TV review: The Curse, C4

If you are watching TV late on a Sunday night bracing yourself for another week at the working grindstone you probably won't want anything too intellectully demanding. In which case The Curse perfectly fits the bill, putting a brisk, fresh twist on the old heist genre.

The Curse, Channel 4, review

A slick Guy Ritchie-esque heist.

The Curse review: Channel 4 comedy caper is an absolute riot

The creative forces behind Murder In Succesville and People Just Do Nothing combine for this excellent Channel 4 series.

Interview: Jessie Cave & Emer Kenny on friendship

True friendship is 'being able to cry in front of them for no reason. Or emoticons.'

Emer Kenny interview

I caught up with Emer Kenny, who plays Danielle, to see what was in store for Danielle third time around.

The Typhleotris is a freshwater fish that lives in Madagascar's limestone caves, a habitat of such consummate darkness that nature has not bothered to provide it with eyes. But even the Typhleotris, with a bag over its head, sealed inside a box, would have been able to see the jokes coming in Badults.

Not all the jokes, it has to be said. BBC3's new sketch show/sitcom hybrid served up several that were genuinely inspired and laugh-out-loud funny, suggesting the fault lay in lacklustre quality control rather than any shortfall in comic creativity.

But the wheat was bulked out by an awful lot of chaff, not to mention corn, which is very surprising for an inaugural episode out to impress.

Written and performed by Ben Clark, Matthew Crosby and Tom Parry - hitherto best known as award-winning fringe troupe Pappy's - Badults places immature adults into a flatshare environment, inevitably inviting - and suffering - comparison with a host of other comedies, notably The Young Ones, The Big Bang Theory, New Girl and even the works of the Three Stooges.

It has manic energy to spare, an engaging cast, cheerfully throwaway plotlines and an instinctive understanding of how to extract the most from its predominantly studio-bound setting.

The surreal inserts - Darwin comes alive off a £10 note to comment on the action - look a bit tired, and the central characters need far clearer delineation, but Badults shows a lot of promise.

However, poor Emer Kenny will need an awful lot more to work with if she is going to make any impression as fourth flatmate Rachel, sidelined almost as soon as she appeared and looking every bit the arbitrary, add-on female.

Bucking the usual BBC3 trend for hand-to-mouth budgets and scruffy single sets, this has a massive cast, gorgeous houses you'll want to nick decorating tips off and its low-level smut is cushioned by some genuinely LOL-worthy moments.

Setting its stall midway between the cringe comedy of The Inbetweeners and too-cool-for-school Skins, it stars two ex-EastEnders: Scarlett Alice Johnson, who you definitely won't recognise as Vicki Fowler, and Emer Kenny (minus Zsa Zsa's blue hair extensions and stroppiness) who you probably will, as well as newcomer Yasmin Paige.

On the boys' team are Dylan Edwards and Sean Michael Verey.

I could tell you which pair of teens end up expecting a baby by the end of this episode, but that would spoil the surprise.

A second series has already been commissioned. Quite right, too.