The Thick Of It

The Thick of It, Series four, BBC Two

New series of Armando Iannucci's political satire sets its sights on the coalition.

It was brave of creator Armando Iannucci to start a new season of The Thick of It (Saturday, BBC Two) without his expletive-spewing spin-doctor Malcolm Tucker (Peter Capaldi). It was the equivalent of hoping that no one would notice if an episode of Fawlty Towers featured only Manuel, Sybil and Polly. But fear not, Tucker/Basil will appear in the second episode, as was made clear when the producers lost their nerve and included a "next week" trailer featuring him.

In this new series, the Tories, though never named as such, were the senior partners in a Coalition - and I don't know whether it was deliberate, but the Lib Dem characters were instantly forgettable.

Given that a neologism from The Thick of It was used by Ed Miliband to describe George Osborne's budget - "omnishambles" - Iannucci must feel that modern political life is copying his satirical art a little too assiduously. It might explain why his usual brio seemed to be lacking in the opening scenes.

Where were the effortless similes and casual insults? It even seemed to borrow a scene from the film Anchorman in which its dim news presenter tries to join in a conversation about love, but can't think of any examples so randomly names things he can see. I love carpet. I love lamp.

These proved to be teething troubles and it got into his stride when Roger Allam as Peter Mannion MP struggled through an excruciating and pitch perfect press launch for "Silicon Playgrounds", the Coalition's digital youth policy. After that the confidence seemed to return. My favourite line came when No 10's loquacious spin-doctor said: "What was that word I used this morning?" Mannion replied: "You used a lot of words this morning. It was like a ----ing Will Self lecture."

We have proof that The Thick of It doesn't, always, need Malcolm Tucker. He's not back until next week, in mournful bored opposition.

Meanwhile, the coalition is being eviscerated on screen as cruelly as in real life. Tory Roger Allam's stuttering, excruciating few minutes before a crowd of tech-wise schoolchildren - he's a happy Luddite but to others a "digitard", a word which will become as useful as "omnishambles" - is equal to any other three minutes of comedy this year.

And a fellow Tory lambasts Lib-Dem colleagues thus: "You're basically a couple of homeless guys we've invited to the Christmas lunch... don't whinge when we don't let you carve the turkey." Somehow, this week in particular, this resonates. Too many good lines to fit in even an entire piece; too much happy brilliance.

Why The Thick of It is safe comedy

The series may have provided some memorable lines, but it's done little more than pander to our prejudices about politicians.

The Thick Of It makes a welcome, belated return for what looks to be its final series. The Coalition are now in power and Peter Mannion, introduced in Opposition as an old-school wet Tory with a distaste for modern politics, is now in office, alongside a thrusting young Lib Dem. The civil servants are the same (as, confusingly, is advisor Glenn, who seems to have conveniently switched parties between series). And the fearsome Malcolm Tucker: well, he's out, leaving an anger - and swearing - vacuum.

Tucker and the hapless Nicola Murray reappear in the second episode, but even there he's a muted version of himself and the show seems softer, less scabrous without his manic presence. Which is probably completely deliberate: creator Armando Iannucci seems to have rethought the show's satirical emphasis as well as the new political framework. The politicians on both sides seem almost vulnerable, but so do their advisors, none of them really having any clue about what they're doing anymore.

It's still very, very funny and the cast are all perfectly pitched. Roger Allam, as Mannion, has such delicious comic timing that a simple line about a Twix made me rewind three times just to savour it again. One could quibble with the sheer amount of vituperative nicknames that the characters hurl around at each other - you have the impression that they must all be sitting up at night drafting new ones for the next day - but at least they make sense, unlike their policies.

TV review: The Thick Of It

There's no escaping it: this opening episode to the fourth (and probably final) series of The Thick of It, one of the smartest, funniest British TV shows ever made, is - whisper it - disappointing.

All is right with the world, The Thick of It is back to wade through the mulch of coalition politics. The new Secretary of State at the Department of Social Affairs and Citizenship is Peter Mannion, looking as ever as if he hasn't actually got dressed, his clothes have fallen on him from the sky.

Mannion was an inept opposition politician and now his chronic lack of connectedness leads him straight into an appalling gaffe at a school when he tries to launch an apps initiative to a group of switched-on teenagers.

Roger Allam is laconically brilliant as Mannion as he lurches from one crisis to the next; if he isn't debasing himself on the phone to his furious, neglected wife he is grappling with his paisley-shirted spin doctor and his hated junior minister. Every line is quotable in what is 30 ruthlessly clever minutes of comedy treasure.

Armando Iannucci interview

"The mistake is to think that because America has this tremendous influence internationally, therefore all Americans are brilliant."

The first episode of the new series features one shocking absence - Malcolm Tucker languishes in opposition and is nowhere to be seen as yet - and of hints that the compromises of coalition are an open goal to for satirists. A botched schools policy dominates the opening episode. It's the brainchild of the Coalition's junior partners but - at the behest of fearsomely irritating spin doctor Stewart Pearson (Vincent Franklin) - it's launched by Roger Allam's crusty traditionalist Peter Mannion, who palpably neither knows nor cares about the initiative. Before long, Mannion's taken his daily 'gaffe dump' and is branded a 'fibre-optic Fagin' - could the government really be proposing the idea of getting kids to design apps to pay for their higher education? As you may have gathered, many of the names remain the same, they're just on different sides of the government/opposition equation. But some things never change. Still bumbling along in the background - hilarious, admirable, pitiful - are civil servants Glenn Cullen (James Smith) and Terri Coverley (Joanna Scanlan). Terri wants out but she's 'too expensive to get rid of.' Glenn is sadder still - when his new colleagues aren't ignoring him completely, they're comparing him to 'a week-old party balloon.' Yet does Glen hold the key to the show's essence? Glenn loses every battle he fights...

The Thick of It: lines of the week - episode one

The Thick of It returns - and every week we'll be picking the lines that made us guffaw most. Add your favourites and unleash your opinions on the coalition partners.