PurpleProseOfCairo

Gatiss really stepping out of his comfort zone here, portraying a gay, waspish and brilliant bookseller cum detective. I was resistant at first, seeing it as Gatiss's attempt to claim the role Cumberbatch got to before him, but I really warmed to it and I'm glad to see a second series has been greenlit.

The supporting cast are very stage school gorblimey, and there are one or two really bum notes like the diminutive Turkish girl who has, to put it kindly, an unusual acting style. Book's beard, cough, wife is a charming and attractive presence and their relationship is well drawn. The cases are unnecessarily convoluted, but who cares. This is slippers, tea and biscuits TV, and God bless it for that.

A much improved episode, though the bar was quite low. This week's offering was a well designed, well timed farce with some very funny situations. The standard of acting from the supporting cast was as poor as ever, however. Some of the people in this series make Bobby Ball look like Sir Laurence Olivier.

The premise is extremely ropey - was a solo night in a modest hotel five minutes from home really the best use of all those vouchers Lee had painstakingly assembled? But having suspended disbelief (an absolute must for this series) one can enjoy the convoluted fixes he gets himself into. It took me a few days to watch this episode as I had lost enthusiasm for the show, but perhaps all is not lost.

Sad to say, this series has gone totally down the pan. It was never innovative or earthshattering, but as many have said, a throwback to a more traditional style of sitcom - however, the privilege is being well and truly abused now. Good old-fashioned corniness has been replaced by rank amateurishness and lazy writing. This episode was embarrassingly bad and unfunny. Outside of the two regulars and Matthew Kelly, everyone else acted as though it was their first read-through of the script. The standard of acting was absolutely shameful for something on prime-time BBC. As someone else has said, Mack does a blatant rip of Eric Morecambe wandering around in the background with his carrier bag - it's just embarrassing. I was very glad when this got a reprieve from cancellation early on in its run, years ago. Now I think it has far outstayed its welcome and needs to be put out of our misery.