Reece Shearsmith

After That Mitchell and Webb Look came the premiere of Psychoville. This is by Steve Pemberton and Reece Shearsmith, two of the men who made The League of Gentlemen, a gruesome comedy-horror series about dangerous freaks from a remote village. Psychoville is a slight departure: it's a gruesome comedy-horror series about dangerous freaks from all over the country.

Among them are a midwife (Dawn French) who looks after a doll as if it were a real baby, a one-handed clown (Shearsmith) who bullies children, and a man (Pemberton) whose obsession with historical murders is exceeded in creepiness only by his uncommonly close relationship with his mother.

In its less queasy moments this first episode was fairly funny. Although casting directors prefer to give us Dawn French as a cuddlesome yokel, she's so much better as a seething nutcase - remember Murder Most Horrid. Print probably won't do justice to the menace she gave the final line in this exchange:

Midwife: "This bit at the top of the baby's head is called the soft spot."

Woman: "You mean the fontanelle."

Midwife: "What's that, Miriam?"

Woman: "My name's Kate."

Midwife: "Oh I'm sorry, I thought you were DOCTOR MIRIAM STOPPARD."

Psychoville isn't some chortling spoof of the horror genre; it genuinely is eerie. Then again, perhaps "horror" is the wrong word. The worry is not that you're about to see something scary, but that you're about to see something revolting. Inventively revolting. You want to turn over before something hideous happens, but you want to keep watching to find out what it is - and at least you rest safe in the knowledge that Krod Mandoon is already behind you in the night's schedule.

As openings go, Psychoville's was near perfect. A quill scratched over paper, a guttering candle flickered in the darkness. Then suddenly all was light. The candle was on a post office counter. A figure shrouded in black swept out, and a stout lady in the queue pursed her lips. "'E's left his candle," she said to another lady.

The slick genius of Reece Shearsmith and Steve Pemberton's new comedy was that it didn't feel like the first episode of anything: indeed its gallery of grotesques seemed immediately very familiar. Were they benefiting from our foreknowledge of their previous opus, The League of Gentlemen? Here too are a monstrous set of characters, ghouls made flesh and plonked in the everyday, and they are all linked (as yet we don't know how) by a letter each receives which reads menacingly that the sender knows what he or she did.

Dawn French as the deranged ante-natal nurse who treats her doll baby as if it was real was particularly compelling. The scary children's entertainer, Mr Jelly, comes with a hook hand and is terrifying. He's not, he says emphatically, Mr Jolly and scares a group of children into screaming fear. When the parents nervously inquire if he really is a children's entertainer, he growls, "No, I'm Harold Shipman." In a production of Snow White, a dwarf actor falls for the leading lady and receives the benevolent counsel of the leading man, without realising that they spend their downtime laughing at him in the porn video he once made. But he has a rather violent capacity for telekinesis...

In a gloomy mansion, a shadowy figure called Mr Lomax intrigues "Tealeaf", the young man sent round to help him. The strangest relationship is between a mother and son, incestuously attracted to each other (she scrapes his back and tucks him in just a second too long), which is quite dark enough without the delicious twist that he seems to be ready to start acting out his obsession with serial killers.

Pemberton and Shearsmith's characters hum with a deranged vitality. The humour is dark, irreverent and vicious - yet warm and affectionate too. The characters are freaks, but we care about them. The mysterious figure in black reminds me of the Phantom Flan Flinger in Tiswas.

Since Royston Vasey closed its doors to business in 2002, the assorted League Of Gentlemen have scarcely set the world on fire. I don't know about you but I expected a bit more from the black-hearted crazy gang than cameos in the likes of Poirot and Benidorm. But at least two of them are back on form for now we have Psychoville (BBC2), a delirious wander back into the Gothic universe of Papa Lazarou et al.

The infected brainchild of Reece Shearsmith and Steve Pemberton, Psychoville features a psychic porn dwarf, a scabrous one-handed children's clown called Mr Jelly, Dawn French doing penance for The Vicar Of Dibley as a demented midwife and much besides, all wrapped up in a cloak of blood-spattered menace that would do Edgar Allan Poe proud. The story thus far is not the point; episode one was all about soaking us in nutjob atmosphere.

As the coterie of oddballs each received a twirly-scripted anonymous note bearing the legend 'I Know What You Did' it was clear it was going to take a while for this plot to thicken, but there were more than enough gruesome diversions going on to galvanise the attention. I was particularly taken by much-too-close-for-comfort mother and son Maureen and David Sowerbutts, especially when she took far too long sorting out his fly. Who hasn't had a moment like that? Oh, that's just me then.

The Sowerbutts also got the best potential catchphrases, essential when students get round to re-enacting scenes. David's 'Sorry, Mum, I did a bad murder' is a definite contender. But better still was the even more disturbing 'Come and give your mummy a kiss'.

I've got Psychoville to entertain me, and it's sure as hell going to do that. The first episode was mesmerising, made up of lots of little stories that (I'm guessing) are soon linked together. There's the jealous dwarf, obsessed with taking Snow White out for a date; the one-handed clown whose act consists primarily of fixing novelty hands to his stump (he was my favourite), and the incestuous, serial-killer-obsessed mother and son. A chirpy bunch. Every time it flitted between them I'd be disappointed because I'd been engrossed, only to find myself just as fascinated by what followed. Except for the incestuous mother and son, that was a bit much, especially when she starts scratching the dry skin from his back. But apart from that, it was great. Creepy, but great. Indeed, the only problem I can foresee is the inevitable smugness it'll inspire in The League of Gentlemen lovers. I failed to cotton on to that one, which apparently - or at least according to the boyfriend - relegates me to some sort of lower order of TV viewer. Psychoville is from the same writers, Reece Shearsmith and Steve Pemberton, and bares more than a few similarities, which meant much of the programme was spent straining to hear over said boyfriend's regular outbursts of ohmygodthat's-justlikeleagueofgentlemen. Not to worry, I'll lock him out next time.

Psychoville episode 1 review

If you loved The League of Gentlemen's dark brand of humour, then the demented stylings of Psychoville might be for you... I wasn't quite sure what to expect from Psychoville, but I wasn't expecting it to be this good. As an introduction to a series, this is one of the strongest, in any genre, I've seen in some time.

Guardian Review

So hurrah then for Steve Pemberton and Reece Shearsmith. Tonight's Psychoville was very funny, very dark and equally mysterious. You might even say vague, but according to Shearsmith this was fully intended. So let's go with it...

Everyone familiar with The League of Gentlemen will know what to expect from Steve Pemberton and Reece Shearsmith's latest offering. It is a characteristic mix of grotesque characters and sick imaginings, amid a bracing absence of anything remotely resembling good taste. That's not a criticism, mind. Although billed as a comedy-thriller, the comedy is as bitter as chocolate made from 100 per cent cocoa solids. But in the absence of laughter, there is a twisted narrative like a coherent nightmare, weaving together the story of an embittered clown, a disturbed midwife, a serial killer, a lovestruck dwarf and a blind collector of soft toys. As with The League of Gentlemen, Pemberton and Shearsmith take on the roles of multiple gargoyles alongside a cast that includes Dawn French and Janet McTeer. Once again they have created a fully imagined world unlike anything else around.

Half of The League Of Gentlemen bring us a new grotesque comedy show that's nothing like The League Of Gentlemen. Apart from, well, the scary clown. And the nurse who likes the fake baby, who could have been a direct lift... if she wasn't played by Dawn French. And the other characters. But otherwise it's totally different.

It's a series, you see - all the characters are loosely linked in that they receive missives from a mysterious letter writer (who has a good gag in the first minute). So that's different. Apart from all those characters in the last one being loosely linked by living in the same town. Ach, who are we kidding? It's The League Of Gentlemen. And that's a good thing.

Message from Reece Shearsmith

Reece Shearsmith talks about the first broadcast of Psychoville.

Psychoville BBC2, 10pm

It's weird, and it's not going to be to everyone's taste, but it packs enough mystery and clever writing into this first half hour to make you curious to see more.