That Mitchell And Webb Look

Mitchell and Webb: third time unlucky

In the field of artistic endeavour, you can always tell when someone or something is on the wane when works become retrospective, parodic and self-referential.

David Mitchell and Robert Webb are probably more famous for the work that they do apart than for their shows as a comedy duo, now that Mitchell is the brilliantly witty guest of choice for edgily satirical panel shows, and Webb became a YouTube darling with his winning turn on Let's Dance for Comic Relief. They are terrific in Peep Show, but That Mitchell and Webb Look just doesn't hit the mark, probably because it's not very funny. Don't get me wrong, there are a few mild chortles - I liked Webb's filthy Queen Victoria at a tree planting - but there's nothing here that will have anyone gasping for oxygen as they fall, laughing helplessly, from the sofa.

The third series of That Mitchell and Webb Look promises to be the funniest and most accomplished to date. Many of the sketches rely on television for their inspiration, a medium with which they are obviously familiar. Alongside a send-up of Poirot and an incredibly silly version of Spooks, there is a long-overdue sketch in which two television executives mull over the idea for The Apprentice. "We deliberately pick 16 idiots - real idiots, arseholes as well," one says to the other, "and then we watch them screw everything up. It's idiots behaving idiotically for an audience of idiots - and for people who think they are watching ironically." There is also a very rude and funny sketch about Queen Victoria's reaction to the smell of the linden tree, in which she undermines the values of the era she helped to create. This is a rare sketch show - one with more hits than misses.

If Krod Mandoon had been written by the same small army of writers who came up with this, it'd be really on to a winner. Much has been said about the death of the sketch show, but this first episode of the boys' third series made me laugh out loud so many times I was unable to make proper notes. Their deconstruction of The Apprentice is absolutely spot on. And after Robert Webb wowed us with his Flashdance for Comic Relief, it's extraordinary to discover how perfectly suited he is to the role of Queen Victoria. A stand-out sketch involving the gift of a tree is pure, rude genius and allows David Mitchell as her Prime Minister (I'm guessing from the beard it's the Marquess of Salisbury) to go off on a rant that plays brilliantly to his pompous strengths. It could almost be Peep Show in Victorian dress. Now there's an idea...

Other than prancing around to Flashdance or firing out droll gags on panel shows, these two have a particular genius for spoofing the nuances of gameshows. With Numberwang, they captured the sensation of tuning in to a daytime quiz halfway through and not knowing the show's baffling rules, and the third series of their BAFTA-winning comedy features an all too plausible scenario - the first post-apocalypse game show, where fuel is a top prize...

Mitchell and Webb Interview

As That Mitchell and Webb Look returns for a third series, its two stars tell The Telegraph that today's comedies are as good as anything from the Seventies, whatever John Cleese says.

A third series for David Mitchell and Robert Webb's sketch show, and the standard is less patchy than before; highlights include the police officer explaining to a community support officer the difference between police and community support brutality.

David Mitchell Interview

'I should probably be thinking seriously now about not living in a grotty flat on my own'

Sketch shows can be hit-and-miss but this often wildly funny TV version of David Mitchell and Robert Webb's Radio 4 series That Mitchell and Webb Sound scored more than most when it first aired on BBC2 in 2006. Long before Webb became an unlikely sex symbol with his Lycra-clad Flashdance turn on Let's Dance For Comic Relief, the sight of him dressed as a banana and doing a silly dance while eating a banana was similarly, stupidly funny. Also introduced here are the self-doubting Nazis, a cruel vicar and two vapid, camp bores.

BBC2 orders more Mitchell and Webb

The Peep Show duo will begin work on the BBC2 series early next year. Series three of That Mitchell and Webb Look is due to air in June and the fourth series is expected to be broadcast at about the same time next year.