'Barley' whine

Oh dear. After Friday's enthusiastic comments on 'Nathan Barley', the second episode turned out to be a real disappointment after the very promising signs of the first.

Though there was plenty of camera trickery this time around (all no doubt justifiable for the party scene), the plot was paper-thin to say the very least. Worse still, it just wasn't very funny, and the satire seemed rather dull and blunt.

Morris has a habit of confounding expectations, but not in this way. Hopefully that episode was a temporary aberration.

(Incidentally, on Friday I mentioned the similarities to 'The Office' and wondered whether Stephen Merchant and Ricky Gervais had seen it. Well, as it turns out, Merchant is one of the show's script editors (I think), along with Peter Baynham.)