Pramface

On the list of programmes cited in the widespread calls to save BBC Three, unplanned parenthood comedy Pramface has cropped up a fair few times. It's a shame, then, that it has been allowed to descend into dullness, as these final two episodes confirm. First up, young dad Jamie's new girlfriend proves a pain, while Mike saves Beth from a humiliating turn as a chugger. In the last episode, it's Emily's first birthday, but as Laura tries to move on with her life, is she truly over the father of her child?

Radio Times review

Pramface's central couple have to be mismatched - it's at the heart of the "comedy" - but does Laura have to be quite so whiny and annoying and does Jamie, the father of her baby, have to be such a gormless man-child? He's an eager-to-please simpleton who is duped once again when a chancy painter and decorator recruits him to do some casual work. This involves Jamie removing his shirt and wearing revealing cut-off jeans. Poor Jamie, he's merely eye-candy for leering middle-aged ladies.

Passive-aggressive Laura, meanwhile, is stomping around her dad's flat as he undergoes a midlife crisis and starts dating a much younger woman.

The Pramface baby daddy - An interview with Chris Reddy

On The Box talks to Pramface creator and lead writer Chris Reddy about finding the humour in teenage pregnancy, the reason John Milton would have made a kick-ass screenwriter and why it's best to avoid Gavin and Stacey comparisons.

It might just be a crazy rumour but the mere fact that it was depressingly believable that the jokers (not in a good way) who run BBC comedy would consider axing Vic & Bob's brilliant House Of Fools told you all you need to know.

A corporation that once championed innovation is now a shameless ratings chaser. Welcome to a world with 99 further series of Mrs Brown's Boys. And Pramface too, probably.

We're now on to series three of this singularly unremarkable attempt to mine easy laughs out of teenage parenthood, featuring a bunch of characters with only a distant connection to what it's actually like to have a child while still in your school years. I'm not saying all comedy has to be social realism but it helps if the relationships are vaguely believable.

Instead we get wet manchild Jamie, a human doormat desperate to win the affection of spoilt Laura who, week in, week out, gives him the runaround. It's all oddly depressing.

The soft-centred babies-making-babies sitcom returns for a third series, with Laura and Jamie (Scarlett Alice Johnson and Sean Michael Verey) having trouble adjusting to life as a couple.

Well, Laura's having trouble and is trying to find a way of dumping her dimple-cheeked lover boy yet again.

"It's like watching someone torture a puppy. Stop messing him around," observes her waspish best friend, which is pretty much the size of it. Angus Deayton and Anna Chancellor co-star.

Radio Times review

BBC Three has always struck me as the most unlikely home for this soft-centred, blandly pleasing sitcom. It's not particularly sweary, its characters are inoffensive and it even flutters on the outskirts of twee, so it's hardly up there with Two Pints of Lager or Bad Education.

As we reach the third series young, accidental parents Jamie and Laura (Sean Michael Verey and Scarlett Alice Johnson), who conceived a baby after a misguided one-night stand, have a polite relationship for the sake of their little one.

But their parents are fractious and in chaos - Jamie's feckless dad has spent the family's money and they are evicted from their home, while Laura's high-flying mum (Anna Chancellor) is still in New York, communicating bad-temperedly via Skype with her estranged husband (Angus Deayton).

Emer Kenny interview

I caught up with Emer Kenny, who plays Danielle, to see what was in store for Danielle third time around.

Sean Michael Verey interview

I caught up with Sean Michael Verey to chat about what's in store for Jamie this series, as well as getting his thoughts as to why Pramface remains under the radar...

This sitcom about two teenagers who are parents but definitely not a couple has found its groove in Series 2. It's bawdy but not gratuitously gross; sweet at heart but not too cheesy. It might be educating a few BBC3 viewers, too. You don't often see a sitcom episode built around the difficulties of, say, breast pumps and expressed milk...