Omid's Out, Reggie Returns

British-Iranian comedian Omid Djalili's standup show has been axed by the BBC, after two series. When it debuted in 2007 on Saturday nights at 9.30pm, The Omid Djalili Show attracted an average of 3.1m viewers, but when series 2 was scheduled on Monday nights at 10.30pm last year, it unsurprisingly lost a million viewers. I can't say I'm upset, because I just don't think Omid Djalili is that funny.

Or, rather, he's not that funny once you've seen his act once. He's one of those comedians that appear to have been peddling the same jokes for 10 years, see. So much of his show involved material I'd seen him perform earlier this decade. And, personally, I always grow weary of comedians who only seem to tackle niche topics -- and for Djalili that was racial issues, which has been a very popular subject matter post-9/11. Being of Middle Eastern descent, Djalili could comment on topics like suicide bombers and the War On Terrorism with a fairly unique perspective, and I'm sure the BBC thought he ticked quite a few diversity boxes, too. I understand that, but.. it does get tiresome.

In other news, the BBC have announced that a second series of Reggie Perrin is in the works. The sitcom, a remake of the classic '70s series that starred Leonard Rossiter, in the title role now taken by Martin Clunes, came in for harsh criticism last year. It certainly wasn't the greatest sitcom ever devised, but I thought it was reasonably engaging, if very old-fashioned. It had a certain charm, mainly because of Clunes. Maybe series 2 will have more spark to it, now that we've arrived at the point where Reggie has had his mental breakdown and walked naked into the ocean to, apparently, commit suicide. Oh yes, fun and larks for a primetime BBC family sitcom!