Stewart Lee's Comedy Vehicle

Daringly or negligently, BBC Two may have upset Eastering Christians last night by transmitting Stewart Lee's anti-religion stand-up set last night. Benedict XVIII got it in the neck and so did John Paul II, or, at least, his marketing man did for selling lollipops bearing his features in Vatican Square. The Muslims were hardly more than a passing reference, however, and Lee got distracted by David Cameron, Laurel and Hardy and a postmodernist reading of his own act. The sketches were awful. His routine about the evangelist who turned up at his door with the poser "If Jesus is the answer what is the question?" (reply: "Is it, 'For which role was Robert Powell nominated for a Bafta?'") was brilliant. As it was 20 years ago, when Lee first performed it.

Editor Note: This review was published in The Times despite the fact the religion episode had actually been moved to the following week and thus had not been broadcast yet

Stewart Lee is a very funny guy, so one can assume that he knows a thing or two about making people laugh. And that's the focus of his musings tonight. He talks about those who have influenced his career and considers where stand-up comedy is going in the future. Very far, if this display is anything to go by.

Stewart Lee turns his attention to the global financial crisis and the collapse of the property market. "The fox," he says, "has his den. The bee has his hive. The stoat has his . . . stoat hole. But only man chooses to make his nest in an investment opportunity." He goes on to explain the crucial difference between a house and an investment. "A home is a basic requirement of life. Like food. When squirrels hide acorns they are not trying to play the acorn market." Those who are now suffering the most from the property slump are the estate agents, but he warns against premature satisfaction. "The struggles to survive that estate agents are going through today," he says glumly, "are a useful barometer of some of the problems that we humans might face in the future."

The urbane Lee continues to do his bit to redress the shortage of stand-up comedy on TV. We're overrun with panel shows in which comics slice and dice their stand-up ideas into witty chunks but we get fewer full-length routines.

What Lee shows over the course of a half-hour programme is how a longer time frame lets him toy with an idea, stretch it to breaking point, and play on preconceptions so that by the end you almost feel part of an unusually witty sociology seminar.

Having said all that, tonight's edition isn't as thick with laugh-out-loud moments as it might be. Some of the better jokes are in the sketches: look out for the spoof Hitler speeches ("And you can't even hit your kids any more!" he rants in German) and Stephen K Amos lifting an otherwise daft joke about Kofi Annan.

Stewart Lee's amusing stand-up show, with accompanying (and, unfortunately, less amusing) sketches, continues tonight with a concerted examination of political correctness. Well, concerted in as much as it gives Lee an excuse to wave a child's ballet shoe over the audience and make jokes about the Finsbury Park branch of Weight Watchers.

Stewart's wonderfully witty weekly barrage against the stupidities of modern life has left us asking one question - why has it taken 10 years for a TV channel to recognise his formidable talent? And, while we're at it, why isn't his former double-act partner, Richard Herring, on the telly screen, either? Regardless, political correctness - or what people assume to be political correctness - is on Stewart's radar tonight. Incoming!

That Stewart Lee, off Stewart Lee's Comedy Vehicle (BBC2), is an angry man. He's an angry man, that Stewart Lee, off Stewart Lee's Comedy Vehicle. On BBC2. And he says thing over and over again, getting angrier and angrier, shouting louder and louder. He says them over again, getting angrier and angrier. Stewart Lee, off Stewart Lee's Comedy Vehicle. On BBC2. He is clever and funny, but everything else and everyone else (especially people who are more successful than him) is stupid and silly. And that makes him very angry. Stewart Lee, off Stewart Lee's Comedy Vehicle. On BBC2.

Episode 2 Review

It's abundantly clear why so many fellow comedians adore Stewart Lee. Everything about his work is acutely observed and taken to places that outreach your average comedian. Even when you don't necessarily agree with his targets, it's great to follow him down.

Who are we to scoff at other cultures, when there is so much to scoff at in our own? In Stewart Lee's Comedy Vehicle, our host turned his gimlet eye on British television, and had riotous fun with the notion that Del Boy falling through the open bar on Only Fools and Horses is repeatedly voted The Funniest Moment Ever on Television, and will be shown again and again "until the rocks melt and the sea burns".

Stewart Lee takes a discursive romp through television, taking swipes at everything from BBC1's The One Show and its host Adrian Chiles ("like being trapped in the buffet car of a slow-moving express train with a Toby jug") to TV audiences ("What do you want?"). The latter is an extended rant against anyone who's ever taken part in a "top TV funny moment" poll and cast their vote for "Del Boy falling through the bar". Lee obviously isn't a fan and he's quietly furious. He goes on too long, but you can see his point. But Lee is at his best when he's firing pellets of wit at everything from BBC founder Lord Reith's supposed "jazz racism" to Andrew Lloyd Webber's Any Dream Will Do.