Well it's certainly never dull. Don't these people ever pause to catch their breath? This satirical spoof of superhero films in particular and Hollywood in general moves at a fast and furious pace from the get-go with Assistant Director Daniel (Himesh Patel) striding around the set barking out orders*, telling white lies and generally doing his utmost to keep the movie show on the road. It's certainly an impressive performance.

Elsewhere Lolly Adefope plays the assistant's assistant Dag. She is the one that keeps her powder dry and – is she doing a Greg-from-Succession? (this is cthe reation of Armando Iannucci and Jon Brown, who wrote on all four seasons of Succession) – might just end up running the studio when everybody else gets sacked. Then we've got script supervisor Steph (Jessica Hynes) as another member of the production team doing her best to avoid the firing lines and not be too flustered. 

And then there are the actors. Justin Edwards as a nervous fish-man, getting into a panic about his mask. And at the top of the food chain, Richard E Grant as bitchy veteran thesp Peter doing a kind of Withnail-if-he'd-made it turn as a diva with attitude who ends up getting his eyes scorched for his troubles (admittedly it's pretty redolent of some of the roles his surnamesake Hugh has played recently). The real-life director Sam Mendes is the director of the first episode and executive producer alongside Iannucci and Brown and he has done everything from Bond onscreen to The Lehman Trilogy onstage so he knows the business inside out. 

Of course with massive ego and massive insecurity and massive money at stake things are bound to go intergalactically pear-shaped. And it's always fun to watch the wheels fall off and lots of money go down the plughole, particularly when the script is as rapidfire and snappy as this one. It maybe doesn't have the visceral verbal imagination of Iannucci's the Thick of It, but at times it is not far off. I quite liked the hyperbolic insult of “cosmic anus” hurled at one point.

I've only seen the first episode. Can they possibly keep this frantic energy up? I don't know, but you can bet your cosmic anus on it i'm going to stick with it to find out.

The Franchise is on Sky Comedy and Now 

Picture: Sky

*for any film buffs reading this it reminded me of Truffaut in Day For Night.