PEEP SHOW 6.6

[SPOILERS] The finale to this excellent sixth series wasn't the perfect ending I was primed for, but the last five minutes were as close to comedy bliss as one could hope – if slightly undermined by a lack of resolution. It was a shame the first half was a bit dry and implausible by Peep Show standards (a driving instructor who doesn't teach?), but there was still much to enjoy and more ears-full of dialogue to savour...

Here, Jez is contemplating extreme measures as his lover Elena's (Vera Filatova) marriage to Gail (Emily Bruni) approaches, such as drowning his unwitting love-rival when she joins him aboard a rowing boat after a picnic. Meanwhile, Sophie (Olivia Colman) buys Mark (David Mitchell) an intensive course of driving lessons, hoping he'll pass his test and get a license before their baby is born, so he can take her to the hospital when she goes into labour. Unfortunately, Mark's a terrible learner driver (not helped by the apathetic, youthful instructor he's assigned), but he's forced into pretending he's passed to save face in front of Jeff (Neil Fitzmaurice), whose accompaniment of Sophie to ante-natal classes singles him out as a "rival dad". And then Sophie suggests calling their son Tarquin Oliver Nimrod or, even worse, Geoff...

It was an episode where the pay-off was worth the wait, as Sophie went into labour and phoned Mark to drive her to the hospital – a duty he couldn't offload onto anyone else, especially a drunken Jez watching Jaws on a laptop. Their low-speed, irresponsible dash to Sophie coincided with Jez needing to break-up Elena and Gail's wedding day, which he eventually did after replacing Mark in the driver's seat and nearly running over Gail on the road. With Sophie aware that Mark lied about passing his test and seeing the state Jez is in, she was forced to drive herself to the hospital with Jez and Mark sat uselessly on the backseat...

One thing that frustrated me was how there wasn't clearer resolution to any of the storylines this year. Sure, it seems likely that Elena and Gail will split and have left the show by the next series, but nothing's certain. It also feels likely that the series 7 premiere will jump ahead in time and we'll see Sophie with a months-old baby already, as that's usually what Peep Show does. It rarely, if ever, continues immediately from a cliffhanger ending -- which is a shame, really. I was looking forward to seeing Mark being frantic at the hospital during the birth, or for a part of this episode to take place in the maternity ward, but it ended a little too prematurely for me.

Still, while this finale didn't quite fill a half-hour with comedy gold like last week's sensational episode, it was worth watching for Mark's stressed meltdown in the car as he constantly kept stalling the engine. I also loved Super Hans casually revealing he has "twins" (pictures of whom Orange have deleted from his phone), and I have to commend Robert Webb for his performances this year -- while David Mitchell tends to get all the awards (a tad unfairly, as Webb is hardly the "weak link"), Webb certainly proved himself the standout half this series.


23 October 2009
Channel 4, 10pm

written by: Sam Bain & Jesse Armstrong directed by: Becky Martin starring: David Mitchell (Mark), Robert Webb (Jez), Eliza Bennett (Sarah), Emily Bruni (Gail), Olivia Colman (Sophie), Vera Filatova (Elena), Neil Fitzmaurice (Jeff), Jim Howick (Gerard), Matt King (Super Hans), Will Beer (Ross) & Mark Kempner (Driving Examiner)