Charlie Brooker

If you watch BBC Four (hey, I can hope the readers of this stuff are intellectual, refined and have nothing to do of an evening) you'll have seen Mr Charlie Brooker pop up in the idents. Over and over again. Every. Single. Time.

It seems the Beeb, after several series of Screenwipe sneaking out, have decided it's A Right Good Thing and are pushing it like ITV2 are hyping that prozzie thing with ickle Billie Piper innit. Note to self: Charlie Brooker is BBC Four's Billie Piper... discuss.

Anyhow, I enjoy Mr Brooker's feverish rantings in the press and on the telly, and always enjoy a tv show about tv. I've even been known to tune into Wogan's Points Of View on purpose. Sad eh?

This time... well, much as I chortled, I felt a bit, er, bad and that. His comparison of the credits of shows being like the pause you have after finishing a book was funny (especially the clown popping up with a "READ THIS!" sign, brandishing Harry Potter) but not particularly valid. A book takes more than half an hour to read... and does anyone need a nice pause to contemplate what they've just seen when it's Look, I'm Out Of Doctor Who And Am A Hooer As Well! on ITV2 or Bloody Hell, Anthea, Look At The Fleas In My Pants! on BBC Three?

And then he did a thing about marketing where he assaulted some twit who'd said a line of marketing spiel. Hmmm. And then he screamed and shouted and swore a lot - something there's not enough of on tv, unless it's in my house where the shouting usually comes from me - but something there was too much of in this show.

I loved the ripping apart of Street Doctors, that was very funny ("Doctor, it's my anus, go on, look at my anus in the street") as was the far-too-true bit about how tv careers work, but apart from Richard Herring's surreal take on Big Cook, Little Cook (so easy to mistype a word in that title) there was no, er, affection for anything. Charlie can do affection - read his pieces on video games or that really brilliant US cop drama that no-one watches, the one who's name escapes me but everyone is crooked and on crack and that.

Focusing on your strengths is one thing, and boy can Charlie rant in a funny, apt and bile-driven way, but relentless shouting and bleeping of swearwords just gets repetitive after a while. The same way as the utter blandish niceness of Lorraine Kelly makes you want to wipe poo on her frock after half an hour. Or is that just me?

My totally pointess advice to far-more-successful-at-writing-about-telly-than-me Mr Brooker would be light and shade, love. I'd laugh a lot more at those ridiculous ads you take the piss out of so brilliantly if you showed something you liked as well, no matter what it is.

Still, I'll watch every week - well, BBC Four bills each episode as new so my Tivo records it twice a day, so I can't miss it. It's a news special next week. I hope they've got all the theme tunes on from over the years. *PUTS ANORAK ON*