Coming Of Age
BBC3
Aerial Telly wrote a weekly comic strip when he was five years old. It was called Jimmy to a Rescue and it featured the titular Jimmy (a stick figure character based loosely on the young Aerial Telly) swinging in on a rope to save the pretty girl in his class from the local fat boy. The punchline in each episode involved the rope snapping and Jimmy falling on top of pretty girl and fat boy and killing them both. It showed precocity, daring and a total lack of artistic ability. It was advanced for a five-year-old child. But at no point did Aerial Telly expect the BBC to commission it. He would have had no such worries if BBC3 were around. Because as bad as you expect Coming Of Age (19-year-old Paul Dawson‘s sitcom) to be it’s about a hundred times worse. These fucks will commission literally anything from the young.
"Aerial Telly wrote a weekly comic strip when he was five years old. It was called Jimmy to a Rescue. But at no point did Aerial Telly expect the BBC to commission it. He would have had no such worries if BBC3 were around."
If you can imagine a downmarket Two Pints of Lager and a Packet of Crisps then you’re somewhere in the region of Coming Of Age. I know what you’re thinking: Two Pints of Lager is a downmarket Two Pints of Lager. You are so, so wrong. Now, I could go easy on this given that the writer is 19 years old and therefore a small child but seriously: fuck you, BBC3. What the fuck were you thinking?
"Now, I could go easy on this given that the writer is 19 years old and therefore a small child but seriously: fuck you, BBC3. What the fuck were you thinking?"
Okay, the students: Ollie (Ceri Phillips) is fucking Jas (Hannah Job) a sexually attractive mixed-race piece of pie. DK (Joe Tracini) is a featureless dumping ground for one-liners culled from the joke of the week texts on the cast’s mobile phones. He keeps coming in his pants! Literally COMING of age! OMG! Darren plays suitor to a fat girl. She is a complete minger! ROFL!
Elsewhere, Matt (Tony Bignell) is best friends with Chloe (Anabel Barnston) and I imagine there’s a will-they-won’t-they just waiting to happen.There’s a teenophile teacher called Mr DICKson. We know he’s a teenophile because he says so in every sentence.
"I don’t care what young people think about anything. Never have, never will. Nobody ever should yet television continues to give them a disproportionate and ludicrous amount of attention."
I could quote lines, situations, sundry stupidities – I honestly don’t have the energy. Go watch it if you like – you paid for it, after all. As I said before, I don’t care what young people think about anything. Never have, never will. Nobody ever should yet television continues to give them a disproportionate and ludicrous amount of attention. This premieres in the same week that they dropped Pulling, one of the best British comedies of recent times. I repeat: fuck you, BBC3. Fuck you in the motherfucking ear.
The best thing about it: An attractive mixed-race piece of pie.
The worst thing about it: I’ll go with DK.
The verdict on Coming Of Age : BBC3 deserve to be fucked in holes they don’t even have yet..
Marks out of 10: 1
Imagined: 3rd October 2008