkson's Ideas. I jumped for joy at Davies's appearance as this surely meant his brilliant sitcom, Man Down, was coming back. I love the show. Even my dog loves it.

Davies plays Dan, a pathetic, lovelorn, middle-aged man who hates his job and lives with his mum, "Old Woman" who, this week, brings a new boyfriend home - a brash Yorkshireman played by Tony Robinson who takes a furious dislike to Dan. Things are tough at school when Dan is summoned to a disciplinary hearing. He must try and destroy his HR file but a new janitor, a mentally unstable Serbian played by Steven Berkoff, stands in the way.

Man Down Series 3 review

For the classroom scenes provide so many of the best lines in the sharp script, often from the kids in Dan's drama class.

TV preview: Man Down, C4

Good to see Greg Davies back as helpless, hapless, hopeless giant man-child teacher Dan. There are some nice new treats in the supporting cast too, but they have to have pretty big personalities to stand a chance of competing with Davies. Luckily they are.

Greg Davies: tricky being anonymous when you're 6ft 8

Funny man Greg Davies, 48, on finding comedy fame late in life, needing therapy, and why he'd love to play a Bond villain...

Mark Hamill is a massive fan of... Bottom

Greg Davies reveals how he was able to cast the Luke S star in the third series of his Channel 4 comedy Man Down.

Radio Times review

Radio Times Top 40 TV Shows of 2015, #30:

Rik Mayall's deranged dad character was one of the joys of Man Down's first series. How would it work without him? He left an unfillable hole, but Greg Davies skirted around it to deliver a second series as absurdly, tastelessly enjoyable as the first. Man-child Dan was if anything more oafish and disaster-prone, his misadventures more far-fetched, but now with the added peril of a mad aunt played by Stephanie Cole. Davies's scripts were never afraid to push daft ideas almost to breaking point, but he and a superb cast cartwheeled through the comic minefield.