Charles on… anything that comes along

Only one word for Armando Iannucci’s new series, about a hapless minister (played by Chris Langham) being bullied by the government spinmeister (Peter Capaldi, brilliant as a Scottish version of Alastair Campbell).

It’s on BBC4 for the moment, so you’ll have to break out the Freeview box (or your Sky box). What everyone’s been saying is true - it is a Yes Minister for the 21st century, showing how the real power lies with the people who give the stories enough rotational momentum to generate their own gravity. It’s not that they actually do anything useful; the fact that they’re always there and are always talking to people and have spoken to more people than you have means that the nothing that they do is still more important than the something you might have done.

Peter Capaldi is fantastic as the AC person - “I had a lump in my throat as I was writing that resignation letter for you!” he snarls at the minister who he is forcing out (”he’s useless, absolutely useless” he is telling - we assume - the PM as the minister arrives for his last day in work, to be bundled out minutes later). He’s got that scary wild-eyed determined teeth-set testosterone aggression that makes you wonder how he can keep going.

And Chris Langham too is wonderful as the hapless minister promoted to or slightly beyond his level of incompetence, which is considerable; his attempts in the first episode first to get a story about an initiative called “Scrounge Busters” - or something - onto Radio 4’s 1 O’Clock news (”don’t ask the Treasury! They’ll squash it!”) and then to get it off when the AC kills it and then to get it revived when the AC reverse ferrets (as it’s known in the newspaper trade; scroll down to the mention of Kelvin Mackenzie in the link to find it).

Bonus links: BBC press kit for the programme; official BBC site, with preview clips.

These posts might be related (the database thinks..):
• The Thick Of It: back, and still brilliant (25 October 2005; score: 70.67%)
• Either oar (24 August 2004; score: 26.1%)
• Why not explain the $700B bailout with a comic - you know, like Google? (25 September 2008; score: 24.25%)