Shane

I don't usually have the strength to complain about ITV1's output. I figure it is a commercial station with a large, loyal mainstream audience and that mine would be a solitary dissenting voice among the legions of Coronation Street and Robson Green aficionados. As long as my license fee does not contribute to the pap it habitually produces, I am happy to simply steer well clear. However, occasionally a programme enters my radar that is so bad, I feel obliged to speak out. Shane is one such programme. I consider myself an apathetic slob when it comes to spleen-venting – usually a shake of the head and some mild tutting is all I can muster when something gets my goat. If I'm really cross, I might be moved to change the channel. But if the BBC had the audacity to commission drivel like this, I would have half a mind to right a stiff letter to the Director General demanding my money back.

Despite it not being my cup of tea, I have the utmost admiration for ITV viewers. Anybody with the mental fortitude to regularly sit through Heartbeat and Emmerdale and actually enjoy them deserves credit, but they are being made mugs of here. Funnily enough, I actually quite like Frank Skinner. With the right format and a warm audience he can be genuinely entertaining. Fantasy Football League made him a household name, but before that, he was a successful stand-up in his own right. Good for him, but, memo to ITV executives: That does not mean he can act or write sit-coms. Skinner should have had the sense to look at previous examples of stars who have signed exclusive 'Golden Handcuffs' deals with ITV (Des Lynam and Ross Kemp, for example) – it is professional suicide.

I can just imagine the embarrassing fawning and ego massaging that must go on at ideas meetings: 'Wow, Frank – a sit-com? Great idea – we'll give you carte blanche. A taxi driver, you say? Brilliant! I know, you can even sing the theme song! This is going to be amazing!'

Actually, it isn't amazing. It is quite, quite awful. Skinner's forte has always been his risqué gags but here he is hampered by ITV's cosy family reputation so most of those are out of the question. Instead the smut is masked by hackneyed Carry On style innuendo. Unfortunately, as turns it turns out, the risqué gags are about all Frank has in his locker and in any sit-com, if the comedy is lacking then the situation had better be pretty damn impressive. Here, it is about as criminally unoriginal as it is possible to be: A rude, neglectful husband; a good-hearted wife (quirkily attractive, but still suitably mousy and put-upon); A rebellious teenage daughter; A younger smart-alec son; A local pub with buxom bar-maid. I won't go on – you get the picture. In the one episode I watched, the only discernible purpose of the other characters was to act as stooges, spoon-feeding Skinner his punch-lines. Any merit the jokes may have had to begin with is mercilessly siphoned off by the clunking, contrived set up:

Baz (to barmaid): I'll have a Coke, please.

Shane (to barmaid): I'll have a pint of Cider

Baz: 'Ere Shane, your daughter's over there with her new fella

Barmaid: Ice and lemon?

Shane: In Cider??

Baz: No, I think they're just talking

'There must be something better than this,' Skinner laments in his whining, Elvis-Costello-wannabe, West Midlands drawl during the title sequence. My advice to viewers is to take his word for it and switch to Channel 5.

I'm really enjoying this series. Very talented cast, with Skinner well supported by the excellent young actor Tony Bignell, who displays great comic timing.

Kelly Scott looks to have a big career ahead of her as she excellently plays Shane's pretty late-teens daughter Velma, while Schneider, Norris and Berrington assist Skinner with their experience as comic actors.

The jokes are funny, the actors give good performances as likeable characters and the plots are amiable enough. Good, light-hearted entertainment; there is certainly space on the market for good quality sitcoms such as this.

SHANE has to be one of the worst sitcoms of all time. Skinner is about as funny as a hangover on a hot day. Is that how to write a sitcom, just line up a load of schoolboy one-liners and attempt to write them into the dialogue. Who are the executives at ITV who commission such dire rubbish and why are they still employed.

It is bad when we have to suffer such bad attempts at comedy but ITV always end up with the BBC and Channel 4 "has beens" although in Frank's case a "never was". But good luck to Skinner for front, he certainly has no artistic pride in whatever he seems to be invoved in, he may be a decent bloke but as a comedian and writer he stinks.

The trade descriptions people should prosecute Frank Skinner and the ITV producers for stealing prime time entertainment slots. If Skinner and ITV had got their comedy timing right, SHANE would have gone out at 2am in the morning so as to ensure a bit of sleep for the insomniacs.

You can replace the questions marks in "2004 to ????" with 2004! This one is a total turkey.

A series of lame double-entendres (and the odd abysmal "dream sequence") from start to finish. The people on the canned laughter track are clearly imbeciles (or relatives of "Fun Time" Frankie.)

Here's an example of Skinner's dialogue:

Shane and his mate (played by David Schneider) are discussing a girl who has propositioned Shane:-

Shane: "I didn't say much at all"

Shane's mate: "Poker face"

Shane: "I might do"

Pitiful, just pitiful. If you laughed at this you're probably dead.

0 out of 10.

P.S. Why can't we give ratings to TV series anyway?!

If you are a Frank Skinner fan like myself then you're gonna love this! He wrote & starred in all seven episodes and made the show his own with spot on comic timing, plenty of sarcasm around the subject of sex & a really catchy theme tune to boot which he too wrote and sung. I found out recently that Frank Skinner has just completed series 2 of Shane back in April and waiting to grace our screens again! Bring it on I say, it's gonna be a treat! Other titles by Frank Skinner include: Frank Skinner Live, Frank Skinner Live At The Apollo, Frank Skinner Live At The London Palladium, Frank Skinner Live In Birmingham & Skinner & Baddiel Unplanned, all certified 18. My advice to newcomers who don't know what Frank's about, watch Shane & the stand ups & I guarantee you won't look back!