Maybe there was a fanfare somewhere but I managed to miss it. Episodes returned for its fifth and final series this week, slipping out on BBC2 at exactly the same time that the more heavily promoted Lee & Dean started in Channel 4.
It will be a shame if people don't watch Episodes. I think it has slightly fallen between the cracks. It's not a knowing, fashionable mock-doc like Lee & Dean or This Country. But nor is it broad split-your-sides mainstream fare like Mrs Brown's Boys and Not Going Out.
And funnily the state of modern comedy is one of the topics touched on in the first episode in the new series. Beverly (Tamsin Greig) and Sean (Stephen Mangan) are now working on their show with Sean's obnoxious ex-writing partner Tim (Bruce Mackinnon) who claims that comedies don't have to be funny any more. Finish after a running time of 30 minutes and you've got a comedy, he argues, between working his writing team like latterday slaves day and night.
Elsewhere Matt LeBlanc – "TV's Joey" – does a pretty good job of sending himself up. He is making a mint but rapidly dying behind the eyes as the host of smash hit reality TV show The Box. If only he could land another big acting role. There's a nice cameo from stand-up Gilbert Gottfried doing one of his trademark screechy rants and also an unusual sex scene between LeBlanc and one of the reality contestants.
I do wonder however if Episodes, by Americans David Crane and Jeffrey Klarik, is a bit too much of a TV industry in-joke. This may be why it has never quite been taken to heart by a big audience. But the dialogue is clever-smart (good gag about woman in writer's room being ignored) and snappy even if it sometimes feels as if a lot of it consists of executives saying "go fuck yourself" and slamming metaphorical doors. It portrays the showbiz world as pretty horrible and backstabbing, where grudges are held and revenge is dished out in the most brutal way possible. It also happens to be quite funny. Not that comedies have to be very funny these days...
Episodes, Fridays, 10pm, BBC2.
Picture: BBC/Hat Trick Productions/Sophie Mutevelian
