Cuckoo Complete Series 1   Starring: Andy Samberg, Greg Davies, Helen Baxendale, Tamla Kari and Tyger Drew-Honey Distributor: FremantleMedia International RRP: £19.99 Certificate: 15 Release Date: 01 September 2014

Ken and Lorna Thompson's daughter Rachel has returned from her gap year with a new husband, Cuckoo - self-appointed spiritual ninja. He is every parent's worst nightmare - a slacker full of outlandish, New Age ideas. Ken and Lorna have no choice but to welcome him into their family home - and if every Englishman's home is his castle, then this hippie has stormed Ken's fortress and plundered everything, most unforgivably, his princess...

I have mixed feelings about the first series of Cuckoo. My biggest problem is that this feels like it should only really be a short gag in a sketch show: middle-class families daughter returns from a gap year abroad and brings her new new age husband back with her. His hippy way of thinking don't fit well with the girl's father as he witnesses said-hippy spouting nonsense and not paying his way in life.

It also sounds like a sit-com idea from the '70s. And when you add to this the fact that none of the female characters are especially well written, you're left wondering whether the show's creators revisited an old, abandoned comedy show that was never picked up.

The writing is averagely funny, but it's really Rick Mayall lookie-likie Greg Davies (Ken) that elevates the show up several levels. Adam Samberg plays an incredibly annoying Cuckoo (a part I can imagine being played by Paul Kaye if the show had been written a 20 years ago - when the subject matter may have been a little more fresh). Special mention also has to go to the comedy talents of Kenneth Collard (playing neighbour Steve) whose scenes in the last two episodes are hilarious.

In fact, its the last two episodes that save this show from being a bit naff. Without spoiling too much, Ken is really the voice of the audience, so his opinion of Cuckoo pretty much mirrors what the viewer feels. So the end of the first series, where Ken has to make a pretty important decision, should have the audience rooting for Ken.

I was surprised that such a terrible continuity error had slipped though (no doubt due to last minute editing of sequences). But someone should really have spotted that Connie had indeed being playing the bongos in a scene before we witness her hitting them for the very first time.

While I warmed to both the characters and the series as a whole, after I'd watched the entire series, I wonder how many people will give up after just a couple of episodes. It feels like a show out of place; out of time. Even though I did, on balance, enjoy this series, I have to admit that I was surprised that a second series had been commissioned.

There are no extras on the disc.

7

Darren Rea