Beehive

Thanks to one night, not switching over after my regular watching of the 'Inbetweeners' on the same channel E4, I thought I'd give this sketch show with an all girl cast a try-out, hopes were not high. I also see that ratings are low from other users.

To be fair I'd agree the show was hit and miss, but I was surprised that when it 'hits' the show can actually provide you with some real laugh out loud moments, and when push comes to shove, if a comedy show makes you laugh, then it's doing a good job.

The jokes can be puerile and obvious, but often it's visually spot on, for example the '4 Russell Brands' or the 'Rural Madonnas' Good for one episode, though maybe not series after series. And I did appreciate the savage parody of 'Sex in the City' somehow all the better for coming from four woman.

Overall a enough laughs to make it worth catching, though it helps if like me you can appreciate a bit of immaturity in your comedy, and after all, and you're likely already on E4 to catch Inbetweeners.

Beehive is the latest in a plethora of 'girl group' comedy shows, coming after Smack the Pony and Tittybangbang, amongst others.

Deliberately outlandish, it veers between silly and puerile and is simply, and the words of Sarah Kendall, "just s*** that makes us laugh".

Some of it will, indeed, make you laugh. Highlights include the extremely rude South African flight attendants, a parody of Sex and the City, the one-upmanship competition called "You've Been Served!" and a quite delightful moment where Kendall believes she's Spiderman.

Trouble is, not all of it works first time. In the tradition of The Fast Show, you need to have seen many of the catchphrases a few times before you start finding them funny, and by then you may have given up. This is a real shame, as there's potential for a lot of growth.

It's saved by terrific performances - the four women can turn their hands to anything, whether it be an accent, a mannerism, a character or a parody of a real person. The production values are high, with the girls' "flat" being the sort of place you'd like to have a look around in reality. Thankfully we get to do this in a reasonable DVD 'making-of' which leads us through the creation of the show and, perhaps sadly, proves it could have been even more puerile.

I like Beehive. Despite the content, it has an oddly benevolent feel which is lacking from its contemporaries. I can understand the low rating, but if you give it a chance you might get more out of it than you expect. A second run could produce a real improvement, but I fear that they'd be pointed even further in the wrong direction by a 'comedy' market based on unpleasantness.